Multi-ethnic group of businesspeople discussing business
What keeps the world's business leaders up at night? What makes them jump out of bed in the morning?
As a leader, if you have more than three things on your to-do list, you're probably not delegating enough. Well, I asked the following questions to a sample of leaders with varying degrees of global oversight and varying job responsibilities. Of all the things you're working on, what are the three things you never cross off your personal to-do list? What are the responsibilities that you don't delegate? And I think it makes sense. They decided that for something to make the top three list, it had to be on 75% of the respondents' lists, for no other reason than the fact that it was. It's like being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. fame. If it’s good enough for Cooperstown, it’s good enough for me.
An interesting finding was that the respondents were unaware of each other's identities. (1) the top three list was nearly unanimous, (2) a total of 10 challenges were provided, and (3) with rare exceptions, the challenges were a combination of technological and humanitarian elements.
Top 3 global leadership challenges
(Actually tied for 4th – 3rd place)
1. Accelerating technological change
Of course, it's AI, which has already proven to be the biggest single civilization-altering thing in history. However, the scope of change is not the only challenge. It also becomes a pace. Continuing to maintain it will make the difference between prosperity and extinction. Can you keep up? Concise and simple.
2. Contest for creative talent
Were you surprised by this? it's not. Creativity is the only sustainable asset that individuals, organizations and nations will once again have. I made this statement to him 27 years ago when evaluating the talent pool of our client companies. That started my journey into creativity research and client consulting, and even led to the creation of a postgraduate course at FDU. Creativity, Change, and 21cent leader of the century. Skills can be replaced. Creativity is not possible. New ideas can be replaced. There is no ability to generate them. Expertise can be replaced. Not ready. Apparently, respondents agree.
3. TIE: A global health crisis
Events like the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic have made painfully clear how quickly and powerfully a devastating virus can take control of the planet and the billions of people on it. I'm doing it. Leaders must coordinate responses, allocate resources, and foster international cooperation to not only fight emerging diseases, but also to anticipate and prevent them. Prediction and prevention are new challenges, but until we do, we need to fight better.
3. TIE: Geopolitical conflicts, wars, migration and refugees:
In a complex world, geopolitics, human persecution, and power struggles of all kinds threaten global stability, security, economics, and trade, down to the most local businesses. Leadership is called upon to foster diplomacy, dialogue and cooperation to prevent conflict and promote regional and international stability. Addressing issues such as terrorism and cyber warfare requires strong leadership and multilateral engagement.
Once we got past the top three (actually four), six more issues made it to at least half of the list. They are cybersecurity and data privacy, ethics and governance, supply chain stability, workplace restructuring, a well-trained workforce, global economic uncertainty and financial stability. ,
All of this will be explained in detail in future posts.
