Driving your company's growth requires making the shifts necessary for digitalized modern work's new terrain and adapting to evolving conditions.

“I acknowledge the uncertainty and seeming incongruence of the times we’re in...Progress isn’t linear. It’s dynamic, sometimes dissonant, and always demanding.” – ​Satya Nadella​, CEO of Microsoft, ​July 24, 2025​.

Driving in unchartered territory, you need off-road tyres, a powerful engine, good eyesight, quick reflexes, and a co-pilot. Are you ready for what's ahead?  

Not only are business environs vastly different, steering through frequent economic and tech disruptions can feel like rally driving. You advance at full throttle, shift down to stabilize or pivot, then shift up again to accelerate—adjusting for different climbs, climes, and other conditions.

Today’s new operating landscape requires intentional shifts:

• Adapting mindsets to handle new and unfamiliar territory.
• Flexing to respond to changing customer needs and demands.
• Identifying optimal AI applicability and facilitating utilization.
• Redesigning for a blended workforce and distributed work.
• Aligning work/ers with projects and moving to skills over jobs.
• Guiding teams who crave clarity while fatigued by change

What are leaders like you experiencing? CEOs report:

• 40% of CEOs and 43% of senior executives doubt their ability to fulfill their responsibilities [​KornFerry 2025​].
• 40% believe their firm will not be viable if continuing its current path.
• 38% say they started competing in NEW sectors in the last 5 years.
• 41% are integrating AI into business processes and workflows.
• Only 31% are integrating AI into workforce and skills strategy.
• 20% say they are extremely/highly exposed to tech disruption [​PwC's 28th Annual Global CEO Survey, Jan 2025​].

Significant shifts need intention and attention since you must change gears decisively, but not cause your team to spin out—progress with peace of mind.

• 78% of leaders believe they have AI figured out, only 39% of workers agree [​KornFerry 2025​].
• 57% of employees feel too much change happening at once.
• Employees noticed changes over 12 mo: 46% to daily responsibilities; 40% to nature of my role [​PwC 2024 Hopes & Fears Survey​, Australia].

The five critical areas of cultural and operational transformation are not optional—they are already reshaping your competitive landscape. First, recognize each of these shifts and their current impact on your business and workforce.

> You don’t need to make all five shifts at once, but you must plan for each.> You must design your approach with human needs and stability in mind.>  Strategic sequence, clear communication, and leading with empathy are key. >  Shifting gears with intention and attention is critical to be effective.

1. GROWTH MINDSETS

What it means: Orient towards values of trust, empathy, and transparency to stimulate psychological safety; cultivate growth mindsets and experimentation; encourage servant leadership to support multigenerational employee resilience.

Why it matters:

• 80% of US senior executives say employees' growth mindsets contribute to revenue growth (​Better Business Forum​).
• 96% of execs say they have a growth mindset; 54% of employees don’t see the evidence; 24% say it’s rarely/never seen [​Tech.co​ Oct. 2024].
• 48% of employees say leaders need to be emotionally intelligent [​HBI, 2024 Global Leadership Development Study​]
• Only 29% of employees trust their team leader [​Cake.com 2025​]
• 45% of Boomers and 17% of Gen Zers report no challenges working across generations [​KornFerry 2025​].

2. FLEXIBLE FRAMEWORKS

What it means: Ditch rigid hierarchies for familiar frameworks to facilitate Digital Transformation 2.0 and workers' transition to dynamic work models. Use a systems approach to co-design and test with teams to implement changes, combining team agreements with asynch methods for autonomy and flexibility.

What are select options:

• Lean - emphasizes continuous improvement and operational excellence using lean manufacturing processes.
• Agile - focuses on iterative development, where requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration.
• Consulting* - focuses on team-based problem-solving with rotating, multidisciplinary expertise.
• Team Sports* - emphasizes flexibility in action with shared responsibility, coordination, and real-time decision-making.  

*Familiar NEW frameworks to be revealed in future newsletter *SW&CM, 2025.

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3. DIGITAL MATURITY & DEXTERITY

What it means: Enable digitalized operating capabilities including upskilling workers to be digitally fluent. Embed learning in the flow of work to accelerate skills acquisition with experimental and collaborative approaches. Emphasize adaptation, adoption, and innovation to achieve better outcomes.

