As I’ve said before, you can do all the leadership training in the world. It doesn’t always make you a leader. But what it does do, importantly, is help you recognise the difference. It helps you identify real leaders when you see them. More importantly, it sharpens your ability to spot toxic cultures. It teaches you to recognise when someone has enough self-awareness to grow, and when someone doesn’t. And once you see it, you can’t unsee it.
Leadership is hard. Public leadership is harder. But when harm is done, whether through action or silence, real leadership requires something more than defensiveness. It requires self-reflection.
If a CEO were to pause and look inward, here is what genuine self-awareness might sound like.
How did I get here?
I have spent my career navigating complicated political environments. I have seen corruption up close. I have worked in organisations where things went very wrong. I was not charged, but I was part of that system. I saw what unchecked power does. I know what it costs communities. I know what it costs people.
Did I bring that culture with me, even unknowingly?
Did I carry forward habits shaped by survival in a dysfunctional system? Did I seek control where I should have encouraged transparency? Have I mistaken compliance for leadership?
Have I confused being right with being in charge?
Leadership is not about managing perception. It is about creating space for accountability and trust. When people around me challenged decisions or asked difficult questions, did I see that as threat instead of engagement?
What role have I played in the harm others say they’ve experienced?
When people say they felt targeted, silenced, or undermined during my leadership, do I hear that as a personal attack or as something to sit with? Have I considered that harm does not require intention, that impact matters more than defence?
What am I afraid will happen if I admit I got it wrong?
Is it fear of looking weak? Fear of being held to account? Or is it fear of stepping into the unknown, into a space where control is replaced by vulnerability?
What would it look like to lead differently, now?
It would mean opening space for truth. It would mean commissioning an independent review. It would mean picking up the phone to those who were hurt and saying, “I want to understand.” It would mean listening, not defending. Owning, not spinning. Rebuilding, not retreating.
Because surviving a broken system is not the same as transforming one.
And if we do not break the cycle, we become it.
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