This is the worst advice we give new CEOs

“Congratulations and condolences.” This is a real message a peer sent when I became CEO of BarkleyOKRP in May 2025. And he wasn’t alone in his sentiment. It seems many regarded this career-defining achievement as the corporate equivalent of buying a boat: Enjoy that first day; the rest will be rough. My future was to be filled with bigger decisions, harder calls, and problems aplenty. And now I was a team of one. My office was an island, miles from help. As they say, it’s lonely at the top. Those at the apex agreed. Tim Cook of Apple called being CEO “a lonely job.” Airbnb’s Brian Chesky described leadership as climbing a mountain where “the higher you get to the peak, the fewer people there are with you.” Isolation, one could reasonably conclude, is the sign of a job well done. And those who can’t do it all themselves shouldn’t be doing it at all. And at first, I bought it. I don’t anymore. This year, I conducted an experiment. I sat down with seven of advertising’s most respected leaders for a podcast series, Tell Me Everything. The topics spanned creativity, AI, and agency growth. The purpose was to inspire industry executives. Or so it seemed. I had a mic and an ulterior motiv…

≈