Journal of Defense Resources Management (Oct 2016)
A VUCA ACTION FRAMEWORK FOR A VUCA ENVIRONMENT. LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS
Abstract
The 1990 coinage describing the surrounding environment as volatile, uncertain, complex and agile (VUCA) is becoming a cliché in the absence of a more profound analysis. To try and uncover its causes would take a comprehensive study that covers multiple areas such as economy, sociology, psychology, history, etc. and that cannot be covered in just few pages. Nonetheless, the reality it describes signals a high need for intervention. Consequently, what this article proposes is an overview of the possible solutions that leaders may have at their disposal or they can build in order to counter the effects of the phenomena derived from such reality via vision, understanding, clarity and agility (VUCA). Thus, its assumption is that by depicting the overt aspects of the phenomena, possible solutions may emerge in the form of a general action plan. Hence, the potential fl aw of the ideas to be expressed: the general aspects need to be adapted and matched to specifi c environments, which hopefully becomes possible should a specifi c mindset be assumed via the aforementioned action framework.
