In addition to these findings, CEOs believed that the world will not simply go back to “business as usual” after the economic downturn.  Leaders will need to be able to manage more complex organizations, more robust customer needs and more demanding expectations from shareholders or taxpayers. Eight in ten believe the environment will become considerably more complex, leading to the number one quality from respondents of creativity.

CEOs in the next five years will need to be more creative in the way they deal with everything from the task at hand to the interpersonal challenges they face to the strategies they develop to meet future goals.  The question is, “are they up to it?”  Time will show that the most successful CEOs in the next five years will be creative rather than pragmatic.  After all, they said so themselves.