How to rethink leadership in 2026, according to young leaders from around the world

Hand-wringing calls to overcome the crisis of leadership and to rebuild trust are abundant. What is needed are practical proposals on how to do so. The World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Leadership is setting out to develop exactly that, and to initiate a global leadership lab to facilitate dialogue, collaboration and action with the aim of opening up new leadership futures that will create better outcomes for people and the planet.

In its latest report, Next generation leadership for a world in transformation: Driving dialogue and action, the council outlines a holistic approach to addressing what appears to be a systemic rather than a purely human failure: The structures and institutions, the assumptions and traits that have long shaped how leadership is defined and exerted, are under unprecedented pressure. Leadership models that were once built on stability and hierarchy can no longer sustain themselves in a world marked by constant transformation, increasing acceleration and complex interdependencies.

The report emphasizes four interlinked, but independent variables that shape the leadership cycle regardless of sector or region: How leaders are selected, how they are trained, how they take decisions and action, and how they are incentivized to manage their succession and long-term legacy.

To learn more about how this systemic redesign might take place, we asked Young Global Leaders who are members of the council to share some personal, practical proposals.

Leadership succeeds or fails long before a leader steps into the public eye. It succeeds or fails because of a diffuse, informal and often unexamined framework that determines who enters leadership positions. It shapes the pipeline of visibility, legitimacy, readiness and opportunity in ways the public seldom perceives, influenced by subtle biases and unwritten norms.

The cumulative effect narrows leadership down to familiar patterns, often rewarding traits belonging to a world that no longer exists. Evaluation processes too often mistake confidence for competence, charisma for integrity, and pedigree for preparedness.

This is precisely why selection is the most powerful solution. If we redesign how we select leaders, we inherently reshape the leadership pipeline, broadening the criteria of readiness. We alter leadership development because training then aligns with the demands of complex systems. We change decision-making because leaders chosen for coherence, clarity and depth bring those qualities into their actions. And we reshape legacy, because continuity of purpose cannot thrive if success is measured solely by individual acclaim.

Selection is where the future is chosen. This moment requires us to resist the temptation to personalize leadership success and failure and instead examine the architecture that causes it. It will improve because we choose — thoughtfully and courageously — to redesign the process when leadership begins and through systems capable of producing leaders who are ethically grounded, contextually smart, intergenerationally aware, and ready to manage complexity instead of oversimplifying it.

Listening is a powerful muscle that unlocks our human potential to grow together, especially in times of uncertainty. It is a timeless skill.

As listening has atrophied in today’s online environment, with many leaders — and citizens — not quite sure how to effectively listen and be heard accurately through all the noise, we know that we have to invest in strengthening our core listening muscles.

It starts with having conversations — a form of dialogue — that allow people to feel seen through being heard. It can happen with a variety of stakeholders at work, in one’s neighbourhood, online, or even over a meal.

It is here where we are given the opportunity to build consensus that could lead to a variety of potential outcomes: complex problems solved, disagreements resolved, ideas inspired, respect offered, grace given, souls touched, agency restored, commitments made, values exchanged, responsibility taken, assumptions clarified, lessons learned, talent realized, fears mitigated, belonging fostered, truth explored and trust formed.

Leaders, and the communities they serve, will find these outcomes to be the fuel needed to effectively transcend divides and build new pathways that future generations want to follow.

As it all starts with listening, my organization Millions of Conversations invites you to start strengthening this listening muscle today by taking the Pledge To Listen. We have our roots in the US and aim to create momentum around the globe so that listening can unlock our human potential to grow together everywhere.

Across sectors and regions, we still train leaders for a world that no longer exists. We invest heavily in technical mastery and formal authority, but far less in the real conditions under which leaders operate today: uncertainty, public scrutiny, fragmented institutions, and environments where every decision carries personal and collective risk.

Throughout my career, my most meaningful lessons came from the courage to take on interdisciplinary challenges, situations where resilience and creativity were tested repeatedly. Working at the intersection of political leadership development, civil society and large-scale private-sector projects, I learned that the defining skill for the next decade is not what leaders know, but how they make decisions when everything is in motion. Leading today means making choices in hostile or ambiguous contexts: facing polarization, misinformation, external pressure, resource constraints, or ethical dilemmas with no perfect answer.

To meet this reality, we need new development models that prepare leaders for the world as it is: decision-making labs under pressure, real sponsorship mechanisms, cross-sector crisis simulations, and spaces that cultivate emotional resilience and ethical clarity.

If the next era of leadership is about pipelines, incentives and legacy, our task is clear: To build systems that help leaders remain courageous, lucid and principled, especially when it is hardest.

I’ve learned in government and in business that even the noblest intentions are powerless against misaligned incentives. When leaders are measured by quarterly earnings or a single electoral cycle, they inevitably prioritize what is urgent, visible and politically survivable. Yet the challenges that define our century — eroding trust, a warming planet, weakened institutions — cannot be solved by short-term, reactive leadership. They demand patient, long-term and reflexive stewardship.

To change behaviour, we must redesign what we reward. And this across all levels: as individuals, as societies, as institutions and companies.

A practical tool to capture that redesign could be a new leadership impact scorecard, which would make lasting value both measurable and consequential. It would assess whether senior teams became stronger, more diverse and genuinely succession-ready during a leader’s tenure; whether flagship initiatives still deliver results five years after a leader’s departure; and whether today’s decisions expand or constrain the options available to future generations. Concretely, an independent, multistakeholder panel, aided by data analytics and AI, could review these metrics every five years, influencing compensation, board reappointments and public reputation. Importantly, the scorecard could be complemented by a questionnaire that encourages leaders to annually ask themselves “the tough questions” about whether they are on track to enabling the above.

Success would no longer be about surviving crises or managing noise. It would mean leaving behind capable successors, resilient institutions and real progress on goals that outlive any single tenure.

Only when incentives reward builders over performers will leadership stop optimizing for applause today and start planting oaks that only our grandchildren will sit under. That is the legacy that matters: systems that thrive long after we are gone.