Iridescence

The world is awash in shades of gray and layers of complexity. Many businesses struggle to keep responses up to date, never mind trying to be proactive in this ever-changing climate. The cliché saying - the only constant is change - has never been more true. And this is reflected in all aspects of business: marketing, sales, manufacturing, product development, strategic planning, human resources, and organization development.

What about leadership?

Yes, leadership must change, too, but not from approach A to approach B. What’s becoming increasingly necessary is nimble and changeable leadership. There is no one best way to lead. In fact, leading with one approach, one style, or one set of assumptions will not produce the best results.

Mother Nature shows us the way.

As the Rufous Hummingbird zooms by you, you notice a flash of red and gold, and then a shimmer of bronzy green. As it hovers with curiosity in front of you, its colors seem to change. Many species of hummingbird shine with iridescence.

When scientist David Lee explored the Malaysian tropical rain forest, the shimmering electric blue of leaves of the Selaginella plant attracted and amazed him. Its iridescence so inspired Lee that it changed the direction of his career.

There is a rare phenomenon where clouds will glow in iridescence. Overlapping layers of varying thickness and water particle size and shape create changing color reflections as they move past one another.

Iridescence is an optical phenomenon in which hue changes according to the angle from which the surface is viewed. Iridescence is caused by multiple reflections from multi-layered, semi-transparent surfaces. Some wavelength frequencies reflect and some are absorbed and each layer creates a different pattern of reflection and light interference. What you see and experience will be different from that which someone viewing the same scene sees from another location.

What if leaders were iridescent? What would that look like?