Marketing in a Web 2.0 World:
Top-Down or Bottom-Up Leadership?
A presentation to the Marketing Club
Daniel M. Ladik, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Marketing
January 26th, 2011
@DanoLadik
Leadership?!@#$%^&*!?
• What IS Leadership?
• Can you name a few leaders?
2
A Definition….
• “………….the capacity to establish direction and
to influence and align others toward a common
aim, motivating and committing them to
action, and making them responsible for their
performance.”
3
True or False?
• Leaders are born…………..
4
FALSE!
• Leadership is increasingly recognized as a transferable skill: it can
be taught. The “Great Man” theories of leadership that used to
predominate have been proven false.
– “The Great Man theory of history is usually attributed to the Scottish
philosopher Thomas Carlyle, who wrote that ‘the history of the world is but
the biography of great men.’ He believed that it is the few, the powerful and
the famous who shape our collective destiny as a species. That theory took a
serious beating this year.” Time Magazine 1/1/2007
• Leadership is more than command and control (e.g., killing the
“old general” metaphor)
• New contemporary theories/ideas concerning leadership are
emerging
5
Transactional & Transformational Leadership
• Two vital strands of leadership – transactional and
transformational leadership.
– Transactional leadership is built on reciprocity – the relationship between
the leader and their followers develops from the exchange of some reward
such as performance rating, pay, recognition, and praise (Theory X).
– A transformative leadership style is described as one that motivates
through identification with the leader’s vision, pulling rather than pushing
others on (Theory Y).
• Transformational leadership occurs when one or more persons
engages with others in such a way that leaders and followers raise
one another to higher levels of motivation and morality.
– Greenleaf’s (1997) image of a leader as servant
– Block (1993) stewardship
• The secret of effective leadership appears to lie in combining the
two elements so that targets, results, and procedures are
developed and shared.
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Geeks & Geezers
• As a result of their research for this book, Bennis and Thomas have
developed a theory/model of leadership development
– Real experience under fire
– Critical learning and experiential learning
– Leaders create a shared meaning: A common goal – everyone is one the same
page
• Stripped to its essentials, leadership involves just three things – a
leader, followers, and a common goal.
• They found that every leader in they study, young or old had
undergone at least one intense, transformational experience - - this
experience was at the very heart of becoming a leader.
– Crucible “a place, time or situation characterized by the confluence of
powerful intellectual, social, economic or political forces; a severe test of
patience or belief.
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Goldman “Leadership That Gets Results”
• On the basis of findings from 3781 executive
participants, the research suggests that leaders
gain the best results by using a combination of
six leadership styles, each of which has a
central characteristic feature and uses different
components of emotional intelligence….
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Goldman “Leadership That Gets Results”
Description
Leader’s
Modus
Operandi
Coercive
Pacesetting
Demand
instant
obedience.
Coercive
leaders are
self-motivated,
initiate
change, and
are driven to
succeed
Set high
standards of
performance.
Pacesetting
leaders use
their initiative,
and are selfmotivated and
driven to
succeed
Demands
immediate
compliance
Sets high
standards for
performance
“Do as I do
now.”
The style in “Do what I tell
you.”
a phrase
Authoritative
Democratic
Coaching
Build
relationships.
Affliliative
leaders are
empathetic and
have good
communication
skills
Actively
encourage
team
involvement
in decision
making.
Good at
communicati
on, listening,
and
negotiation
Expand and
develop
people’s
skills. Have
the ability to
listen well,
communicate
effectively,
and motivate
others
Mobilizes
people
toward a
vision
Creates harmony
& builds
emotional bonds
Forges
consensus
through
participation
Develops
people for the
future
“Come with
me.”
“People come
first”
“What do
you think?”
“Try this.”
Energizes
people
toward a
common
goal.
