skills for competitiveness and...
TRANSCRIPT
e-LeadershipSkills for Competitiveness
and Innovation
Research fi ndings developed by: Prepared for the European Commission, DG Enterprise and Industry
Contents
About the Study
Acknowledgements
During 2012, empirica, IDC and INSEAD
worked together on a study for the
European Commission’s Directorate
General Enterprise and Industry. The
objective of the study, titled “e-Skills for
Competitiveness and Innovation: Vision,
Roadmap and Foresight Scenarios,” was
to develop a vision for Europe’s e-skills for
This project would not have been possible
without the generous participation of many.
We are grateful of the support and
contributions of the Steering Committee,
consisting of Martin Curley, Vice-President
and Director INTEL Labs Europe; Annabelle
Gawer, Assistant Professor in Strategy and
Innovation at Imperial College Business
School; Peter Hagedoorn, Secretary
General of EuroCIO; Elmar Husmann,
Senior Managing Consultant at IBM.
Within the European Commission (EC) our
contact point was André Richier, Enterprise
and Industry Directorate-General, Services
competitiveness and innovation, and to
examine ways to face current and future
challenges. A particular focus of the study
was on e-leadership skills. The resulting
analysis, roadmap and scenarios focus
on how Europe can seize opportunities in
innovation, new technologies and emerging
Industry Directorate, Key Enabling
Technologies and ICT Unit.
Finally, we are very grateful to the many
professionals who took time from their
important efforts at enhancing e-skills to
participate in the project workshops and to
talk with us.
ABOUT THE PROJECT ..............................................................................................................................................................................2
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................................................................................................2
FOREWORD ...............................................................................................................................................................................................3
INTRODUCTION .........................................................................................................................................................................................4
e-SKILLS FORECASTS AND SCENARIOS ................................................................................................................................................6
THE IMPORTANCE OF e-LEADERSHIP ...................................................................................................................................................10
ESTIMATING DEMAND AND SUPPLY OF e-LEADERS ...........................................................................................................................16
RECOMMENDED ACTIONS .....................................................................................................................................................................20
Recommendation 1: Engage with a broader set of stakeholder groups to sharpen defi nition and metrics for e-leadership skills .........21
Recommendation 2: Regularly monitor demand and supply of e-leadership ..........................................................................................22
Recommendation 3: Develop and apply e-leadership curricula guidelines .............................................................................................23
Recommendation 4: Create new formats and partnerships for teaching e-leadership skills ..................................................................24
Recommendation 5: Align actions to develop e-leadership skills with efforts to foster entrepreneurship across the EU .......................25
Recommendation 6: Foster e-leadership in the context of entrepreneurship and new business creation ..............................................26
Recommendation 7: Build awareness of the relevance of e-leadership skills for innovation, competitiveness, and employability ........27
OVERVIEW ...............................................................................................................................................................................................28
Imprint: This brochure has been prepared by INSEAD eLab on behalf of the European Commission, Enterprise and Industry Directorate General. It is a publication of the study “e-Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation: Vision, Roadmap and Foresight Scenarios,” which was carried out by empirica, IDC and INSEAD eLab.
Legal Notice: Neither the European Commission nor any person acting on its behalf may be held responsible for the use to which information contained in this publication may be put, nor for any errors which may appear despite careful preparation and checking. This publication does not necessarily refl ect the view or the position of the European Commission. © European Union, 2013
Reproduction is authorised, provided the source is acknowledged, save where otherwise stated. For use/reproduction of third-party copyright material specifi ed as such permission must be obtained from the copyright holder(s).
forms of organisation and production, while
maintaining its priority on inclusive growth.
2 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Foreword
There is a huge opportunity for job creation and growth which Europe should not miss.
There are clear signs from industry and
other stakeholders that the demand for
ICT-related occupations (digital jobs) is
going to grow even greater in the coming
years. However, a drop in the number of
ICT graduates leaving universities and the
retirement of ICT workers over the coming
years are endangering the ICT job growth
potential. There is a huge opportunity
for job creation which Europe should not
miss. Europe, national governments and
stakeholders have the possibility to create
up to 864.000 ICT jobs up until 2015 which
the market would be ready to absorb. This
would close the forecasted e-skills gap
and this was the topic of the high-level
conference “e-Skills and Education” on 4-5
March 2013 at which President Barroso
launched the “Grand Coalition for Digital
Jobs”.
Past developments have shown that
ICT-related occupations are much more
resistant to crises than most other jobs.
The market absorbs more than the annual
output of ICT graduates from educational
institutions. Consequently, today, investing
in e-skills entails even greater opportunities
and fewer risks.
The growing importance of ICT for both
business operations and innovation is
an opportunity for professionals who are
e-skilled - i.e., who are both ICT-savvy
and business-savvy. These competencies
are critical for fostering both jobs created
by existing companies through innovation
and growth as well as self-created
jobs by entrepreneurs (including social
entrepreneurs) who leverage technology
to create new products, services and
business.
antonio Tajani,
Vice-President of the
European Commission
The growing importance of e-skilled
professionals - particularly e-leaders
- also means that a greater number
of stakeholder groups are becoming
interested and involved in ensuring
demand is well defi ned and assessed and
supply is suffi cient. When the Commission
launched initial efforts at ensuring Europe
had suffi cient e-skilled professionals to
be innovative and competitive, it worked
primarily with those most immediately
concerned - specifi cally, the ICT industry
and the ICT services sector. Since then,
as organizations are investing even more
in ICT and are digitizing an even greater
number of business processes, products
and services, efforts have expanded and
we have engaged with Chief Information
Offi cers and their equivalents - i.e., with
leaders who are responsible for ensuring
their organizations (whether in the ICT
sector or not, primarily in medium and
large-size fi rms) are maximizing value
creation from ICT. A greater number of
stakeholder groups is becoming involved.
The launch of the “Grand Coalition for
Digital Jobs” is refl ecting this evolution.
The results of the study of INSEAD, empirica
and IDC demonstrate that e-leaders are
essential to all types of organizations and
Europe already has several successful
efforts at building e-skilled professionals.
The next steps are to collaborate with a
greater variety of stakeholder groups in
the context of the “Grand Coalition” to
implement the recommendations and
rapidly scale-up existing successes. The
Commission looks forward to its continued
contributions to ensure Europe has the
right and suffi cient professionals and
leaders to be innovative and competitive.
3e-Leadership Study
Introduction
Results from a recent study conducted
by INSEAD eLab make this strikingly
clear. They highlight that when firms have
access to e-skilled professionals, such
as enterprise architects, risk and security
specialists, and application developers,
and invest more in new technologies,
the probability of becoming competitive
can double. However when firms with
insufficient e-skills make significant
investments in new technology, do
not increase the likelihood of better
performance—essentially they risk wasting
their investments in new technology and
losing any competitive edge.
