Technology is promoting some pretty positive changes in the corporate world, specifically blockchain technology. Hanane Benkhallouk, Founder of Tawazoun, familiarised herself with the topic and now shares how this tech has the potential to change the concept of leadership and centralization.
For a few decades now, humanity has feared the idea of technology taking over human jobs and increasing unemployment. When tech thrives and starts doing humanly work faster than people, companies replace their human workforce with technology.
I know it’s a valid concern, and humanity needs to strike the right balance between the human workforce and robotics. However, I also believe technology is promoting some pretty positive changes in the corporate world, specifically talking about blockchain technology here.
A few weeks back, I had no idea about how the blockchain tech worked — but I wanted to change that, living up to my own motto, “Remain relevant in an ever-changing world”.
To familiarize myself with this subject, I performed extensive research, as well as attended a dedicated workshop on it. During this knowledge-grab, I came up with this insight of how this tech has the potential to change the concept of leadership and centralization, and I wanted to share this thought process with everyone else.
But before I can talk about how this tech is changing the world, it’s important to set up the context.
What is blockchain and how does it work?
Blockchain technology was developed to nest the world’s first-ever cryptocurrency, the Bitcoin. It’s a decentralized system of storing information digitally. The term “decentralized” is of utmost importance here. What it means is that no single entity is in charge of holding the data in its hands.
Let’s take the example of a typical financial company and crypto, shall we?
When you use the services of a financial company, possibly a bank or a fintech organization, all your banking information and history are stored in a single entity’s database, and that entity is, of course, the financial institution in question. The entire system is centralized in that organization’s hands.
This is too much power for a single entity to have, especially in today’s egocentric, profit-driven world. Under any unforeseen circumstance, that entity could exploit the information they have about you, and use it to make illegal, or at least unethical, profit.
On the other hand, nobody has the same amount of power over crypto. Every transaction you make is stored on an endless number of nodes scattered all over the internet. There’s no “central hub” where all the information is located. Instead, the entire network is the hub.
This approach ensures no single entity, be it a person or a company, has the power to exploit mass information. Furthermore, the transactions done through crypto are irreversible and untraceable, so no entity can alter the details of a transaction to conduct fraud.
Blockchain promotes human-centricity and empowers leadership values
When no person or company has so much power over the masses, they’re automatically bound by nature to adhere to the moral values of leadership. They become aware that they don’t have enough power over others to forcefully practice immoral leadership traits. This phenomenon promotes a decentralized leadership approach that thrives with healthy practices.
Simply put, this technology has the potential to break the centralized control that the biggest financial institutions have over the people. It takes the control away from corporate hands and puts it right into the people’s laps.
Furthermore, as you, a typical citizen, doesn’t have to trust a single organization to keep your financial information safe, trust issues are automatically resolved. You won’t have to trust anyone, as there is no someone who holds your information.
Blockchain also has the potential to remove all kinds of bias from security vendors. If cybersecurity companies rely on the information made available to them through private messaging and databases, they could be biased due to racial, religious, or gender discrimination.
However, blockchain ensures that said information is publicly available to all the linked parties. As the information isn’t centralized, everybody would be able to see the data about security threats publicly. Hence, cybersecurity vendors don’t have any excuse for not providing their services effectively due to bias.
All in all, blockchain can break the system of today’s centralized, power-driven, corporate world where certain organizations have too much power. Instead, this technology ensures everybody gets to become a leader.
The bottom line
For decades, many have seen technology as the evil that will inevitably replace humans in various industries. However, no one paid attention to how certain technologies are fixing some rising problems found in today’s societies.
Blockchain is one of those technologies that’s set to infiltrate the centralized corporate system and make sure no one has too much power. All in all, it can potentially empower and sustain.
About the author
Hanane Benkhallouk is an award-winning senior consultant with a broad scope of expertise and exposure to international markets. She counts 20 years of a diverse thriving career journey that started in New York City before moving to Dubai in 2005. Her multi-industry working experience included being in charge of innovation and entrepreneurship programs across the Arab World, at the Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum foundation, which was the turning point in her career shift.
Today she works as the Executive Director of Sustain Leadership consultancies. A culture change and certified innovation strategist, Hanane supports corporates, government institutions, NGOs and SMEs, in building human centric business models, and creating cultures of innovation in order to sustain their leadership, while maximizing impact.
Hanane pioneered a multitude of initiatives which stemmed from her passion to cultivate entrepreneurial and innovative mindsets, accelerate the gender balance agenda, and advance the MEA region towards a knowledge-based economy.
