“During the last few years, in Romania as well, we witnessed many companies go through extremely difficult situations, and the outcomes of those circumstances were almost always determined by their management team. I have seen great leaders in action and I believe that they had the strength and resilience to respond to fear and vulnerability in a way that gave them and their teams long-term success. Therefore, they are now in a position to not only confidently respond to challenges, but also shape and create new opportunities for the future”, said Dino Ebneter, Country Managing Partner, Mazars in Romania.
Following this positive note, when asked which will be their most important sources of growth in 2023, the Romanian C-suite leaders mentioned organic growth (43%), M&A activity (36%), and strategic alliances/joint ventures with third parties (11%). Although they are optimistic about the future, they are still prepared for the current and coming challenges, therefore, they have identified the top three trends that will have the biggest impact on their businesses in 2023: energy prices and/or shortages (61%), economic trends, including inflation/higher cost of living (57%), and geopolitical tension/instability (43%).
When asked “Which are the top strategic priorities for your business over the next 3-5 years?”, Romanian leaders chose the entering of a new product or service category (36%) as a top priority (vs. ranked fourth globally), followed closely by transforming their company’s IT/technology (29%) and implementing a new or revised sustainability strategy (29%). Globally, number one is taken by transforming the company’s IT/technology.
C-suite leaders must understand emerging technologies and embrace today’s digital world. According to our research, executives are at least fairly familiar with the more leading-edge technologies including automation (96%), artificial intelligence (AI)/ machine learning (71%), metaverse (61%), and Web3 (57%). When it comes to understanding and exploiting these technologies, surprisingly, Web3 is considered the most important (46%), while metaverse, automation, big data, and AI, share the same percentage (32%).
Another high priority for businesses both locally and globally is represented by IT security. More than half of the Romanian respondents (57%) are confident their data is “completely” protected, while 43% of them believe it is “partially” protected, compared to last year, when they were very pessimistic regarding this topic – only 31% felt their data was “completely” protected. 86% of the respondents are confident that they will not have a data breach in their organisation in the next 12 months.
Sustainability stands as one of the top three strategic priorities for Romanian C-suite leaders over the next three to five years. While 43% of the respondents have already budgeted costs to implement their sustainability strategy and reporting, 29% are planning to do so in their next budget review. Furthermore, most businesses (46%) already produce a sustainability report, and a further 36% plan to in the coming 12 months, meaning eight in 10 are either currently producing a report or planning to.
When it comes to readiness for ESG reporting, only 14% report being completely ready, while 54% mention they are mostly ready, meaning that they could publish according to regulations with little extra effort. Of course, there are still 25% who will need to show a significant effort.
This commitment to reporting is not always easy to action. While globally the main challenges when producing a sustainability report remain identifying data quality (37%) and data tracking (28%), at the local level, having the internal capabilities/expertise (21%) represents the top challenge, followed by finding the right service provider (18%).
At the same time, the responsibility for ESG reporting is very important, and at the moment, we can identify at the local level several representatives who are in charge of this project within a company, such as the CEO (18%) or the leaders of the marketing (11%), risk (11%), and sustainability (7%) departments. Globally, things are a little bit better, with the chief sustainability officer taking the lead (29%), together with the CEO (25%).
Businesses are looking at their work culture to attract the right talent. The Romanian C-suite executives believe teamwork/ camaraderie (93%), quality of team members (89%), and opportunity for advancement (83%) are the most vital ingredients for attracting the best people to their organisation.
The vast majority of leaders (90%) say gender equality and the advancement of women is on their organisation’s top management agenda – 43% consider it a top three priority, while 29% a top five priority. To drive this forward, around half (46%) report having a dedicated programme on gender, equality, and sexism in place. But, despite the investment and commitment, there is no real progress in gender balance at the top level. Only 21% of the leaders boast over 30% of women among their top strategic decision-makers.