Figure 1 illustrates one example of
many such complementarities between
technology, skills and performance. In the
total sample upon which these results are
based, 46% of those surveyed were low
investors in cloud-based services (i.e.,
they spent less than 10% of their total ICT
budget on cloud-based services), while
30% were high investors in cloud-based
services, and the remaining 24% (not
shown in the diagram below) did not invest
in cloud-based services. 1
To be innovative and competitive in today’s global digital economy, organisations have little choice but to invest in information and communication technologies (ICT). However, without the proper skills to put these technologies to effective use, firms are at significant risk of wasting their investments and missing key opportunities for growth and competitiveness.
1 INSEAD eLab. (2013). “Building Competitiveness and Business Performance with ICT: How investments in new technology can make companies more competitive.” A research report developed in collaboration with AT&T. Available at www.corp.att.com/bemoreproductive/.
Size of Each Group Type
(% of total sample)
Within group, % of firms that are
competitively agile
36%
46% of participantswere Low Investors in Cloud
42%
72%
46% 13% 17%
Figure 1: The benefits of having sufficient access to e-skills; the risks
of insufficient access
36% were competitively agile
42% were competitively agile
72% were competitively agile
13% of participantswere High Investors in Cloud
with Weak Technical
Talent
17% of participantswere Low Investors in Cloud
with Strong Technical
Talent
4 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Within the group of low investors, only 36%
were competitively agile - that is, compared
to the average, they respond more quickly
and effectively to local opportunities or
threats.
The benefi ts of having suffi cient
technology-focused talent: 17% of the
total survey sample consisted of high
investors in cloud-based services that also
had high technical skills. Of the fi rms in this
group, 72% were competitively agile.
The risks of having insuffi cient
technology-focused talent: High investors
in cloud-based services with insuffi cient
technology-focused talent represent 13%
of the total survey sample and 44% of high
investors in cloud-based services. Survey
fi ndings reveal that these high investors
were statistically no more likely to be
highly agile than low investors in cloud-
based services. In essence, fi rms that were
investing more in cloud-based services to
enhance agility yet had insuffi cient access
to technology skills were at risk of wasting
their investments on cloud-based services.
Having strong e-skills is not simply benefi cial to competitiveness — it is necessary to avoid wasting investments in ICT. This is true for all types of organisations – no matter the size or sector.
This report synthesizes the key fi ndings
from the study “e-Skills for Competitiveness
and Innovation: Vision, Roadmap and
Foresight Scenarios.” The key objective of
this study is to help reduce innovation skills
shortages, gaps and mismatches in Europe,
and to provide sound, unbiased empirical
evidence about supply and demand for
different types of ICT-related skills in
Europe under different socio-economic
scenarios. A special focus of the study is
on higher-level innovation skills (which we
call “e-leadership skills”). After providing a
synthesis of the analysis of the supply and
demand developments for ICT practitioner
and ICT user skills, the remainder of this
document will focus on e-leadership skills
and seven recommendations for action.
Managers, entrepreneurs, and business executives must have e-competences to grow, export and be connected to the global digital markets. In a digital economy, e-leadership skills are essential.
—Michel Catinat, Head of Unit “Key Enabling Technologies and ICT”
at DG Enterprise and Industry, European Commission
5e-Leadership Study
Growing Gap: Even with the crisis, demand for ICT workers continues to outnumber the supply. This gap represents an opportunity for job creation which Europe should not miss.
TThe ICT workforce in Europe in 2011
amounted to 6.67 million which is 3.1% of
the overall workforce. It has been growing
over the past decades and will continue to
grow in the future. From 2000 to 2010 the
ICT workforce grew at an average annual
rate of 4.26%. Even at the times of the
economic and fi nancial crisis which Europe
is undergoing since late 2008, growth
remained at 2.65%.
The demand appears to be signifi cant for
e-leaders. Of the approximately 255,000
vacancies for the EU-27 in 2012, we fi nd
76,000 vacancies for “ICT management and
business architecture” skills. Furthermore,
the gap is disproportionately affecting
small and medium-size enterprise: 70%
of vacancies can be found in SMEs which
demand ICT skills in much greater numbers
than large enterprises.
However, interest in pursuing ICT careers
seems to be diminishing among younger
generations. Since 2005, the number of
computer science graduates has been in
continuous decline in Europe. This decline
intensifi es by the growing number of ICT
practitioners retiring from the workforce.
The bottom line is: Europe is not ‘producing’
suffi cient numbers of ICT graduates
to satisfy the demand. The results of a
representative empirica survey of CIO‘s and
HR managers in eight European countries
in 2012 show that the number of expected
vacancies in ICT-related occupations,
extrapolated to the whole of Europe (EU-
27), can be estimated at around 255.000
in 2012.
To be competitive, innovation is critical. There are three key aspects to innovating effectively and efficiently: strategy, skills, and tools. These three are the responsibility of the most senior management team.”
—Federico Flórez, Chief Information and Innovation Offi cer, Ferrovial
e-Skills Forecasts and Scenarios
6 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Future Gaps: Scenario-based forecasting of ‘ICT practitioner and professional skills’ in Europe 2012-2020
The likely future development in e-skills
demand and supply in Europe were
estimated by emprica, based on several
scenario-based forecasts. In a “Cautious
Growth” scenario the e-skills excess
demand or shortage amounts to 372.000
in 2015 compared to 255.000 at present. In
a more optimistic ”Return to Confi dence”
scenario the shortage, i.e. the theoretical
number of ICT vacancies amounts to
864.000 in 2015.
Each scenario infl uences the input and
output factors that make up the model of
future demand and supply. Input factors
consist of such factors as the number
of ICT graduates expected to enter the
ICT workforce as well as the number of
self-trained or industry certifi ed workers.
Output factors include such factors as
retirement trends and other exits patterns.
These scenarios were put to the test
at three workshops, and the experts
there scrutinised the assumptions and
contributed to honing the fi nal model.
Future e-skills demand will increasingly
occur in higher level ICT jobs including the
management, planning and strategy and
ICT development specialist occupations
and less in ICT support, delivery and
operation, i.e., infrastructure type
occupations.
Even under the two most likely scenarios—“Cautious Growth” and “Return to Confi dence” —gaps between demand and supply of e-skills are signifi cant.
2 For a signifi cantly more detailed description of the methodology used, please refer to Chapter 2 of the Final Report, available at http://eskills-vision.eu/
7e-Leadership Study
Results from the scenario “Cautious Growth”The scenario “Cautious Growth” features
economic growth with a slow return to
historical growth trajectories. From 2010
and 2015, GDP growth across Europe
is assumed to have on average a 0.92%
compound annual growth rate.
Moderate IT investments will be reflected
in 2.1% annual growth until 2015, with
an increasing trend from 2014 onwards,
to a growth rate of 4.3% on average
between 2015-2020. IT investments will
build upon a rapid diffusion of mobile
devices, applications, cloud services and
other new IT delivery models. Big data
applications and services are expected
to grow considerably from 2014 onwards.
