POSITIVE CORNER 23: Good growth with foresight and responsibility
The scientific journal Science has declared the rise of renewable energies the "Breakthrough of the Year 2025." Solar and wind energy are increasingly being chosen because they are economically attractive and strengthen energy independence. This wasn't always the case, but is the result of long-term, consistent, and forward-looking management by countries and institutions that recognized this need.
This bears a strong analogy to the ω dimension of leadership. It demands that decisions not be limited to the short-term self-interest of one's own organization or the logic of the next quarter. Leadership here integrates people's interests into broader contexts and assumes responsibility for the consequences beyond one's own immediate horizon.
The researcher Theodore Modis has shown with many examples that the resulting "natural" growth processes can often be described using sigmoid or S-curves: After a slow start-up phase, accelerated growth follows, before the development flattens out again.
Living nature is an expert on this. Humans, mammals, and birds grow physically according to this pattern. Once they reach adulthood, their "growth" or development continues along a different path. Individuals no longer grow, but they for instance form communities and groups, which in turn can grow and thrive up to a certain point. Key factors for such growth are the capacity for self-regulation and reproduction, as well as the resource capacity of the environment.
Renewable energies currently appear to be in the steep section of such a curve: scaling reduces costs, lower costs increase demand, and demand enables further scaling.
This leads to two key insights for leaders:
First , sustainable change often begins long before the visible breakthrough – through investment, patience, infrastructure, and collaborative learning.
Second , even a successful S-curve eventually reaches its limits.
ω-oriented leadership therefore asks in a timely manner:
What next development and learning curve do we need so that progress does not come at the expense of people and the environment?
Growth becomes sustainable when it follows a natural course and remains responsible for people and the environment. This is one of the central leadership challenges of our time.
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