World economy, change, strategy, team, culture, and the list goes on. Business leaders face multiple simultaneous challenges on many fronts, but what are the most crucial things for leaders to focus on going forward?
We asked many of our Oslo Business Forum 2022 speakers what they think. So, here are 4 issues these top business experts highlighted:
Amy Edmondson: Think Long-Term
The overarching focus must be an appreciation for our deep interconnectedness and vulnerability on this small planet. What that means for leaders across industries is finding the courage to consider longer-term consequences of near-term actions – and to use that to alter those near-term actions. We need to focus on making the world work for everyone – and indeed this will take the kind of leadership that is too rarely seen. It may seem that my answer to this question quickly goes beyond the scope of my expertise, which is absolutely true. And yet, I believe the ability of leaders to focus on what matters most will require engaging people – at all levels, and with diverse expertise – in fearless, evidence-based journeys to discover the new solutions we need to thrive in the future.
Duncan Wardle: Be Human
If you ask the Artificial Intelligence experts what skill sets they believe will be the most important of the next decade, they will tell you “the ones that will be the hardest to program.” What would those be? They will tell you, “the ones that make us inherently human!” …And I will be sharing those during my talk. We must also challenge the paradigm of Profit over Purpose, because here comes Generation Z, who care far more about Purpose than Profit.
Martin Lindstrom: Build a Purpose-Driven Culture
“Building an authentic purpose-driven culture is the key for employers to survive and thrive in this environment.”
The workplace has never been this accessible, and loyalty has never been this low. Remember: every employee is only a click away from a different job. Often they don’t even need to move. That independence has turned companies into disposable entities. An employee’s average tenure at a company has never been this short.
Building an authentic purpose-driven culture is the key for employers to survive and thrive in this environment. With the world in disarray (and a war taking place in everyone’s backyard), employees are asking some fundamental questions. The days of “business as usual” are long gone. This new reality demands highly nimble leaders who know how to take a stand, unite teams around shared purposes, and create movements. In short, tomorrow’s leader needs to know how to create and oversee an internal tribe.
Yesterday’s leaders never learned to be nimble, become tribe leaders, create a powerful purpose, and maintain a movement—yet these are fundamental to running a company today.
Zoe Chance: Change Your Focus
In the medium term, we need to move beyond the market-based incentive systems that force the insatiable pursuit of short-term profits.”
In the near term, leaders can focus on employee engagement. Work is hard, life is stressful, and the permanent expansion of remote work means turnover will remain high. Unhappy employees make unhappy customers, and unhappy customers make unhappy shareholders. The profit gap between high-engagement companies and their low-engagement competitors, which Gallup calculates at 21%, will increase. (And remember engagement applies to leaders too—including you.) In the medium term, we need to move beyond the market-based incentive systems that force the insatiable pursuit of short-term profits. The fate of our planet depends on it.
Want to learn more from these bright business minds? You can by joining Oslo Business Forum 2022: Future-Focused Leadership on the 21st and 22nd of September!