'Lead or Follow': A Learning Reflection

16 June 2017

Funded by Santander through the Business School, I was given the privilege to attend a TEDx conference in Glasgow. The theme for this year challenges the notion of leadership in the 21st century and beyond: What does leadership means in our ever-evolving society that are shaped by the continuous fluidity of cultural and technological shifts? Has the power relation changes from leadership to followership? Is there a possibility for a robot leader in the future? These were just some of the big questions thrown out by different speakers from all walks of life, ranging from athletes, business leaders, journalists, to designers, innovators and scientists.

If I am to sum up on how a leader should lead from this conference in a few words, it would be ‘leading by being curios’. While our world is constantly changed by disruptive innovation models and technological advancement, we could have never known what might come next or imagined how our societies will look like in the future. To face such uncertainty, one of the speakers, Prof. Helen Minnis, suggested that ‘great leaders lead by not knowing the answer’. Here, she described that a true leader is someone who will always accept uncertainty while staying curious.

Following her argument, another speaker, Jane Bentley, offered another perspective that a good leader leads by following. Arguing that we are all born followers, she asserted that the art of following is not passive action rather it’s about being adaptability to situations and coming out with innovative solutions to tackle world problems. With these two arguments in mind, I believe this how leaders should lead in the future. Claiming to know the answers to every problem will only in fact, make us blind in our decisions.

Apart from the talks, I also had the opportunity to attend a discussion lab session led by the Scottish Quality Accreditation (SQA). Throughout the session, I sat with several individuals from various education sectors and discussed the ways in which how current education qualifications can be improved to better reflect the needs of employers and societies. The discussion was interesting yet critical as everyone at the table were actively engaging in the conversation and I learnt to contribute and raise my opinions confidently during this process.

On top of that, I had the chance to visit the demo labs as well where all kinds of technological inventions and innovations were displayed. One particular technology that had attracted me the most was ‘Pepper’. As part of the European Commission project to understand the growing market of consumer entertainment robotics, Pepper is the latest development of a humanoid robot to support fun and engaging interactions with human in dynamic environments of public shopping malls. At the booth, I even had the chance to speak with Pepper and watch him perform a robotic dance!

This conference has been by far one of the best events that I’ve attended while studying in Edinburgh. I am indeed grateful for this eye-opening opportunity as the TEDx experience has inspired and spurred me to become an innovative leader in the field of education one day.

Norman Chee, MSc Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Find more information about Santander funding under Opportunities.