The Most Important Leadership Qualities over the Next Five Years?
Here’s an important – and sobering – take on the global economy’s move toward recovery. George Ambler’s blog on The Practice of Leadership website says that leaders world-wide “are experiencing high levels of uncertainty and complexity, where 8 in 10 CEOs expect their environment to grow significantly more complex and fewer than half believe they know how to deal with it successfully. This environment creates an urgent need for leadership.” In this fascinating blog, Ambler cites the 4 main findings from the 2010 Global IBM CEO Study:
- Today’s complexity is only expected to rise
- Creativity is the most important leadership quality
- The most successful organizations co-create products and services with customers, and integrate customers into core processes
- Better performers manage complexity on behalf of their organizations, customers, and partners
The “2010 Global IBM CEO Study” was recently published. It’s one of the largest one-on-one CEO interview studies, surveying 1,541 CEOs, general managers and senior public sector leaders from 60 countries and across 33 industries. The primary findings of this year’s survey are as follows:
- Today’s complexity is only expected to rise and more than half of CEOs doubt their ability to manage it. Seventy-nine percent of CEOs anticipate even greater complexity ahead. However, one set of organisations we call ‘Standouts’ has turned increased complexity into financial advantage over the past five years.
- Creativity is the most important leadership quality, according to CEOs. Standouts practice and encourage experimentation and innovation throughout their organisations. Creative leaders expect to make deeper business model changes to realise their strategies. To succeed, they take more calculated risks, find new ideas, and keep innovating in how they lead and communicate.
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