SME investments in IT innovation will
increase only very slowly because of the
slow recovery and persistence of the credit
crunch.
In the education domain, a slight increase
in the number of ICT graduates and
some labour mobility is expected. Private
funding for education and training will be
at a moderate level. In the social domain,
data-driven commercial services on the
web, also driven by mobile devices, will
imply some “big brother” risks. Politically, a
continuing incremental process of building
Europe step by step is expected. Continuing
negotiations between EU Member States
will bring about gradual and cumulative
progress in European cohesion.
In the ‘Cautious Growth’ scenario, the ICT
workforce in Europe will grow from 6.53
million people in 2011 to 7.09 million in
2020, whereby 5.15 million people will be
ICT practitioners and 1.95 million will be
ICT management level employees.
e-Skills Forecasts and Scenarios
864,000
1,000,000
900,000
800,000
700,000
600,000
500,000
400,000
300,000
200,000
100,000
2011 2012 2013 2014 20150
255,000
676,000
487,000
363,000205,000 222,000 259,000
372,000
510,000
254,000199,000173,000
While a general trends towards practitioner
shortages can be observed, there will even
be some practitioner unemployment in
some countries but only for a few years,
due to little / lacking mobility across the EU.
These countries are most notably Poland
and Spain. Poland sees an oversupply
mainly due to the steady and strong output
of graduates from tertiary and vocational
education, while Spain continues to suffer
from a slump in demand.
In the scenario “Cautious Growth,” the gap between demand and supply is expected to reach 372,000 in 2015. This figure can best be described as ‘demand potential’ or ‘job potential’ for ICT jobs.
8 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Figure 2: Forecasted demand and supply of e-skills according to two scenarios
Vacancies TotalPractitionersManagement & Architects
Scenario: Return to Confidence
Vacancies TotalPractitionersMangement & Architects
Scenario: Cautious Growth
Results from the scenario “Return to Confidence”
The scenario “Return to Confidence” features a
far more optimistic economic growth scenario
with a recovery in Europe expected from
2014 onwards. GDP growth across Europe
is assumed at an average annual growth rate
of 1.3% between 2010 and 2015. Demand
will be particularly high for ICT management-
related jobs and there will be an increasing
number of vacancies for practitioner jobs
The economic recovery sets a favourable
environment for IT investments, growing at
2.9% annually until 2015 and further increasing
to a growth rate of 5.6% between 2015-2020.
In this scenario, there is an increase in
the share and total number of application
development jobs and a slight decrease in
the number of more infrastructure related
jobs. ”Return to Confidence” features a
robust general trend towards practitioner
shortages, whereby if any rates of practitioner
unemployment are observed, they will be at
the natural unemployment rate of about 2%.
In this scenario the demand potential for ICT
workers will reach beyond 7.47 million in 2020
and amount to 8.99 million.
In the scenario “Return to Confidence,” the gap between demand and supply is expected to be 864,000 in 2015.
We are at an inflection point where Europe can really take advantage of ICT to dramatically boost productivity – provided we have the right skills and leadership. This is the only way that Europe can grow its productivity. These new technologies are as a whole creating jobs.”
—Jan Muehlfeit, Chairman Europe, Microsoft Corporation
That the opportunities of a good crisis should not be missed seems to have been missed by some of our leaders. We are doing less with less rather than more with less. We should be focusing on how to reinvent ourselves.”
—Constantijn van Oranje-Nassau, Head of Cabinet of Vice-President
Neelie Kroes, European Commission
9e-Leadership Study
The Importance of e- Leadership
a new type of leadership —e-leadership—is becoming essential to organisational innovation and competitiveness.
To enhance their productivity and
competitiveness, organisations are
increasingly relying on ICT to operate their
business processes, to innovate and to
provision products and services.
As organisations invest more in business
operations and technologies, ICT leaders
are expected to be more business-savvy
while business leaders are expected to
be more ICT-savvy. INSEAD researchers
are fi nding that the strategic roles of CIOs
and their ICT Groups have expanded
considerably. Since 2009, INSEAD
researchers have collaborated with CIOnet,
a European CIO federation, on an annual
survey of CIOs. The results consistently
show that:
• CIOs spend a signifi cant percentage
of their time outside of managing ICT
services;
• CIOs spend about a third of their time
working with non-ICT colleagues,
whereas ICT Groups spend about
a quarter of their time working with
non-ICT colleagues. In both cases,
they anticipate the percentage of time
working with business colleagues to
grow by at least 20%; and
• CIOs and their ICT groups anticipate
spending an increasingly smaller
percentage of their time managing ICT
services and a growing percentage
of their time working with business
colleagues; managing enterprise-wide
business processes; and working with
external customers and partners.
As organisations invest more in business
operations and technologies, ICT leaders
are expected to be more business-savvy
while business leaders are expected to
be more ICT-savvy. INSEAD researchers
are fi nding that the strategic roles of CIOs
and their ICT Groups have expanded
considerably. Since 2009, INSEAD
researchers have collaborated with CIOnet,
a European CIO federation, on an annual
survey of CIOs. The results consistently
CIOs spend a signifi cant percentage
of their time outside of managing ICT
services;
E-leadership in the context of e-skills
The Commission has been at the forefront of tracking
the evolving demand and supply of e-skills. In 2004, the
European e-skills Forum adopted the following defi nition
for e-skills (EC, 2004):
ICT user skills: the capabilities required for the effective
application of ICT systems and devices by the individual.
ICT users apply systems as tools in support of their own
work. User skills cover the use of common software tools
and of specialised tools supporting business functions
within industry.
ICT practitioner skills: the capabilities required for
researching, developing, designing, strategic planning,
managing, producing, consulting, marketing, selling,
integrating, installing, administering, maintaining,
supporting and servicing ICT systems.
E-business skills (also referred to as e-leadership): the
capabilities needed to exploit opportunities provided by
ICT, notably the Internet; to ensure more effi cient and
effective performance of different types of organisations;
to explore possibilities for new ways of conducting
business/administrative and organisational processes;
and/or to establish new businesses.
In the course of this study, a variety of stakeholder groups
and experts have been consulted and the following
defi nition of e-leadership was developed.
e-Leadership is the accomplishment of a goal that relies
on ICT through the direction of human resources and
uses of ICT. Essentially, e-leaders are leaders who draw
on technology to accomplish an ICT-enabled objective.
