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6. July 2026Something is changing in the business world around the globe. Are you recognizing the signs? Companies like Daimler and Zappos are. It’s a shift that is going to disrupt management hierarchies, change the role of leaders, and naturally increase employee engagement.
Something is changing in the business world around the globe. Are you recognizing the signs? Companies like Daimler and Zappos are. It's a shift that is going to disrupt management hierarchies, change the role of leaders, and naturally increase employee engagement.
What is the shift about? It’s a paradigm shift. If you are in the old paradigm, you still believe that engaging employees is a company’s responsibility. You must find ways to make your employees do what you want them to do, depending on your values: for example through a strong top-down approach, or by making them happy through incentives, team-building activities, and by providing them with colorful spaces to foster their creativity. And yet, nothing much really changes. Power struggles are still evident. People keep complaining, some just do the minimum, while others work like crazy and feel resentful because they don’t get promoted. You know that employee engagement is a critical factor for your business' success, you keep looking for something new that could work, and it feels like pushing water uphill. You feel the responsibility, the load is on your shoulders as a CEO, HR Director, or leader at any management level, and it weighs heavily.
What if this massive responsibility simply dissolved itself? This paradigm shift is opening our minds to a new way of understanding work and leadership. Concepts such as New Work, Teal, Swarm Organization and Holacracy are emerging, and they are paving the way to the future.
New Work
The concept of New Work has been developed by the Austro American social philosopher Frithjof Bergmann. It is based on the understanding of Liberty, meaning the freedom to do something that is really important for you, something that you want to do because you believe in it. The central values of New Work are autonomy, freedom and participation in society, allowing space for creativity and self-fulfillment. According to Bergmann every human being can find work that is aligned with their own values, desires, and skills. Imagine a team of people in which every member does what he/she is really good at and passionate about. Imagine they are deeply and actively involved in a project with a goal they truly believe in. How high would their level of engagement be? And the quality of their performance?
Now you may argue: "This is wishful thinking. There are jobs that need to be done that no one likes.". That’s exactly how technology is going to help us. Robots and Artificial Intelligence are already starting to take over those alienating tasks that no one likes, where human error is high, often due to what? To a lack of motivation and attention. The process may be more rapid in some industries and countries compared to others, but today we are creating the conditions for working better and evolving ourselves.
You may say: ‘Too good to be true’. And I would answer: ‘Read on, it’s already happening!’
Swarm organization
Daimler started utilizing Swarm Organizational methods in 2016 in order to enable more rapid and agile development. Working in a swarm means more flexibility, self-determination and creative freedom.
Rick Falkvinge describes Swarm Organization as “a decentralized, collaborative effort of volunteers that is built by a small core of people that construct a scaffolding of go-to people, enabling a large number of volunteers to cooperate on a common goal."
A key aspect of the swarm is that it is open to all people who want to contribute. The focus is on what a person can do and wants to do, opposed to what they 'must' do. They can choose a work item off a list and just start doing it. Anybody who wants to contribute to the goal, in their own way and according to their own capacity, can do so.
In an interview that appeared in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on July 9, 2016 Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche said: “We envision to shift about 20 percent of our employees to a swarm-organization. In doing so, employees who are not bound to strict hierarchies shall be linked for certain topics”. This is a massive cultural change, considering Daimler’s highly hierarchical, rather conservative structure in the past. What does this tell us? Change is possible!
Holacracy
Holacracy was adopted by Zappos a few years ago. Holacracy is a self-management practice to run purpose-driven companies. In holacratic companies there is an agile organizational structure and every team is self-organized. People are empowered to make decisions and drive change in order to achieve the company’s goals. Roles are defined around the result that people want to achieve, and can change as the projects evolve and new goals emerge. Authority is distributed to teams and roles, decisions are made locally.
Teal Organizations
Now, this one is profound – get ready for it. Teal organizations are based on the Teal paradigm described by Frederic Laloux in his groundbreaking book ‘Reinventing Organizations’. He refers to the next stage in the evolution of human consciousness, a shift that happens when we dis-identify from own ego, which is driven by Fear (determined to predict and control people and events at all costs), and we develop the ability to Trust our true self and others. It is a shift from a belief in scarcity and limited resources to a belief in abundance and unlimited resources. I know this may sound weird to many of you, but scientists are starting to confirm this view, and you may want to read the books ‘Biocentrism’ by Dr. Robert Lanza and ‘The Biology of Belief’ by Dr. Bruce Lipton to learn more.
