Leadership is like a constantly changing game. To be successful a leader must take into account factors such as personalities, environment, politics, demographics and trends. This is especially true for a leaders who wants to stay strong over time as they promote up through an organization.

The Center for Creative Leadership was founded to study effective strategies and tactics for leaderships in a scientific approach. A decade ago, I had the opportunity to attend their weeklong signature Leadership Development Program. It gave me valuable insights into my leadership style that have stayed with me to this day.

Recently, they released an article on their website titled The Top 20 Leadership Challenges. The article broke down leadership across four levels: frontline, middle, senior, and executive. Five challenges were identified for each level. At the frontline level, the first challenge was around frustrations with people and time.

Many frontline managers reported that their top leadership issue is feeling overwhelmed with inefficiencies and frustrated with others. This includes challenges with offering guidance to direct reports, overcoming resistance to change, dealing with difficult employees, and adjusting communication and feedback styles to collaborate more effectively with different people. And again, this appears to have become an even bigger concern for leaders at this level since the pandemic.

Moving up to the middle manager level, the first challenge had to do with personal limitations.

A top challenge for leaders at this level is their own personal limitations and feelings of inadequacy, as they often must overcome their own doubts about their abilities and readiness to lead — as well as the doubts of their peers or supervisors. Dealing with the challenge of personal limitations requires overcoming impostor syndrome, humility to seek the input of others, courage to do the right thing, and projecting confidence while communicating effectively.

Since the pandemic, mid-level managers have reported this as an issue even more frequently. With new cultures brought on by remote and hybrid workplaces, overcoming common limitations in order to make an impact as a leader has become even more challenging.

To learn about the other 18 leadership challenges, please read the entire article on the Center for Creative Leadership’s website.