Authoritative
leaders
initiate
change and
are
empathetic
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Affilliative
Leadership summary……
●Servant Leader
●Transformational
●Coach
●Transactional
●General
Theory X
(Coercive
-0.26)
Theory
Y
(-- Pacesetting
-0.25)
(-- Authoritative
(0.54)
Affilliative (0.46) Democratic Coaching (0.42)
(0.43)
(Overall impact on
corporate climate)
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Leadership Nuggets
• Three words leaders have trouble dealing with: “I don’t
know.” I think good leadership will often start with
questions whose answer is: “I don’t know, but we’re going
to find out.” (Warren Bennis)
• None of us is as smart as all of us. (Warren Bennis)
• It will require the creation of what I regard as the “virtuous
teaching cycle,” which implies that “I teach you, but I create
the situation where I learn from you, as well.” Leaders will
need to become better listeners and not just
communicators. (Noel M. Tichy)
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In a Web 2.0 World, why
should marketers care about
leadership?
Yes, everyone needs good leaders, however….
• With a CRM culture, marketers are rising to the
CEO post in ever increasing numbers
– 1970s & 1980s vs. 1990s & 2000s
• Marketers should drive organizational change
– “Marketers have to be the leaders of change. There is
no other department that has a better understanding of
customers and drives that understanding throughout
the organization” Peter Kim, Senior Analyst at Forrester
Research
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A New Era? – The Web 2.0 World
• The days of “we package it and your buy it” are gone…
• The consumer and the firm are intimately involved in
jointly creating value that is unique to the individual
consumer and sustainable to the firm.
• Traditional exchanges are transactional
– One way: Firm to consumer (e.g., B-to-C)
• Modern exchanges are relational (e.g., CRM)
– Multi-way: B-to-C, C-to-B, & C-to-C
• Customers become advocates
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Marketing needs leadership ideas NOW!
• Consumer or Community Generated Marketing – Web 2.0
– Organized around people – based on relationships
– Ebay, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Wikipedia, Linux, Craigslist, LinkedIn,
Flickr, Google, Blogger, Amazon, Netflix, Threadless
– Community and Collaboration
– WWW as a tool for bringing together the small contributions of millions and
making them matter (The Wisdom of Crowds)
– Engaging, interactive, authentic
– “It’s the User-Generated Generation” Brian Williams
• Branding
– Harley Davidson
– Authenticity: actual customer experiences that personally engage the
customer
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The Emerging Concept of a Market
Firm-Customer Interaction
(1) Interaction is the locus of co-creating of value and economic value
(2) Co-Creation Experiences are the basis of value
The Firm:
Collaborator in co-creating
value and competitor in
extracting economic value
The Market:
Co-creation
Experiences of Unique
Value
The Customer:
Collaborator in co-creating
value and competitor in
extracting economic value
Prahalad and Ramaswamy (2004) The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers
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Final thought from Professor Randy Pausch
• Randy was asked, “Because our past is tied so intricately to our future, do you
feel that one’s worth or even legacy includes all the regrets – brick walls
succumbed to – or does it matter at all in the scheme of things in this universe
or this life?”
• Randy responded: “Absolutely, our legacy includes all the brick
walls – the ones we got over and the ones we didn’t, right? I didn’t
get into the NFL and I talked about that in the lecture, as you
know. But again, at Electronic Arts, I learned this wonderful
expression – experience is what we get, when we don’t get what
we wanted – and of course part of our legacy is all the things we
failed at because failure is where most of the learning occurs. So I
like to tell my students, you know if you are failing a lot, you are
probably learning more per time-unit then most of your peers, so
don’t get discouraged.”
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Reading List
• Geeks & Geezers: How Era, Values, and Defining Moments Shape Leaders
– Warren G. Bennis & Robert J. Thomas
• Emotional Intelligence or Primal Leadership or Social Intelligence
– Daniel Goldman
• The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers
– C.K. Prahalad & Venkat Ramaswamy
• The Perfect Store: Inside eBay
– Adam Cohen
• How Brands Become Icons: The Principles of Cultural Branding
– Douglas Holt
• Outliers or Blink
– Malcolm Gladwell
• The Wisdom of Crowds
– James Surowiecki
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