According to the Teal paradigm, an organization is viewed as a living organism, an independent force with its own purpose, and not simply as a vehicle for achieving management's objectives. Teal organizations are characterized by self-organization and self-management. The hierarchical top-down pyramid is replaced with a decentralized structure consisting of small teams that take responsibility for their own governance and for how they interact with other parts of the organization. Instead of jobs and positions, people can choose different roles based on how the role feels to them, how much they are aligned with its purpose, whether they feel it is the right thing for them to do, and whether they believe that their contribution is going to be of service to the company’s purpose, and ultimately to the world.
In Teal organizations, people are encouraged to not only utilize their rational-analytical skills, but also their intuition that allows them to deal with the complex, ambiguous and not-linear nature of reality, in business as well as in life. Let's be honest: even if we keep wanting to put our organizations (and other aspects of life) in structured boxes (thinking that we can control them), it will always fail - the nature of life (and organizations) is fluid and in continuous expansion.
Employee engagement from the inside out
In the organizational methods described above, people are not ‘asked’ or ‘forced’ to do things. They do them because they believe in the purpose of their work, because contributing feels right to them. If they fail, they can take an honest look at themselves, learn from mistakes, and make a conscious decision on whether they want to continue or move to something else that is more suited to their true abilities.
A higher level of consciousness
This requires the readiness for a sincere and authentic introspection. Our ego is driven by the constant fear of losing something, and its job is to make us believe that we want certain things in order to maintain control, such as money, status, power, "independence and freedom" (self-deceptive forms of independence and freedom). To move beyond the subtle games of our ego, we can ask ourselves: What matters most to me in my life? What are my true passions and talents? What makes me feel really alive and happy? When I’m 90 years old and look back at my life, what kind of person would I like to see? What kind of relationships would I like to have built during my life? How would I like to contribute in order to make my home / company / town / this world a great place for myself and my children? When you answer these questions with your heart and soul, you move past your ego and start recognizing what kind of job and what kind of organization is right for you, you start dreaming of new possibilities and do what it takes to make them true.
Sure, not everyone might be ready for this. You may still think that there is no space for your passions, dreams and talents. You may still be enveloped in the old paradigm of scarcity and fear. An evolutionary shift in human consciousness is not something that happens over night. Maybe you don’t even want it because it feels uncertain and scary. However, just know that the process has already started, it is happening around us, in small and large organizations. Each one of us may get there at their own pace.
The leader of the future
Now the final question: Will leaders still be needed? If so, what kind of leaders will we need? And what will be their role? I believe we will need less leaders, and their true role will be to inspire others. We need leaders who are driven by a higher purpose, rather than their ego. Leaders who know where the organization is heading, but are capable of letting go of controlling how to get there, trusting that their employees have what it takes to achieve a common goal they believe in. When both leaders and employees are honest and true to themselves, about what they really want and what they are good at, hiring talents or getting rid of disengaged employees is not an issue any more. People naturally move to the teams and organizations that are best for them, where they feel they can give their best. Too optimistic? Maybe... and yet, I'm already seeing this happening with some of the leaders I've been coaching and their teams. So, for them and for me, this is possible.
What about you? What shifts are you seeing in your organization?
Author: Myriam Callegarin
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About Myriam Callegarin
Myriam Callegarin is a Global Executive Coach and Leadership Consultant. She works with successful leaders who want to upgrade their ability to bring out the best in themselves and their teams, so they can add extraordinary value to their companies and customers. She combines an extensive corporate and business experience with a deep passion for coaching as a tool for personal, leadership and organizational development. Some references: Daimler, Ford Motor Company, Porsche, Roche, Luxottica, UniCredit, Banca Intesa San Paolo, Chiesi, Ferrero, Bonduelle, ENEL, E.On, World Food Programme (United Nations) and more.
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