Good morning.
My friend Dov Seidman, who runs the HOW Institute for Society, has a new survey out this morning assessing the “State of Moral Leadership in Business.” Its main finding: The demand for moral leadership is going up while the supply is going down. Ninety-three percent of respondents in the most recent survey said there was “high demand” for moral leadership in business, up from 88% in 2022 and 86% in 2020. But based on their behaviors, only 10% of CEOs ranked in Seidman’s top tier of moral leadership, compared to 12% in 2022.
Needless to say, “moral leadership” is a tricky concept. And measuring it is even trickier. You can read Seidman’s full report here and explore his methodology here. But the bigger point is that business is changing, and leadership must change with it. Running a big business in an era of profound technological, geopolitical and cultural upheaval has become less and less about telling people what to do, and more and more about engaging them, inspiring them, providing a north star for them to follow, and guardrails to abide by. Says Seidman:
“Today’s leaders are facing unfamiliar challenges and ever-increasing expectations from stakeholders across society…They look to leaders for hope—and hope can only be fostered by leaders who bring out the best in people, who inspire collaboration, a common purpose, and future possibilities.”
Seidman has been on a journey with Fortune since December of 2016 when he was the opening speaker at the Fortune Global Forum held in Rome and at the Vatican. The 100 or so CEOs who attended the event spent their time sharing ideas on how the private sector can address some of the big, difficult social and environmental problems Pope Francis was focused on, and they presented their conclusions to the Pontiff at the end of the event. It was a moving two days and led to the creation of the Fortune CEO Initiative. In my view, it became a seminal moment in the development of a new form of capitalism more focused on positive social impact.
Like so many others, myself included, Seidman sees no conflict between “moral leadership” and long-term shareholder value. From the new report:
“Moral leadership inspires elevated behavior in people, shapes values-based organizational cultures, strengthens performance, nurtures meaningful relationships within teams, and builds stronger links to society and communities.”
And check out this week’s Leadership Next podcast with Blackbird.AI CEO Wasim Khaled, who explains why his company chose Valentine’s Day as the launch date for a new product—Compass—designed to help people assess the truth of information they access online. Find the interview on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
More news below.
Alan Murray
@alansmurray
alan.murray@fortune.com
TOP NEWS
Talking about mental health
Three-quarters of employees want to talk about mental health concerns at work, yet seven out of 10 business leaders lack the training to facilitate those conversations, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). “Today’s workforce wants their employers to care about their mental health,” NAMI CEO Daniel H. Gillison Jr. says. Fortune
Can AI help you keep track of all your Slack messages?
Slack users now have a new tool to catch up with the flood of internal messages from colleagues. The workplace messaging platform will now offer AI-generated summaries of conversations, as well as a new AI-powered search tool. New Slack CEO Denise Dresser—the company’s third head since Salesforce bought the messaging app—says she’s using the tool to get up to speed with her new job. Fortune
Japan’s surprise recession
Japan has lost its position as the world’s third-largest economy to Germany, after GDP shrunk by 0.4% in the final quarter of 2023. Economists expected a 1.1% increase. The country is now in a technical recession since the economy also contracted in the third quarter of 2023. The unexpected recession may alter the Bank of Japan’s decision to increase interest rates for the first time since 2007. Bloomberg
AROUND THE WATERCOOLER
Billionaire brothers behind a British supermarket chain took millions out of their gas station chain so they could repay debt on their private jets by Prarthana Prakash
Bank of America and Lockheed Martin say you don’t need a degree to land a job there—but that’s not what their hiring data suggests by Eleanor Pringle
Harvard law professor on Elon Musk: ‘Over the past 100 years, Delaware has periodically irritated one or two executives by enforcing the law’ by Amanda Gerut
Sony cuts PlayStation 5 sales forecast, signaling a dim year for the video game industry by Chris Morris
Inflation is no match for AI, top analyst says: ‘We’re at the start of a 3- to 5-year tech bull market’ by Sheryl Estrada
This edition of CEO Daily was curated by Nicholas Gordon.
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