The Power of People: How Human Skills Drive High Performance

The workplace of 2025 is shockingly different than the workplace of 2020 which was shockingly different than the workplace of 2015. It’s interesting to think about how…analogue…work in the 2010s was. We had the internet, obviously, and email, but the speed-of-light technology we utilize today without a second thought would have been unfathomable to those who had to physically dial into conference calls from a landline in a cubicle deep within an anonymous skyscraper.

Wiley Workplace Intelligence surveyed 1,511 people to understand what it means to be a high performer in today’s Jetsons-esque world of work. With the increasingly mandatory use of AI as leaders assess how to meet their bottom lines in this challenging economy, individuals are reflecting on what inspires high performance and we found that while the technology we utilize daily has become exponentially more powerful, the core of what makes work meaningful hasn’t changed all that much since the analogue days. It is high quality leadership, emotional intelligence, and psychological safety that drives engagement and performance in 2025.

The Psychological Safety Advantage

When it comes to building high-performing teams, psychological safety stands out as the most powerful differentiator. It’s not a new concept, but the data underscores just how much it matters: employees who strongly agree that they feel safe speaking up, sharing ideas, or raising concerns are 31% more likely to be part of a high-performing team than those who strongly disagree.

That’s not a small difference. It’s a clear signal that performance is tightly linked to the relational climate within an organization. When individuals feel safe, they contribute more freely, challenge ideas productively, and engage more deeply in collective goals. When teams lack this safety, even the most talented individuals may hold back.

For leaders and organizations, the implication is straightforward: if you're not actively cultivating psychological safety, you're leaving performance potential untapped.

Leadership and Emotional Intelligence: The Human Catalysts

While technology, workflow, and organizational structure have their place, our research found that effective leadership is the top predictor of high team performance with 90% reporting it as key. Not far behind is emotional intelligence, cited by 83% as an important component.

These two elements work together. Effective leaders build trust, model empathy, and create the kind of conditions where teams can thrive. Emotional intelligence is what enables that kind of leadership—it allows people to navigate tension, listen actively, and adapt to change without derailing team dynamics.

In many ways, leadership and emotional intelligence are what drives psychological safety. Leaders who lack self-awareness as to how their behaviors impact morale or struggle to manage conflict can easily undermine team trust, even with the best of intentions. On the other hand, leaders who demonstrate emotional intelligence help teams feel heard, valued, and resilient under pressure.

Rather than treating these capabilities as innate traits, organizations should view them as skills that can be developed, coached, and measured.

The Remote Work Perception Gap

One of the more surprising findings is the gap between how remote work is perceived to impact performance and how remote teams actually perform. While 21.6% of respondents believe remote work has a negative impact on building high-performing teams, the data tells a different story: remote workers are actually the most likely to report being on high-performing teams (85%) vs. office-based respondents (79%).

This perception gap may stem from assumptions about collaboration, communication, or team cohesion being tied to an in-person office presence, but the reality suggests that when remote teams are well led and well supported, they are not only capable of high performance, but they also often outperform their in-office counterparts.

The takeaway isn’t that remote is inherently better (though offering flexible or remote-first work is a surefire way to retain top talent in this job market), it’s that performance depends more on how people work together than where they work. Remote success likely reflects clarity in communication, intentional trust-building, and a focus on results over presence. For organizations navigating hybrid environments, it’s a prompt to rethink old assumptions and lead with data, not nostalgia.

How to Build High-Performing Teams

The factors that define high-performing teams aren't abstract ideals, they are elements of meaningful work and successful organizations that have stood the test of time, regardless of what external changes are afoot. That’s good news for organizations because it means high performance isn’t a mystery, it’s a management strategy.

Rather than focusing solely on tools or operational efficiency, the focus should shift to what happens between people: how they lead, relate, and communicate under pressure. These dynamics are the structural backbone of organizational success, engagement, and high performance. And when done well, they drive outcomes just as effectively as any system or process.

To build high-performing teams, organizations can:

• Invest in leadership development that prioritizes emotional intelligence.
• Foster psychological safety through clear norms, inclusive dialogue, and modeled vulnerability.
• Recognize and reinforce team contributions, making people feel valued for more than their output.

High-performing teams are intentionally cultivated, and the strongest organizations will treat that cultivation as a strategic priority.

Wiley’s suite of professional solutions provides a structure and common language to help empower entire organizations with the skills needed to get to the next level. From building better teams with The Five Behaviors^®, and improving understanding to create engaged, collaborative, and adaptive cultures with Everything DiSC^® on Catalyst™, helping you make confident hiring decisions with PXT Select^®, or unlocking the power of leadership at every level with The Leadership Challenge^®, Wiley has innovative solutions that help make the workplace a better place.

Catalyst’s newest offering, Worksmart, drives manager performance and is an essential tool for managers that helps them tackle real-world challenges in the moment, with confidence. Featuring five targeted learning modules facilitated by a Practitioner, in about an hour each, that provide action plans managers can apply immediately with their teams to tackle real-world challenges such as those featured in Wiley Workplace Intelligence research.

Wiley Workplace Intelligence conducts in-depth research on key workplace issues by gathering insights from individual contributors, managers, and leaders. Wiley Workplace Intelligence then analyzes these findings to provide actionable solutions that are shared in our blog.