Tag: perspectives

  • The Wharton Blueprint for A.I. Agent Adoption by Wharton

    The Wharton Blueprint for A.I. Agent Adoption by Wharton

    About the paper

    The report is a mixed-methods synthesis rather than a single original study: it combines recent academic research on human-AI interaction, practitioner perspectives from executives at firms deploying AI agents, and recommendations from Wharton faculty.

    It does not present one unified sample or fieldwork design; instead, it draws on multiple experiments, surveys, working papers, and case-informed expert contributions, with sample sizes and geographies varying by cited study and not clearly specified at the report level.

    Length: 47 pages

    More information / download:
    https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/special-report/wharton-blueprint-ai-agent-adoption/

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report?

    The report’s core argument is that AI agent adoption is no longer mainly constrained by technology, but by psychology. The authors argue that many people are still unwilling to let AI agents perform meaningful tasks on their behalf, not because the systems cannot do anything useful, but because users hesitate to believe that the agent is competent, to trust it, and to hand over control. The report therefore frames adoption as a behavioural and design challenge rather than a purely technical one.

    It organises this adoption problem into three “psychological frictions”:

    • perceived competence
    • trust
    • and delegation of control.

    These are presented as the three core barriers that developers and organisations must overcome if they want broader acceptance of AI agents. In other words, the report is not asking only whether agents work; it is asking what makes people willing to let them work on their behalf in real settings.

    The report is also quite explicit that this is a practical blueprint. It is designed for people building or deploying AI agents and aims to translate behavioural science into design recommendations. That makes its purpose strongly applied: it is less about theorising AI adoption in the abstract and more about showing how organisations can reduce resistance and increase real-world uptake.

    2. How does the report explain the first friction, perceived competence, and what makes users believe an AI agent can do the job?

    The first friction is perceived competence, which the report defines as the user’s subjective belief in the agent’s ability to perform desired actions. The key point here is that perceived competence is not the same as technical capability. An agent may be highly capable in a technical sense, but if users do not experience it as capable, they will still hesitate to adopt it.

    The report argues that users prefer agents that appear competent rather than warm. Across cited experiments, people were less willing to use AI that sounded cheerful or friendly than AI that signalled expertise, consistency, and reasoning. Competence cues included explaining criteria, showing reasoning, and making recommendations in a way that felt rigorous rather than overly personable. In practice, the report suggests that in serious domains such as health, finance, law, and professional work, a warm personality can actually undermine adoption if it makes the system seem less capable.

    Another major idea is that people judge whether the agent adds value. In the report’s discussion of AI-enabled travel agents, four factors shaped that perception:

    • convenience
    • personalisation
    • ubiquity
    • and superior functionality.

    At the same time, benefits alone are not enough. Privacy concerns, technology anxiety, and the desire for human interaction can still depress adoption even when users recognise obvious advantages. That means perceived competence depends both on positive cues about usefulness and on reducing perceived reasons not to engage.

    The report also places strong weight on explanations. In high-stakes contexts, users felt AI was more reliable and safer when it explained its process in detail, including the steps taken, data considered, or method used. Explanations therefore function not only as transparency, but as a signal of seriousness and quality. Finally, the report argues that agents can borrow competence from humans: when AI is presented as supporting a credible human expert rather than acting as an equal or rival, resistance falls and competence rises. This is one of the clearest examples of the report’s broader logic that adoption depends heavily on perception and framing.

    3. What does the report say about trust, and which factors most strongly increase or weaken trust in AI agents?

    The second friction is trust, defined as the user’s willingness to rely on the AI agent despite uncertainty. The report presents trust as central because AI agents are not just offering information; they are potentially taking action. That raises the stakes, since users must feel confident not only in what the system says but in what it might do.

    One of the strongest findings is that trust improves when users understand the agent’s limitations. The report cites experiments showing that people trusted AI more, and worked more effectively with it, when they were explicitly told where it was likely to fail. Rather than undermining confidence, acknowledging weaknesses helped users feel that they understood the system’s boundaries and therefore knew when to rely on it and when to be cautious. This is an important insight because it runs against the instinct to present AI as broadly capable and seamless.

    The report also argues that proof of successful outcomes often matters more than technical explanations. Users were more persuaded by evidence that the agent had successfully performed similar tasks before than by detailed accounts of how the system worked internally. The implication is that many users do not primarily want interpretability in a technical sense; they want reassurance that the system delivers results. Similarly, trust rises when agents reduce uncertainty before, during, and after use by making goals explicit, showing steps as they happen, and demonstrating how feedback improves future actions.

    Other trust-building mechanisms in the report include making the agent seem as though it understands the user’s goals, labelling it as “learning” or “improving,” using precise rather than rounded numbers, and tailoring outputs to specific user criteria rather than generic averages. The report repeatedly warns against the opposite pattern: trust falls when AI feels generic, when it seems to optimise for “most users,” or when it makes the process so effortless that users feel detached from the outcome. That last point is especially interesting, because the report suggests that convenience alone does not guarantee trust; too much automation can reduce psychological ownership and make people less willing to accept the result.

    4. How does the report understand delegation of control, and what level of autonomy does it recommend?

    The third friction is delegation of control, which the report defines as the user’s willingness to grant the AI the autonomy required to act on their behalf. This is where adoption becomes most sensitive, because an AI agent can move from being a helpful assistant to something that feels intrusive or disempowering.

    The report’s clearest conclusion is that people prefer a moderate level of autonomy. Too little autonomy makes the agent feel burdensome and not worth using, because the human has to micromanage it. Too much autonomy makes people feel that their freedom and control are being taken away. The recommended design pattern is therefore “human in the loop”: the agent should do meaningful preparatory or analytical work, but final decisions or key approvals should remain visible and accessible to the user.

    Control is not just about actual permissions; it is also about felt control. The report highlights research showing that concerns about control account for a substantial share of people’s decision whether to adopt AI. It therefore recommends making edit, pause, stop, reverse, and review options highly visible. Users need to know not only that controls exist, but where they sit and how easily they can be used. This is consistent with the report’s wider emphasis on transparency, checkpoints, and reversibility.

    The report adds two further nuances. First, adoption increases when users feel the agent is “theirs,” for example through naming, setup choices, or preferences, because ownership increases willingness to invest attention and effort. Second, the report notes that people rely more on AI under pressure, because repeated evaluation is cognitively costly. Yet it does not recommend manufacturing urgency; instead, it suggests using real workflow pressures to make AI the easier default. The overall message is that delegation works best when autonomy is earned gradually, bounded clearly, and embedded in a structure where the human still feels like the principal actor.

    5. What are the report’s wider implications for organisations, and what limitations does it acknowledge?

    For organisations, the report implies that successful AI agent deployment depends as much on behavioural design, workflow design, and communication as on model performance. The most important practical lesson is that adoption is unlikely to follow automatically from capability. Even if agents can perform useful tasks, users may resist them unless systems are positioned as competent, transparent, bounded, and supportive rather than all-powerful or frictionless. In organisational terms, this means deployment strategies must address psychology deliberately.

    The report’s recommendations point towards a fairly specific organisational philosophy. Agents should be framed as assistants, not authorities; they should explain their reasoning in business terms; they should show users what they are doing before, during, and after action; and they should operate within structures resembling job descriptions, permissions, escalation paths, and measurable outcomes. This effectively treats AI agents less like magical automation and more like junior or specialist collaborators who require oversight, governance, and staged trust-building.

    At the same time, the report is careful to acknowledge limitations. It explicitly states that this is based on the current best scientific evidence in a rapidly evolving field, and that many insights are extrapolated from adjacent AI and organisational behaviour research because AI agents themselves are still relatively novel. The report also notes limitations study by study: many cited findings come from experiments, hypothetical scenarios, specific sectors such as travel, healthcare, e-commerce, or financial advice, or controlled lab environments rather than long-term real-world deployments. That means the blueprint is evidence-informed, but not final or universally settled.

    So the deeper implication is twofold. First, organisations should not wait for perfect certainty before designing for adoption, because the report offers a strong behavioural framework already. Second, they should treat these recommendations as a living playbook, to be tested, adapted, and updated as both the science and the technology mature. That combination of confidence and caution is one of the report’s defining features.

  • Fast + Flexible – 2026 C-suite Perspectives Study by Padilla

    Fast + Flexible – 2026 C-suite Perspectives Study by Padilla

    About the paper

    The paper is a mixed-methods report on how C-suite leaders are approaching uncertainty, workforce change, AI, hybrid work, well-being, social impact, and DEI/ESG positioning in 2026.

    Padilla says it combines an online survey of 100 C-suite executives and 1,000 employed adults, more than 60 interviews with C-suite leaders analysed using both AI and human interpretation, and desk research conducted in the latter half of 2025; the geographic scope appears U.S.-focused, but the respondent geography is not clearly specified in the report.

    Length: 10 pages

    More information / download:
    https://padillaco.com/c-suite-perspectives-2026

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about the 2026 C-suite mindset?

    The core argument is that senior leaders are no longer waiting for uncertainty to pass. Instead, they are treating instability as a permanent condition and responding by trying to move faster while keeping room to pivot. The report frames this as a shift from earlier stages of disruption management toward a new posture it calls “fast + flexible.” It explicitly contrasts previous years’ mindsets — “conflicted” in 2023, “fatigue + focus” in 2024, and “moving ahead” in 2025 — with a 2026 mood defined by urgency, adaptability and momentum.

    That shift is not presented as optimism in the simple sense. The report says leaders want more stability, but do not expect to get it. In other words, their confidence is pragmatic rather than serene. They are trying to make decisions under pressure, operate through volatility, and show progress despite persistent ambiguity. This is especially visible in the report’s emphasis on inflation, policy change, regulation, AI and innovation as rising leadership challenges.

    For communicators, the deeper meaning is that organisations are entering a period where flexibility itself becomes a strategic capability. The report suggests that leadership credibility now depends less on promising certainty and more on showing agility, direction and steadiness amid ongoing turbulence.

    2. Where does the report find the biggest gaps between leaders and employees?

    The report’s most important pattern is a recurring perception gap between the C-suite and employees. It argues that leaders and employees do not experience organisational reality in the same way, and that this divergence is now showing up across several high-stakes issues. The report even describes this as a kind of “K-shape” divide in viewpoints between leadership and employees.

