In Western culture, we are used to a certain kind of leadership persona. We are used to loud, charismatic, bigger-than-life leaders. The idea of a quiet, humble, but strong leader is something we are still learning how to embrace. Something about that doesn’t seem quite like leadership to us, but that is starting to change, and that is good news for us. No longer do you need to be able to wow a crowd or be the life of the party to influence a large number of people. Susan Cain, in her book, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, covered this movement from every angle, but I’m going to focus us on why we should integrate social media into our leadership.

As I’ve covered in many articles so far, technology professionals tend to be the quiet type. If we are ready to embrace it, social media is the leadership platform we’ve been waiting for. Social media is the great equalizer. If used properly, it can give the quiet and reserved a megaphone like nothing else. Pete Cashmore, founder of Mashable, explained his leadership style as a prominent figure in the social media movement:

Wouldn’t it be a great irony if the leading proponents of the “it’s about people” mantra weren’t so enamored with meeting large groups of people in real life? Or, perhaps…fitting. Perhaps social media affords us the control we lack in real life socializing: the screen as a barrier between us and the world.

Those of us that are technology-savvy have been doing this for a very long time. Long before Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn were ever dreamed-up, we collaborated with each other on Bulletin Board Systems, Usenet groups, ICQ chat, and other services. Today’s social technologies are better, but more importantly, they have been adopted by mainstream culture.

I’ve written extensively about how to improve leadership effectiveness in the real world through public speaking, in-person networking, and self-awareness. As important as those skills are, modern leaders need to be equally skilled online. Leaders need to develop an effective online presence and lead effectively through social media. I’ll get into the how-to’s in a future article, but here I want to firmly establish why this is critically important:

1. Ninety percent of Millennials claim to check their social media before they even get out of bed each day. If you speak the language of digital natives, they will listen to you. More importantly, if you speak the language of digital natives, you will hear them! Millennials already make up half of the global workforce. This isn’t a someday issue. It’s now. If you aren’t doing this now, you are already behind. You simply cannot afford to view social media as an annoying distraction for narcissistic teenagers. While that may be true, it’s also a powerful way to communicate and connect people and refine ideas like never before. Unless your organizational strategy is to age-out and die-off, then you need to focus your attention on how Millennials work and communicate.
2. Once upon a time, people worked for a single organization their entire career. While that still happens, it’s rare, and you make a big deal out of it. Just this week, I celebrated one my team member’s 35^th anniversary with the company. It was a great accomplishment, but that won’t be the reality for most of my team. When your team members leave your organization, they cannot leave their experience, talent, and intelligence with you. They take it with them. Your former employees become your future clients. Your retirees become your future consultants. Bob Johansen, in his book, Leaders Make the Future, explains that social media and networks are a great way to stay connected to your former co-workers. If you are a leader, you are already wise enough not to burn bridges with people, but don’t stop there. Use social media to keep your relationships with former co-workers fresh. Use social media to tap into your alumni network, casting a larger net for collaboration and information sharing.
3. Social media is the communication medium that fits the times of modern organizational culture. Command and control is dead. Top-down management is futile. Formal communication is too late. People work in self-organizing teams. Ideation is organic. Communication is fluid. Innovation flows bottom-up. Leadership needs to be accountable, relevant, transparent, and authentic. Social media is a multi-directional real-time medium that makes it happen. Modern organizational leadership and modern communication are two sides of the same coin. You simply cannot be a modern leader and ignore social media.
4. Social media is the new water cooler. We need a new water cooler, because the old water cooler is obsolete. Our companies are more geographically diverse than ever before. Being casual and social with co-workers around a physical bubbling object in the hallway won’t get the job done. Today’s technology teams work across Silicon Valley, a corn field in Iowa, and an office complex in Bangalore. Embrace your company’s Enterprise Social Media platform and use it. Chances are, adoption is in the single digits, but it will explode in the next few years. Get an early edge and become involved now.

Those are the core reasons why using social networking as a medium for leadership is critical for success. Leaders that are younger and more technology-savvy have an advantage here. Those that aren’t, simply have to be more intentional. Those that are introverted can lead as effectively as an extrovert, in-part through leveraging social media.

My primary distribution for this blog is via social media, so chances are good that I’m preaching to the choir. I still thought this article would provide strong encouragement to those of us on social media, but lurking instead of contributing, or fatigued and thinking about quitting.

Thanks for reading. Please share this with your colleagues and comment below. In a future blog post, I’ll dive into the how-to’s of leading through social media. Stay tuned!