The Optimistic Leader

It’s December, a month of emotions. Some of us are lifted by the joys of the holidays and ski season, and perhaps experiencing record productivity, awesome job satisfaction and ending the year on a professional high. Others may feel exhausted from project delays, disappointing earnings results, and the lack of daylight. Looking toward 2025, we may be thinking about leaning into the new year, a clean slate, a fresh start—with hope for good health, happiness and career gratification!

In KPMG’s 2024 CEO Outlook, the study found that 92 percent of CEOs surveyed from 11 markets (Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Spain, UK and US) “were optimistic about their organization’s future”. That is an encouraging and inspirational statistic—across the globe, optimistic leaders abound.

Optimism is more than a cheery disposition and hopeful outlook on life. Optimistic leaders have conviction around establishing a culture of positivism and productivity through a collective drive towards successful outcomes. These leaders practice results-driven habits that focus on managing teams and tasks effectively while finding solutions to obstacles and re-framing them as lessons learned, data points and meaningful indicators. Optimists walk the talk by leading with purpose, executing with a commitment to success, and are resilient to setbacks.

In optimistic leaders, look for positive energy, advanced business acumen, great interpersonal skills and strong relationships with their teams, peers and colleagues, stakeholders, clients—and even, “the competition”.? They have spacious and generous personalities—they’re keen listeners, open to opinions, willing to try new ways, adjust strategies and pivot. They manage with confidence and certainty; they’re direct, honest and matter-of-fact communicators, but also known to be emphatic and accepting.

Moreover, optimistic leaders continually motivate their teams and the people around them. Their leadership style is infectious and sparks trust, enthusiasm and belief in attaining challenging objectives. They inspire active learning, and improved problem solving and solutioning. Hope is currency, and optimistic leaders motivate, influence, and energize their teams.

A study by Michelle Gielan surveyed 2000+ Americans on their levels of optimism and financial health, and found that optimists are happier, have healthier bank accounts, and they do better over the course of their careers. They make more money and they’re more likely to be promoted. In addition, “they are six times more likely to be highly engaged at work, and five times less likely to burnout than pessimists.”

Psychologists who study theories of optimism believe it is an inherent trait and identify optimism as “a crucial aspect of human’s success in evolution”. Optimists utilize their ability to interpret situations and move forward assuredly to work toward favourable outcomes, in contrast to defaulting to negative behaviours around disappointment and hopelessness. “Optimism teaches us how to see what is going wrong and still be hopeful that it can be turned right.”

Nevertheless, at times optimists operate counter to realists and pessimists. Leaders need to manage pessimists – their go-to negative thinking will bring down a room with over-stated risks and inevitable doom.? Contrarily but also harmful, the “toxic optimist” can be off-putting, downright annoying, and out of touch with reality. The “realists” on the other hand, are in fact quasi-optimists—they voice cautiousness but are on-board and work hard to achieve desired results. According to Dr. Martin Seligman, former President of American Psychological Association and a researcher in the field of optimism, states that between optimism and pessimism lies “realism”, and identifies realists as “cautiously hopeful of favorable outcomes, but they do as much as they can to obtain the desired results… Realists believe that non-positive thoughts aren’t “always bad”.

Realists are a welcomed balance of collaboration and vigilance. Yet, over years of executive search, I believe optimistic leaders have an edge in that they possess the ability to “keep it real”.? An optimistic leader isn’t wearing rose-coloured glasses and won’t get blindsided. They’re well-connected to reality. Optimistic leaders will admit, that in times of difficulty they struggle too, but inevitably think their way out of big problems. They analyze and re-evaluate, rely on facts and data…and make good things happen. Optimism is a critical component of leadership effectiveness, however, building a team with both optimists and realists is optimal.

Finally, be optimistic for the sake of your health. Studies have proven that optimists enjoy healthier lives and live longer. Researchers found that the “most optimistic men and women demonstrated, on average, an 11 to 15 percent longer lifespan, and had 50-70 percent greater odds of reaching 85 years old compared to the least optimistic groups.”

Let’s head into the New Year with optimism—wishing you a successful 2025!

1.???KPMG 2024 CEO Outlook. https://kpmg.com/xx/en/our-insights/value-creation/kpmg-global-ceo-outlook-survey-2024.html

2.???Gielan, Michelle. “The Financial Upside of Being an Optimist”.? Harvard Business Review. March 12, 2019. https://hbr.org/2019/03/the-financial-upside-of-being-an-optimist

3.???Chowdhury, Madhuleena Roy.? 11 Optimism Exercises & Theories. PositivePsychology.com. December 10, 2019. https://positivepsychology.com/optimism-tools-exercises-examples/

4. ? Collingwood, Jane. “Realism and Optimism: Do you need both?”?? PsychCentral. May 17, 2016. https://psychcentral.com/lib/realism-and-optimism-do-you-need-both#1

5.???Boston University School of Medicine. “New evidence that optimists live longer.” ScienceDaily, August 26, 2019. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/08/190826150700.htm