    The clearest gap concerns change readiness. According to the report, 67% of leaders believe employees are “fully” or “very” well equipped to embrace and support change initiatives, while only 43% of employees agree. That is a substantial disconnect, especially given that the changes in question include AI, mergers and acquisitions, and leadership transitions. The report interprets this as evidence that some leaders may be overestimating workforce readiness.

    A second gap concerns well-being. Leaders say their own well-being has improved and are also relatively upbeat about employee well-being, with 48% believing employee well-being has improved. Only 25% of employees say the same. Importantly, when people do report improvements, the report says these are tied more to personal boundaries, health and self-care than to better workplace conditions or stronger business performance. That weakens any claim that organisations themselves have solved the well-being issue.

    A third gap appears around AI. The report says 88% of leaders describe their organisations as adopting AI aggressively or selectively, yet only 43% of employees view AI as a net benefit to their job. The report is careful here: it does not present employees as outright rejecting AI, but rather as uncertain about its value and impact. That distinction matters, because uncertainty can still become resistance if not addressed.

    Taken together, these gaps support one of the report’s strongest underlying messages: organisational change is not just about strategic decisions at the top, but about whether employees understand, trust and can absorb those decisions.

    3. What does the study say about the leadership qualities now seen as most necessary?

    The report argues that leadership today requires an unusual combination of traditional authority and human openness. It says the three most important “classic” leadership qualities are credibility, vision and authenticity, which together create what the report calls a paradoxical need to show both certainty and vulnerability.

    What has risen most sharply, however, are qualities associated with toughness and steadiness under pressure. On page 4, the visual “Qualities on the Rise” shows the biggest year-over-year increases for fearlessness (+18), stoicism (+14), vision (+13), certainty (+13), authenticity (+7) and inclusivity (+7). That pattern is revealing. It suggests leaders feel pressure to be decisive, resilient and unflinching, but also to remain credible through honesty and attentive listening.

    The report does not celebrate hard-edged leadership on its own. It explicitly warns that while leaders may be leaning into traditional executive traits to power through uncertainty, employees may need more empathy, transparency and humanity in order to come along with them. So the model of leadership implied here is not pure command-and-control. It is stronger than that in one sense, but softer than that in another: leaders must project direction without pretending to know everything.

    This has direct communication implications. The report says employees and leaders are broadly aligned on which traits matter, and that communicators can use this alignment to support strategy. That means internal communication should not just explain decisions; it should also help leaders perform the right balance of realism, openness and conviction.

    4. How does the report interpret current organisational flashpoints such as hybrid work, AI, social issues, and DEI/ESG?

    The report treats these issues not as isolated debates but as examples of a wider strategic tension: leaders want to keep adapting quickly, but employees do not always share their assumptions or pace. Hybrid work is a good example. The report says 79% of leaders expect their organisations to maintain or move toward hybrid models, but 21% are becoming stricter about in-office policies. Its interpretation is that organisations have settled into hybrid work operationally, but not psychologically or culturally. In other words, hybrid remains workable, but unresolved.

    AI is presented as having crossed an inflection point. The report says it is no longer seen by the C-suite as experimental, but as core infrastructure. Yet employee uncertainty remains significant. The implication the report draws is not merely that firms need AI tools, but that they need a clear narrative about AI’s intent, value and expectations. It explicitly recommends combining change management with thought leadership around AI. That is a notable framing, because it positions communication not as a support function after adoption, but as part of adoption itself.

    On social issues, the report suggests leaders are more willing to speak out than before, but selectively and mainly when issues are directly relevant to the business. It says 54% of leaders believe it is important to speak out on relevant external social issues, while 26% of employees think their companies are avoiding taking a stand at all costs. The report’s explanation is that companies may now be communicating their positions more internally or to directly affected groups, rather than through broad public declarations.

    On DEI and ESG, the report argues that language is changing more than underlying intent. It says these commitments still rank low as formal C-suite priorities, but the benefits associated with them remain valued. On page 7, the report says organisations are using alternative terms such as belonging, inclusion, fairness, representation and culture instead of DEI, while ESG is increasingly treated as “good business hygiene” focused on practical actions such as emissions reductions, efficiency and sustainable sourcing. The key idea is not abandonment, but repositioning in more business-linked language.

    5. What are the main implications for communicators and organisations?

    The report’s most consistent conclusion is that communication now has to do more than inform. It has to reduce gaps in perception, build trust in leadership intent, and help organisations carry people through instability. Nearly every section ends with an implication that points back to communication as a strategic enabler rather than a downstream messaging function.

    First, communicators need to treat change readiness as a live organisational risk. Since leaders appear more confident than employees about workforce preparedness, internal communication should not assume readiness; it has to build it. That means clearer explanations, more deliberate engagement, and more effort to create what the report calls change-resilient cultures.

    Second, communicators have an especially important role in AI. The report makes clear that executive enthusiasm alone is not enough. Employees need a believable account of why AI is being used, where it adds value, what expectations apply, and how risks are being managed. In effect, AI adoption requires narrative leadership as much as technical implementation.

    Third, the report suggests that hybrid work, well-being, and social-impact positions all require stronger internal sense-making. Tightening office expectations without buy-in may damage retention. Assuming employee well-being has improved may mask unresolved strain. Taking stands selectively without explaining the “why, when and how” may create internal scepticism. In all three cases, silence or vague messaging widens the gap between leadership intent and employee interpretation.

    Finally, the broader strategic implication is that communicators should help leaders embody the report’s central formula: move fast, but not blindly; stay flexible, but not vague; build momentum, but through alignment, clarity and trust. That is the real communication agenda running through the entire study.

  • FGS Global Radar 2026 – A Rewired World by FGS

    FGS Global Radar 2026 – A Rewired World by FGS

    About the paper

    The report argues that 2026 will be shaped by a “rewired” world marked by geopolitical fragmentation, deep public pessimism, widening gaps between elites and citizens, accelerating AI adoption, and increasingly atomised influence systems.

    It is a mixed-methods report based on 175 in-depth interviews with senior leaders and policy experts across business, politics, academia and media, combined with nationally representative polling of roughly 20,000 people across the US, Canada, the EU member states, the UK and Japan; public results are averaged across markets with equal weighting by country or bloc.

    The report is explicit about scale and broad geography, but does not clearly specify fieldwork dates or detailed polling procedures beyond that summary.

    Length: 56 pages

    More information / download:
    https://fgsglobal.com/radar

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about the state of the world in 2026?

    The core argument is that the world is no longer merely volatile or uncertain; it has been fundamentally “rewired”. The report says the post-war rules-based order is fragmenting, international institutions are weakening, and politics is increasingly driven by strong leaders, national interest and spheres of influence rather than shared values or multilateral norms. It presents this as the defining context for 2026, with the US and China setting the pace and the rest of the world being forced to adapt.

    The report also argues that this rewiring is not only geopolitical. It is economic, technological and communicative. Economically, it sees a K-shaped pattern in which gains accrue unevenly, especially to high-income groups and tech-related sectors. Technologically, AI is portrayed as a major driver of practical business change, labour-market disruption and geopolitical competition. Communicatively, influence is becoming atomised, with mainstream media and traditional institutions losing authority while fragmented digital networks and AI-mediated information systems gain power.

    For leaders, the implication is that older assumptions about stability, consensus and institutional mediation are no longer dependable. The report’s message is that success in 2026 will depend on combining long-term strategic clarity with the agility to respond to constant disruption.

    2. What evidence does the report provide that public pessimism and distrust have reached a critical level?

    One of the report’s strongest findings is the depth and breadth of public pessimism across the 27 countries it polled. It says that in all 27 countries, substantial majorities believe the political system is failing ordinary people and needs fundamental reform, that public institutions are wasteful and badly run, that national identity is disappearing, that democracy is weakening, and that life will be harder for the next generation. It adds that 73% say their country feels divided. Denmark is singled out as the only country where one of these pessimistic propositions is not supported by a majority, which underscores how widespread the mood is elsewhere.

    The report interprets this as more than routine dissatisfaction. It explicitly says this level of pessimism is not normal and may not be sustainable. It describes a widening gap between elites and the broader public, especially in Europe, Japan and Canada, where confidence in governments and institutions is said to be collapsing. It also notes that even people who dislike Donald Trump may still admire his disruptive capacity to act, because many citizens feel conventional institutions no longer deliver results.

    Distrust also extends to information systems. In the stakeholder section, the report says only Denmark and Finland have more people trusting than mistrusting mainstream news media, while 61% overall believe mainstream media have their own agenda and cannot be trusted to report fairly. Politicians are described as the least trusted information source in every country surveyed. That finding strengthens the report’s wider claim that legitimacy is eroding across both politics and media.

    3. Which major divides does the report identify, and why do they matter?

    The report argues that 2026 will be defined by multiple reinforcing divides rather than one single cleavage. The first is the divide between elite and public opinion. Experts tend to see trade-offs as unavoidable on issues such as taxation, AI governance and business incentives, while the public often believes there are simple solutions if only better leaders were in charge. That gap matters because it creates fertile ground for populism and makes it harder for governments to build support for difficult but realistic policies.

    A second divide is between old and young. The report says both generations feel resources are skewed unfairly towards the other, while many experts fear that wealth transfer through inheritance will make success depend more on family assets than enterprise. At the same time, polling suggests younger generations are somewhat more optimistic than older ones in the short term, even though the public overall thinks life will be harder for the next generation. This divide matters because it combines economic frustration with perceptions of intergenerational unfairness.

    A third divide is between the engaged and the disengaged. Younger adults are less likely to follow politics and more likely to think voting makes no difference. The report says disengaged people are more likely to distrust others, believe globalisation has gone too far, downplay climate change and believe conspiracy theories. This matters because democratic systems depend on participation and basic confidence in shared reality.

    A fourth divide is between the global north and south, especially on climate and development. Experts argue that climate impacts are increasingly tangible in the global south, while economic pressure and populism in the north are pushing climate lower down the agenda. Yet publics in the surveyed democracies broadly oppose sending money overseas for climate or development support. This matters because climate disruption and migration pressures are likely to intensify just as willingness for cross-border solidarity weakens.

