What's really on the mind of the CEO?

What’s top of the agenda for UK CEOs this year? For PwC’s 11th annual CEO survey over 1000 CEOs globally were interviewed. The results give an insight into the priorities of CEOs – their confidence on business prospects, key trends, cross border M&A, climate change, regulation, collaboration and the people agenda.

To give you some food for thought, we’ve provided a snapshot from the UK responses here. These and further coverage provided within the report highlight the attitudes that will shape business both at home and across the globe in future years.

1 Energy blind spot

UK CEOs are markedly less concerned about energy security than the global average; with only 20% registering any concern and more than a quarter professing no concern whatsoever about this or the security of the supply chain. At the same time 55% of UK CEOs say they are concerned about rising energy costs suggesting UK CEOs may not have yet joined the dots between energy security and rising energy costs.

2 Wanted: challenging leaders

Some 93% of UK CEOs put a premium on the ‘courage to challenge’, yet over half of them have difficulties recruiting people with this quality. Language skills and the ‘ability to collaborate’ are seen as much easier to find. Hardest of all to recruit for in the UK, from the CEOs point of view, are people with combined business and technical expertise and the ability to develop and lead others.

3 Changing benefits of technology

UK CEOs report the implementation of new technology as the most popular change made by organisations in the last three year (91%). However, only 15% of UK CEOs see technological innovation as the main source of competitive advantage, and few believe the UK government is working to stimulate innovation. Disappointment with the benefits of new technology or simply a focus on other aspects of the business?

4 Competing for skills

While CEOs do not appear concerned about the impact of low-cost competition, with only 36% citing any concern, a significant 61% are somewhat or very concerned about the availability of key skills.

5 Service, talent, change

Improved customer service, attracting and retaining key talent and ability to change are seen as the main sources of competitive advantage in achieving growth right now.

6 A change in the climate?

More than a third of UK CEOs believe climate change will benefit their business economically although only a quarter claim to be investing significant resources to address the risks and opportunities of climate change. Almost half of UK CEOs, however, show no concern for the impact of climate change on their business growth prospects.

7 Regulatory overload

Asked what they would most like to change, UK CEOs resoundingly focused on changes to regulation, seeking less regulation, bureaucracy and government interference. UK CEOs appear to have little appetite for government seeking to drive convergence of global tax and regulatory frameworks, although this issue finds favour with more than half of CEOs globally.

8 Growing pains?

Mergers and acquisitions and joint ventures/strategic alliances have played a more prominent role for business success through the eyes of the UK CEO than for their counterparts globally. Some 30% cite M&As or joint ventures/strategic alliances as having the most positive effect on their business compared to a global average of 19%. Internally-generated cash flow remains the preferred option for financing growth, though a surprising 32% (up from 18% last year) expect to finance growth from the debt market this year.

9 Intangible assets

UK CEOs are far less concerned about intellectual property rights (19%) than their global peers (32%) ranking this as less of a threat to their business growth than inadequacy of basic infrastructure or pandemics and other health crises. Are they protecting the right assets?

10 Barriers to change

Lack of engagement or motivation of middle managers to drive change, compounded by the lack of change management skills and experience in senior managers, are seen as the critical barriers to achieving the desired benefits of change. Conversely, 77% of UK CEOs are confident or very confident their leadership has the capability and confidence to lead significant changes.