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Harvard Business Review
3 days ago
- Business
- Harvard Business Review
The Best Leaders Edit What They Say Before They Say It
In many organizations, transparency is held up as a leadership virtue. Open communication fosters trust, signals authenticity, and helps employees feel informed and included. But as leaders step into executive roles, the context changes. Casual remarks often carry the weight of a mandate. What once felt like honest candor can become counterproductive. A passing comment may be interpreted as a directive. An offhand thought can trigger unnecessary confusion or anxiety. Instead, you have to master executive presence, where how you speak matters as much as what you say. That's why strategic editing is a critical senior leadership skill. It's knowing what to say (and what to leave out), how to say it, and when silence is more powerful. First-time CEOs and other new C-level leaders often find that the communication habits that served them earlier in their careers don't scale well at the top. To communicate more effectively, leaders need to develop the skill of saying less with greater impact. Five Types of Overcommunicating Leaders In high-stakes environments, people look to senior leaders for clarity, confidence, and stability. When communication is unfiltered or unclear, it creates confusion or fear, even if the intent is transparency. Through our work coaching C-suite clients, we've identified five common overcommunication styles. Importantly, these aren't personality flaws; they're signs of a missing skill: the ability to communicate with executive-level precision. 1. The Straight Shooter This leader shares unfiltered thoughts in the name of honesty. They value candor and believe in 'telling it like it is.' But without thoughtful framing, blunt statements can damage morale and shut down growth. Especially at the executive level, how comments about the business or people are delivered is just as important as what's being said. A CEO one of us (Jordan) worked with had a tendency to share direct, unbuffered thoughts about segments of the business at all-hands meetings. While on one hand the team appreciated his candid style, on the other, certain people felt taken for granted and disrespected. Through coaching he learned to pause before saying what was on his mind and consider how he wanted his audience to feel. He maintained his direct approach but got better at framing comments more constructively. 2. The Idea Generator This leader shares too many early ideas without strategic framing. They thrive on creativity and innovation, but teams can become overwhelmed or confused when new ideas are shared without context or when priorities are already in motion. One founder frequently pitched new innovation projects during team meetings. While imaginative, the constant influx of new initiatives diluted focus on the company's core advertising business. Through executive coaching with one of us (Tutti), he introduced a structured '5% innovation time' and began clearly distinguishing between exploratory concepts and strategic priorities. This shift preserved his creative energy while enabling the team to stay focused on execution. 3. The Anxious Communicator This leader overshares uncertainty in the name of transparency. They want to be honest and real but often broadcast indecision or internal anxiety too early. During organizational change, this can leave teams feeling unmoored rather than informed, contributing to change exhaustion when repeated ambiguous updates erode employee confidence and clarity. One CEO Jordan coached wanted to be transparent as he navigated shifting return-to-office plans. With his executive team, he often shared his evolving thoughts—and worries—in real time, sometimes leaning toward full-time return, other times suggesting permanent remote work. The frequent reversals were meant to keep people in the loop but instead left his team confused and anxious, which made it harder for them to communicate effectively with their own teams. By pausing to finalize his thinking before communicating and aligning his tone with a sense of direction, he helped his team and the organization relax and regain clarity. 4. The TMI Leader This leader blurs personal and professional boundaries. Especially in organizational cultures that emphasize authenticity or 'bringing your whole self to work,' some leaders overcorrect. While empathy is a critical leadership skill, blurring boundaries by oversharing personal stress, doubt, or emotion can erode credibility and create discomfort. Consider a founder Tutti worked with, who regularly opened team offsites by sharing personal struggles, hoping to foster connection. Instead, team members began questioning her steadiness and judgment. She needed to better balance her authenticity with the intention behind why she was sharing, and pick what and when to share and not to share. 