    4. How does the report portray the outlook for geopolitics, the economy, AI and climate in 2026?

    On geopolitics, the report expects 2026 to be shaped by strong leaders and weaker institutions. It presents the US and China as the two dominant powers, with more grey-zone conflict, strategic rivalry in trade and technology, and the rest of the world struggling to align. It says public pessimism is high about both US-China relations and the chances of peace in the Middle East and Ukraine. Europe is portrayed as pivotal but vulnerable: admired for stability, yet anxious about its competitiveness, growth and geopolitical relevance.

    On the economy, the report describes “a tale of two economies”. Experts are split between cautious optimists, who think the global economy will muddle through, and pessimists, who believe it is structurally fragile and overdue for correction. The report highlights over-leverage in the West, inflationary pressure, and heavy concentration of value in the “Magnificent 7” tech stocks. At the public level, affordability dominates: inflation and cost of living appear as the most important issue in several major markets, and many people believe growth mainly benefits those already well off.

    On AI, the report says the debate has shifted from whether AI will matter to how it will be implemented and with what consequences. Experts expect significant business evolution rather than total revolution, including agentic AI, more conversational models, greater robotisation and practical implementation across functions such as customer service, HR, finance and software development. But both experts and publics are concerned about employment effects: 70% of the public believe AI will destroy more jobs than it creates, and large majorities support stronger regulation and higher taxation of AI companies.

    On energy and sustainability, the report argues that current systems are not fit for purpose. Experts think infrastructure, regulation and planning are too slow to support either economic competitiveness or climate goals. Public concern about climate change remains high, but so do concerns about affordability. The report finds that most people support progress towards carbon neutrality at a slower pace to limit financial pain, rather than pushing ahead as fast as possible regardless of price increases.

    5. What perspective does the report take on leadership, and what are its main practical implications?

    The report clearly adopts a leadership-oriented perspective. It is written for decision-makers in business and politics, and its practical conclusion is that leadership in 2026 requires more than technical competence. Leaders need to understand fragmented realities, operate amid contested legitimacy, and make strategy resilient to volatility rather than built for stability. The report explicitly recommends building a “reality function” to interpret fractured environments, rebuilding strategy around volatility, treating affordability and fairness as non-negotiable constraints, and handling AI as both a capability issue and a social contract issue.

    Its assumptions are also visible. The report assumes that institutional weakening, pessimism and fragmentation are durable enough to shape business strategy directly. It assumes that political backlash, distrust and perceived unfairness will increasingly constrain what organisations can do. It also assumes that influence is no longer governed by a stable hierarchy of media, parties and institutions, but by a messy system of competing networks, platforms and AI-shaped information flows.

    The final practical message is that leaders must combine strategy, agility, authenticity and storytelling. Strategy matters because organisations need a stable destination. Agility matters because the route will keep changing. Authenticity matters because legitimacy is constantly contested. Storytelling matters because fragmented audiences do not absorb complexity easily, and leaders have to repeat and clarify their message in a crowded, distrustful environment. In that sense, the report is not just a diagnosis of 2026; it is also a guide to the leadership style it believes that environment now demands.

  • The New CCAO and CCO Mandate by United Minds

    The New CCAO and CCO Mandate by United Minds

    About the paper

    The paper examines how Chief Corporate Affairs Officers and Chief Communications Officers are adapting to political volatility, cultural complexity, economic uncertainty, and AI-enabled communications work.

    It is an original qualitative research report based on semi-structured, in-depth interviews with CCOs and CCAOs from Fortune 1000 companies, conducted over two months in early 2025; the exact number of participants is not clearly specified in the report.

    The geographic scope includes both U.S.-based and European corporate affairs leaders.

    Length: 8 pages

    More information / download:
    https://webershandwick.com/news/new-ccao-and-cco-mandate-navigating-a-new-era-of-corporate-leadership

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report?

    The report argues that the corporate affairs and communications function has not retreated in importance as companies have pulled back from the more visible social-issue positioning of the early 2020s. Instead, CCAOs and CCOs have become less publicly visible but more strategically central inside the enterprise.

    The core claim is that corporate affairs leaders are now expected to help companies navigate a volatile intersection of business, politics, culture, stakeholder expectations, employee sentiment, and reputation risk. Their mandate is no longer simply to explain corporate decisions after the fact. They are increasingly expected to help shape those decisions before they are made.

    The report frames this as a shift from communications as a reactive function to corporate affairs as a source of enterprise foresight. The ideal corporate affairs function, according to the report, helps leaders anticipate risk, understand stakeholder dynamics, interpret political and cultural signals, and protect the company’s licence to operate.

    2. How is the CCAO/CCO role changing in relation to business strategy?

    The report’s first major theme is that corporate affairs leaders are becoming proactive business partners. Their value increasingly lies in their ability to translate political, regulatory, cultural, and stakeholder signals into business implications.

    This means they are not only advising on messages, positioning, or crisis response. They are helping business leaders understand where external pressures may require changes to products, operations, stakeholder engagement, or risk management. One example in the report describes a policy-related issue around a consumer product where corporate affairs brought data to the business, prompting an eight-week sprint that helped resolve product issues and changed the relationship between corporate affairs and the product leader.

    The report presents corporate affairs leaders as “orchestrators” across functions. Because they sit close to the CEO agenda and have an enterprise-wide view, they can connect information from legal, policy, HR, product, finance, operations, communications, and external stakeholders. Their strategic value comes from synthesising those signals into business intelligence.

    The practical recommendation is to build formal cross-functional intelligence networks and develop ways to quantify external risk in financial terms. In other words, corporate affairs must be able to speak the language of business impact, not only the language of reputation.

    3. Why does political complexity matter so much in the report?

    Political volatility is one of the report’s defining conditions. The authors locate the research in the early 2025 U.S. context, following Donald Trump’s second inauguration and first 100 days in office. The report says companies are operating in a climate shaped by executive orders, economic volatility, hyper-partisanship, and sudden political attention.

    The report argues that this has forced corporate affairs leaders to rethink public engagement. Companies are moving away from broad social activism and towards brand protection, business-aligned issue engagement, and risk management. The task is no longer simply “Should we speak out?” but “Where does engagement serve the business, where does silence reduce risk, and where is private dialogue more effective than public positioning?”

    One especially important idea is the “audience of one” problem: the risk that a single powerful political figure can draw attention to a company and create operational, reputational, or regulatory consequences. Corporate affairs leaders are therefore developing scenario plans, rapid-response frameworks, and more cautious approaches to political communication.

    This also changes the advisory role of corporate affairs. The report suggests that CCAOs and CCOs are becoming voices of restraint and judgement within executive teams, helping leaders distinguish between noise, bargaining tactics, genuine risk, and issues that require action.

    4. How does the report redefine crisis and reputation management?

    The report argues that crisis management is no longer an exceptional capability. It has become a baseline expectation. In a “permacrisis” environment, corporate affairs teams must apply crisis tools continuously, not only when a discrete crisis breaks out.

    This changes the role in two ways. First, crisis work now extends beyond media response. Corporate affairs teams are expected to help solve the underlying problem, coordinate across business functions, and prevent issues from escalating. Secondly, the report says corporate affairs leaders must make the financial case for proactive reputation management.

    One quoted example describes a corporate affairs leader asking for $2.5 million for a campaign during a contentious situation and using analysis to show that the potential return was 12 times the investment. The point is that reputation work becomes more credible in the C-suite when it is connected to profit protection, revenue risk, regulatory exposure, or operational continuity.

    The implication is that corporate affairs must move from “the team that handles crises” to “the function that helps prevent avoidable business risk”. The report recommends crisis prevention scoring, financial modelling of reputational risk, and closer collaboration with finance and analytics partners.

    5. What does the report say about employees and AI as part of the new mandate?

    The report treats employee communication as a continuing priority, but one that has become more delicate. Employees are described as one of the most important stakeholder groups, especially during uncertainty. At the same time, internal communication now has to navigate political polarisation, regulatory sensitivity, DEI-related scrutiny, and the risk that different employee groups may interpret corporate messages very differently.

    The report therefore points to a more cautious, “sanitised” form of transparency. Companies may still communicate openly, but in ways designed to avoid partisan signalling or unnecessary exposure. The authors recommend mapping internal stakeholder intersections and using tools such as message testing to understand differences within the employee base.

    AI is presented as a practical accelerator for the corporate affairs function. The report says AI is being used for tasks such as preparing Q&As, analysing large volumes of stakeholder content, vetting influencers, monitoring media and misinformation, supporting strategic planning, and improving data analysis. Rather than presenting AI mainly as a replacement threat, the report frames it as a way to free communications professionals from routine work and move them towards more strategic advisory roles.

    However, the report also makes clear that AI adoption is a change-management issue. Teams need clarity on what should remain human-led, what can be AI-assisted, and what ethical guardrails are needed around bias, accuracy, and appropriate use.

    Overall conclusion

    The report’s main message is that the CCAO/CCO mandate is expanding from communications execution to enterprise-level judgement. Corporate affairs leaders are being asked to help companies interpret volatility, anticipate risk, advise CEOs, manage political exposure, support employees, use AI responsibly, and convert stakeholder intelligence into business decisions.

    Its most important contribution is the framing of corporate affairs as a foresight function. Its main limitation is methodological: while the qualitative design is described in some detail, the report does not clearly specify the number of interviewees, which makes it harder to judge the breadth of the evidence base.

  • Moving Ahead – 2025 C-suite Perspectives Study by Padilla

    Moving Ahead – 2025 C-suite Perspectives Study by Padilla

    About the paper

    The paper is a mixed-methods thought leadership report on how senior business leaders are approaching 2025, combining original survey research, executive interviews and desk research.

    Padilla says it surveyed more than 100 C-suite executives and 1,000 employed adults, and interviewed nearly 50 C-suite leaders; the report does not clearly specify the countries covered, so the geographic scope is not clearly specified in the report.

    Length: 12 pages

    More information / download:
    https://padillaco.com/c-suite-perspectives

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about the 2025 mindset of C-suite leaders?

    The core argument is that C-suite leaders have moved from recent years of conflict and fatigue into a more determined, forward-looking posture. They are described as “cautiously optimistic” and eager to make progress after years of reacting to disruption, but they are doing so in an environment still marked by uncertainty, mistrust, fragility and political tension. The report frames this as a balancing act: leaders want momentum, but they know the conditions for driving change remain unstable.

