Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I’m Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning.
In today’s business environment, uncertainty is the new norm. A striking 70% of current CEOs surveyed by management consulting firm AlixPartners report that their companies face high levels of disruption. This relentless volatility demands a new kind of leader at the helm. Consequently, boards and executive recruiters are shifting their focus. The old checklist of pedigree and past operational titles is giving way to a more nuanced inquiry: Does this candidate have the inherent capacity to be agile, to learn, and to evolve?
“When you’re working on CEO succession, with the clients we serve, there’s less of a debate about whether people are qualified,” says David Lange, a managing director and member of Russell Reynolds Associates’ (RRA) Global Board & CEO Advisory Practice. “It’s much more about: ‘Can they scale; can they adapt; can they evolve?’” This question cuts to the heart of modern leadership potential.
Measuring Pivot Potential
To answer this, firms like RRA have developed sophisticated methodologies for quantifying what they call a leader’s “dynamic quality to continue evolving and leading through change.” Central to their approach is the Leadership Portrait, an assessment model refined over 26 years. This framework moves beyond traditional psychometrics to evaluate factors like curiosity, drive, resilience, and social intelligence. More recently, it has incorporated measures of “potential realization”—scrutinizing an executive’s core values, their intrinsic desire to have a meaningful impact, and, critically, their self-awareness regarding personal strengths and limitations.
Margot McShane, co-lead of RRA’s Global Board & CEO Advisory Practice, points to a counterintuitive asset: the willingness to say, “I don’t know.” “We think some self-doubt with a CEO can be a very helpful thing,” she explains, “because it keeps them curious and aware of blind spots which can derail them and organizations.” This humility fosters a learning culture and prevents the arrogance that often precedes failure in turbulent times.
Evaluating candidates on this metric of potential realization can dramatically alter succession outcomes. RRA cites a telling example: a client passed over its highly experienced chief operating officer (COO) and instead elevated its chief financial officer (CFO) to the top role. The former CFO lacked traditional P&L management experience but scored exceptionally high on the Leadership Portrait. The assessment revealed strong courage, a high potential to learn, and a sophisticated ability to navigate risk. Under this new CEO, the company’s stock price increased 60% over two years—a powerful validation of the agility-over-credentials approach.
Lane notes that the classic CFO skill set, while valuable, can sometimes signal a different mindset. “Mastery of financial data to make airtight decisions is no longer actually as important as the ability to make sense fast,” he says. In a chaotic environment, the speed of accurate interpretation trumps the comfort of exhaustive analysis.
Measurement’s Real-World Impact
One lingering question is whether boards will maintain patience with a new CEO who is deliberately agile and iterative. Former Walmart CEO Doug McMillon, whose 12-year tenure is hailed as a masterclass in adapting to technology and crisis, admitted in a Stanford Business School interview that his early reviews criticized him for taking too long to make decisions. “As the years went, that stopped being on my [reviews] because I think I got more confident and more self-aware that sometimes decisions just needed to be made,” he reflected.
Interestingly, McMillon’s statement welcoming his successor, John Furner, highlighted traits directly aligned with the “potential realization” framework. He praised Furner’s “curiosity and digital acumen combined with a deep commitment to our people and culture.” This public endorsement suggests that the very qualities boards are now seeking—curiosity, learning agility, and values-driven leadership—are becoming standard criteria for succession.
For aspiring CEOs, McShane offers direct advice: “Don’t think about what your next job is; think about what your last job would be—and what [you] need to do, personally and professionally, to make that happen.” The message is clear: own your development journey with intention. “What we know about any CEO candidate is that they have to own their ambition,” she concludes.
How Do You Measure Agility?
The imperative for agility extends beyond the C-suite to every team member. When hiring or promoting, what specific indicators of adaptability and learning potential do you prioritize? How do you assess whether someone can truly realize their potential in a rapidly changing role? I’d like to hear your practical insights and experiences. Send me an email at stephaniemehta@mansueto.com.
Read more: leadership acumen
- Adapting to change is the most critical professional skill today
- How to drive business agility and accelerate growth
- The CEO pipeline is running dry
Here is the original Fast Company article detailing Russell Reynolds Associates’ Leadership Portrait methodology.
