What Does it Take to Lead an E-Commerce Venture? (page 1 of 2)

The reason Berry is racing like crazy is simple. "E-procurement is a $10 trillion market worldwide, nearly 30% to 40% of which is not bid—and that is our untapped opportunity," he explains. To grab a chunk of that market before the competition moves in, ICGCommerce.com has set a blistering pace since its launch last October. It already has 350 employees and offices in London and Toronto. Little wonder Berry feels he is speeding down a highway. "You go as fast as you can," he says. "Just don't crash."

Berry is hardly alone. As more and more companies try to seize opportunities in today's volatile Internet environment, they are forced to move at great speed down uncertain—often experimental—paths. This poses enormous leadership challenges for dot-com companies as well as traditional bricks-and-mortar businesses trying to develop e-commerce initiatives. What exactly does it take to lead an e-business effectively in today's fast-changing, technology-driven world? Are traditional leadership skills enough? Or do CEOs and other top executives need to cultivate new capabilities in order to move as fast as possible without crashing?

Answers to these questions and more were discussed at a session on "Transformational Leadership for eCommerce Initiatives" at a meeting of the Wharton Forum on Electronic Commerce on June 1'2000. Moderated by Michael Useem, director of the Wharton Center for Leadership and Change Management, the session involved presentations by Berry, William Kelvie, chief information officer of Fannie Mae, and two MBA students, John Joseph and Kelly Jo Larson. "Leadership is especially important when the future is uncertain," says Useem, who conducted an informal straw poll before the session. He asked: If you were a venture capitalist looking at investing in an enterprise, how much weight would you place on the business model, and how much on the talent of the management team? The response: 50-50. "To succeed in e-commerce, the business model is key, but talent is key as well," says Useem.

Talent must take specific forms to provide effective leadership in e-commerce ventures. According to Berry, the most important quality such leaders must possess is the ability to build a team. Paradoxically, the humility—some might call it egolessness—that is needed to manage a team must go hand-in-hand with the drive and confidence that stems from a strong ego. Leaders of e-commerce ventures must have the ability to attract teams of talented risk-takers. "You have to find people who are willing to put some skin in the game," Berry says. "At ICGCommerce we attracted people who left millions of dollars on the table to join us, and so all of us had a stake in the company."

Dot-coms typically have a very direct communications style, Berry explains, and leaders must equip themselves to deal with that. In traditional companies, criticism of a colleague's or subordinate's actions often takes what Berry calls an "oreo cookie" approach—you first say something positive, then slip in your criticism coupled with a suggested change, and end by saying something positive again. The fast-paced e-commerce world, however, simply doesn't permit the luxury of such a leisurely approach. "You communicate directly, and you must build a team that can cope with that," he says.

The speed at which everyone works in an e-commerce venture also means little time is available to train anyone.