    The report also presents this as an evolution over time. In 2022, leaders were “conflicted”; in 2023–24, the mood shifted to “fatigue and focus”; and in 2024–25, the mindset is “moving ahead.” The recap diagram on page 11 makes this progression explicit and shows that the new phase is not about optimism alone, but about trying to capitalise on change resilience, rethink the employee-employer relationship, prepare next leaders and communicate in an era of reduced trust.

    So the report’s main meaning is not merely that leaders feel better. It is that they want to stop managing one crisis after another and start advancing strategy again. But the report is equally clear that progress depends on whether leaders can set direction clearly, manage expectations and prevent what it calls “trust erosion.” If they cannot, forward motion may stall and turnover may continue.

    2. Which pressures and leadership priorities are shaping executive decision-making most strongly in 2025?

    The report says inflation and economic uncertainty remain the top priorities, but the fastest-rising challenges now cluster around technology, security and talent. The page 3 chart shows the biggest year-over-year increases in leadership challenges as determining whether and how to leverage AI (+13), protecting data privacy and security (+11), attracting and retaining talent (+11), adapting to market shifts in consumer behaviour (+8), achieving business performance goals (+7), and modernising technology infrastructure (+7).

    This matters because it shows that the executive agenda is broadening. Leaders are not only worrying about macroeconomic turbulence anymore. They are also dealing with the practical implications of technological change, workforce expectations and business adaptation. The report interprets this as a sign that leaders are ready to “get on with it,” but need to revisit purpose, vision and direction so stakeholders understand what the organisation is trying to do.

    The report also highlights a cluster of leadership qualities rising in importance: confidence, flexibility, humility, stoicism and growth mindset. On page 4, these are presented almost as a new leadership toolkit for the moment. The message is that leaders expect criticism, know they will have to make difficult decisions, and must communicate those decisions in ways that maintain trust among employees, investors, customers and others. In other words, the report assumes that communication ability is no longer a soft extra, but central to leadership effectiveness.

    3. Where does the report identify the biggest perception gaps between leaders and employees?

    The report repeatedly highlights perception gaps between leaders and employees, especially around readiness for change, well-being and political culture at work. These gaps are among the most important findings because they suggest that executive confidence may not be matched by employee experience.

    On change readiness, page 5 shows that 67% of the C-suite believe employees are fully or very ready to embrace and assist with change initiatives, while only 41% of employees say the same about themselves. That is a substantial disconnect. The report’s conclusion is that leaders cannot assume prior change efforts have fully brought employees along; change management and change communication remain essential.

    On well-being, page 6 shows another sharp gap: 50% of the C-suite think employee well-being has improved over the past year, while only 29% of employees agree. The report adds that leaders are puzzled because they believe they have already offered support through mental-health resources and flexibility, whereas employees’ concerns are often tied to broader pressures such as health, living costs and inflation. This implies that organisational interventions alone may not feel sufficient from the employee point of view.

    A third gap concerns politics and dialogue. On page 7, 44% of C-suite leaders think politics are openly discussed among people with opposing views in a constructive way, compared with only 24% of employees. This suggests leaders may overestimate the health of internal discourse. The report then connects this to a broader movement from trust and ambivalence toward scepticism, polarization and even grievance. That is one of the report’s strongest warnings: fragile culture is not just about morale, but about the risk of deeper social fracture inside organisations.

    4. How does the report interpret current shifts in ESG, DEI and AI through a business-strategy lens?

    The report argues that ESG and DEI are being reframed less in moral or idealistic language and more in pragmatic business terms. It says these issues have consistently ranked low as explicit C-suite priorities, yet the outcomes associated with them, such as talent attraction, retention, culture and adaptation to market change, remain important. In other words, the substance still matters even if the framing changes.

    Page 8 is especially revealing. The report says pushback on ESG and DEI is causing some leaders to rethink strategy while others are continuing, sometimes more quietly, and grounding their case in business value. It explicitly calls this an “era of business pragmatism.” The table on that page contrasts “altruism” and “pragmatism,” for example framing sustainability not as leaving the Earth better for future generations, but as ensuring access to clean water needed for products; and framing DEI not simply as fairness, but as necessary for talent and innovation.

    That framing reveals one of the report’s assumptions: in the current climate, strategic legitimacy increasingly depends on proving commercial relevance. The implication is not that values disappear, but that leaders are expected to justify values-led initiatives in operational and economic terms. The report advises companies to tie ESG and DEI clearly to organisational goals, talent strategy, mission and business success, while also considering the downstream effects of any changes in approach or language.

    On AI, the report is similarly pragmatic but more overtly positive. Page 9 says 83% of C-suite respondents are selectively or aggressively adopting AI. Their main motivations are improving the quality of products and services (47%) and keeping pace competitively or gaining advantage (43%). At the same time, employees are more wary, with 24% seeing AI as a moderate or significant threat. So AI is presented as both a strategic imperative and a communication challenge. Leaders may move faster than employees, but if they do not explain the vision and bring people with them, adoption friction will increase.

    5. What are the consequences of all this for leadership communication, succession and organisational momentum?

    The report’s strongest practical conclusion is that communication sits at the centre of execution. Across change, culture, AI, politics and trust, leaders are told to communicate direction clearly, explain difficult choices, use multiple messengers, and help people understand not only what is changing but why. Page 4 even includes the blunt observation that communication is still the most important skillset a leader can have, and that too few leaders possess it.

    This matters because the report links communication directly to trust and buy-in. If employees do not feel heard, if hybrid-work shifts are not explained well, if political tensions are ignored, or if AI strategy is imposed without context, the organisation risks losing momentum. The recurring implication sections throughout the report keep returning to this idea: communication is how leaders convert strategic intent into organisational movement.

    The second major consequence concerns succession and executive stability. On page 10, the report describes an ongoing “Great Executive Resignation,” saying turnover remains at very high levels and that there has been a seven-point increase in leaders stepping back earlier than in the past, to about one in five leaders. It also notes that many next-level leaders do not necessarily want to step into top roles. Among employees aged 52+, 61% want their career or responsibilities to stay the same or be simplified, while only 31% want growth in career or responsibilities. The implication is that succession pipelines are under strain.

    The deeper conclusion is that organisational momentum is now a retention issue as well as a performance issue. Leaders who see progress are more likely to stay; those who do not may step away faster. That means companies need to build leadership capability below the top tier, strengthen communication skills across multiple levels, and create visible forward movement. The report ends by saying leaders want more trust, civility and predictability in 2025, and suggests that those who can “plan and pivot” effectively will be better placed to drive meaningful change and growth.

  • FGS Global Radar 2025: The Year of Consequences by FGS

    FGS Global Radar 2025: The Year of Consequences by FGS

    About the paper

    The report is a mixed-methods outlook on the political, economic, technological, climate and workplace consequences likely to shape 2025, with a strong emphasis on what those shifts mean for business.

    It combines 70 individual depth interviews with senior stakeholders across business, politics, media, finance and academia, conducted in October and November 2024, with a nationally representative UK poll of 2,084 adults fielded from 15–17 November 2024; the primary geographic scope is the UK, although the analysis addresses global developments, especially the US and Europe.

    Length: 25 pages

    More information / download:
    https://a.storyblok.com/f/137553/x/493262557e/fgs-global-radar-2025_the-year-of-consequences.pdf

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about 2025, and why does it call it “the year of consequences”?

    The core claim is that 2025 is not presented as a year of entirely new issues, but as the year in which the consequences of recent political shocks, especially the 2024 election cycle and above all Donald Trump’s return, begin to bite. The report argues that many of the underlying challenges remain the same, but the language, political framing and practical terms of engagement around them are changing. In that sense, 2025 is portrayed as a year of disruption, reframing and forced clarity rather than simple continuity.

    The report roots this in a broader anti-incumbent mood across developed Western economies. It argues that falling living standards, inflation and concern over immigration helped drive voters away from established governments. Trump is treated as the most consequential manifestation of that trend, with likely spillover effects across geopolitics, sustainability, AI, business and culture.

    At the same time, the report is not wholly apocalyptic. It repeatedly stages a tension between pessimists and pragmatists, or between gloom and opportunity. Its final position is that 2025 will be dangerous and unstable, but that it may also create openings for decision-making, innovation and strategic repositioning. That balanced but business-oriented framing is central to the report’s purpose.

    2. How does the report think Trump’s return will reshape the global environment for politics and business?

    Trump is the organising force of the report. The authors state bluntly that “2025 will be the year of Trump”, and the expert consensus presented is that he should be taken more seriously this time because he now has more experience, stronger intent and a limited window in which to act. The report expects an early phase of “shock and awe”, including executive action on tariffs, deregulation, immigration and geopolitical positioning.

    Economically, the report expects Trump to push tax cuts and deregulation, with many experts anticipating a short-term US boom that could also buoy global dealmaking and M&A. But it also records a counter-view: that tariffs, labour restrictions and fiscal loosening may later fuel inflation and possibly trigger conflict with the Federal Reserve. So the outlook is not one of settled optimism, but of a potentially powerful near-term stimulus coupled with medium-term instability.

    Geopolitically, the report suggests Trump’s foreign policy is harder to predict because international order is not seen as his main priority. It outlines fears that support for NATO, Ukraine and multilateral institutions could weaken, while authoritarian states may feel emboldened. It also expects pressure on Ukraine to accept a deal, sympathy towards Netanyahu, and renewed tension around Taiwan. At the same time, some interviewees think Trump’s disruptive style might break deadlock in stalled conflicts. That split between alarm and reluctant pragmatism is one of the report’s recurring patterns.

    3. What does the report say about the state of democracy, public trust and mainstream politics, especially in the UK and Europe?

    A major theme is that democratic systems are under strain because governments are struggling to bridge the gap between what they promise and what they can actually deliver. The report links this to structural pressures such as debt, ageing populations, infrastructure needs, weak growth and immigration tensions, especially in Europe. It argues that this mismatch is eroding faith in liberal democracy and creating fertile ground for populism.

