Indholdsfortegnelse for 20. December 2025 i I by IMD

Longevity is often viewed through a personal lens – the desire for a longer, healthier life. My father, on his 85th birthday, just announced that he wants to live to be 100, and some of us are calculating whether we can retire early if we live longer. For business leaders, however, longevity is not just a personal question; it is rapidly becoming a fundamental force reshaping economics, workforce dynamics, and consumer markets. By 2050, the number of people aged 60 and above will exceed two billion. As the articles in this issue of I by IMD demonstrate, this demographic shift is not merely a trend to be observed, but a strategic disruption to be managed. To set the scene, Nele Dael and Alyson Meister explore the implications of this “Age…

When it comes to metrics, most leaders track their businesses with precision, yet few examine their own biology with the same discipline. I began measuring mine for a straightforward reason: I wanted to feel better and understand my health at a deeper level. As I ran thousands of tests and made my data transparent, my goal was to uncover what genuinely improves energy, sleep, and well-being – the basics that quietly determine how we show up in every part of our lives, including leadership. What started as a personal effort to improve my health evolved into something broader. I wanted to understand what allows a human being to perform at a high level, not just at 35, but at 55, 75, and beyond. For executives, this isn’t an abstract question.…

Metformin, rapamycin, and other similar drugs have gained significant attention for their potential to slow the aging process and treat age-related diseases. However, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has neither approved these drugs for anti-aging purposes nor recognized aging itself as a disease. According to the FDA, aging is a natural and inevitable biological process. While these substances show promise in animal studies, more clinical evidence is required before they can be deemed safe and effective for increasing longevity.…

As leaders, we can become absorbed by performance. We focus on vision, strategy, goals, and milestones; we measure growth, productivity, and innovation. In this relentless pursuit of results, we often overlook the foundation that sustains it all – the physical, mental, and emotional health of the people who make our organizations come alive. Nurturing this foundation is not only a moral responsibility but also the ultimate strategic one. Building a healthy organizational community is, in essence, building a healthy society. A community can improve the well-being of its members through better access to jobs, stronger support for local businesses, and greater promotion of health education. Just as conscious and unconscious habits shape human health, the health of an organization is the sum of its shared behaviors – both visible and…

Longevity has changed the leadership equation. With six generations now working side by side, age is a collection of lived experiences that shape how we think, create, and lead. Women over 50 represent one of the greatest untapped advantages in the global workforce, offering wisdom, perspective, and leadership maturity that can accelerate innovation and inclusion. The most successful organizations will be those that intentionally design for longevity, valuing wisdom as currency, fostering collaboration across generations, and redefining success not by age or title, but by purpose and impact. For too long, age in the workplace has been treated as a countdown clock. Women in particular have faced double jeopardy, often perceived as “too young” early in their careers and “too old” later on. Longevity calls for a new mindset. Wisdom…

The longevity sector is at a transformative inflection point, but the leadership capabilities needed to translate scientific promise into market success are not yet clearly established. This nascent industry stage offers an opportunity to redefine impactful leadership for a new world: what kind of leader is required to ensure the longevity industry reaches its economic and social potential? Drawing on interviews with longevity sector CEOs, founders, scientists, marketers, and investors, we explored and uncovered the new leadership phenotype required for this emerging market. Here, we offer a blueprint for boards, investors, and executives to identify, cultivate, and empower the leaders who can build thriving longevity-oriented organizations and realize the potential of the healthspan century. Navigating market frontiers Leaders in longevity markets are tested by a unique crucible of strategic, financial,…

The global energy transition is no longer an abstract promise but is unfolding at unprecedented speed, signaling a structural shift in how the world generates power. While renewables now get twice as much investment as fossil fuels, critical minerals refining remains dominated by China while AI is reshaping demand growth. Scan the code to read the full report GLOBAL INVESTMENTS IN CLEAN ENERGY AND FOSSIL FUELS, 2015-2025 CLEAN ENERGY INVESTMENT AND FOSSIL FUEL INVESTMENT BY REGION, 2025 MADE IN CHINA China will remain the top refiner for almost all critical minerals needed for the energy transition. AI IS DRIVING DATA CENTER DEMAND Global data center power consumption is expected to double by 2030, four times faster than other sectors. UNSTOPPABLE GROWTH In the next five years, the world is set…

