Terence Mauri: Biggest leadership challenges for 2023 - HRD (2023)

The big story for leaders in 2023 is Forever Beta, which I define as leadership and acceptance of constant transformation. Recently I was invited to give a lectureNordic Economic Forumabout the future of management and how many managers are currently caught between the certainties of the past and the unknowns of the future.

I think a change of perspective is worth at least 80 IQ points because your current perceptions are based on your previous assumptions. New perception – the ability to see, hear or become aware of something new in existing information and to notice the blind spots we are blinded to – is at the heart of leadership and essential to maintaining long-term workplace vitality.

One of the clearest signs of a high learning orientation is rethinking your assumptions and updating your opinions. It involves directionality (clarity of mind) and materiality (activation). On the brink of uncertainty, context becomes key. Leaders must determine their context, culture and pace skillsensure future viability. It means:

• context over control;
• curiosity about conformity;
• resilience to fear;
• speed over safety;
• And simplicity instead of complexity

Forever betais defined as a leadership and management style that inspires employees to challenge the status quo and reject self-evident norms. It starts with the curiosity to learn and the courage to unlearn. Learning helps leaders grow and unlearning helps as the world evolves.

Biggest leadership challenges for 2023

If there is one challenge for business leaders in 2023, it is to remember that data is not the new oil. Attention is the new oil. Attention to culture and talent. Focus on tightening the growth and value agenda. Attention to the introduction of new agile management methods. And attention to redesigning work that prioritizes belonging (caring and attachment), becoming (growth and opportunity) and faith (radiating meaning and trust).

Research from the Hack Future Lab shows that attention—especially executive attention—has exploded into millions of fragmented pixels, and that the accelerators have been technology and the changing nature of skills, talent, and sustained performance.

• 93% of leaders believe their leadership awareness is key to growth, but only 27% believe it is a strength.
• 68% of leaders report that they or their teams are at risk of becoming overwhelmed and overwhelmed.
• 63% of executives say business decisions made today are more complex than they were two years ago.
• 41% of executives can connect decision-making to business value and strategy.
• 28% of leaders responsible for executing strategy could name only three of their organization's five strategic priorities.

This is the main findingManagers are tired. zoom fatigue. face exhaustion. cooperation fatigue. resolution fatigue. brain fog. With over $41 trillion in enterprise value at stake and 93% of executives expecting significant industry disruption over the next three years.

Horisontens tragedy

I was recently invited to speak with Mark Carney, former governor of the Bank of England, at a leadership conference on the future of leadership. A defining moment of truth was the "tragedy of the horizon"—a leadership blind spot that plagues most leaders. It does not mean leading from the future instead of the past. Leading from the future means curiosity instead of conformity, resilience instead of fear, and agency instead of "false empowerment." If we lead in an outdated way, it is an attack on human potential and the potential of the future.

What is worst? 1. We have seen the trends on the horizon. or 2. We saw the trends on the horizon and did not act? Research from the Hack Future Lab shows that in order to lead from the future, leaders need to bring the future into the present to act today. Thus the tragedy of the horizon can be solved.

A useful starting point is to ask people-oriented questions that improve sensory perception and decision-making. What are the boldest questions you want to ask in 2023?

✅ Are we exercising courageous and focused leadership?
✅ Are we minimizing or maximizing freedom and responsibility?
✅ Commercialization or humanization of work experience?
✅ Are we obsessed with values ​​and not just statistics?
✅ Do we enable smart decisions, not just the fastest ones?
✅ Are we amplifying the existing human genius?

Most organizations also lack a strategic orientation. No one knows your strategy. Not even your top managers. Hack Future Lab's survey of S&P 500 companies found that only 28% of executives responsible for executing strategy could name three of the five strategic priorities for their organization.

Today's challenges cannot be solved with yesterday's logic. Leaders must focus on three priorities and adopt a “no” strategy to separate the signal from the noise and get things done.

1. Who we are (reinforces identity)
2. How we work (Enabling Agility)
3. How We Grow (Build Scalability)

Call to action for 2023

As leaders respond to continued inflation, supply chain shocks, Green Swan events, recessions and the war in Ukraine, there are worries and anxieties, but enough is being done to foster bold leadership that matters: value creation, human vitality and long-term resilient growth. I challenge leaders to be the change in 2023 and explore two big questions.

1. How can we harness the disruptive forces of recent years and empower others to BE the change with bold intentions?

2. Do we have the right mindset, culture and behavior to achieve this? If not, why not?

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Thonor Mauriwas described by Thinkers50 as "an influential and outspoken thinker on change and the future of management".

He is the founder of a global management think tank, Hack Future Lab, an entrepreneurial mentor at MIT and an adjunct professor at IE Business School, where he talks about leading and embracing change and unleashing the DNA of courageous leadership.

A new releaseBuilding resilient organizationsco-authored with the world's leading business thinkers in collaboration with Thinkers50 and the Brightline Initiative.

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