New Research Shows a Perception Gap in Leadership Skills and Mindsets

Leaders today are facing a faster world and higher expectations from employees compared to their predecessors. With that in mind, we partnered with influencer and best selling author Jacob Morgan on global research (including a survey of 14,000 LinkedIn members) to get a handle on the future trends impacting leadership and the challenges leaders will face in the next decade. The qualitative research, that informs Jacob’s new book, The Future Leader, came from more than 140 CEOs around the world that Jacob interviewed.

Here’s what we learned: 

• Artificial Intelligence. Nearly 60% of respondents say AI will impact leadership over the next ten years. This finding is reflected in our most recent Emerging Jobs Report, which was dominated by job roles related to AI around the world, a trend we’ve seen for three years running. 
• Workforce Agility. In line with the growing importance of AI, 44% of respondents felt that adapting to technological advancements was a key challenge, followed by reskilling and upskilling employees, and keeping up with the overall pace of change. This is validated by McKinsey research that estimates 375M workers globally - or one-third of the US workforce - will need to jump to new occupational categories and learn new skills by 2030. Basic AI skills will become a part of the digital literacy we all need to be successful in our day-to-day lives. 
• Scarcity of Top Talent. As leaders prepare for the age of AI and digitization, we continue to see strong hiring numbers and competition for top talent. It’s no surprise that 45 percent of respondents said attracting and retaining top talent as the top challenge for leaders. 
• Purpose matters. More than half (53 percent) of respondents noted that leaders will need to possess a “purpose-driven and caring” mindset. We’ve seen this trend before… purpose is a driver of engagement based on data by Glint, a leader of employee engagement, and LinkedIn’s recent research found that 52 percent of millennials are redefining career goals by prioritizing values and purpose over a paycheck. While these trends are setting the stage for future leaders, there is a gap between how prepared leaders feel and the confidence employees have in them. Notably, in a world where trust is in short supply, more than 50% of respondents feel a lack of confidence in their leadership’s abilities to navigate these trends. That statistic is in contrast to the fact that 61% of leaders believe that they are "definitely prepared" for some of the trends outlined above.

This gap between how leaders feel and employees see them is a significant issue, especially at a time when change is accelerating.  How will leaders navigate the competitive landscape if their teams are not confident in their capability to navigate the future? 

To do this, up-leveling leadership soft skills will be essential. In fact, when asked which skills future leaders will need to possess, responses centered around soft skills, with the top being motivating, engaging and inspiring people (51%), being emotionally intelligent (39%), and listening and communication (34%). 

As leaders begin to address the top workforce challenges and move to close this confidence gap, it's also imperative that leaders also empower their teams to react to these changes on their own. In particular, as trends around AI and the scarcity of top talent continue, employees will increasingly seek employers that give them the tools and space to continuously learn new skills and grow professionally, thus future-proofing their own careers.