Change Leadership for the 21st Century: A Discussion with Pete Pande

With an ever-changing economic, political and technological landscape, the question arises about whether leaders and industries in the 21st century are equipped to handle these changes. In this Profit through Process podcast, Genna Weiss of Six Sigma IQ speaks with Pete Pande—President and Founder of Pivotal Resources, leading expert in process improvement, organization change and Six Sigma initiatives, and noted author of The Six Sigma Leader—who shares his Change Leadership strategy for responding to change as well as for initiating change and process improvement. Sharing the three broad components—smart leadership, process and portfolio management, and effective change execution—that allow any leader to ensure that their change management efforts are implemented successfully, Pande offers clear Change Leadership takeaways that any organization can follow.

In addition, Pande offers his insight into how corporate America is managing and coping with change in the 21st century, revealing some of the companies and industries that are forging ahead with their change execution efforts. He explains how the economic crisis is forcing companies to reevaluate how they prioritize process improvement projects and how this prioritization is affecting their change management efforts. Tapping into his Six Sigma expertise, Pande also relates how the application of Six Sigma to leadership can aid in addressing many of the change management issues for American companies today. Pande offers surprising counterintuitive advice, providing examples of what he calls "leadership paradoxes" that should provoke any change leader to reevaluate how he or she is implementing organizational change initiatives.