In: Finance
Discuss leadership development trends and challenges in the twenty first century
Leaders in business face constant challenges.While some of these challanges are typically easier to identify and respondto,others,such as recognising and developing emerging leaders within your company,can prove more difficult.The role of leadership in business is more than just strategising a winning business model to drive the bottom line:It also include developing employees to ensure that the future set of managers are well-balnaced,inclusive and set new trends for leadership.
Here are some leadership development trends:
i)Investing in inclusion and diversity:Unleashing the full potential of a workforce that understand and reflects your customer is only achieved through embracing diversity in your leadership team.Research shows that companies with more diverse workforce are better at developing innovative products and services.
ii)Launching more female leaders:In 2008,the number of female CEOs in fortune 500 companies dropped by an alarming 25%,from 32 to 24.This is a serious cause for concern,when you consider the importance of female leadership.A global survey of 21,980 firms from 91 countries by the Peterson Institute for international Economics has shown a direct correlations between female leadership and business profiatability.As per report-A profitable firm at which 30% of leaders are women could expect to add more than 1% points to its net margin compared with an otherwise similar firm with no female leaders.
iii)Fighting for authenticity:Gone are the days where rigid hierarchical organisational structure produce results.Authencity in leadership is key,and leaders who creates space for thoughtful,honest conversations about real issue that impact their team will thrive this year.More organisations are invetsing in leadership development skills to teach leaders to function in this way.
iv)Focusing on accountability:A culture of accountabilty revolves around leadership.As such,businesses are investing training into their leaders around creating consequential conversation,both up and down the leadership ladder.Managers who lead by example by holding themselves,and those in their team,accountable to an attainable set of standards and values will set the bar for others to follow.
v)Cultivating culture:Developing a healthy culture where teams feel safe,comfortable,valued and supported will results in improved employee engagement,retention,high-performance and innovations,as well as overall business profitabilty.
B) Leadership challenges in the 21st century
21st century leaders need to anticipate change and be agile enough to deal with the challenges that are coming at them from all angels.
i)The rate of change is accelerating :Removing the middle layer of management is something that we have witnessed for the past 20 year,and we will continue to see a move towards flatter management structures.We have also seen a modernisation of workspace and a change in modes of work.
ii)Artificial intelligence is coming:Mckinsey estimates that of current work task are automable.These functions are often highly structured and repititive in nature.least likely to be automated are those function that require a greater level of emotional intelligence(EI).Such as managing people,inspiring and motivating etc.
iii)The war talent continues:There's are not enough highly skilled talent to go around.Employers will increasingly turn to globally-sourced freelancers,the gig economy and crowd sourcing.
iv)The millennials are here:Workers will follow their passion and companies will have to prove that they are worth their workers' time.This means that the organisations will have to have a greater social purpose and make sure employee see it and are part of it.
v)Continous learning will be critical for success:Learning 24*7 will need to be the new normal in order to cope with the rate of change.For leaders and organisations to stay one step ahead and thrive they will need to embrace a change mindset and equip themselves with the skills needed in the future workplace.