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Head of Leadership & Advocacy | Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand

We are all in shock and coming to terms with the Brexit result.

The true financial impacts will emerge over time. In a world that is so inter-connected the likely impact on our prosperity is likely to be negative. Maybe not a Lehman Brothers shock but negative.

There will continue to be lots of finger pointing as to how this happened but the one reality is it has. Is it a one off event? - No it isn't. There seems to be a worldwide breakdown in the leadership systems as we have known them. The Arab Spring, terrible uprisings in the Middle East and worldwide Jihad, US dissatisfaction with its conservative leadership, Australia facing annual Prime Minister changes and potentially facing another hung parliament. Why are these systems all under such strain?

It is essentially the total dissatisfaction of an increasingly connected world with its political leadership; a lack of authenticity driven by purely serving their own interests and not those of the greater good. Looking to self-interest at the expense of Prosperity for all.

What lessons can we take? How are we acting in our personal and business lives to serve and act in the public interest, as well as the business, clients and communities we serve? Maybe this crisis in Brexit leadership or lack thereof is an opportunity for us all.

It's ironic that the first time a member of the EU has voted to exit was in the UK where the British Parliament has often been referred to as the Mother of Parliaments. A small point, but it reflects the democratic heritage of UK voters. It also implies that the European Union lacks a democratic structure that can evolve with the aspirations of the growing populations of its member states.

The EU (formerly the EEC) was formed out of the ashes of WW11 as a means of creating interlocking markets between previous enemies, so that it would be too costly to go to war again. It is essentially an economic bloc with political aspirations. But economics is only part of governing people. While the EU created a legislature it never evolved into one that replaced national legislatures. It has a smallish judiciary but not one that balances the power of the legislature or executive. The legislature has an appointed president but without the power of a US president or a UK or Australian PM.

The main power is in the executive in the form of the bureaucracy. After the UK's application to join the then EEC succeeded on the second attempt in 1973 and was supported by a referendum in 1975, I think there was a general settling in period and an acceptance of EU rulings in the belief that it was for the good of the country. That made UK leaders and EU bureaucrats complacent. They assumed that the solution in all cases was an economic one. If people had enough money and a reasonable and rising standard of living, voters were prepared to compromise.

However, in the past few years the EC has also made centralised political decisions which national voters believed they had no say over, and their elected representatives failed to either present in a way they understood, or they failed to lead attempts to force the bureaucrats to change their decision. Those political decisions such as opening the borders panicked people - surprisingly, those further from the borders that were first breached - because they expected their society or culture to be adversely affected. That social factor is something I don't think the economically-based EU has ever adequately addressed.

Every leader who has taken their organisation through a massive change knows the challenges they will face. Some will be real, and some will be imaginary to their employees etc. It's up to the leader to understand how those fears will impact on their constituency, no matter how trivial they might appear to outsiders.

In the case of the UK leaders who were leading the Remain campaign, I think they were complacent. They thought they would win through voter inertia because that's how things have been done since 1973. The lessons learnt would be:

Leaders must get out and about and develop a nose for the real issues worrying their constituencies, not depend on surveys or focus groups.

Leaders must be truthful and not talk in marketing speak. Cameron should've told UK voters that the EU structure did need fixing and, assuming he believed that, make the case that he was the person to do that. But as he failed to discern the real concerns for voters, he naively agreed to a referendum (which he probably thought he would win), rather than push for key changes at the EU to better represent voters.

Leaders need good advisers, not pollsters or spin doctors, who are encouraged to speak honestly.

Those nations more dependent on exports like Australia are likely to have leaders who are prone to continually emphasise the economic argument. That might be acceptable to younger populations where growth means jobs and homes. But ageing populations have more experiences and can compare different stages in a nation's life and are likely to put more emphasis on the social linchpins. If they haven't got a massive nest egg that governments and financial institutions say they should have on retirement, they will look for comfort in their heritage or known social values, not simply money - they probably don't have enough anyway! If they see those social values threatened, watch out, because they think they have nothing left to lose.

In a society of constant change, leaders must lead from the front, not the rear (by consensus). You can't follow a leader who is behind you. When a constituency is expecting a leader to make a decision, making a decision is better than making no decision at all (I'm thinking here more of Turnbull).

Leaders must treat their historically better educated and globally aware constituents as partners and take them into their confidence.

Leaders must be good communicators (a good dose of humility wouldn't go astray). Brexit was a failure of leadership, not only by UK politicians but also by other EU politicians and bureaucrats. But on the positive side, it was a success of democracy on which we base our economy.

Rob Ward AM is the Head of Leadership & Advocacy | Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand, Chairman of the Board NSW Jockeys Benefits Trust and a Board Member of the Public Interest Oversight Board (Madrid).