How To Master The Cycles Of Leadership: The Four Seasons

Whether you’re an aspiring leader, a newly appointed CEO, or a board member wanting to better steward your company’s performance, A CEO For All Seasons: Mastering The Cycles Of Leadership is the hands-on playbook you need – packed with practical, proven tips to help you navigate the four distinct phases of leadership.

“The journey of a CEO has a beginning, middle, and end, and the challenges leaders face early on are often far different than those midway through and near retirement, explain the authors of the book – Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, Vikram Malhotra, and Kurt Strovink.

“For us, the most apt analogy to describe these cycles is the four seasons of the year,” they add.

Spring: Stepping up - Preparing for the role.
Summer: Transitioning into the role. Starting strong. Leading with impact.
Fall: Navigating the middle years. Staying ahead. Sustaining momentum. Enhancing your learning. Future-proofing the organization.
Winter: Transitioning out of the role. Sending it forward. Fortifying a lasting legacy. Handing over gracefully. Embracing what’s next.

Some of my favorite learnings from the book include:

During the first six to 12 months, leaders should:

Not make it about themselves.
Listen, then act.
Nail your firsts. Understand people’s “why?” Keep to a single narrative. Err on the side of complete candor.
Play “big ball.” Spend time on things that no one else can in ways that magnify your effectiveness without getting mired in things that don’t make a difference.

Also, profess the authors, CEOs of the future will find ways to gain leverage by “leading through leaders.” In practice, what that means is that the best of the best in the future will turn their organizations into “leadership factories” where those in vital roles (on the order of hundreds) are both highly skilled and have robust succession plans, and where thousands of employees are equipped to be excellent problem-solvers both in value creation and risk management.

Be sure to check out the six reflection exercises in the book that help CEOs achieve their full potential in each of the four seasons. The exercises cover:

Direction setting
Culture change
Team performance
Board effectiveness
Stakeholder engagement
Personal leadership effectiveness

You’ll also learn a treasure trove of fast facts about dozens of exception CEOs who the authors interviewed as they authored the book.

Finally, while grounded in CEO insights, the book’s relevance extends to leaders at every level navigating high-stakes decisions, transition periods, or long-term growth. It includes case studies and interviews with power players like Steve Schwarzman (Blackstone), Adena Friedman (Nasdaq), Mike Wirth (Chevron), and Michael Dell (Dell)—and surfaces common blind spots that derail even the best-intentioned leaders.
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Dewar, a coauthor of the New York Times bestselling CEO Excellence, is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company. She has published over thirty articles in the Harvard Business Review and the McKinsey Quarterly and is a frequent keynote speaker.

Keller is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company. He is the author or coauthor of seven books, including CEO Excellence and the national bestseller Beyond Performance: How Great Organizations Create Ultimate Competitive Advantage.

Malhotra, a coauthor of CEO Excellence, is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company where he has worked since 1986. He has served on McKinsey’s Board of Directors and as McKinsey’s Managing Partner of the Americas.

Strovink is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company and a member of the firm’s board of directors. He also leads the company’s global CEO services practice. He coauthored the national bestseller The Journey of Leadership: How CEOs Lead from the Inside Out.

Thank you to the book’s publisher for sending me an advance copy of the book.

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