3 Aral, Brynjolfsson and Wu 2012; Brynjolfsson and Saunders 2010; Hunter and Westerman 2010; and Weil and Ross 20104 For recent examples, see Austin et al. 2009; Fonstad 2011, 2012; Peppard 2010, 2013; Spitze and Lee 2012; Woerner and Weill (2009).5 Fonstad (2012). “Three ways to thrive: How Chief Information Offi cers are enabling their organizations to grow and strengthen in today’s challenging economy.” An annual report on the expanding strategic roles of ICT professionals, developed by INSEAD eLab in collaboration with CIONET
10 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
11e-Leadership Study
In showing why the demand for e-leaders is
outpacing the supply, INSEAD researchers
have profi led many organisations that have
become far more competitive because
of their different uses of ICT. Below we
discuss two of them, AkzoNobel and
Coca-Cola Europe.
In 2012, the CIO of AkzoNobel, Pieter
Schoehuijs, earned the title of European
CIO of the Year for business-process driven
leadership, because of his role in building
a new generation of e-leaders within and
outside the company. About eight years
ago, to compete more effi ciently and
enter new markets, senior management
at AkzoNobel decided to transform the
company from a fi nancial holding fi rm of
separate businesses into a more matrixed
organisation where the business units were
coordinated to improve effi ciency and
obtain synergies.
ICT was fundamental to this transition.
Today, the ICT Group at AkzoNobel has an
annual operating budget of 300mn EUR
and is responsible for all the company’s
systems, including those supporting
functional organisations such as fi nance,
supply chain, HR, and legal. About 930
people work in ICT in 43 countries around
the world. This massive consolidation,
coupled with a greater use of external
service providers, has signifi cantly
changed the skill set needed by the ICT
Group at AkzoNobel. Before, there was
a greater need for technical people who
knew how to perform services such as
install servers, manage systems, and apply
patches. Now, there is a greater demand
for professionals who are more skilled at
service delivery management, systems
planning (e.g., enterprise architecture) and
business processes.
At the Coca-Cola Company, Europe
CIO Sabine Everaet and her team of 45
specialists handle all non-outsourced ICT
needs in Europe. For a global fi rm that
generated revenues of more than EUR
46.5 billion in 2011, Everaet and her group
are considered key business partners for
identifying risks and interdependencies for
complex programs, and have a scope well
beyond that of the classical ICT projects.
They earned their enhanced strategic
roles only after improving ICT operations
and enhancing key business processes.
Everaet has enriched the skills of the entire
ICT team by enabling them to slip easily
into the role of high-level business-ICT
relationship managers. Explains Everaet,
“I am really encouraging my guys to work
with the business units, work with senior
management of the bottlers, work with
corporate, understand what the dynamics
are, see things from their perspective, learn
to connect the dots, and come away with
a holistic view.”
Effective e-leaders are capable of leading teams and managing technology systems in ways that achieve both local and global demands.
The Importance of e-Leadership
In 1961, W.C.H. Prentice published an
article on “Understanding Leadership” in
the Harvard Business Review (HBR), which
proved so relevant that the venerable
journal republished the piece in 2004. In
the article, Prentice offers the following
defi nition of leadership (Prentice 2004:
102-3):
Leadership is the accomplishment of a goal
through the direction of human assistants.
The man who successfully marshals his
human collaborators to achieve particular
ends is a leader. A great leader is one who
can do so day after day, and year after year,
in a wide variety of circumstances.
Ever since Prentice opened up this
exciting fi eld of study, a signifi cant body
of research on leadership has developed
identifying critical activities and skills
that constitute effective leadership and
describing how leadership activities
and responsibilities can be distributed
across several individuals. Research on
leadership consistently highlights four
general activities that leaders must be able
to accomplish well:
• Making sense of a situation (e.g.,
identify interdependencies);
• Building and aligning relationship
across boundaries (e.g., build
relationships within and across
organizations);
• Developing a compelling vision for
an initiative that creates value (e.g.,
identify risks and synergies from
interdependencies); and
• Managing change and Inventing
- access, negotiate, coordinate,
and motivate a variety of resources
throughout the processes of realizing
the initiative and of achieving and
sustaining value from it (e.g., active
experimentation).
In addition to listing activities, scholars
have compared leadership characteristics
to management traits in order to highlight
the differences between the two concepts.
In his 1989 book, “On Becoming a
Leader,” Warren Bennis composed a list
of these differences. What follow are some
examples of his research:
• The manager administers; the leader
innovates.
• The manager maintains; the leader
develops.
• The manager focuses on systems
and structure; the leader focuses on
people.
• The manager relies on control; the
leader inspires trust.
• The manager asks how and when; the
leader asks what and why.
• The manager does things right; the
leader does the right thing.
Drawing on the work of Prentice and dozens
of other scholars, INSEAD researchers
have defi ned e-leadership as follows:
e-leadership is the accomplishment of
a goal that relies on ICT through the
direction of human resources and uses of
ICT.
E-Leaders are especially salient to
digital enterprises. Digital enterprises
are enterprises from all sectors of the
economy that can drive economic and/or
social value by using digital technologies.
They are characterized by a high intensity
of utilisation of new digital technologies
to sharpen their business intelligence,
engage with their customers, improve
their operations and invent new business
models.
12 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
• Leadership is the accomplishment of
a goal through the direction of human
resources.
• e-Leadership is the accomplishment
of a goal that relies on ICT through
the direction of human resources
and uses of ICT. e-Leaders are
leaders that draw on technology to
accomplish an ICT-enabled objective.
Figure 3: e-Leaders are leaders focused on using technology and a multitude of resources
to accomplish ICT-enabled goals.
• Entrepreneurship is the
accomplishment of a new
organisation through the direction of
human resources. Entrepreneurs are
leaders who create new ventures.
• Digital entrepreneurship is
the accomplishment of a new
organisation that relies on ICT for
its operations and its products and
services through the direction of
human resources and uses of ICT.
Digital entrepreneurs are leaders who
create new ventures that rely on ICT
for their operations, products and
services.
Digital EntrepreneurLeader
Manager
Entrepreneur
e-Leader
13e-Leadership Study
Effective e-leaders have a T-shaped portfolio of skills.
Effective organisations expect that
e-leaders should have a T-shaped portfolio
of skills. Very simply, having a T-shaped
portfolio of skills means that a leader is
both a business-savvy and an ICT-savvy
professional. More precisely, having a
T-shaped portfolio of skills means that a
leader has the following skills:
• Using ICT: A vertical set of skills
that represent expertise or “deep
knowledge” in a specifi c area (e.g.,
science; engineering; ICT; social
sciences);
• A horizontal set of skills that
represent “transversal skills” (e.g.,
negotiation; critical thinking; design
and systems thinking, business and
entrepreneurship, etc.) that enable
collaboration across a variety of
boundaries, and;
• BOTH vertical and horizontal sets of
skills require a basic level of ICT user
skills, as defi ned by the Commission.
Although e-leaders should have a
T-shaped portfolio of skills, the distribution
of expertise may vary, depending on what
sets of activities an e-leader is responsible
for. The table below summarizes eight
general goals and related sets of activities
that successful organisations must be
able to accomplish (whether with internal
or external resources) in order to use ICT
competitively.
The table shows how each of the eight
sets of activities demands either strategic
understanding (knowing what is possible) or
practical understanding (knowing how to do
the possible) of a set of skills. For example, a
Chief Marketing Offi cer is expected to have
a strategic understanding of technology
such as social media and analytics and a
practical understanding of measuring and
modelling consumer behaviour. On the
other hand, an enterprise architects need
to have a practical understanding of ICT
systems and how to defi ne and manage
interdependencies (e.g., between ICT,
business processes and data) as well as
functional, product and sector expertise
to ensure that the enterprise architecture
supports an operating model that is best
for the organisation’s given its strategy.
The Importance of e-Leadership
Identifying relevant technology opportunities and influencing organizational stakeholders to capitalise on those opportunities are some of the defining characteristic for modern ICT leadership. Employees – especially recent graduates – often benefit from having a defined structure that will help them evolve and grow as the organization evolves and grows. Intel believes that to attract and retain the best talent, it is important to provide employees with a clear and explicit development path that caters for personal, organizational and industry leadership.”
—Jim Kenneally, principal investigator at Intel Labs, and
Research Fellow at Innovation Value Institute
14 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
In large and medium size organisations, e-leadership is distributed across multiple individuals.
In many large organisations, one head
e-leader, such as the CIO, is responsible for
the overall development and management
of ICT systems, while other deputy
e-leaders are accountable for leading a
more specifi c set of activities, such as
one of the eight listed in the table. In
addition to the CIO, many organisations
for example now employ a Chief Enterprise
Architect who is responsible for ensuring
that ICT systems, business processes and
data are all coordinated and aligned to the
organisation’s operating model. In several
organisations, there are also high-level
business-IT relationship managers who
must lead teams of business managers
and ICT developers to ensure the demands
of a particular business unit are prioritized,
aligned and met.
Table 1: To be accomplished well, each of the following key set of activities requires a different mix of strategic and practical understanding of vertical and horizontal expertise.
6 For general research on the importance of distributed leadership see Ancona and Bresman (2007), Ancona et al. (2007), and Ancona et al. (2009).
Literacy &
Basic Skills
Read
ing, w
riting, m
ath,
dig
ital literacy, etc.
ICT
expertise
Functio
n expertise
Pro
duct exp
ertise
Custo
mer &
Secto
r exp
ertise
Manag
ing chang
e &
inventing
Develo
ping
a co
mp
elling visio
n
Build
ing and
aligning
relatio
nships
across b
ound
aries
Making
sense of a
situation
Key Sets of activities
Business development,
sales and marketing
Business process management
Program & project management
Global sourcing management
Enterprise architecture
Solution development and implementation
Information management & security
IT services management & delivery
+++ + + + +
+ + + +
+ + + +
+ + + +
+ + + +
+ + + +
+ + + +
+ + + +
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
+++
Using ICT
(Vertical Expertise)
Developing organisations
(Horizontal/Transversal Expertise)
Global Knowledge Economy Talents
+ = strategic understanding (knowing what is possible)+++ = practical understanding (knowing how to do the possible)
15e-Leadership Study
Do European organisations have enough e-leaders to use technology to enhance their competitiveness through better operations and innovation? The simple answer is no, but the reality is far more nuanced.
To estimate the demand of e-leaders,
the research team assumed that some
organisations need more e-leaders than
others, depending on two dimensions.
1. The size of organisation: In terms
of number of full-time equivalents
(FTEs), large (250-99 FTEs) or very
large firm (1000+ FTEs) will have
a greater need and capacity to
distribute key responsibilities across
more individuals than a micro firm
(1-9 FTEs) or a small firm (10-49
FTEs).
2. The ICT-Intensity of a sector: This
is the degree to which organisations
rely on technology for their business
operations, innovations and the
provisioning of their services and
products. The demand for e-leaders
is greater for organisations in the
ICT sector than for organisations in
non-ICT sectors, because the ICT
sector needs e-leaders for internal
operations, innovation and for
external provision of services. Within
non-ICT, there are high ICT intensity
sectors and low ICT intensity sectors.
Estimating Demand and Supply of e-Leaders
Based on these factors, organisations
were assigned into one of three different
groups, differentiated by different colour in
the table below. Within each of the three
groups, demand was estimated.
The overall number of demand for e-leadership in Europe is estimated at 680,000 persons.
Table 2: Summary of estimated e-leadership demand.
Type of Firm & Sector
ICT sector
High ICT intensity sectors
Low ICT intensity sectors
medium
medium
medium
high growth SMEs
high growth SMEs
high growth SMEs
large & very large
large & very large
large & very large
TOTAL ESTIMATED DEMAND OF e-LEADERS
4
8
1
1
1
2
5
1
2
Size of firmEstimated
demand of e-leaders per enterprise
Number of enterprises
Estimated ToTaL demand for e-leaders
by firm type
6,500 26,000
15,000
1,400
15,000
11,000
60,000
30,000
25,000
120,000
30,000
25,000
29,000 145,000
227,000 227,000
42,000 84,000
436,000 680,000
16 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Estimates of the supply of e-leadership skills
The research team made scholarly use of
the valuable data collected by the National
Association of Colleges and Employers
(NACE), which is a highly regarded source
of information on the employment of the
college educated worldwide. Nonetheless,
more research needs to be done in this
area – especially with regards to metrics
(e.g., see first recommendation)
Ensuring we have sufficient e-leaders is a business issue. We need leaders who understand how the business operates, what new and relevant information and communication technologies are emerging, and how can we best take advantage of opportunities enabled by the new technologies to help the business thrive.”
—Daniel Dubreuil, CIO, SAFRAN
In a larger study of the European
management population, NACE created
eight management categories ranging from
top executives in the c-suite all the way
down to assistant managers of product
lines. To estimate the supply of e-leaders
within each of these eight categories,
researchers multiplied the population within
each group by its “e-leadership quota” –
the estimated number of people within
a NACE category who have a sufficient
T-shaped portfolio of ICT and business
skills to serve as e-leaders. The total supply
consists simply of adding up the e-leaders
within each NACE professional group.
as a result of these assumptions, the overall supply of e-leaders at management level in Europe is estimated at around 661,000.
Table 3: Summary of estimated e-leadership supply.
occupation Group
Entrepreneur – Gazelles
ICT service managers(ISCo 1330)
other Managers(ISCo 112, 121, 123, 131, 1332, 134, 141, 142, 143)(selection of examples, below)
Managing directors and chief executives
Business services and administrative managers
Sales and marketing managers
Research & development managers
Managers in agriculture, forestry and fisheries
Professional services managers (other)
TOTAL ESTIMATED SUPPLY OF e-LEADERS
12,000 12,000
260,697 260,697
12,553,845
1,495,180
2,283,360
1,094,997
129,445
109,833
135,759
Population of Each occupation Group
Times (x)e-leadership quota
Equals (=) ICT Population
100%
100%
3%
5%
5%
50%
.5%
.5%
varied(average is about 3%) 389,182
44,855
114,168
54,750
64,723
549
679
661,000
17e-Leadership Study
Estimating Demand and Supply of e-leaders
Assumption: 100% of the 260,687 ICT service managers qualify as e-leaders.
