And if the team is re-imagined as an ensemble, then the person who leads these teams must also be re-engineered. The traditional view of a leader is a manager who monitors, controls and rewards or punishes behavior. This is a transactional style of leadership. But today’s virtual ensembles that are globally distributed and digitally connected require a new style of leadership that the authors call “ambassadorial leadership.”

Ambassadorial leaders must be able to span geographic, cultural and organizational boundaries and create trust between disparate groups of people. There are seven specific behaviors that are needed, according to the authors, including: