Challenges and change in 2025
From strategy to leadership, retail and cybersecurity some of our faculty shared some of their thoughts for 2025 on Instagram throughout January. So in case you missed them here are a few snapshots on what they are looking out for this year and some top tips on how to navigate the change that is coming.
Michael Smets on leadership
While 2024 was the year when half the global population went to the polls in elections, 2025 is the year we are seeing many of those new (and some not so new) global leaders on the world stage.
For Michael Smets, Professor of Management and leadership expert, 2025 is a significant year when it comes to how we think about leadership.
‘What makes good leadership or not so good leadership? In the US Donald Trump's cabinet will take office and we'll see what it means for different people with different levels of experience and kinds of experiences entering the arena of politics. We will see to what extent corporate leadership by one of the richest people in the world and political leadership intersect. And what's common to all of these themes from a perspective of leadership is who do senior decision makers surround themselves with?'
His advice for your own 2025: 'Do a quick check in. Who is around you? Who is in your personal advisory board? Who is in your personal backstage crew? Who helps you make better, more responsible decisions in 2025?’
Rupert Younger on corporate diplomacy
For corporations navigating their way through tariffs, trade wars and regulations in 2025 – whether it is with the USA, EU, China or any number of other countries - it is clear that geopolitics is back on the business agenda. As Rupert Younger, Director of the Oxford Centre for Corporate Reputation, explains that means corporate leaders will need to be corporate diplomats.
‘We've seen in the last three years the return of polarisation, nationalism and conflict. And this year, I think leaders are going to be faced with an extraordinarily difficult and volatile set of decisions to make in a time of increasing technology with AI and other technological tools that are streamlining business.
‘The superpower for leaders this year is going to be their humanity. It's going to be their listening skills. Are they really on top of what is being said to them by different stakeholders and constituencies all over the world? It's going to be about their ability to be corporate diplomats, to be able to engage and build consensus where there's friction. And it's going to be a year when those leaders who can navigate those will really emerge as the brilliant leaders. It's going to separate out those who are leaders in normal times from those who really are exceptional.’
Trudi Lang on strategy
In her research and practice Trudi Lang, Associate Professor of Management Practice, works with executives so they take a broader view of strategy, because change often comes from outside their industries
‘In 2025, I'm really looking forward to working with the executives to take a broader view of strategy to really understand what is emerging from outside the industries, because that's where change often comes from. For example, consumer electronic firms and mobile phone companies are actually coming into the car industry in a significant way, producing electric vehicles, and a hospital in the US has set up its own production company to produce TV shows and movie shows.
'These are interesting examples of how change comes from the periphery, the left field. My hope in 2025, therefore, is that the proverbial left field becomes one of curiosity and opportunity for executives, rather than one of surprise and threat.’
Jonathan Trevor on strategic alignment
In January 2020 the world became aware of a strange viral pneumonia outbreak in Wuhan in China. By March 2020 we were facing a global pandemic, and business across all sectors and geographies were grappling with unprecedented challenges. Five years Jonathan Trevor, Associate Dean for Practice and Affiliates, and Professor of Management Practice, is clear that the lessons that businesses learned during Covid are as relevant today as they were then.
‘I think it's business as usual in terms of leaders of organisations having to respond to ever more change and to cope in an ever more complex business environment, one in which global sources of disruption, whether that's political, economic, social or technological, are changing the ways in which we do business. So really it's incumbent upon organisations to think very carefully about how it is that they maintain fitness over the course of the coming year to ensure that they're capable of responding to those threats and finding opportunities for value creation but also risk mitigation.’
Jonathan Reynolds on the challenges of change in retail
In the last few years, we've seen more change than any of us have frankly seen in our lifetimes. Jonathan Reynolds, Associate Professor in Retail Marketing, Deputy Dean and one of the leading academic experts in the global retail sector, explains that now we're getting into a period now when the challenges of change are coming at us in multiple directions.
‘The first of these for retailing is that of consumer confidence and it's pretty fragile based on historically high inflation and cost of living concerns, not just in Western Europe but elsewhere around the world, particularly in China where there are concerns about other parts of the economy not performing as well as could be expected. And the confidence of shoppers and consumers is really what drives the success or otherwise of retailers.
'But more than that, I think we've seen also real sea change in the nature of the retail sector with the growth of new competitors. And we can see those sorts of competitors - Shein, Temu, TikTok - and social commerce of various kinds increasing quite dramatically in many Western markets in particular and starting to catch up with the growth in Asian markets.'
Manuel Hepfer on cybersecurity
Are you ready for zero-day? And no we're not talking about the new Netflix drama, Zero Day. We're talking about the cybersecurity risk that your company could be facing from a vulnerability that is not widely known and for which no patch exists. Manuel Hepfer, Research Affiliate at Saïd Business School shares his top tips for 2025:
Shift to resilience: 'There's a lot of thinking around moving away from cybersecurity protection, which is trying to prevent a cyberattack from happening, to building organisational resilience, which means to be well prepared for if an attack happens. There's no such thing as 100% security, and what matters in this day and age is resilience in the face of insecurity.'
Regulator changes and with a particular focus on boards: 'There are new regulations coming into effect in cyber all around the world. And there's a particular stream of regulation that focuses on board directors, and it requires that boards demonstrate adequate oversight of cybersecurity risk.'
Geopolitical activity: 'In a geopolitical order that is quite brittle these days, there are some nations who are taking advantage by using the domain of cyber to gain political and economic advantages.'
And then there is AI: 'We're not yet seeing autonomous AI agents fighting against each other, but what we have started to see is that threat actors are using generative AI to enhance their productivity and their efficiency in carrying out their attacks. Who will gain the upper hand in this arms race between attackers and defenders is yet to be seen, but I think AI has a good shot at giving the advantage to the defenders.'
Pinar Ozcan on fintech literacy
Imagine learning how to save better through AI-driven nudges. Why take on debt when you could be building healthy financial habits instead? From small fintech innovators to large banks, financial services firms and Big Tech, 2025 will see plenty of developments in the world of finance. Pinar Ozcan, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Academic Director of the Oxford Saïd Entrepreneurship Centre and the Oxford Future of Finance and Technology (Fintech) Initiative, is excited about how AI is being used to help people better understand their financial lives and make smarter decisions.
‘One of the things that I'm excited about for the next year is all the developments that we've seen in our lives in terms of generative AI and how that will come and change the financial industry. In particular, I work with fintechs that use AI in order to understand people's financial lives better and give them suggestions about what to do better. So for example, if you can learn how to save through AI and through little nudges, why would you go and try to get a loan? It's much better for you in the long run.
'So I'm excited particularly about those fintechs that have the financial education and financial health of the customer in their business model. And if they can use technology and AI in order to understand how people learn and give them all those nudges and all that knowledge in order to make sure someone can become more financially responsible, then I feel that my research will have accomplished its goal.'
