所有商界领袖现在需要什么？大无畏的想象力

几年前我就开始听到这句话：“我们其实是一家拥有XX的科技公司。”各行业公司的首席执行官都这么说。2011年，美国联合航空首席执行官石志辉对我说：“我们其实是一家拥有翅膀的科技公司。”其他人则在经营“一家拥有轮子的科技公司”，“拥有铁轨的”、“拥有精炼厂的”、“拥有商店的”科技公司。他们说得都对。

如今，我们周围的新事实已经证明，各行业的领导者实际上都身处科技行业。杰夫·伊梅尔特领导的通用电气公司日前宣布推出一项新业务，旨在分析来自全球各地，包括通用在内的任何公司的工业机械所产生的海量数据，从而预测并改善这些机械的性能。通用电气正在积极地重新定位，让自己成为一家拥有预测性分析软件业务的工业公司。如今的竞争对手包括IBM和谷歌。

特拉维斯·卡拉尼克执掌的优步公司宣布，这家打车服务商正在赔钱，但投资者并不在意，他们对该公司的估值高达500亿美元，甚至更多。在美国，每家出租车和房车公司如今都是科技公司，这一趋势很快就会蔓延到全世界。美国国防部长阿什·卡特在硅谷建立了国防创新机构来研究机器人、增量制造、大数据分析、网络安全等技术，他很清楚自己如今身处什么行业。运动品牌阿迪达斯也在首席执行官赫尔伯特·海纳的领导下重新振作，该公司在8月初收购了Runtastic。阿迪达斯不再是一家单纯的运动装备生产商，而是一家为运动员提供应用和设备的公司。

甚至连咖啡公司也可以是科技公司：Keurig Green Mountain公司的业务就建立在创新性酿造技术之上，但业绩疲软导致该公司前景不明，股价在8月6日猛跌29%。该公司的前景现在很大程度上依靠新推出的一种冷饮机器。《华盛顿邮报》报道称，这种机器“是对Keurig公司科技能力的一次大考，也是首席执行官布莱恩·凯利为公司长期发展进行的一次定位。”

成为科技公司的领袖并不需要精通科技。石志辉是个律师，伊梅尔特原来是个营销人员，海纳的专业是经济学。（不过卡特是个例外，他是理论物理学家。）领导者需要具备用科技语言进行表达，以及识别人才的能力。而最重要的，通常也是对领袖最具挑战性的一个能力，则是设想哪些是可以实现的。科技的能力正在超出人类使用它的能力。

说来奇怪，大胆的想象正成为科技型企业的领袖核心能力。对所有公司来说，这一点都十分重要。（财富中文网）

译者：严匡正

审校：任文科

I started hearing it years ago: “We’re actually a technology company with [fill in the blank],” CEOs of every kind of business were saying. “We’re actually a technology company with wings,” United Continental CEO Jeff Smisek told me in 2011. Others were running “a tech company with wheels,” “with rails,” “with refineries,” “with stores.” And they were all correct.

Today, we’re surrounded by new evidence that leaders in every discipline are actually in the tech business. Jeff Immelt’s GE yesterday announced a new business that will analyze massive amounts of data generated by industrial machines—GE’s or anyone else’s—anywhere in the world, predicting and improving their performance. GE is aggressively repositioning itself as an industrial company, but now that encompasses predictive analytics software. Its competitors include IBM and Google.

Travis Kalanick’s Uber announced on Wednesday that his company is losing money, but investors don’t care; they value the company at $50 billion or more. Leaders of every taxi and limo company in the U.S., and soon the world, are running tech companies now. Defense Secretary Ash Carter has formed a Defense Innovation Unit in Silicon Valley to learn more about robotics, additive manufacturing, big data analytics, cybersecurity, and more; he knows what business he’s in now. Adidas, the athletic apparel firm being reinvigorated by CEOHerbert Hainer, announced yesterday it’s buying Runtastic. It doesn’t make athletic apparel; it makes apps and hardware for athletes.

Even a coffee company is a technology business: Shares of Keurig Green Mountain, which has built its business on innovative brewing tech, plunged 29% yesterday on weak earnings and outlook. Now much depends on its introduction of a new cold-beverage machine—which, the WSJ reported on Wednesday, “marks a major test of Keurig’s technology skills and Chief Executive Brian Kelley’s effort to position the company for long-term growth.”

Being the leader of a technology enterprise doesn’t demand deep tech skills. Smisek is a lawyer; Immelt came up as a marketer; Hainer majored in economics. (Carter, though, is a theoretical physicist.) It does demand an ability to speak the language of technology and an ability to evaluate people. Most important—and generally most challenging for leaders—is that it demands an ability to imagine what might be possible. Technology’s capability is outrunning our ability to use it.

Strange to say, but fearless imagination is becoming a key competency for leaders of tech-enabled enterprises—which means pretty much all of them.