    The UK polling evidence is used to illustrate this erosion. The report says 24% of the UK electorate now believes that voting does not make a difference, while nearly eight in ten voters think they are entitled to expect more from government. Particularly striking is the finding that more than one in five people under 45 agree that the best system for running a country effectively is a strong leader who does not have to bother with elections. The report reads this as a serious warning sign about younger adults’ confidence in democratic delivery.

    On the UK specifically, Labour is portrayed as politically dominant but strategically unclear. The report says business and even Labour supporters see a lack of compelling growth narrative, while public confidence is weak: only 13% think the government has a clear and convincing plan for stronger growth, only 11% think it is doing what they hoped, 64% think the UK is in steep decline, and 68% believe Labour will increase their taxes. So the report’s view is that stability of parliamentary control does not equal public confidence or strategic clarity.

    4. What picture does the report paint of AI, climate and business opportunity in 2025?

    The report treats AI as both transformative and unsettled. It emphasises the extraordinary scale of investment, including a cited $1 trillion being spent on AI data centres, and argues that while many firms are still struggling to turn proof-of-concept work into real competitive advantage, most experts believe the technology will prove genuinely transformative over time. It suggests that the biggest near-term gains may come not from science-fiction breakthroughs, but from practical uses that improve productivity, speed up processes and reduce backlogs in functions such as marketing, communications and public services.

    But the public mood is far more divided. The report says opinion splits almost exactly into thirds: those who fear AI could control humans, those who think it will positively transform lives, and those who think it is overhyped. It also notes public scepticism about concrete benefits: only 39% expect positive effects on healthcare and life expectancy, 38% on productivity, and just 17% on their own standard of living, while 50% fear negative effects on job opportunities. The report therefore positions AI as a field where elite and public sentiment have not yet converged.

    On climate, the report argues that international diplomacy has weakened, especially because of Trump and the disappointing COP29 outcome, yet it also sees real momentum in the economics of transition. Its key argument is that sustainability will progress less through idealistic global cooperation and more through energy security, cost competitiveness and industrial advantage. In other words, the report believes the climate narrative is shifting from moral exhortation to transactional self-interest.

    That argument is reinforced by polling. Majorities believe climate science and think action is necessary, but many also want a slower pace to reduce cost burdens, and 45% say there is little point in costly UK action unless larger countries do more. So the report’s broader conclusion is that both AI and climate will move forward in 2025, but under more pragmatic, contested and economically framed conditions than before.

    5. What does the report conclude about workplace culture, generational divides and the implications for business leaders?

    The workplace section suggests that culture debates will remain intense, but the report’s own evidence points to a fairly practical hierarchy of employee priorities. In its UK poll, the top three features of an ideal workplace culture are flexible working hours, trust in leadership, and support for employee wellbeing and mental health. That is notable because it places everyday working conditions and leadership credibility above more symbolic or ideological culture-war themes.

    The report argues that hybrid work is still durable, but that employers will become more assertive about office attendance, with three-day minimum expectations likely to spread. It also says mental health will become even more strategically important because of its effect on absenteeism, wellbeing and retention. By contrast, DEI remains in place but is expected to be discussed less publicly and in less politicised language, especially in the wake of Trump’s return. The report also finds that DEI-related factors rank relatively low in the public’s list of workplace culture priorities.

    Generational differences are another major finding. The report shows sharp age-based divides on asylum, free speech, gender identity, China, EU relations and views of intergenerational fairness. But it also complicates the cliché of a simple youth-versus-age split by showing that preferences are more situational: for example, flexible working matters most to those in mid-career and to women, while views on resilience, authority and fairness vary in more layered ways.

    For business leaders, the implication is clear: broad-brush assumptions about “what younger people want” are not enough. The report points instead towards a need for clearer leadership, more explicit explanations of workplace expectations, greater care around employee wellbeing, and more disciplined choices about when companies comment publicly on social or geopolitical issues. Overall, it recommends a more grounded, less performative model of corporate culture.

    Overall, the report is best read as a business-facing synthesis of elite interviews and UK public opinion that argues 2025 will be shaped by disruption, reduced ideological certainty and more transactional politics. Its message is that leaders should prepare for volatility, but also for openings created by clearer power structures, technological progress and a more hard-headed operating environment.

  • C-suite Outlook 2025 – Delivering Value in a Volatile World by the Weber Shandwick Collective

    C-suite Outlook 2025 – Delivering Value in a Volatile World by the Weber Shandwick Collective

    About the paper

    The report examines how global C-suite leaders are thinking about value creation, stakeholder priorities and volatility in 2025.

    It is based on original survey research: a short survey of 200 private-sector global business leaders from multinational companies operating across North America, Latin America, EMEA and APAC, with fieldwork conducted from 14 November to 4 December 2024.

    The sample includes companies headquartered in the United States and 22 other countries across five sectors, so the geographic scope is global, although the report presents only limited methodological detail beyond the sample profile.

    Length: 9 pages

    More information / download:
    https://webershandwick.com/news/delivering-value-in-volatile-world

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about leadership in 2025?

    The core argument is that CEOs and senior executives are entering 2025 with underlying optimism, but that optimism is tempered by a strong sense that the external environment remains unstable and difficult to control. On page 2, the report frames this tension directly: business leaders see relative macroeconomic stability compared with recent years, yet they remain highly alert to geopolitical disruption, market shocks, activism, policy change and other forces that can quickly alter the operating environment.

    From that starting point, the report argues that corporate leadership now has to move beyond older, more polarised debates about shareholder primacy versus stakeholder capitalism. Its preferred framing is practical rather than ideological: the job of leadership is to define and deliver the specific mix of value that matters most to the stakeholders who shape the company’s success. In other words, the corporation’s role is presented not as serving one constituency at the expense of others, but as earning legitimacy and performance by managing a company-specific “value equation” across multiple stakeholder groups. This is the report’s main conceptual move, and it underpins everything that follows.

    2. How do executives define “value”, and which forms of value matter most to them?

    A major contribution of the report is that it treats value as multi-dimensional rather than purely financial. On page 4, executives rank five forms of value: economic value is highest at 98% importance, followed by functional value at 96%, ethical value at 88%, and both emotional and societal value at 78%. When respondents were asked to allocate relative weight across these categories, economic value received the largest share by far at 41%, compared with 24% for functional value, 14% for ethical value, 11% for societal value and 10% for emotional value.

    That ranking shows two things at once. First, the report does not pretend that executives have become post-financial or post-commercial. Economic performance remains dominant. Secondly, it suggests that modern business leadership increasingly sees non-financial forms of value as part of business success rather than as optional extras. Ethical, societal and emotional value are not leading priorities, but they are still recognised by substantial majorities as important. The report therefore presents a broadened model of business value: financial performance sits at the centre, but it is strengthened or undermined by how companies function, behave and relate to stakeholders.

    There is, however, an interesting gap between aspiration and performance. The page 4 chart on how well companies are delivering value across stakeholders shows strong perceived delivery on economic and functional value, but weaker performance on societal and especially emotional value. Fewer than a quarter say they are delivering societal or emotional value “very well”. So the report implies that executives recognise a wider value agenda more readily than they currently execute it.

    3. Which stakeholders matter most in executive decision-making, and what does that reveal about the report’s perspective?

    The report makes clear that stakeholder thinking is now mainstream among the leaders surveyed. On page 3, 99% say that considering the interests of multiple stakeholders is important. But the stakeholder model being described is not flat or equal. On page 5, customers rank first, with 99% saying they are important and 86% calling them very important. Investors and shareholders follow at 96%, and employees at 93%. Policymakers and government officials come next at 81%, with partners and suppliers and local communities both at 79%. Advocacy groups and non-profits rank much lower.

    This hierarchy matters because it reveals the report’s practical worldview. It is not arguing that all stakeholders should be treated identically, nor that external advocacy pressure should dominate corporate decisions. Instead, it suggests a prioritised stakeholder model centred on those groups most directly tied to performance, legitimacy and licence to operate: customers, capital providers, employees, regulators and key operational partners. That is a more managerial and strategic version of stakeholder capitalism than a purely normative one.

    The report also subtly signals that stakeholder management is becoming more political. The relatively high ranking of policymakers and government officials, combined with repeated references later in the report to regulation, geopolitics and public affairs, suggests that public policy is no longer a peripheral concern. It is becoming structurally central to the executive agenda, especially in a world where policy decisions can affect supply chains, investment flows, reputation and growth.

    4. What does the research say about volatility, preparedness and growth prospects for 2025?

    The report’s most important empirical message is that leaders feel materially less prepared for the kinds of disruptions they cannot control directly. On page 5, executives report greater confidence in handling internal or more familiar reputational threats, such as a major data breach, a company security threat, a health epidemic or a product recall. But preparedness drops sharply for external shocks such as global armed conflicts, terrorist attacks, political division after US elections, misinformation campaigns, natural disasters and actions by elected officials. This distinction is central: leaders are more comfortable with operational crises than with systemic volatility.

    That matters because the report links growth prospects to the ability to deliver value under pressure. On page 6, only 17% of companies are described as in “high growth”, while 63% report moderate growth and 21% expect moderate or high contraction. Eight in ten companies therefore expect at least moderate growth, but the standout point is not exuberance. It is restraint. The report presents 2025 as a year of cautious forward movement rather than broad-based acceleration.

    The priority data reinforces that interpretation. Revenue growth and profitability top the list of business priorities, but leaders also rank managing market volatility, investor expectations, business transformation, culture and workforce capability very highly. On page 7, the actions executives say they are taking include growing the business, launching products, adjusting governance structures, navigating AI, diversifying supply chains and responding more actively to policy and regulatory issues. So the report portrays growth not as a return to normal expansion, but as something that must be actively defended and engineered amid instability.

    5. What are the report’s implications for communication and public affairs teams?

    The clearest implication is that corporate communications and public affairs functions are becoming more strategically important, but many organisations are not yet confident that those teams are equipped for the task. On page 7, only 17% of executives say their communications and public affairs functions are “well equipped” to keep pace with rapid change, while 13% say their confidence in those functions has decreased. The report therefore identifies a capability gap at exactly the point where volatility makes communication, public affairs and reputation management more consequential.