5. The Detailed Over-Explainer This leader overloads meetings with unnecessary complexity. They equate thoroughness with clarity, offering too much context or diving into technical details. In executive or board settings, this can lose the audience, triggering side conversations about minor points and becoming a distraction that derails meeting focus. One functional leader we worked with lost credibility in cross-functional meetings by diving into minutiae, explaining every nuance before arriving at a recommendation. We suggested he shift his style to lead with a clear synthesis of the issue and offer detail only when asked. He practiced providing his headline recommendation first, followed by the top three or four concise reasons why. As a result, his colleagues were more engaged and clear about his point of view, and the conversation stayed on track. And, of course, he still had the details in his back pocket if questions came up. Colleagues reported that his communication style became sharper and more impactful. How to Hone the Skill of Strategic Editing Strategic editing is the skill of adjusting your communication to match your role. It's not about withholding information; it's about choosing what's most essential to say, how to say it, and when it'd be more effective to say nothing at all. Here's how: 1. Recognize that everything you say (or don't say) carries weight. Executive communication is always amplified. A passing comment can redirect strategy. A sigh in a meeting can spark anxiety. That's why being intentional about what you communicate and how you deliver it is critical for creating the impact you intend. Practice being explicit about what you're communicating and what you do and don't know: 'I'm just thinking out loud right now…' 'I have feedback from the board that I want to share and discuss. We're not going to make a decision today; I want to explore the issue with you first.' 'I've had some ideas on ways to adjust our strategy that I'd like to discuss with you. To be clear, I'm not saying this is a new direction. Today I just want us to consider where we are, the shifting environment, and what might make sense going forward.' 'We had a tough quarter, and we may need to shift our go-to-market strategy. I don't know if that's true yet, but I want to discuss it.' 2. Clarify your audience and outcome. What do you want your audience to think, feel, and do after hearing you? Make it a practice to ask yourself three simple questions before communicating widely: Who is my audience? What do they care about right now? What do I want them to be thinking/feeling/doing as result of my communication? This may sound obvious, but in our experience, far too many senior leaders forget to take this critical step and ultimately impact people in a way they didn't intend. Strategic editing starts with clarity of intent. Jordan worked with a tech CEO who was perceived as insensitive. His team was under a lot of pressure and driving hard in a competitive market. The team felt that he always wanted more without acknowledging their hard work, struggles, and accomplishments along the way. This led to venting between team members outside of team meetings. After receiving feedback, the CEO started to make a point of asking himself how his team was feeling before he stepped into a meeting to share his perspective with them. He got better at acknowledging the team's concerns, needs, and successes—not just challenging them. As a result, the team felt like he understood the difficulties they were facing, cared about their well-being, and genuinely wanted to help them to be successful. This created a more motivating environment for all concerned. 3. Prepare or pause. A lot of executive communication happens in real-time exchanges when you don't have time to prepare. Good strategic editing also means developing strong impulse control and recognizing, in the moment, when an idea surfaces that's half-formed or emotionally charged. In this situation, it's critical to pause. Write the idea or thought down. Give yourself a few minutes to consider if sharing it will distract from the core topic and cause unhelpful ripples, or whether it would be better to discuss it later when you've had time to think through the best approach. We saw one first-time CEO at a large, facilitated gathering of senior leaders take the whole meeting off track. The CEO wasn't happy with the focus of the conversation and in the middle of the meeting insisted on a complete change of direction. The result? Awkward confusion, a lot of startled side conversations, and a poor meeting result. We've also seen C-level leaders in startups, where the environment is more casual, have had a hard time keeping significant structural changes such as reductions in force or reorgs to themselves, resulting in a lot of internal angst and distraction. Sometimes the most strategic move is to say nothing. This can be challenging for extraverted leaders used to thinking out loud, or highly driven leaders who like to move fast. But timing matters. What you share now versus next week or next month can significantly affect how a message is received. Embrace the pause. The rule of thumb is that if you're at all unsure of whether or not you should say something in real time, don't. 4. Frame your message strategically. How you say something shapes how others interpret it. Behavioral economics research by Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman shows that people respond very differently to the same information depending on how it's framed. For example, presenting a medical treatment as having a 90% survival rate feels very different from describing it as having a 10% mortality rate, even though the data is the same. For leaders, framing is especially important when communicating ambiguous, messy, or evolving information. It helps create structure and signals confidence. One startup CEO Tutti worked with received a request from a major customer for more direct access to the core product. While this move could have created doubt among her employees, the CEO framed it instead as an experiment to test a new service model in the spirit of customer learning. This message preserved confidence in the company's direction while creating space to explore. 