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Drawing on decades of CEO experience, A CEO for All Seasons outlines four critical phases of leadership: stepping up, starting strong, staying ahead, and sending it forward. It emphasises that successful leadership requires self-awareness, bold yet inclusive decision-making, continuous learning, and an outward-looking mindset to avoid stagnation.

Across each stage, leaders must balance reflection with action, evolve their teams and strategies as contexts shift, and ultimately focus on legacy by setting up their successors and organisations for sustained success beyond their tenure.

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The article argues that while many people define themselves by their jobs, relying too heavily on work as a core identity can be limiting and harmful. Although career-based identity can provide purpose, belonging, and motivation, over-identifying with work can lead to imbalance, burnout, and even an identity crisis if circumstances change. Instead, the author advocates for a more multi-dimensional identity, where work is just one part alongside relationships, health, values, and personal interests, which together contribute to a more stable and fulfilling sense of self.

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The article argues that modern leaders must “steer with both hands”, balancing the demands of running today’s organisation with creating tomorrow’s. This requires ambidexterity, holding exploration (pursuing new ideas for future performance) and exploitation (leveraging existing resources for current performance) together rather than choosing between them.

The authors position this as a collective capability that enables innovation without losing stability, supported by three key practices: structures (strong horizontal and vertical information flows), routines (diversified project portfolios), and culture (empowering people to share information and make decisions).

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The Gallup 2025 global workplace report revealed that 23% of managers felt lonely the previous day to the survey. For leaders, workplace loneliness can subtly shape how they interact with their teams. They may communicate less openly, avoid feedback of appear withdrawn – this can shape entire team dynamics, morale and performance. Furthermore, a manager who has felt lonely at work is more likely to distance themselves from friends and family in the evenings, creating a loop that perpetuates loneliness. Friends and family are an important circuit breaker and studies find that the level of importance that we give these relationships, makes us better able to switch off and connect after work.

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Stepping into a first CEO role is challenging at the best of times, and even more so within a purpose-driven organisation. In this episode, Michelle and Danielle sit down with Alex Ksugas, CEO of Mojo Crowe, to explore the real experience of moving from the corporate world into leading a values-based organisation founded by Ben Crowe. Alex speaks candidly about pressure, visibility, people-pleasing, decision-making, and redefining success as a leader, offering a deeply human and practical conversation for CEOs navigating uncertainty, complexity, and the personal demands of leadership.

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Despite a well-established science of identifying leaders and no shortage of reliable tools to assess leaders’ potential, half of senior executives can be expected to fail. What explains this gap? It has to do with the difference between what leaders can do and what they actually do. As a leader, how can you bring your best self to another year that’s sure to be characterised by unpredictability and constant change?

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Senior-level promotions are an opportunity for leaders to impact a company’s strategy, but it’s easy to get pulled back into the tactical weeds. A visibly higher spot on the organisational chart doesn’t guarantee time for strategic thinking. To gain that, you must do the hidden (and harder) work of redefining how you think, behave, and interact within the system, and be adaptable to the unpredictable needs of stakeholders you need to influence. Here’s how to protect your ability to lead at the altitude your new role requires and that your team needs to succeed.

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This article explores a practical discipline used by the world’s most effective CEOs: creating space for intentional self-reflection amid constant pressure and complexity. Drawing on McKinsey & Company’s CEO checklist, it shows how regularly pausing to ask the right questions helps leaders lift their gaze from day-to-day demands, stay aligned with the impact they want to create, and lead with greater clarity and accountability. Structured around 18 reflective prompts spanning strategy, culture, leadership, governance, stakeholders, and personal effectiveness, the checklist offers a simple but powerful way to step out of the weeds, challenge assumptions, and continually recalibrate how you lead in a changing environment.

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The authors challenge the idea that CEOs should stay purely strategic, arguing that top-performing leaders engage deeply in how work gets done. By shaping processes, modelling behaviours, and teaching frontline teams, they build systems that foster clarity, autonomy, and continuous improvement. Through five core principles, the article shows how depth, presence, and operational fluency can become a lasting competitive advantage rather than a form of micromanagement.

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