Future Management Skills for Engineers

From MIT Sloan:

"We ask these executives to consider how they see the future and to assess the current capability of the corporation. From this, we were able to identify the “future risk factors” — the aspects of the corporations that would be important in the future, but are currently poorly executed. The same top risks came out every year: how to manage virtual teams; how to manage in multi-generation groups (particularly with regard to differential use of technology); how to support rapid knowledge flows across business units.

Notice what all three areas of risk have in common: They are all fundamentally about management. But this is a very complex form of management — managing virtually rather than face to face; managing when the group is diverse rather than homogenous; managing when the crucial knowledge flows are across groups rather than within. These are highly skilled roles in terms of both managerial capabilities (for example, to build rapid trust, coach, empathize, and inspire) and management practices (for example, team formation, objective setting, conflict resolution). It is these managerial skills and practices that will be augmented by technology over the coming years in ways we may have not yet grasped but which will emerge, just as the use of personal technology has emerged."