    The practical implications are spelled out most fully on page 8 in the “new rules” section. The report argues that value creation must start at the top, that CEOs need to prepare now for future volatility, that organisations must actively manage controllable volatility such as mis- and disinformation, that AI should support decision-making, and that the policy environment will become more demanding in 2025. In effect, communications is being repositioned from a downstream messaging function to an upstream strategic capability that helps leadership sense, interpret and respond to threats and expectations.

    For a communications reader, the most significant underlying message is this: communicators are not merely being asked to explain value after the fact. They are increasingly expected to help organisations define value, map stakeholder expectations, detect volatility early, prepare response systems, and support CEO judgement in real time. At the same time, the report suggests that many firms have not yet invested enough in these capabilities. So its conclusion is both elevating and cautionary: communications teams are needed more than ever, but they must upskill and become more operationally strategic if they are to meet the expectations being placed on them.

    One caution is worth noting. Because the report is based on a relatively short survey of 200 leaders and is presented in a highly synthesised, infographic-style format, it is better read as a directional executive sentiment study than as a deeply elaborated academic analysis. Even so, it offers a clear and useful picture of how senior leaders are framing the challenge of 2025: deliver growth and stakeholder value, but do so in a world where volatility is persistent, political and increasingly external to managerial control.

  • Fighting Fatigue with Focus – 2024 C-suite Perspectives Study by Padilla

    Fighting Fatigue with Focus – 2024 C-suite Perspectives Study by Padilla

    About the paper

    The paper is a mixed-methods executive insight report on how C-suite leaders’ priorities and communication challenges have shifted, especially under economic pressure, hybrid work, declining worker well-being and leadership fatigue.

    The report combines an online survey of more than 100 senior leaders and company owners, in-depth interviews with more than 30 C-suite leaders, an online survey of more than 1,000 employed adults, and desk research; the fieldwork was conducted in summer/fall 2023, but the geographic scope is not clearly specified in the report.

    Length: 12 pages

    More information / download:
    https://padillaco.com/post/fighting-fatigue-with-focus

    Core Insights

    1) What is the report’s central argument about the current mindset of C-suite leaders?

    The report’s core argument is that senior leaders have not fundamentally changed their top priorities, but those priorities have become sharper and more intense because the past 18 months have produced a sense of leadership fatigue. Padilla argues that the C-suite has moved from a more “conflicted” mindset, shaped by COVID, social issues and geopolitical uncertainty, towards a more “focused” mindset shaped by economic pressure, hybrid work, worsening well-being concerns and late-career reassessment. The recommended response is not grander rhetoric, but tighter focus: business outcomes, simpler storytelling and stronger preparation of the next generation of leaders.

    This is important because the report does not frame fatigue as mere burnout language. It presents fatigue as a strategic condition that affects decision-making, communication style and succession planning. On page 11, the recap diagram makes the shift explicit: yesterday’s response required resilience, humanity and “translucency”, whereas today’s response requires simplification, story-based communication, leadership development and, in some cases, leaders stepping down or back.

    So the report’s overall meaning is that leadership today is becoming narrower, more pragmatic and more outcome-driven. The implied message is that communicators and advisers must adapt to that reality rather than assume executives still have the appetite for broad agendas or abstract positioning.

    2) How have leaders’ priorities changed since Padilla’s earlier report, and what remains consistent?

    What remains consistent is the underlying business agenda. The report says C-suite priorities “haven’t changed”, but the most important challenges are now more pronounced. Compared with the earlier report, rising inflation is up by 15 percentage points, adapting to change or innovating the business is up by 11 points, adapting to market shifts is up by 9 points, and differentiating from competitors is up by 8 points. Achieving business performance goals is also up, though more modestly.

    What has changed is the context around those priorities. In the earlier phase, leaders were navigating COVID effects, racial reckoning, emerging social issues, unsettled employees, geopolitical uncertainty and fears of economic slowdown. That produced a “conflicted” mindset. In the current phase, the environment is described as a retracting economy, declining worker well-being, the impacts of hybrid work and leaders “entering the last lap” of their careers. This creates a more focused, but also more compressed, leadership posture.

    The report also suggests that this shift changes how leaders want communication delivered. Under today’s pressure, leaders want a clearer line from communication to business outcomes. Page 7 states that communicators should articulate the “why”, use business storytelling, begin with the story, then follow with key messages and proof points. That reveals an assumption running through the report: clarity is no longer just a stylistic virtue; it is a management necessity in an environment of fatigue and constrained attention.

    3) What does the report say about DEI, ESG and corporate responses to external social issues?

    The report presents all three areas as still relevant, but more conditional and more tightly tied to business relevance than before.

    On DEI, Padilla says more than half of both leaders and employees feel brands have made progress, yet very few see DEI as a top business priority. The report notes that only a small share of C-suite leaders list achieving DEI commitments as a top business challenge, even as employee belief that their employer prioritises DEI has risen. The interpretation is that DEI has not disappeared, but it is no longer the dominant leadership conversation. The quote on page 4 captures this: DEI is “still relevant”, but “not the main topic of conversation.” The report also flags ageism as an underappreciated issue, noting that 27% of leaders and employees over 52 say they have experienced age-related discrimination in their career.

    On ESG, the report is even more explicit about pragmatism. It says ESG as a whole remains relatively low on leaders’ priority lists, but business-critical elements still receive attention. Forty-three per cent of leaders say they do not have formal ESG initiatives, while 33% focus on ESG aspects tied to business metrics or stakeholder needs. The implication is not that ESG is over, but that it survives where it can be linked to differentiation, customer relevance and measurable organisational value.

    On external social issues, the report shows a divided and cautious stance. According to the chart on page 6, 36% of C-suite leaders avoid taking a stand because of cost, while 33% do not hesitate to take a stand on relevant issues. At the same time, 46% of employees expect brands to respond to major social issues through action. Padilla’s implication is that organisations need an internal decision framework for when to speak, rooted in company purpose, stakeholder groups and likely ripple effects.

    Taken together, these sections reveal the report’s broader perspective: values-led issues have not vanished, but the licence to act on them now depends far more on strategic fit, stakeholder logic and business pragmatism than on broad principle alone.

    4) Where does the report identify the biggest disconnects between leaders and employees?

    The clearest disconnect is around employee well-being. Leaders generally believe well-being has stayed the same or improved over the previous 18 months: 65% say it has stayed the same and 26% say it has improved. But the employee-side benchmark cited on page 8 points in the opposite direction: about two-thirds of employees say well-being has worsened or stayed the same, while leaders are much more likely to think it has improved.

    This matters because the report suggests leaders may believe that post-COVID investments in benefits, flexibility or work environment have solved more than they actually have. The phrase “My Employees Are Doing Great—Aren’t They?” is deliberately ironic. It signals that executive perception may be lagging behind lived employee experience. The implication is that organisations need more frequent pulse checks, closer examination of whether well-being programmes are actually valued, and a clearer definition of the employee experience they are trying to create.

    A second disconnect emerges around hybrid work. Leaders recognise that employees value flexibility, and many leaders value it themselves, but they also believe hybrid work carries long-term costs for culture, work quality and leadership development. The visual on page 9 is especially revealing: hybrid work creates a generational “hourglass” in leadership development, with early-career and late-career staff more likely to be present in the office, while mid-career staff are less present because of longer commutes and more home commitments. That suggests the middle layer, often crucial for mentoring and managerial continuity, may be the least physically connected.

    A third disconnect is more implicit: older leaders and employees appear to be moderating their ambitions at the same time as organisations urgently need stronger succession pipelines. Among employees over 52, 62% want their career or responsibilities to stay the same or be simplified, while only 30% want growth. Meanwhile, 30% of C-suite leaders are seeing peers step away earlier or extend their stay, and nearly 1 in 10 are considering leaving earlier themselves.

    The cumulative effect is a leadership system under strain: employees may be less well than leaders think, hybrid work may be weakening developmental bonds, and succession assumptions are becoming less reliable.

    5) What are the practical implications for leadership and communication going forward?

    The report’s practical recommendations are quite direct. First, communicators and leadership teams should anchor initiatives in business outcomes, not just activity. Page 7 explicitly urges leaders to focus on outcomes, articulate the “why” and use business storytelling. That means communication should not begin with channels, campaigns or messaging architecture. It should begin with the business story that leaders need people to understand and act on.

    Second, companies need more disciplined internal listening and more realistic culture management. The well-being disconnect suggests leaders cannot rely on assumptions or legacy investments. The report recommends pulse checks, clearer articulation of the desired culture and a more deliberate mapping of the ideal employee experience. In other words, culture should be treated less as a slogan and more as an operating system that requires measurement and adjustment.

    Third, hybrid work needs to be managed as a developmental issue, not only a flexibility issue. The page 9 diagram shows that hybrid arrangements affect collaboration, culture and especially leadership development. The recommendations therefore include improving collaboration tools, prioritising management feedback, strengthening the office’s “sense of place”, and balancing clarity with flexibility in policies and communications.

    Fourth, succession planning and leadership development need more urgency. The report argues that organisations must prepare a larger pool of future leaders and develop both classic leadership traits, such as credibility, confidence, authenticity and ethics, and newer traits such as empathy, flexibility, vulnerability and humanity. This is one of the report’s strongest conclusions: fatigue at the top is not only a personal issue, but a structural issue that can disrupt leadership continuity if firms are not preparing successors far enough down the organisation.

    My reading of the overall implication is that the report is less about trend-spotting than about managerial narrowing. Its advice is to reduce noise, tie communication to what matters commercially and organisationally, and recognise that fatigue changes what leadership can realistically absorb and deliver. That makes the report particularly useful for communicators who need to frame their work in ways that feel indispensable rather than merely desirable.

  • FGS Global Radar 2024: A Year of Volatility by FGS

    FGS Global Radar 2024: A Year of Volatility by FGS

    About the paper

    The report is a mixed-methods outlook study on the political, economic, technological and social forces expected to shape 2024, with a particular focus on implications for business.

    It combines 60 stakeholder depth interviews conducted in October and November 2023 with public polling of 2,024 UK adults, weighted to be nationally representative; the geographic scope of the primary data is clearly the UK, even though many of the issues discussed are global.

    Length: 23 pages

    More information / download:
    https://a.storyblok.com/f/137553/x/db3cf37498/fgs-global-radar-report-2024.pdf

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about 2024, and why does it frame the year as unusually consequential?