Why it matters:

• Tech skills with increasing use 2025-2030: 88% for AI and big data, 72% networks and cybersecurity, 71% technological literacy topping all other skills, employers' expectations [​WEF Future of Jobs Report 2025​].
• 80% faster annual net income growth at companies using the most emerging technologies vs those not investing in the tech [​Oracle​].
• 50% higher returns and 42% average profit margins were experienced by companies with advanced digital capabilities compared to 18% avg profit margins for digital laggards [​PwC Building the Digital Enterprise​].
• 40% of Gen Zers find major tech skills gap among older colleagues vs. 24% of Boomers find problems with their tech skills [​KornFerry 2025​].
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4. JOBS → SKILLS

What it means: Rethink how value is created by people and start/keep shifting from a static job-based model. Use a dynamic skills-based approach to deploy talent in areas of strategic growth, align with change initiatives, improve internal career mobility and discover where capability gaps exist.

Why it matters:

• 57% more likelihood of companies being agile with a skills-based approach [​Deloitte, The Skills-based Organization​].
• 40% to 60% adoption in skills-based hiring vs fixed roles, doubling in four years 2020-24 [​Software Oasis​].
• 65% shift in job skills predicted by 2030 due to AI [​LinkedIn​].

“Shifting to a system where skills are the core currency of the labour market thus has the potential to tackle existing inefficiencies in job-fit between employers and employees; help prepare for a near-future of greater volatility in the labour market; and enhance opportunity, prosperity and equality for workers,” ​WEF report​ 2019.

5. BLENDED WORKFORCE

What it means: Shift to stop hiring/firing/hiring cycles with greater emphasis on a core full‑time team; offer more employment arrangements to add fractional and other part-time employees for targeted needs; integrate more contractors and specialized freelancers; complement and augment workers with AI agents.

Why it matters:

• 36% of executives say work is increasingly being performed by workers outside the company who don't have defined jobs [​Deloitte​].
• 37% of US, UK, NL, DE, AUS cos hire freelancers globally [​​Remote '25​​].
• 51% of US workers expected to be freelancers by 2027 [​​Statista 2022​​].
• ​​12% of the global workforce​​ is projected to be freelancers by 2025.
• 80% of common customer service issues are expected to be resolved without human intervention by 2029 using agentic AI [​Superagi.com​].

We must actively shift gears and drive TOWARD the change, not turn away. Just as if you skid in a car, you turn the wheel INTO the direction of the skid.

To manage these interdependent changes, you need first to know your organization's status relating to each shift, then start with small steps:

1. Conduct a Shift Audit - What is your company's progress for each of the key shifts? Where are folks engaged and progressing or action has stalled? Has any shift not yet actively advanced? Use leader interviews and employee surveys to assess status and readiness.
2. Anchor with Rituals & Learning - Cultivate a learning foundation to improve understanding, flexibility, and adaptations for all shifts: embed frequent feedback and learning loops; enhance empathy and coaching skills; increase sharing and transparency; mentor employees navigating anxieties; co-create/update team agreements.
3. Pilot Focused Micro‑Moves - Launch targeted initiatives to advance core aspects of your organization's priority shifts: share daily examples and benefits of leaders' growth mindsets in action; focus hiring managers and team leaders on skills to match with business needs; develop principles and protocols for async distributed work.

Use August to shift and scale while giving workers grounded direction. More practical insights with actionable steps next week!

📘 ​The Next Rules of Work​, ​Gary A. Bolles​ - new landscape, new rules.

🗞️ ​Recommitting to our why, what, and how​ memo, Satya Nadella.

📹 ​The Power of Yet​, Carol Dweck - Prompting action. We're not there, yet.

🎶 ​Titanium​, David Guetta - Uplifting for resilience during change.

Achieving business growth with multiple shifts in progress and employees needing stability is not easy or obvious. For customized insights to prioritize your attention, get in touch with me.

I can accelerate your growth and enhance your leadership of these shifts so your business can grow effectively. ​Click here to book a 30-minute session.​

Next week, we'll get practical and actionable with the first of these critical shifts.

See you again then.

Sophie

P.S. My new course is here! Based on content 630,000+ learners have loved—now designed to enhance results for you and your team leaders.

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