According to the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025 (the WEF Report):
“About 170 million new jobs will be created this decade… while 92 million roles will be displaced.”
The WEF Report offers a compelling assessment of some of the global factors that are driving change for leaders, for example: technological development, the green transition, economic and demographic shifts – to name just a few.
At Alta Pete Consulting, we regularly translate these global insights into a local context, working with legal, government, and corporate teams to prepare leaders for what’s next. Questions we often hear from legal leaders in WA and around Australia include:
- “How do I best prepare myself, my team and my organisation in the face of change and uncertainty?”
- “What professional leadership skills should I invest in, especially given how much technology can now do?” and
- “How do I lead myself and others with integrity and in a sustainable way when workplace demands feel overwhelming?”
These are questions with no easy answers.
In this article we have identified:
- some key trends that we believe every legal leader should be watching; and
- five practical tips for legal leaders to prepare for what’s next.
Skills shaping the future of legal leadership
Adaptive thinking and cognitive agility
As more and more routine tasks are automated, legal leaders must master the ability to switch between the different roles required of legal leaders: strategic foresight; empathetic engagement; and analytical reasoning, especially in hybrid and cross-functional teams.
AI fluency and ethical judgment
The rise of generative AI demands more than technical literacy. Legal leaders must guide ethical governance, safeguard client trust, and ensure that technology enhances—not erodes—justice, transparency, and accountability.
All leaders need to remember the cautionary tale of Robodebt in this regard.
Empathy-driven legal services
Legal services are shifting from process-centric to people-centric. To quote David Maister: “The quality of your relationships determines the quality of your business.”
Legal leaders must champion accessibility, inclusion, and community impact in how legal solutions are designed and delivered.
Resilience and wellbeing as strategic assets
In a volatile world, the ability to model composure, foster psychological safety, and embed recovery practices is now a core leadership skill—not a wellness perk.
As Tony Schwartz says: “We’re not meant to operate like computers—at high speeds, continuously, for long periods of time.”
Self-aware legal leadership
The WEF Report identifies some of the core capabilities that will be required of leaders to thrive in the workplace of the future: social influence, talent management, analytical thinking and environmental stewardship.
Five practical tips to prepare for what’s next
- Lead with influence, not control
To optimise performance from talented knowledge workers like lawyers, leaders need to be influential. To quote Amy Cuddy: ‘Trust is the conduit to influence.’ Legal leaders can build trust through coaching-based leadership, emotional intelligence, and inclusive decision-making.
Importantly, legal leaders need to lead in a way that ensures team members, colleagues and stakeholders alike all feel valued, connected and listened to.
2. Know how you think—and how others do
‘Know thyself’ is the pithy way the ancient Greeks articulated the concept of self-awareness. Using psychometric tools like Herrmann Brain Dominance Instrument (HBDI) can be an effective way to understand your thinking preferences and collaborate across diverse styles.
To attract and retain the best and brightest, psychometric tools and sharing ways of working can be valuable techniques – especially where they are used as a ‘common language’ within and across legal teams.
3. Make feedback a habit, not a hurdle
According to Kim Scott, author of Radical Candor, “feedback is a gift”. Too often, feedback is seen as an inconvenience or is approached in a tokenistic manner.
Embracing frameworks and techniques for structuring your feedback can help to refine your legal leadership impact and foster a culture of continuous growth.
Also, remember to seek feedback on your own leadership – 360-degree feedback surveys can be an effective way to do this.
4. Prioritise with purpose
Time management for legal leaders of the workplace of the future will be less about doing more in less time (especially for lower-value tasks).
Effective prioritisation for legal leaders will be increasingly about leading with purpose, prioritising strategically important matters, and being intentional and communicating clearly. As Brené Brown reminds us: “Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.”
Wellbeing deserves explicit prioritisation—not as a reactive measure, but as a proactive leadership strategy. Embedding recovery practices and psychological safety into legal team rhythms is essential for sustainable performance.
5. Model integrity in a tech-driven world
As Commissioner Catherine Holmes AC SC said in the Robodebt Royal Commission Report, 2023:
“The culture [which led to Robodebt] … was marked by a lack of curiosity, a willingness to go along with the convenient, and a resistance to frank advice.”
Ethical leadership in digital environments will require legal leaders to be consistent, transparent, and show moral courage—especially when the rules are still being written and when the pressure is on.
Next steps
As the WEF Report makes clear, in the age of AI, what remains for humans is leadership. Not just technical oversight, but moral clarity, relational depth, and the ability to navigate complexity with integrity and character.
If you are ready to explore what that looks like in practice, join me and a panel of WA’s most respected legal leaders on 14 October 2025 for Charting the Course: Legal Leadership in a Time of Transformation, hosted by the Law Society of Western Australia.