Every new CEO begins with momentum, but sooner or later, the launch mentality that powered growth begins to stall. If you fear that your leadership is in the doldrums, ask yourself the following: Where am I leading by instinct, rather than by system? Is it helping or holding us back? What is it that only I can do? Which parts of the organization would fail if I were to stop making the daily decisions? Have I clearly defined what success looks like now, or are we still chasing the old version of it? Who on my leadership team is “scaling” faster than the company, and who is falling behind? Do board conversations focus on insight or information? What metrics genuinely predict performance, and which merely serve to reassure us that…

1. What is your personal motto? Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change. 2. Name three traits that make a great business leader. A historic perspective to learn from the past, a curious mindset to shape the future, and optimism to inspire and navigate challenges. 3. What experience has had the greatest influence on your leadership style? Embracing failure and disappointment. Failure taught me humility, perseverance, and resilience. According to a Japanese saying, resilience is seven times falling down and eight times standing up. Disappointment taught me gratitude and love for those who stand by me, in good and especially bad times. 4. How do you balance your well-being and personal life with leadership? Through structure, reflection, and serendipity. Structure helps me organize my day, and routines turn that structure into consistent action.…

A few weeks ago, we convened over 60 CEOs and senior board members in Lausanne for IMD’s annual CEO Roundtable. It’s a rare opportunity for CEOs to compare notes and an opportunity for us to get a sense of what is on the minds of leading CEOs. This year’s topic was leading under extreme uncertainty. Guided by IMD faculty, CEOs dissected the implications of the emerging new geopolitical order, the rapid rise of agentic AI, and the emergence of Gen Z – the biggest generation in history – as consumers and employees. Each of these megatrends is transforming the business environment. Taken together, they create an extremely volatile playing field. One key takeaway was the importance of understanding how these forces interact. Technology is at the heart of geopolitical tensions,…

The story of Oedipus may be the weirdest of the Greek myths. (Note: contains spoilers.) An oracle prophesies that the baby Oedipus will grow up to kill his father and marry his mother, who are the king and queen. They send the baby off to die, but he is secretly adopted and raised by another royal couple. Through a series of bizarre misadventures, Oedipus indeed ends up killing his father and marrying his mother, bringing about a plague. When he comes to see the terrible things he has done, he gouges out his own eyes. Those tracking the Donald Trump administration may be forgiven for seeing parallels. Oracles predicted malign consequences from the administration’s policies, such as a chaotic tariff regime and unrestrained expansion of fossil fuel production. The administration,…

Longevity is among the most captivating ideas of our age, not only because it speaks to science and health, but because it taps into something deeply human – the desire for more time to create, contribute, and enjoy the people and places we love. In boardrooms and research labs alike, the discussion often centers on what might soon be possible: precision interventions, powerful new therapies, and data-rich tools that promise to reshape the arc of human aging. But beneath the excitement sits a quieter, more complex reality. We are celebrating the prospect of extending individual lives at the very moment the systems that sustain life – environmental, social, and planetary – are under increasing strain. Life expectancy is rising for some but falling for others. Health is improving in certain…

At some point, everyone has a moment of truth about their health: a parent falls ill, a friend receives a diagnosis, a doctor gently but firmly tells you it’s time to make a change. It’s often only when these moments arrive that we shift our mindset from assuming “I’m fine for now” to suddenly caring very much about the future. By then, the focus has moved from prevention to desperately catching up. Why do we wait? Most of us want to live longer, healthier lives, yet we carry an underlying assumption that our final years will inevitably be marked by decline. We hope for vitality but quietly accept the prospect of frailty. We call this the longevity paradox: the gap between what we aspire to and how we actually behave.…

When Philip Morris International (PMI) set out to replace its core product, few believed it could succeed. Yet under CEO Jacek Olczak, the world’s largest cigarette maker is turning its smoke-free vision into one of the most ambitious business transformations of the decade, reshaping its portfolio, culture, and purpose along the way. When PMI declared in 2016 that it aimed to deliver a smoke-free future, the statement reverberated far beyond the tobacco industry. The world’s largest cigarette manufacturer -which owns five of the 15 best-selling international brands, including Marlboro – had set out to gradually replace its core product with less harmful, scientifically developed alternatives. Less than a decade later, the company, which employs more than 80,000 people, has made remarkable progress. In 2024, PMI generated net revenues of around…

