What Is the Biggest Challenge Facing Leaders Today? (In 2022 & Beyond)

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Leaders face all sorts of challenges, on a yearly, monthly, and daily basis. It’s a part of work and life. In this post, I’d like to address the biggest challenge facing leaders today: difficult people. We’ll address who difficult people are, why they’re so difficult, and what leaders can do to more effectively deal with them. I’ll also provide a practical real-life example.

Who Are Difficult People?

To help us better identify this pervasive challenge that leaders face, let’s more specifically define who difficult people are.

Difficult people are those who act in dysfunctional, unhelpful, and uncalled for ways. While there are all different types of difficult people, they all share something in common: they aren’t team players, and they don’t have the best interests of their colleagues and/or the organization at heart.

Here are some of the activities of difficult people in the workplace and other arenas of life:

• Excessive criticism (not constructive feedback, but someone who knocks you down and insults you because they like doing it)
• Backstabbing
• Sabotage
• Lying and manipulation
• Saying one thing and doing…