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84% of CEOs are actively 'rebooting' their leadership teams to strengthen resilience

To keep up with and prepare for constantly evolving economies, CEOs around the world are taking the step to 'reboot' their C-suite leadership capabilities. In fact, the 2019 Global CEO Outlook report by KPMG, released yesterday (3 June), stated that C-level roles have already changed significantly over recent years, as CEOs respond to new demands facing them.

To respond to these demands, CEOs are increasingly focused on building resilience in their organisations, as a necessity in mastering disruption and maintaining momentum.

As such, they are finding ways to strengthen their leadership team. Henadi Al-Saleh, Chairperson, Agility, who was quoted in the report, explained: "In order to be resilient, a company has to have the right leadership and one with the right mindset. Building the right culture and organisational structure are crucial."

In line with that, 84% of CEOs surveyed are actively transforming their leadership teams to strengthen resilience.

The report also revealed how upskilling plans affect these transformations - for instance, in organisations with plans to upskill more than 51% of their workforce, 86% of the CEOs plan to also transform their leadership teams.

On the other hand, in organisations with plans to upskill less than 40% of the workforce, a lower 75% of CEOs plan to transform their leadership teams.

Be agile, or be irrelevant

Apart from transforming leadership capabilities, CEOs are embracing the growing need for agility in their organisations. They are becoming more customer-centric, while increasing their speed of innovation and collaborations across organisational boundaries.

Fiona Grandi, National Managing Partner for Innovation & Enterprise Solutions at KPMG US, said: "Companies that innovate well have a CEO who develops and promotes an innovation strategy."

Additionally, the survey found an increase in CEOs who said 'acting with agility is the new currency of business; if we're too slow, we will be bankrupt," from 59% last year to 67% this year.

 

Methodology

The survey data published in this report is based on a survey of 1,300 CEOs in 11 of the world's largest economies: Australia, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Spain, the UK and the US. The survey was conducted between 8 January and 20 February 2019.

The CEOs operate in 11 key industries: asset management, automotive, banking, consumer and retail, energy, infrastructure, insurance, life sciences, manufacturing, technology, and telecommunications.

Read the full report here. 

Graphic / KPMG

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