At a conference in Charlotte, North Carolina, working with executives on future trends and their relationship to risk management. It’s an exciting time to be discussing global change and potential scenarios, especially in the wake of the financial debacle where real things are changing at a breakneck pace.

One woman put a fine point on our predicament. “The worst part of this is that our leaders are being revealed as the emperors who have no clothes. We require a certain degree of strength and trustworthiness in our authority figures. But a lot of these guys are looking ignorant, fraudulent, or worse.”

I think the answer here is not anarchy. Our economic system is far too complex to ever revert to operating our countries and industries without some degree of hierarchical leadership.

Trust in leadership is already shaken by the terrifying sudden meltdown of the world credit market. Thinking in terms of scenarios, if we have one or two or crises to follow up the financial catastrophe, how much less power will our institutions carry? Why listen to the news? Why pay attention to cabinet ministers? What does the boss know? He might be out of a job tomorrow too.

The fact remains, we will need leadership to guide institutions through the many challenges on the horizon. Reputation will be an important part of maintaining influence.