Top Leadership Skills for 2025 3 minute read Written by Shawn Bakker, Psychologist Effective leaders combine management skills with a broader set of leadership capabilities that enable them to solve complex problems, adapt to change, and learn as they go. In our work with new leaders, we have identified three skill gaps that they need to address to shift from individual contributors to true leaders. Gap #1 – Response Scope Effective leaders tackle situations with a broad response scope. They consider long-range implications, and the breadth and depth of issues. Too often we see new leaders respond to complex situations with overly simple solutions and treat symptoms rather than causes. The work environment for new leaders can make it difficult to dig deeper. With daily pressures to get things done quickly, leaders can get stuck on focusing on what needs to be done, without considering why. So rather than exercising leadership, they end up being micro-managers. To broaden their response scope leaders, need to do the following: Prioritize – with clear priorities, leaders know which issues they must devote the time and effort to explore more fully. Challenge Assumptions – when tackling priorities, do not make assumptions. Fact over fiction needs to be the mantra. Be Curious – if you want to get to the root cause of an issue, ask questions and involve a wide range of stakeholders. Gap #2 – Adaptability Our research with the Work Personality Index shows that new leaders are consistently less flexible and more reliant on structures and procedures than senior leaders. Individuals at the beginning of their leadership careers emphasize planning, organization and efficiency at the expense of gathering information and adapting to new opportunities. Peter Drucker famously said, “There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.” New leaders need to utilize a combination of planned and emergent strategies. This involves building a strategy, implementing it, responding to feedback and opportunities that emerge, and then adapting. Gap #3 – Reflection To broaden their response scope and be more adaptive, leaders need to engage in more reflection. The best leaders learn from their experiences by reflecting on their experiences. Leaders who don’t reflect fail to recognize the root causes of issues – they lack response scope. Leaders who don’t reflect fail to change with the times – they are less adaptable. Purposeful reflection can utilize the format of after-action-reviews or post-mortems. The essence of these reviews is to take time to consider what learning and growth opportunities can be discovered. After key events, leaders should set aside some time and answer the following questions: How can I use this success to grow and develop? What can I learn from this failure? What went well? What could have gone better? What will I do differently next time? To dig deeper into these topics, and how organizations can better support the development of these leadership capabilities, you can view my recent webinar: Developing Leaders – Top Leadership Skills for 2025. Watch On-Demand
