Thompson, chairman of the Chief Government Alliance and beforehand ranked because the world’s prime CEO coach, and Loflin, Nasdaq’s International Head of Board Advisory, joined forces to offer a 360-view of this loaded second for management, from the C-suite and board views, respectively. In a wide-ranging dialog with Fortune, they talked in regards to the Shakespearean themes of management and turmoil and the sensation that “heavy is the head that wears the crown.”
For these aspiring to succeed in the highest, Thompson shared the standard knowledge he’d discovered from his mentor, Marshall Goldsmith: “What got you here got you halfway there.” (Goldsmith had a New York Occasions bestseller in 2007 with What Received You Right here Received’t Get You There.)
The transition from being a high-performing government in a “swim lane” to having the “aperture of having a full enterprise” requires substantial new studying and ability growth, Thompson argued, as a result of regardless of how nice an government you might be or how ready you assume you is likely to be, the stakes are existentially excessive. The chance {that a} CEO may “lose his or her head within the next year or so” is “easily like 20% or at the big brands It feels like it’s twice that,” stated Thompson, who just lately penned an essay with reference to CEO “decapitation” for Fortune.
Including to this stress, Thompson and Loflin added, is the novel shift in board member expectations. Board members, who as soon as may need been “golf buddies,” at the moment are “really under the gun to perform.” They’re “less patient” and anticipated to “actually deliver,” primarily based on their subject material experience.
This surroundings calls for practically each candidate be able to function a “peacetime in a wartime CEO,” Thompson stated, able to harvesting one of the best facets of the corporate tradition whereas additionally being “disrupting and breaking new ground.” An government promoted from a useful function, akin to a CFO, might possess the “gravitas of understanding the street and the shareholders,” however typically lacks the breadth to “light hearts and minds” throughout the workforce, or do “ride-alongs with customers.”
The loneliness of the tower, and ‘relationology’
Fortune has been monitoring this tenuous second for leaders all through 2025. Prime recruitment agency Challenger, Grey & Christmas discovered 1,235 CEOs had left (or misplaced) their jobs via the primary half of 2025, a shocking 12% enhance from 2024 and the very best year-to-date whole since Challenger started monitoring CEO turnover in 2002.
Jim Rossman, Barclays’ world head of shareholder advisory, who’s been intently monitoring shareholder activism for many years, equally discovered file activist-linked turnover on the prime for 2025. “It feels like what activists have done is basically [to hold] public companies to the standards of private equity,” Rossman advised Fortune in a earlier interview, as they’ve come to view the CEO “more as an operator, not somebody who’s risen through the ranks.” In different phrases: Outcomes matter.
The extraordinary surroundings contributes to emotions of isolation. As CEOs typically word, being the boss is a lonely job the place leaders are caught within the center, with data they can not share with stories however should share with the board, creating an enormous data asymmetry, as Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella beforehand advised McKinsey.
Carolyn Dewar, the co-leader and founding father of McKinsey’s CEO Apply, beforehand advised Fortune that “No one else in your organization or above you, like your board or your investors, see all the pieces you see.” She advocated for leaders to encompass themselves with trusted advisors—“a kitchen cabinet” of types.
Equally, Loflin advised Fortune he’s keen on the idea of “relationology,” which he describes as “sort of a study of relationships.” He steered leaders should develop a “portfolio of relationships of intimacy” which might be “very context-relevant.” A frontrunner’s effectiveness hinges on having fluency, as an illustration, when chatting with a CFO about analyst days, or working with a compliance crew to maintain the enterprise protected or connecting authentically with union executives. Loflin stated he’s typically seen it being a “big surprise” to achieved leaders that they’ve, say, seven totally different teams they should interact and perhaps as many as six new abilities to actually flesh out earlier than they’re able to take the enterprise to the subsequent degree.
This want for deep, context-aware connection additionally applies to non-public life, Loflin added. The concept a private life {and professional} life will be totally separate “undermines leadership and undermines the fabric of a company.” Critically, Loflin stated, the chair should actually know his CEO “at a deep level, like a Shakespearean level,” requiring a transparency that ensures applicable accountability. In spite of everything, Loflin famous as one instance, boards must be conscious {that a} private relationship that violates firm coverage can jeopardize company governance on the drop of a hat. The board actually must know who their CEO is, perhaps higher than the CEO is aware of themselves.
The facility and the privilege, the hubris and the humility
Loflin, who admitted to Fortune that he’s a little bit of a Shakespeare nerd, famous the distinction between a tragedy and a comedy is decided by “the vulnerability and the self-awareness of the protagonist,” and a tragic final result outcomes from a sense he likened to “never recognizing whether I needed to grow or change.”
Thompson added that surviving as a CEO requires an “odd combination” of traits you may learn in a Greek tragedy: hubris and humility.
The CEO should possess the hubris, or extreme pleasure, to consider they are often one of the best of their subject, but additionally the profound humility that acknowledges they will’t do it alone.
The skilled mandate is relentless, Thompson added, citing a key interview for the ebook from Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon: in the event you have been the “same guy you were a year ago, you don’t deserve to be promoted.” Thompson stated he thinks of hubris of being at “the edge of your competence, so rather than retreating, you actually should lean into that” to accumulate the talents and assist it’s essential to continue to grow as knowledgeable.
For prime leaders, Thompson stated, the highest job just isn’t a prize to be received, however a “privilege to do this role.” Simply as Olympic athletes should consistently enhance, he added, leaders should acknowledge that breaking a file solely attracts extra competitors.
Loflin urged boards and executives alike to maneuver past a Wolf of Wall Avenue mindset and into “what it means to authentically care for and build the confidence and foster appropriate accountability.” He stated that for a lot of executives, admitting you may have areas to enhance on and get higher at is a “special vulnerability.” He argued boards want extra real, interpersonal affection—typically of the powerful love selection—is required to forestall a really Shakespearean tragedy on their watch.
Loflin stated he’d simply had breakfast with a board director for a $30 billion firm and the topic of affection arose: “Do you love your management team?” The director stated sure, undoubtedly, virtually like kinfolk. In spite of everything, they’d been with the corporate over a decade and are available to have deep relationships with different administrators and their C-suite. Loflin argued that over many years of advising boards on company governance, he needs extra would undertake this type of perspective.
“I don’t think it’s going to hurt anything in business because a good father has to talk to a troubled son, hopefully he’s mentoring when [the son is] getting himself in trouble.” In spite of everything, Loflin continued, “bad stuff happens, and I think some of these metaphors are important.” In different phrases, it shouldn’t be the Wolf of Wall Avenue, however the wolf—or the activist—is all the time on the door.
