the leadership crisis

The leadership crisis we keep diagnosing is real. Leaders do behave badly. Gallup’s 2026 measure of confidence in U.S. institutions sits at 27 percent, which is the fifth consecutive year below thirty, and near the lowest reading in more than five decades of tracking. Only one in five employees, according to Gallup’s most recent workplace data, say they trust their company’s leadership, and the Edelman Trust Institute finds that just 19 percent of non-executive employees believe their CEO tells the truth. Political leaders defend cruelty as strategy and are rewarded at the ballot box. Just when you think things couldn’t get any worse, a new scandal emerges, and any hope that people will wake up is dashed by a chorus of voices defending the indefensible: he gets results, she had no choice, the other side is worse, the ends justify the means...

Character isn’t something you have. It’s something you practice, in small choices, on ordinary days, so it’s available to you when the stakes are high. Every meeting, every email, every hire, every silence, every purchase, every vote is a rep. You’re either building the character you’ll need or spending down the character you have...

Our research shows character can be assessed, developed, and embedded in organizations. But it starts with us. We don’t have the leaders we have because some external force imposed them on us. We have them because, one calculation at a time, we chose them. And the mirror, if we’re willing to look, is where that choice actually gets made.

Mary Crossan

"Puzzled By The Prevalence Of Bad Leadership? Try Looking In The Mirror," Forbes. October 20, 2026

pressure and stress

Pressure and stress feel fundamentally different. Pressure is positive. It pushes us to give our best and rise to a challenge. Stress is an anticipatory feeling based on fear of something that may not transpire. As a leader, your job is to give people purpose and direction so they can put appropriate pressure on themselves to achieve the company’s goals. You need to explain the challenge so they believe their actions can influence the outcome.

When you communicate your own panic, you can leave people feeling responsible for a situation they have little power to change. When you show that you can handle the pressure, you are giving them a reason to believe in their own contribution. That’s how success is built. Your job is to help create solutions, not just verbalize the things that aren’t working. Leaders who demonstrate problem-solving skills are more likely to inspire their team to come up with solutions.

Sara Bell

"Careful, managers. Your mood affects your whole team’s performance," FastCompany. October 20, 2026

pairing leadership with humility

I see myself as leading a team of experts and equals, and I hire people who know more than I do in their domains. Rather than dictating how each person must work, I give them goals I know are right for the business and then let them figure out how to achieve them. I’ve been surprised by the creative solutions my team finds, often with minimal input from me. My role is to lead and to orchestrate, not to try and do everyone’s jobs for them. By pairing leadership with humility, I avoid micromanagement.

Michael Quoc, Product.ai

As quoted in "38 leaders on balancing confidence with humility," by the FAST COMPANY EXECUTIVE BOARD. Fast Company. October 19, 2026

saying so cost me nothing

Early on, people mistook my intensity for aggression. That feedback reshaped how I lead, though it never lowered my conviction. A team can’t follow someone who won’t commit to a position. So, I take the position and say it plainly. Then I ask who sees it differently, and I mean it. I’ve been wrong in front of my team more than once and saying so cost me nothing. What costs you is defending a call everyone in the room already knows is bad. If nobody pushes back, I haven’t built the right room.

Trent Cotton, ICIMS

As quoted in "38 leaders on balancing confidence with humility," by the FAST COMPANY EXECUTIVE BOARD. Fast Company. October 19, 2026

let's figure it out together

I think good leadership requires being confident about where you’re going while remaining curious about how you’ll get there. I’m comfortable saying, “I don’t know. Let’s figure it out together,” because the best ideas usually emerge when people feel empowered to bring their own expertise and perspective to the conversation. Confidence creates momentum, but humility leaves room for something better than the idea you started with.

Thom White, Work Program Architects

As quoted in "38 leaders on balancing confidence with humility," by the FAST COMPANY EXECUTIVE BOARD. Fast Company. October 19, 2026