“I think we now live in an era when many of the concerns in running organizations are being reframed in terms of risk, which suggests that risk professionals are likely to rise to the top.”

(Source: “Managing Risk in the New World,” Harvard Business Review, October 2009)

My basic message is that 21st century leadership is all about making smart decisions under uncertainty, extreme volatility, constrained resources, increasing needs, and lack of full information. Borrowing Marshall Goldsmith’s term, I believe that the 21st century mojo of leadership will be all about making the tough decisions that need to be made in an economy running at a trillion-dollar deficit.

Twenty-first century leaders who understand, embrace, and execute smart political, financial, environmental, and stakeholder decisions will prevail and succeed. The 21st century leadership and management rubric will revolve around risk/cost/benefits involving enterprise risk management (ERM).

So, what is the “new normal?”

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