    The report’s central argument is that 2024 will be defined by volatility, uncertainty, disruption and change, but not in a purely apocalyptic sense: it also presents openings for adaptation, resilience and selective optimism. The authors frame the year as unusually consequential because it combines an exceptional concentration of elections, continuing geopolitical conflicts, economic fragility, climate pressure, AI disruption and changing expectations of business leadership.

    The report begins by describing 2024 as a year of “known-unknowns”, with particular emphasis on the fact that more people would be involved in elections than at any other point in human history, and with the US election treated as the most consequential uncertainty. Rather than trying to predict exact outcomes, the study aims to identify the trends and debates that will affect business during the year. That is an important framing choice: this is not a forecasting model, but a strategic interpretation exercise grounded in elite interviews and public opinion data.

    Its key findings reinforce that framing. Opinion formers expect uncertainty and turbulence across geopolitics, the economy, culture and the workplace. They see volatility as more likely to intensify than fade. At the same time, they hold a mildly more positive view of the UK’s prospects than the public does, largely because they expect some political stabilisation after the UK general election and some easing in inflation and interest rates. So the report’s core argument is not simply that 2024 will be chaotic, but that business leaders will have to navigate overlapping shocks while distinguishing between background noise and genuinely strategic shifts.

    2. Which major risks and uncertainties does the report identify as most important for business leaders?

    The report identifies political instability and geopolitics as the most important risk cluster for business leaders. Stakeholders describe political instability as the biggest risk facing business in 2024, driven by major elections, continuing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, and the growing influence of non-democratic states. The phrase “uncertainty is the new certainty” captures the report’s broader diagnosis: unpredictable external shocks are no longer exceptional but normalised.

    Within that broader risk picture, the potential return of Donald Trump is treated as the single most significant political threat. Stakeholders widely believe a Trump victory is a real possibility and fear that a second term would be more unconstrained than the first, with consequences for NATO, Ukraine, global trade and geopolitical stability. Importantly, the report notes that this concern is less about the resilience of the US domestic economy and more about the international effects of American foreign policy and political posture. The public polling echoes this anxiety, with large shares of UK respondents expecting another Trump presidency to destabilise the world and negatively affect their own lives.

    The report also highlights immigration as a major source of political polarisation, especially in the UK, Europe and the US. Stakeholders expect it to become an even more contentious election issue, sharpened by climate-related migration pressures and labour-market tensions. This matters for business because immigration is not presented merely as a social issue; it is bound up with economic policy, labour supply, social cohesion and electoral strategy.

    Beyond politics, the report emphasises supply-chain vulnerability, energy-price shocks and the strategic consequences of long-running conflict. Several interviewees argue that resilience now matters as much as profit, and that businesses will have to think more seriously about de-risking supply chains. The report stops short of advocating a single economic doctrine, but it clearly suggests that geopolitical risk is now a boardroom issue rather than a distant policy concern.

    3. How does the report portray the economic outlook, and where do stakeholder and public perspectives diverge most sharply?

    The report portrays the economic outlook as cautiously stable rather than buoyant. Stakeholders broadly expect a middling global year and a mildly positive UK year, shaped by falling inflation, eventual interest-rate cuts and the likelihood of a more stable UK political environment. They do not foresee dramatic economic improvement, but neither do they expect collapse. In that sense, the report’s economic lens is one of guarded pragmatism.

    For the UK specifically, stakeholders are relatively bullish. They associate an expected Labour victory with greater predictability, continuity in fiscal policy and a calmer investment environment after years of political turmoil. They also expect inflation and interest rates to decline over the course of 2024, though some note that the timing of monetary easing may be late and its effects delayed. This is not presented as a growth boom, but as a return to something closer to normality.

    The sharpest divergence appears between elite and public sentiment. The UK public is markedly more pessimistic than stakeholders, especially on the cost of living, living standards and the broader strength of the economy. The report shows net negative expectations on the cost of living, personal standard of living and the UK economy, even if job security is slightly more resilient. Public pessimism is also intensified by concern that prolonged wars will push up energy prices again. So while stakeholders see scope for stabilisation, the public sees little immediate relief.

    That divergence matters because it reveals one of the report’s underlying themes: macro-level improvement does not automatically translate into felt improvement. A steadier political environment and lower inflation may look positive from a policy or business perspective, but ordinary people may still experience stagnation, pressure and distrust. The report therefore suggests that leaders will need to communicate with much greater sensitivity to this gap between institutional optimism and lived economic insecurity.

    4. What does the report say about AI, and why does it treat it as both an opportunity and a source of backlash?

    The report treats AI as one of the defining contradictions of 2024: it is seen as a potentially transformative engine of productivity and growth, but also as a source of labour disruption, democratic risk and public unease. Stakeholders are generally more optimistic than the public. They expect AI to boost economic growth, unlock gains in medicine and science, and accelerate efficiency. At the same time, they anticipate redundancies in white-collar fields such as customer service, software development and communications, with some even arguing that entry-level roles across many industries are vulnerable.

    This combination of optimism and anxiety explains why the report expects backlash. Interviewees warn that AI could be used to distort elections through deepfakes and misinformation, undermining democratic legitimacy during an election-heavy year. They also foresee organised labour resistance, treating the 2023 actors’ strike as an early sign of broader anti-AI mobilisation. The public data supports this: a majority expects increased backlash, including further strikes, and many support faster government regulation to protect against security breaches and misinformation.

    Another important point is that the public is less confident and less informed about AI than elite stakeholders. Only a small minority say they are very confident they could explain what AI is, and attitudes differ sharply by age, gender and self-reported tech literacy. Younger people and those more confident in explaining AI are more positive; older respondents and less confident groups are notably more negative. This suggests that public opinion on AI is shaped not just by material risk, but by familiarity and perceived agency.

    The report therefore presents AI as a major battleground for 2024, not because it doubts the technology’s momentum, but because it expects a struggle over who benefits, who bears the costs and how regulation should work. That is why it frames the coming debate as not merely technological, but economic, political and social.

    5. What broader conclusions does the report draw about climate, corporate purpose and the role of business in society?

    The report suggests that businesses are entering 2024 under pressure to become more disciplined, more internally focused and more credible in how they talk about their role in society. On climate, stakeholders agree that the issue is strategically central and that no serious business leader or politician can now deny its importance. Yet they are pessimistic about actual progress towards net zero in 2024, citing weak political will, high investment requirements, election-year caution and unresolved disputes over who pays. The result is a gap between rhetorical commitment and practical momentum.

    The public broadly shares the sense that climate change matters, but the report shows limits to public willingness to absorb the cost. That creates a politically difficult environment: there is acknowledgement of urgency, but less agreement on sacrifice. The report’s interpretation is that democratic politics, especially short electoral cycles, favours short-term decisions, whereas climate action demands long-term commitment. This is one of its clearest structural arguments.

    On corporate purpose, the report argues that purpose remains important but that its public expression is changing. Many stakeholders believe external purpose messaging has become entangled with accusations of virtue signalling and greenwashing. As a result, they expect companies and CEOs to retreat from broad social commentary and focus more on purpose that is directly relevant to the business and more meaningfully communicated to employees and communities. This is not a rejection of purpose, but a repositioning of it.

    The same logic appears in workplace culture. Hybrid working is described as here to stay, though not as a case for full-time remote work becoming universal. Stakeholders and the public both expect flexibility to remain important, and the public wants even more of it. Taken together, the report’s broader conclusion is that businesses in 2024 will need to act with restraint, relevance and credibility: less grandstanding, more internal alignment; less abstract signalling, more evidence and substance.

    Overall, the report’s perspective is that business leadership in 2024 will be judged not by confidence alone, but by the ability to operate in a world of overlapping instability while making selective, defensible choices about what to engage in, what to say and how to build trust.

  • Future of Professionals Report 2023 by Thomson Reuters

    Future of Professionals Report 2023 by Thomson Reuters

    About the paper

    Thomson Reuters’ Future of Professionals Report 2023 examines how AI, especially generative AI, is expected to transform professional work across legal, tax and accounting, risk, compliance, corporate and government settings.

    It is original survey research based on a web survey conducted in May–June 2023 among more than 1,200 professionals, with about half based in the US and most of the rest in the UK, Canada and Latin America.

    The report combines survey findings with Thomson Reuters’ own interpretive commentary, so it should be read as a research-based thought leadership report rather than a neutral academic study.

    Length: 36 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en-us/posts/technology/future-of-professionals-2023/

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report?

    The report’s central argument is that AI will not merely make professional work faster; it will reshape the value proposition of professional services. Thomson Reuters presents AI as a catalyst for transformation across three linked dimensions: productivity, professional value, and responsible adoption.

    The productivity argument is the most immediate. Professionals expect AI to help with operational efficiency, research, document review, drafting, administrative work, risk identification, regulatory monitoring and client communication. The report repeatedly frames AI as a way to remove repetitive or low-value work so that professionals can spend more time on higher-value advisory tasks.

    The deeper argument is about the future role of professionals. The report suggests that “Professional 2.0” will be less defined by routine technical execution and more by judgement, strategic advice, client service, specialisation, and the ability to use AI effectively. It argues that AI will shift professionals from doing more work manually to orchestrating, checking, interpreting and adding value to AI-enabled work.

    The report is optimistic, but not naïvely so. It recognises fears around accuracy, job loss, ethics, data security, regulation, work-life balance and professional identity. However, Thomson Reuters’ overall position is clear: AI will not replace highly trained professionals wholesale, but professionals who use AI will outcompete those who do not.

    2. How do professionals expect AI to affect productivity, client service and business performance?

    Professionals in the report are broadly positive about AI’s operational potential. A key headline finding is that 67% expect AI or generative AI to have a transformational or high impact on their profession over the next five years. That makes AI the most significant trend tested in the study, ahead of economic recession and the cost-of-living crisis.

    The report identifies several productivity gains. In law firms, AI is expected to help with large-scale data analysis, non-billable administrative work, time recording, research and document-related tasks. In tax and accounting, respondents see potential in analysing deductions, income streams, tax scenarios and future tax results. In corporate and government departments, AI is expected to streamline internal processes, reduce external spend, improve research and speed up document review.