However organisations that have consolidated and centralized their ICT functions
into a shared services organisation have had to dismiss some managers while at the
same time have had to hire new managers.
Assumption: 50% of the 129.445 Research & Development managers qualify as
e-leaders. It could be argued that this too is a generous assumption, as many
scientists working in R&D labs do not necessarily have the ability to inspire and
guide teams of people to create ICT-based solutions.
Assumption: 5% of Business services and administration managers (NACE 1210)
qualify as e-leaders. Some assumptions could be argued as being too limiting.
For example, it could be assumed that twice as many business services and
administrative managers are sufficiently ICT-savvy to be e-leaders.
If this assumption is relaxed from
100% to 80%, then there are 52,000
fewer e-leaders in Europe.
If this assumption is relaxed by half,
from 50% to 25%, then there are
32,000 fewer e-leaders in Europe.
If this assumption is changed from
5% to 10% then there are 114,000
more e-leaders in Europe.
Change in key assumptions related to estimating SUPPLY of e-leaders Resulting change
Changing the assumptions reveals an even greater gap between demand and supply of e-leaders.
The estimates of demand and supply of
e-leaders cited in this report are quite
conservative. When the estimates were
presented to experts from academia,
industry and public policy institutes, most
agreed that the real demand for e-leaders
is probably higher; the real supply even
lower; and consequently, the actual gap
between demand and supply is even
greater.
To develop a better understanding of how
sensitive the estimates are to each key
assumption and in the process, develop a
better understanding of why demand and
supply fluctuate, readers are encouraged
to examine, challenge and change each
assumption to see how it affects the
demand or supply. Table 3 describes how
changing a few key assumptions add or
take away from the original estimates of
demand and supply.
We joined forces with European Commission and some business schools to develop curricula for 2-years programs to earn an IT-MBA and a Masters in Business Enterprises Architecture.”
—Christian Pagel, Vice-President of Corporate Business Systems and CIO, SGLCarbon SE,
Board Member for HR & Education, EuroCIO
18 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Assumption: In the ICT services sector, medium-size firms need only four e-leaders
and large-size firms need eight e-leaders to be productive. It could be easily argued
that this assumption is well off the mark, as firms in the ICT services sector need
e-leaders to build bridges with internal clients and to engage with external customers.
Assumption: Gazelles need only one e-leader to succeed. It could be argued that in
today’s digital economy, any start-up that has succeeded in achieving 20% growth
per annum for its first five years relies heavily on technology for its operations and
its new products and services. As a result, most Gazelles would need at least two
e-leaders, one to lead projects related to operations and another to lead projects
related to new products and services.
Assumption: medium-size firms in high ICT intensity sectors only need two e-leaders.
It could be argued that because they are in high ICT intensive sectors, these firms
need at least four e-leaders, where each could be responsible for two of the eight sets
of activities described earlier.
If this assumption is changed to ICT
services sector firms need twice as
many e-leaders, then demand for
e-leaders increases by 37,000.
If all Gazelles need two e-leaders,
then demand for e-leaders in Europe
increases by an additional 70,000.
If medium-size firms in high ICT
intensity sectors each demand
four e-leaders, rather than two,
then demand increases by 120,000
e-leaders.
Change in key assumptions related to estimating DEMAND of e-leaders Resulting change
When all these assumptions are taken into
account, then demand rises by 227,000
e-leaders to a total of 915,000.
The assumptions used to develop the
estimates of demand and supply of
e-leaders provide important insights
into how academic institutions, policy
makers, and businesses can work together
to forecast demand more accurately
and ensure a sufficient supply. The
recommendations section includes more
specific actions that can be taken to
eliminate the gap.
We understand from our employees and customers that there is a gap. We have developed curricula materials to help build the CIOs of the future.”
—Jeannette Weisschuh, Director of Sustainability and Social
Innovation, Hewlett-Packard GmbH
19e-Leadership Study
Recommended Actions
The good news is that Europe has several examples of successful multi-stakeholder efforts that are helping to build a larger supply of e-leaders. The challenge going forward is one of rapid scaling.
This section presents recommendations
from the study “Vision, Roadmap and
Foresight Scenarios for Europe 2012-
2020” for ensuring Europe has suffi cient
e-leadership skills. The intention of
these recommendations is to provide
valuable input for the development of a
comprehensive roadmap for actions at EU
and national levels. The recommendations
are intended for a variety of stakeholder
groups.
20 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
The project developed the following seven recommendations, along with a proposed timeline for key actions.
Engage with a broader set of stakeholder
groups to sharpen metrics for e-leadership
skills
Regularly monitor demand and supply
of e-leadership
Develop and apply e-leadership curricula
guidelines and quality labels
Create new formats and partnerships for
teaching e-leadership skills
Build awareness of the relevance
of e-leadership skills for innovation,
competitiveness, and employability
2013 2014 2015-2020
Preparation
Preparation
Implementation
Implementation
First Results
Foster e-leadership in the context of
entrepreneurship and self-employment
Preparation
Implementation
First Results
Align actions to develop e-leadership skills
with efforts to foster entrepreneurship across
the EU
Preparation
Implementation
First Results
First Results
Preparation
Preparation
Preparation
Implementation
Implementation
Implementation
First Results
First Results
First Results
Recommendation
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
1 Engage with a broader set of stakeholder groups to sharpen definitions and metrics for e-leadership skills
8 See Dewhurst, M., Hancock, B. and Ellsworth, D. (2013). “Redesigning Knowledge Work: How to free up high-end experts to do what they do best.” Harvard Business Review. Pp. 59-64.
Further attention needs to be paid to
using these results for the development
of an e-leadership skills framework as an
extension of the European e-Competence
Framework (e-CF) for ICT practitioners.
This would be used by organizations in
the public and private sector to identify
and inventory key skills for accomplishing
their strategic objectives.
The Commission is best placed to
lead on the further development and
sharpening of metrics for e-leadership
skills. Essential to the success of such
an initiative is regular engagement with
a broad set of stakeholder groups, such
as C-level business executives and
digital entrepreneurs. The Commission
may want to initiate such an activity as
an integral part of on-going studies in
which all relevant stakeholders need to
be involved in dialogue. Stakeholders
include industry, education, training and
certifi cation institutions, academia, the
CEN Workshop on ICT skills, Eurostat,
the national statistical institutes, national
employment agencies and staffi ng
industry representatives at national and
European levels.
of a stakeholder dialogue. Initially it could
be funded by the European Commission
for instance though the CEN mechanism.
actions:To accelerate the development of
e-leadership, it is important to engage
with non-IT business leaders, such as
Chief Executive Offi cers, Chief Financial
Offi cers and Chief Marketing Offi cers, as
well as with digital entrepreneurs. During
this project considerable insight and input
has been provided by Chief information
Offi cers. Senior management teams can
identify new critical skills required by their
strategy and create a detailed inventory of
how to access them. The same information
will be necessary form entrepreneurs and
freelancers communities. A trusted neutral
party can collect and synthesize lessons
from applications of e-leadership to ensure
the defi nitions are broad enough to cover all
relevant cases of ICT-informed leadership
in today’s enterprises and precise enough
to be practical and insightful.
Background:There is a need for more precise and shared
defi nitions and metrics of e-leadership
skills and competencies to demonstrate
what kinds of e-leaders are associated with
specifi c kinds of business and social value
creation; ensure curricula and e-leadership
development efforts are relevant; improve
monitoring of demand and supply of
e-leadership skills; and increase the
effectiveness of policy decision making.
Until now, CIOs have played an important
and active role, in large part because they
are part of well-organized European CIO
networks and they have expressed clear
needs and requirements. Now there is a
need to complement their contributions by
involving business line managers, CxOs,
entrepreneurs, and freelancers. However
this will be more challenging as these
groups are less organized and aware of
their e-skills needs.
Recommendation
21e-Leadership Study
2Recommendation
Regularly monitor demand and supply of e-leadership
Background:There is still insufficient quantitative data and
relevant statistics to define and anticipate
shortages, gaps and mismatches. Existing
data sets from other sources are scarce
and have limited relevance. The lack of
data significantly restricts the actions of a
broad set of stakeholder groups. New and
better data would help defining priorities
and measuring progress.
actions:Building on the first recommendation (i.e.,
engage broader set of stakeholders and
sharpen metrics for e-leadership skills),
the following initiative would help establish
regular monitoring of demand and supply
of e-leadership skills.
1. Specify data requirements
for establishing meaningful
measurements for use in a monitoring
system consisting of data collected
from two types of surveys: those
of demand side actors (e.g. HR
managers, CIOs in organisations) and
those of suppliers (e.g. universities
and business schools);
2. Identify and analyse secondary data
sources for suitable data (mainly
from Eurostat to ensure homogenous
data across all EU Member States) to
extract information on demand and
supply of e-leadership skills required
by policy makers as a basis for
decision making.
3. Monitor key performance indicators
and scenarios on the supply side
and demand side of e-leadership
skills and benchmark these KPIs
against national policy initiatives and
multi-stakeholder partnerships in all
Member States.
These actions should be started as a
coordinated Europe-wide activity and
carried out by the Commission in close
cooperation with Eurostat and national
statistical institutes. The results, especially
data on expected demand, should be
made available to universities and business
schools in order to initiate appropriate
course development on the supply side.
European industry could then be made
aware of new e-leadership courses at
universities.
Benchmarking will also provide a robust
basis for understanding the impact of the
policies, initiatives and actions launched
at the EU and national level. Such insights
would enable policy makers to propose
and coordinate better ways and more
efficient means to reduce e-leadership
skills shortages, gaps and mismatches
through multi-stakeholder partnerships.
22 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
Background:Despite record levels of unemployment
in Europe, the demand for ICT workers
outstrips the supply and this gap will
continue to grow by around 3% per year
(see page 6). The mismatch between the
current skills available and the needs of
the labour market concerns all EU Member
States, even if it affects some of them to
a lesser degree. According to our research
and based on the synthesis scenarios,
the number of expected ICT vacancies
in Europe will be between 372,000 and
864,000 by 2015. More specifically, with
regards to e-leadership, even with the
most conservative assumptions, there are
an estimated 19,000 vacancies. Unless
more is done to attract young people into
computer science degrees and to retrain
the unemployed, many of these positions
will remain unfilled.
By applying e-leadership curricula
guidelines, key stakeholders can accelerate
the scaling of Europe’s successes.
One starting point for the development
and the implementation of the e-leadership
curricula guidelines (with a strong
involvement of pan-European networks of
CIOs) will be initiative launched in January
2013 aimed at a rapid development of
e-leadership skills curricula guidelines
and quality labels. To this end, a select
number of universities and business
schools will take part in a demonstration
of their implementation in 2013/14. In
addition, a multitude of promotion and
dissemination activities are planned to
increase awareness and recognition
of the results and achievements in
2015. Any organisation interested in
participating is encouraged to contact:
actions:Develop e-leadership curricula guidelines
in conjunction with key stakeholders in
Europe: on the supply side these are
universities and business schools, on
the demand side these are ICT using
companies in Europe, the ICT sector in
general, and associations representing
European CIOs and HR Directors etc.
Together, they can develop, demonstrate
and disseminate European guidelines and
quality labels for new curricula fostering
e-leadership skills.
Guidelines and quality labels can build on
the activities of the ICT Skills Workshop of
CEN, and in particular the development of
the European e-Competence Framework
(e-CF). Guidelines and quality labels
should also be compatible with the
European Quality Assurance Reference
Framework for Vocational Education and
Training (EQAVET).
3Recommendation
Develop and apply e-leadership curricula guidelines
23e-Leadership Study
4Recommendation
Create new formats and larger partnerships for teaching and acquiring e-leadership skills
Background:Although there are several successful
efforts at developing e-leaders (e.g., IT-
vest in Western Denmark; the Professional
Programme in Business & Enterprise
Architecture in the Netherlands; the
Cranfield IT Leadership Programme in the
United Kingdom), more multi-stakeholder
partnerships are needed to scale these
successes and help individuals entering
and currently in the workforce develop the
portfolio of skills and competences that
e-leaders require.
actions:A greater number of educational institutions
could to team up with industry and roll out a
range of e-leadership curricula and e-skills
courses, while re-defining and enhancing
teaching formats. According to a European
CIO association, many universities want to
add technological depth to their programs
but do not have the resources to do so.
By working with demand side actors,
these schools can have access to these
resources and thus be able to deliver new
content, course and program development.
European universities could consider taking
greater advantage of Massive Open Online
Courses (MOOC) to encourage far more
students to enrol in their e-leadership skills
courses. Despite the challenges presented
by this online format, MOOCs can open
up a whole new range of opportunities for
teachers and students alike. Developed
as entry-level courses, MOOCs can be
designed to attract greater numbers of
students to study e-leadership skills.
In order to kick-start this initiative, the
Commission together with the Member
States could support e-leadership MOOC
demonstrations through a dedicated
project. With some initial funding,
universities could compete in a Europe-
wide competition for the best and most
successful e-leadership MOOC. Such
an initiative could be operated by key
stakeholders such as the ICT industry, ICT
and CIO associations etc., representing
both the demand and the supply side of the
market. This would help in promoting and
raising awareness of MOOCs throughout
Europe on the one hand and their wider
dissemination throughout the educational
sector on the other hand.
