Young Global Leaders

Leadership in the XXI Century

A recurrent topic of our times, the lack of leadership, is the greatest challenge facing those holding public or private responsibilities today. It is an ideal that forces us to urgently promote the changes that societies need all over the world to level out living and economic standards.

This challenge, enormous by itself, invites us to think about the basic requirements that new leaders should have and transmit in the century just beginning.

Without any question, the next generation of leaders will be defined, first, by their clear commitment to solving the everyday problems faced by their particular communities and countries. All, however, with a global vision.

Second, our new leaders must have a proactive attitude that allows them to react in advance with the utmost efficiency to the constant changes caused and affected by ever more innovative productive processes, by the information economy, and by the awesome technological advances that sprout up every second.

The new generation of world leaders should also stand out for its capacity to commit to ideas and ability to make decisions oriented by their impact on society. I would like to emphasize, in this order of ideas, that new leaders should be moved by highly ethical values and always be accountable for their actions.

One of the most important qualities that new leaders in the public and private sectors should have is the capacity to define, with a clear medium- and long-term vision, their policies, programmes and strategies.

For this purpose, they should be excellent communicators of ideas and actions in order to generate trust among their people; to overcome possible obstacles to the fulfilment of their objectives and create a greater number of development opportunities for their countries, communities or firms.

Another important point is that they should be excellent negotiators. Nowadays, it is neither possible nor convenient to govern or direct a company unilaterally. Communication and agreements are needed to build consent and achieve lasting arrangements for the benefit of all the parties involved.

In this sense, the new times will demand from us action with high degree of efficiency and creativity, the development of robust information channels and great social sense, because no project can last if it is not based on the well-being of the people towards whom it is aimed.

In the particular case of Latin America, private and political leaders face several challenges in the social and economic arenas of development:

· To overcome marginalization and inequality, as well as to attack the causes of extreme poverty

· To thrust the modernization, productivity and competitiveness of our economies vis-à-vis other countries through maintenance of public safety, attraction and generation of private investment, and by fostering knowledge and new technologies

· To strengthen the legal and democratic framework

· To protect the environment from the irrational exploitation of our natural resources

These issues can only be faced through renewed collaboration schemes between the public, private and social sectors – a collaboration that must urgently create favourable conditions for all people to develop their capacities and abilities from birth onwards. This can only happen if education is improved.

Education has been and will continue to be the most incredible instrument to create opportunities, fight inequality and empower people to effectively harvest the benefits of economic growth. I am convinced that education is useful to reach these goals, but also to create a widespread culture of respect for environmental and human rights.

At the same time, collaboration is also essential to create modern and efficient communication and service infrastructure and strong industrial and technological regions, and to develop innovation and research centres, among other basic pillars of overall competitiveness, which is the only way to insert our continent into the flow of global trends.

These are only some of the issues that we face now and in the near future. However, I am sure that the younger generation is fully committed to leading the way to reach our goals.