Aboardroom can look a lot like companies that we’ve led – the same people, the same strategies – but the kind of leadership it demands is completely different. After a decade as a CEO and more than 10 years serving on and chairing boards, it became clear that many of the qualities that make you a good CEO don’t necessarily make you a good chair. The boardroom is a different place – slower, more reflective, and focused on helping others succeed. I often say I got it all wrong before I began to get it right. Board leadership demands a different kind of conduct – one that makes collaboration more productive, handles conflict constructively, and supports others in delivering their best. Those skills took time, and more than a few…

The gap between future-ready and future-fragile companies shows up in the numbers. Against a backdrop of geopolitical tension and mass AI deployment, some firms are turning disruption into an advantage, while others are discovering that yesterday’s strengths trap them in yesterday’s game. The 2025 Future Readiness Indicator ranks 49 technology companies, 27 pharmaceutical companies, and 41 fashion companies on their future readiness. Those dominating the top of this year’s indicator combine supply chain agility with an ability to adapt quickly to shifting regulations. The winners move capital, talent, and capabilities across borders and product lines faster than the world can throw up new constraints. These companies often have the capability to orchestrate an entire ecosystem rather than relying on a single product or service. They are laser-focused on performing in…

While societal forces shape longevity, leaders occupy a uniquely influential position within those forces. They design organizations where millions of people spend most of their waking hours. They influence supply chains that touch ecosystems and communities across the globe. And their decisions signal what we value and what we are willing to protect. Leadership alone cannot solve the longevity challenge, but it can meaningfully shift the conditions that make longer, healthier lives possible. Leading self: modeling the shift toward long-horizon health For many leaders, longevity has come to mean self-improvement – refining habits, tightening routines, and optimizing every available metric. But the more consequential shift is not about perfecting the self; it is about expanding the horizon. At its core, longevity is a way of thinking – a commitment to…

Capturing the Longevity-Equality Dividend requires intentional design. Governments must invest in care infrastructure, including affordable childcare and elder care. Policies must support flexible work arrangements, lifelong learning, and reentry pathways that treat career breaks as assets rather than liabilities. Organizations must adapt their leadership models to value life experience, reshape performance systems to recognize nonlinear contributions, and create mentorship networks that support talent across generations. This is not simply social policy; it is economic strategy. Here are a few ideas for carrying out the strategy: • Intergenerational leadership hubs. Establish physical or virtual “centers of longevity leadership” where women over 50 mentor, consult, and coach younger professionals, leveraging decades of lived experience. • AI-driven life transcript tools. Develop AI systems that help people map their life experiences (paid work, caregiving,…

Could an ecosystem-led approach to disparate industrial information technology systems build more resilient and efficient global supply chains? Caspar Herzberg, CEO of industrial software company AVEVA, argues that breaking down data silos across companies and sectors could benefit all stakeholders through what he calls “radical collaboration”. “The average factory has hundreds of systems, and hundreds of software applications – and that’s within just one company,” he said. “If you multiply that over supply chains, there are thousands of systems and thousands of different datasets that have enormous value locked in them but don’t speak to each other and aren’t brought together.” If shared and analyzed, insights from this proliferation of walled IT systems and software in industrial processes in sectors as diverse as energy, pharmaceuticals, and transportation could help companies…

Frances is the director of marketing at a multinational pharmaceutical company. Dubbed “superwoman” by her colleagues, she is respected for being smart, competent, relentlessly driven, and an excellent executor. She is ambitious, and a recent company reorganization has raised serious hopes of a promotion. Talking to her manager, however, she is disappointed to learn that a position she’s been hoping for is to be filled by an external hire. Daunted but not deterred, Frances schedules a follow-up meeting with her boss, hoping for a candid conversation about why she has been passed over. During this meeting, Frances receives dismaying feedback. While there is no doubt about her execution capabilities, the senior management team does not see her potential as a strategic leader. Frances disagrees. She feels unrecognized, believing that others…