24 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
5Recommendation
Align actions to develop e-leadership skills with efforts to foster entrepreneurship across the EU
Background:To boost entrepreneurial activity in
Europe, the Commission launched an
Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan
(COM (2012) 795 final). This is designed
to “unleash Europe’s entrepreneurial
potential, to remove existing obstacles
and to revolutionise the culture of
entrepreneurship in Europe”. The Action
Plan will also change the public perception
of entrepreneurs and of entrepreneurship
education. An increasingly important
aspect of entrepreneurship is digital
entrepreneurship. It is important that
future efforts from the Commission help
create a digital entrepreneurial culture
and help attract, develop and retain digital
entrepreneurial skills and talent.
actions:Aligning the Entrepreneurship 2020
Action Plan with the actions of DG
ENTR is essential to foster e-leadership
skills successfully across a variety
of firms and sectors. The role of ICT
and e-leadership skills as enablers of
successful entrepreneurial activity needs
to be emphasised in the entrepreneurial
learning initiative. Experience suggests
that becoming a digital entrepreneur has
a strong appeal to highly educated young
people – a fact which should be exploited
for reaching out to the target audience of
the learning initiative.
EU Member States have also been
urged to offer pre-university students the
opportunity to have at least one practical
entrepreneurial experience before leaving
compulsory education, such as running
a mini-company, being responsible for an
entrepreneurial project for a company, or
engaging in a social project. The acquisition
of entrepreneurial abilities enhances
the employability of youth: according to
recent research, 78% of entrepreneurship
education alumni were employed directly
after graduating at university, against 59
% of a control group of higher education
students.
From these activities the Commission
concludes that “EU higher education in
entrepreneurship can boost high-tech
enterprises and high-growth companies
by supporting business ecosystems,
partnerships and industrial alliances.” It
is further proposed to apply the guidance
framework to entrepreneurial schools and
VET institutions, developed by the EC in
collaboration with the OECD and currently
being promoted across Europe. These
schools should take full account of the
essential role of e-leadership skills for 21st
century entrepreneurs.
9 http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/newsroom/cf/itemdetail.cfm?item_id=6412&lang=en&tpa_id=0&displayType=news&nl_id=1026
25e-Leadership Study
6Background:A widespread consensus haunting
Europe is that its management is old
fashioned and lags behind that of the
new world, notably the USA and parts
of Asia, in its ability to turn innovative
potential into business opportunities.
Among e-leaders, it is important to keep
in mind, that entrepreneurs (not only digital
entrepreneurs) and freelancers will play
an increasing important role. While it is
easier to mobilise groups and associations
of ICT practitioners, CIOs and managers,
it will be crucial to address the needs of
entrepreneurs and freelancers.
Education for entrepreneurship is
already high on the agenda in most
EU Member States, which have put in
place a wide variety of programmes and
activities. Here, e-leadership skills are of
essential importance. The Commission’s
Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan
(COM (2012) 795 fi nal) already includes a
reference to e-leadership skills.
Foster e-leadership in the context of entrepreneurship and self-employment
Recommendation
26 E-Leadership: Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation
actions:As a fi rst step, European and national
Member State policy initiatives and
programmes targeting entrepreneurs and
business start-ups should be assessed
as to whether and how e-leadership skills
are taken into account. Then e-leadership
skills should be mainstreamed within
entrepreneur-training programmes and in
the requirements specifi cations for funding:
for example, in the context of structural
funds spending related to business start-
ups in knowledge-intensive parts of the
economy. Secondly, an assessment of
the impact of the identifi ed e-leadership
initiatives could be carried out.
In addition, there is a need to support
cooperation and exchange of information
on European and national Member State
policies initiatives and policy documents,
along with key stakeholder initiatives,
projects, best practices, reports and
studies. This cooperation should be centred
on thematic areas or major initiatives and
where appropriate, the results of an impact
assessment of identifi ed e-leadership
initiatives would be discussed.
7Recommendation
Build awareness of e-leadership skills for innovation, competitiveness, and employability.
Background:Increasing awareness of the attractive
opportunities for people with e-leadership
skills and more generally promoting the
acquisition of e-skills as an excellent
choice for young Europeans has been
at the centre of Commission long term
e-skills strategy. Having organised events
surrounding the e-Skills Week in 2010 and
2012, the Commission is actively planning
further awareness raising activities in the
context of the “Grand Coalition for Digital
Jobs”. To this end, the Commission wish to
involve a larger number of key stakeholders
in a variety of activities throughout Europe
and in all EU Member States.
actions:The Commission, national governments
and other key stakeholders including
relevant associations and federations need
to continue to play a key role in awareness
creation and promotion of e-skills in
general and e-leadership skills in particular.
Formats like the e-Skills Week and the Get
Online Week have proven to be a suitable
format for addressing a broad range of
target groups. It is therefore recommended
to continue to use existing formats but
adapt them to specific new requirements.
Additional formats for awareness raising
and promotion of e-leadership skills, such a
mentorship programs, need to develop and
moreover involve different actors, which
are likely to be the many associations and
federations representing the demand side
of the ICT job market.
Hence, the key actors that need to be
activated are those bodies that represent
European CIOs and HR managers
etc. These include EAPM (European
Association for People Management),
EHRF (European Human Resource Forum),
EURES (EURopean Employment Services),
and eurociett (European Confederation of
Private Employment Agencies). Raising
awareness of e-leadership skills needs to
become an integral part of their European
and national agendas, including those
designed for their annual conferences and
networking events.
networking events.
27e-Leadership Study
To create signifi cantly more business and
social value and excel in today’s global digital
economy, organisations of all sizes and from
all sectors are investing in information and
communication technologies. However,
without the proper skills and leadership
to put these technologies to effective
use, organizations are at signifi cant risk of
wasting their investments and missing key
opportunities for value creation, growth
and competitiveness.
Overview
This report synthesizes the key fi ndings
from the study “e-Skills for Competitiveness
and Innovation: Vision, Roadmap and
Foresight Scenarios.” The key objective
of this study is to help reduce innovation
skills shortages, gaps and mismatches in
Europe, and to provide sound, unbiased
empirical evidence about supply and
demand for different types of ICT-related
skills in Europe under different socio-
economic scenarios.
Contact Information:
For further information and to request copies of this report, please contact:
European Commission
Enterprise and Industry Directorate-General
Unti D4 “Key Enabling Technologies and ICT”
1040 Brussels, Belgium
e-mail: [email protected]
This report synthesizes the key fi ndings A special focus of the study is on
“e-leadership skills.” This report provides a
synthesis of the analysis of the supply and
demand developments for ICT practitioner
and ICT user skills, an overview of the
growing demand for and shrinking
supply of e-leadership skills, and seven
recommendations for action.