    Client service is another major theme. Respondents expect AI to improve the speed, clarity and consistency of communication. The report mentions AI helping draft and edit client communications, translate complex ideas into plain language, identify client needs arising from regulatory change, and support faster internal advice. For in-house teams, the report suggests that AI may strengthen their role as business partners by helping them provide more consultative, growth-oriented advice.

    However, the financial consequences are less clear. Firms may become more profitable if AI reduces costs and frees professionals for higher-value work. At the same time, clients may use AI as a reason to push fees down, move more work in-house, or turn to alternative legal service providers. The report does not claim certainty here; it explicitly notes that the “financial victor” remains uncertain.

    3. What evidence does the report provide that AI will change professional roles, skills and career paths?

    The report argues that AI will fundamentally alter who does professional work, what skills are valued, and how people enter and progress within the professions.

    One of the strongest findings is that 64% of professionals believe AI will make their professional skills more highly valued, while 33% fear that AI could contribute to the demise of their profession or reduce demand for their skills. This tension runs throughout the report: professionals see opportunity, but also existential risk.

    The report expects new career paths to emerge. It suggests that some work currently performed by credentialed professionals may shift to paralegals, junior professionals, enrolled agents, legal tech consultants, operations specialists or other non-traditional roles. It also anticipates more hybrid roles combining professional expertise with technology, data science, IT, security, regulatory and AI skills.

    Training is presented as one of the clearest areas of change. Almost 90% of respondents expect basic mandatory AI training for all professionals within five years, and 87% expect everyone to need training in new skills. The report also predicts changes in how junior professionals are trained and in the nature of university or college education.

    A particularly important nuance is that AI may reduce traditional entry-level work. More than half of respondents expect a decline in entry-level roles over the next five years, yet a majority also expect the total number of professionals in their firm or department to increase. In other words, the report does not predict simple job destruction. It predicts a reshaping of the professional labour market: fewer traditional junior tasks, more specialised or AI-enabled roles, and greater need for adaptability.

    4. What are the main concerns, risks and barriers identified in the report?

    The report identifies several overlapping concerns.

    The biggest fear is accuracy. A quarter of respondents cite compromised accuracy as their greatest concern. This is especially important because professionals work in fields where errors can have legal, financial, ethical or regulatory consequences. The report stresses that AI outputs must be checked by humans rather than accepted at face value.

    Job loss and professional displacement are also major concerns. Nineteen per cent cite widespread job loss as their biggest fear, while 17% cite the demise of the profession. Some respondents fear that AI may “dumb down” professional judgement if people rely on machine-generated answers without understanding the underlying reasoning.

    Ethics and data security are also prominent. Fifteen per cent cite data security as their biggest fear, and another 15% cite loss of ethics. The report connects these concerns to the need for transparency, explainability, trustworthy sources, professional standards and regulation.

    The biggest barrier to change is cultural rather than technical. The report says 83% of professionals cite risk aversion or fear of change as a top-three barrier within the professions. Lack of technology skills, lack of investment, partnership models, and lack of diversity of thought are also identified as obstacles.

    Finally, the report is ambivalent on wellbeing. AI could reduce long hours, lower the risk of errors, and remove mundane work. But some respondents fear it could increase pressure, reduce human connection, worsen engagement, or create anxiety about disposability. The report therefore treats wellbeing as both a potential benefit and a risk depending on how AI is implemented.

    5. What is Thomson Reuters’ perspective, and what are the implications of the report?

    Thomson Reuters’ perspective is strongly pro-adoption, but framed around responsible implementation. The company argues that AI should be embraced decisively, but with guardrails around trust, ethics, transparency, accuracy, regulation and human oversight.

    Its assumptions are visible throughout the report. Thomson Reuters assumes that AI adoption is inevitable, that productivity gains will be substantial, and that the professions will be reshaped rather than destroyed. It also assumes that the highest-value professional work will remain human-centred: advice, judgement, client relationships, ethics, interpretation and strategic thinking.

    The report’s implications are significant. For firms, it suggests a need to rethink pricing, services, staffing models, training and competitive advantage. For in-house departments, it suggests an opportunity to move from cost centres to growth enablers, particularly if AI helps them deliver more consultative advice and bring more work in-house. For individual professionals, the implication is that passive adaptation will not be enough. They will need to develop AI literacy, deepen expertise, understand their own value proposition, and learn how to work with AI rather than around it.

    The broader conclusion is that trust will be the decisive condition for AI adoption in professional work. Without confidence in accuracy, data security, ethics and explainability, the promised productivity gains may not materialise. With the right governance, however, the report argues that AI can improve productivity, increase professional value, create new roles, support better client service and potentially improve wellbeing.

  • The Changing Face of Leadership Communication by Padilla

    The Changing Face of Leadership Communication by Padilla

    About the paper

    The report examines how leadership communication is changing under sustained pressure from pandemic disruption, employee volatility, social issues and economic uncertainty.

    It is a mixed-methods report drawing on an online survey of 100+ C-suite executives and company owners, an online survey of more than 1,000 employed adults, and nearly 20 one-to-one depth interviews with C-suite leaders; the geographic scope is not clearly specified in the report.

    Length: 58 pages

    More information / download:
    https://padillaco.com/post/the-changing-face-of-leadership-communications

    Core Insights

    1. Why does the report argue that leadership communication has changed so sharply?

    The report’s core argument is that the context around leadership has become far more unstable, emotionally charged and publicly scrutinised than the environment many senior leaders came up in. It describes the past “2½ years of chaos” as shaped by COVID-19, polarised politics, unsettled employees, gun violence and other social issues, geopolitical uncertainty, supply chain shortages, whiplash economics, racial reckoning and stagflation. That combination has made it “not an easy time to be in the C-suite”.

    The report also shows that these pressures are not abstract. In the survey, the top reported leadership challenges were coping with economic uncertainty at 42%, rising inflation at 33%, public health incidents at 32%, supporting employee well-being at 29%, and attracting and retaining talent at 27%. That puts emotional, operational and reputational strain into the same leadership frame.

    In other words, the change in communication is presented as a response to a changed operating environment. Leaders are no longer communicating in relatively stable conditions; they are communicating amid overlapping crises, faster feedback loops and heightened stakeholder expectations. That is why the report treats communication change as structural rather than cosmetic.

    2. How does the report characterise what leaders are feeling, and why does that matter?

    The report’s clearest single-word diagnosis is that leaders feel “conflicted”. That matters because it frames leadership communication not as a polished top-down exercise, but as something shaped by genuine internal tension.

    That tension shows up repeatedly in the interview material. Leaders describe feeling helpless during COVID, uncertain about what the next day would bring, and torn between different employee needs: flexibility versus certainty, empathy versus business discipline, transparency versus reassurance. The report also argues that many leaders were rewarded earlier in their careers for confidence, infallibility, competitiveness and prioritising work over personal life, but are now being asked to lead in a very different climate.

    This matters because the report sees conflict not as weakness, but as the defining emotional condition of contemporary leadership. The better leaders recognise that conflict, rather than pretending it does not exist. That becomes the basis for a more adaptive communication style: less rigid certainty, more judgement, and more conscious balancing of competing demands.

    3. Which leadership qualities does the report say have become more important, and what does that reveal about the new leadership model?

    The report shows that credibility and authenticity top the list of qualities ranked “extremely important” for effective employee communication, at 74% and 73% respectively. Confidence follows at 66%, then ethics at 65% and transparency at 63%. Empathy sits at 52%, humility at 51%, while vulnerability and stoicism are both much lower at 26%.

    But the more revealing finding is the change over time. The qualities seen as more important than two years ago are led by social issue advocacy at 80%, empathy at 76%, flexibility at 73%, vulnerability at 70% and a growth mindset at 68%. That suggests the leadership model is shifting away from simple command-and-control confidence towards a more complex mix of moral positioning, emotional intelligence and adaptability.

    The report does not argue that traditional strengths disappear. Confidence, credibility and certainty still matter. Instead, it suggests leaders are having to combine older expectations of competence with newer demands for candour, empathy and social awareness. That is why the report repeatedly presents today’s leadership as a balancing act rather than a clean replacement of one model by another.

    4. What communication dilemmas are leaders now trying to manage in practice?

    The report identifies several recurring dilemmas. One is the challenge of creating a “change comfortable” culture. Leaders describe shorter planning cycles, the need to keep returning to the “why”, and a growing focus on resilience, interconnections and comfort with ambiguity. Long-term direction still matters, but detailed long-range plans are presented as far less reliable than before.

    A second dilemma is transparency. The report explicitly labels this the “transparency dilemma”, framing competency and confidence against transparency and candour as potentially conflicting leadership attributes. Interviewees say they are getting more comfortable saying “I don’t know”, but not stopping there; they must acknowledge uncertainty without undermining reassurance.

    A third dilemma concerns humanity. At company level, that means expanded benefits, flexible work, culture-building and taking stands on social issues. At leader level, it means more empathy, more visible personal openness, more kindness and more acknowledgement of blind spots. Yet even here the report stresses boundaries: leaders may need to show that they have feelings without fully exposing those feelings.

    Finally, there is the dilemma of criticism. Because leaders are listening more, they are hearing more dissent from employees, customers, investors and communities. The report argues that criticism is now a given, not an exception. Negative feedback no longer automatically signals a bad decision; it is part of the new communications environment.

    5. What are the report’s main implications for communication advisers and teams?

    The report’s practical conclusion is that communicators need to evolve from message crafters into strategic advisers. It contrasts old requests such as “Go say this for me” or “How do I say this?” with broader questions such as “What are the consequences of what I say and do?” and “What should I do?” That signals a move from tactical execution to leadership counsel.

    According to the report, today’s strategic communications adviser must be in tune with the complexities of the business, highly attentive to stakeholder groups and subgroups, able to think about the message, the messenger and the methods, and capable of listening to and interpreting feedback.

    The broader implication is that communicators are no longer just helping leaders express decisions. They are helping leaders navigate ambiguity, stakeholder conflict, social expectations and organisational change. The report ends by saying that strategic communications professionals have “never been more essential as advisors and transformers”. That is the document’s clearest statement of purpose: it is making the case for a bigger, more embedded and more strategic role for communication counsel.