Open Access

Haroon Abbu, Paul Mugge, Gerhard Gudergan, Gerrit Hoeborn

• Digital leaders play a pivotal role in the success of digital transformation initiatives. They increase the confidence of their organizations during these often risky and disruptive transitions. The most pressing question is how they can lead their companies into a future that is continually shaped by digital innovations. Several methods for effective leadership have been theorized in the past, and many of them have been profoundly substantiated and used in corporate practice. But digital leadership demands a certain set of new dimensions ― both human traits and technical skills ― to meet the challenges of the digital age. These include the concepts of growth mindset, ethical AI, and data focus, among others. Currently, there is no reliable scale to identify and measure key digital leadership dimensions. Therefore, in this article, we present our efforts toward developing a reliable scale to measure the human dimensions of successful digital leaders. It lays the foundation for a self-assessment tool, which inspires leaders to reflect and improve upon aspects of their leadership necessary to digitally transform their businesses.