Two meetings, thirty years apart, that shaped how I think about leadership
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The hair changed. The job titles changed. The lesson didn't.
I've often reflected that two meetings, nearly thirty years apart, shaped how I think about leadership more than any book, course or management theory ever has.
In my early twenties I found myself sitting in meetings with the CEOs of some of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies. I was there as the note taker.
One meeting has stayed with me for over thirty years.
During a strategy discussion with AstraZeneca CEO Sir Tom McKillop, the room agreed to proceed with Option A. As the conversation continued, Sir Tom repeatedly drifted back towards Option B. No one seemed willing to raise it.
As the person writing the meeting report, I eventually asked:
"Excuse me Tom, just so I'm clear... are we sticking with A or moving to B?"
He smiled, thanked me for correcting him and confirmed we were sticking with A.
Fifteen minutes later, he drifted back to B again.
So I asked the same question.
Again, he thanked me.
My bosses were horrified.
I wasn't.
We left with clarity instead of confusion.
That meeting taught me something I've carried throughout my career.
It also left me with enormous respect for Sir Tom. He had the confidence to be challenged because he cared more about reaching the right decision than protecting his authority.
The best leaders don't expect to be right all the time. They create an environment where people are prepared to challenge them because better decisions matter more than hierarchy.
Many years later, now leading my own agency, I found myself parachuted into a very different room. Investors had asked me, with only hours' notice, to help a business facing a major operational crisis affecting hundreds of thousands of patients.
Everyone had aligned around a communications strategy announced by the CEO that, in my judgement, would make the situation worse.
I was the outsider.
I'd never met the leadership team.
There was every chance I'd be thanked for my time and shown the door.
Instead, I explained why I believed a different approach, in fact almost the opposite strategy, was needed.
To the CEO's credit, he listened.
The discussion changed.
A new direction was agreed and I went on to help lead the communications programme through one of the most challenging periods in the organisation's history.
Nearly thirty years apart, those two meetings taught me the same lesson.
Leadership isn't about having all the answers.
It's about creating a culture where people feel able to speak up and having the judgement to listen when they do.
The goal isn't challenge for its own sake.
It's clarity.
As advisers, board members and colleagues, we have a responsibility to put our perspective on the table when we genuinely believe it will lead to a better decision.
Respectfully.
Constructively.
Without ego.
Because if you've been invited into the room, your job isn't to make people comfortable.
It's to help the room arrive at the clearest and best decision possible.
What is worth carrying forward?
Looking back, what has stayed with me isn't that I spoke up.
It's that, in both rooms, there were leaders prepared to listen.
In both meetings, intelligent people were trying to reach the right decision. The difference was whether the culture allowed uncertainty to be voiced before confusion became consensus.
The lesson I've carried forward is that good leadership isn't measured by how often a leader is right. It's measured by whether people feel able to contribute honestly, and whether different perspectives are welcomed in the pursuit of a better decision.
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