2025. That date looms large for me, as we're mid decade, at that turning point in a decade of change that over the last four centuries has heralded major industrial advancements. But it's not just 2025, it's that mid decade which can be so powerful in moving things forward. If we just look back over recent decades.
1995 was the year that changed technology. Amazon and Ebay were founded, Playstation moved into the US, and Microsoft created windows 95 (remember that? Sadly I do!)
2005 brought You Tube Firefox, 3G cellular networks and the first software for visually impaired users.
2015 saw the Apple Watch, Teslas self driving cars, real time voice translator from Skype, Emergent AI and the digital genome.
We’re now moving towards Industry 5.0, as coined by the Leadership Futures report released jointly by Henley Business School, Reading University and the World of Work Institute. This brings us to the era of humanmachine collaboration, where we will have to grapple with challenges we haven’t faced in two generations when technology changes how we work for ever. Gen Alpha will be in the workplace in the next two years, joining five generations who all have a different relationship with technology. This brings us leaders increasing challenges for how we engage with, and shape the workplace of the now and the future.
The European Commission has stated that this new era is “defined by a re-found and widened purposefulness, going beyond producing goods and services for profit.” For some this will be normal, for others a real shift in focus as we must become more conscious of the macro trends impacting society and industry. The world of work and leadership is changing rapidly, and to stay relevant we need to change with it.
PWC’s 27th Global CEO survey in 2024 found that “45% of CEOs believe their company will not be viable in 10 years if it stays on it’s current path”. Trust and engagement with societal institutions and organisations is generally low, ESR is crucial for everyone, technology is changing more rapidly than we can adopt it.
Therefore our focus becomes clear: we need to lean into people, purpose and technology as leaders if we are to enable ourselves and our organisations to be in the best place to ride the curve of change. So I wonder…
Who is the leader you are becoming? I’ll let that sit with you for a little.
Think back. You will have had many transformations in your career, many roles and potentially many versions of being a leader. Some of this will have happened naturally, some of it will have been enforced change through roles or organisations. Some of it may even have been intentional through a period of personal development.
As we develop though, we don’t always emerge like butterflies, shedding our previous cocoons of past lives to fly off in our new one. Instead we hang on to behaviours, ways of working, thought processes, beliefs and patterns – many of which are long past their sell by date. These are our tried and tested ways of working and being, some which may even have come from childhood.
I wonder, are they serving you well? Are they allowing you to thrive, or, are they increasingly getting in the way, holding you back, not quite fitting with the current and future version of you.
To operate effectively in this new world of work, we’ll need to engage on an increasingly human level, and dial up those essential, never soft, skills which we may have neglected over the years as too fluffy, or unimportant. They are the ones that will enable us to connect to our people, engage them with our purpose, and lead them effectively into Industry 5.0.
Where then do you need to lean in, what needs to be dialed up or down, and where might you focus your development to move from a doing leader to a being leader? More on that next month…
Annabel is an Executive and Team Coach, Leadership Facilitator and Coach Supervisor.
If you would like to explore what’s next for your development Contact Annabel via LinkedIn, annabel@successfultraining.co.uk, or visit www.successfultraining.co.uk