As we move through 2025, there are two key areas leaders must focus on to be successful – adapting to new trends and optimising current delivery. Both are key to future success. This is the viewpoint of Chris Roebuck, Global Leadership Speaker who in this month’s Retail Insight highlights the areas of focus for leaders that will accelerate success.
Future Trends
These trends are reshaping work and our organisations must adapt to them:
- Technological Integration: Leveraging AI and machine learning to enable data-driven decision-making.
- Hybrid and Remote Work: Maintaining work-life balance while fostering engagement and inclusivity.
- Purpose-Driven Leadership: Inspiring teams via a meaningful organisational vision.
Optimising Current Delivery
The challenge for leaders is in responding to these trends while delivering “business-as-usual” at the same time. This remains the core leadership test.
However there is a major problem preventing leaders from doing this effectively, one that is hidden, but which has massive negative impacts every day in every organisation.
It is the lack of foundational leadership skills development. As a result many leaders suffer the “too much work, not enough time” vicious circle. According to the Chartered Management Institute and my research – 82 per cent of leaders lack the critical management skills to do their jobs. As a result:
- About 80 per cent of leaders haven’t been taught to delegate effectively – losing them half a working day a week extra time they could use to inspire people
- Over 80 per cent of employees aren’t inspired to give their best
- Organisational performance is more than 23 per cent lower than it should be
- Your best employees are 50 per cent more likely to leave
- You could be losing out on more than 10 per cent of additional profit you could be getting
This is a long-standing problem. Despite the billions being spent on leadership development annually the percentage of employees giving their best has only risen by five per cent since 2005!
Accelerate Your Success Framework
To overcome these challenges, leaders must deliver on three critical areas:
1. Optimise Task Delivery
Leaders must be competent at:
- Prioritisation: Ensure alignment with strategic objectives
- Time Management and Planning: Deliver consistently and on time
- Delegation: Empower and develop team members while freeing leaders to focus on high-value tasks plus gaining half a day a week.
- Effective Communication: So people know what to do, why and the benefit
- Constructive Feedback: Regular input to inspire and develop skills.
Research shows there is significant room for improvement, Gallup found only 45 per cent of employees know what is expected of them at work.
2. Get the Best from People
To get the best from people, leaders need to focus on them as human beings, not just employees, by:
- Building trust, inspiration and belief
- Listening, offering praise and supporting career development
- Acting with integrity and fairness
These actions can boost effort by up to 30 per cent from 60 per cent of employees.
From their own experience every leader knows what actions get the best from people, but don’t know how to use them most effectively. This can be learnt in just an hour, delivering significant impact.
3. Focus on Strategic Alignment
Leaders must check operational activities align with strategic objectives by:
- Clarifying “line of sight” from individual tasks to organisational goals
- Reinforcing alignment through team discussions and regular feedback
Connecting employees work to the organisational vision they can get up to 35 per cent more effort. The big picture also boosts collaboration and external awareness, providing further competitive edge.
Getting these three steps in place then creates extra time and bandwidth for the fourth key step:
4. Entrepreneurial Leadership: Seizing Opportunities
As well as delivering operational excellence, leaders must develop an entrepreneurial mindset to seize opportunities. They need to enable everyone to be:
- Focused on delivering success not just their job
- Focused on the end customer
- Understanding and leveraging the whole organisation
- Optimising risk not minimising it
- Always looking for new ways to do things better
- Looking outside to seize opportunities
- Being a proactive brand ambassador
- Keeping it simple and efficient
Entrepreneurial Leadership can be developed by enabling corporate leaders to collaborate with entrepreneurs to develop entrepreneurial thinking.
Practical Steps to Develop Leaders Foundational Skills
- Training Programmes: Organisations should mandate foundational leadership skills training, especially for new leaders. A one-day program can provide a solid base and even a one-hour intense keynote can start the journey.
- Simple Actions: Ensure leaders regularly implement the actions above via performance management, regular communication and team meetings.
- Mindset Shift: Encourage entrepreneurial and diverse thinking.
Conclusion
By filling the foundational skill gaps via Accelerate Your Success leaders can reach their full potential quickly to deliver business-as-usual at an excellent level and have bandwidth to build the future.
Leaders who do this will be more successful for the rest of 2025 and beyond.