5. Pressure-test your communication. Especially now with so much change, uncertainty, and ambiguity, senior leaders need safe spaces to process their thoughts confidentially. Whether with a coach, mentor, or trusted advisor, find someone who can help you think through your evolving ideas and messages before you share them more broadly. You'll especially want to pressure-test and refine your message before a high-stakes setting such as an all-hands meeting, a contentious performance review, or a major client pitch. Ask a trusted advisor: How does this message land with you? What do you take away from it? What needs to be changed, clarified, or simplified? How can I make it more inspiring and impactful? Pressure-testing helps you distill your message, reduce noise, and walk into the room with clarity and confidence. . . . At the executive level, your words carry more weight and come with greater responsibility. Strategic editing is about being more deliberate, not less transparent. The most effective leaders don't just share what they know or think; they share what their teams need to hear in order to act with clarity, confidence, and focus.
Associated Press
05-07-2025
- Business
- Associated Press
Thought Leadership Skills Training For Events & Conferences Expanded
Beacon Thought Leadership has expanded its skills development program to support conference organisers and speakers managing intensified competition and rising audience expectations in the post-pandemic events sector. London, United Kingdom, July 4, 2025 -- Beacon Thought Leadership has expanded its training services to equip professionals with the skills to craft compelling and authoritative content targeted at events. The move comes in response to a surge in both virtual and physical conferences following the pandemic—which created a highly saturated event landscape, forcing organisers to compete for limited audience attention across multiple formats. Additional details are available at Industry data indicates that nearly 90 percent of C-level decision-makers consider thought leadership influential when evaluating organisations. For event professionals and speakers, this data underscores the need to move beyond marketing tactics and instead focus on delivering original, research-backed insights that address audience needs. The shift to hybrid and virtual platforms has made it more difficult for conference content to stand out. Participants increasingly multitask during virtual events or prioritise networking at physical venues, making it harder for organisers to deliver sessions that hold attention and influence perceptions. This dynamic has elevated the importance of high-quality thought leadership as a tool for differentiation and strategic positioning. Beacon's offering includes three core components. First, immersive workshops prioritise interactive discovery and audience-centric content planning. Second, one-on-one coaching supports professionals through the full arc of content development, from ideation to delivery. Finally, advisory clinics provide input for in-progress projects, helping teams strengthen clarity, narrative structure, and value proposition. 'Event organizers need original ideas supported by solid evidence and communicated through compelling narratives,' a Beacon representative said. 'Without substance, marketing falls flat. Sustainable impact requires intellectual rigor and effective articulation.' The program aims to help organisers build thought leadership platforms that attract high-value stakeholders, drive industry dialogue, and elevate the perceived authority of their events. By emphasising substance over style, Beacon's approach enables professionals to assess the strength of their ideas and sharpen content for measurable impact. About Beacon Thought Leadership Beacon Thought Leadership develops persuasive content strategies for executives, institutions, and organisations seeking to influence industry conversations. The company's experts have produced research-based content for global platforms such as the World Economic Forum and G7 summits, with features in Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review, and other leading publications. Beacon supports C-suite executives, strategists, and business researchers through content development and skills training programs. Organisations seeking skills development can contact Beacon at Contact Info: Name: Athena Peppes Email: Send Email Organization: Beacon Thought Leadership Address: 27 Old Gloucester Street, London, England WC1N 3AX, United Kingdom Website: Release ID: 89163959 If you come across any problems, discrepancies, or concerns related to the content contained within this press release that necessitate action or if a press release requires takedown, we strongly encourage you to reach out without delay by contacting [email protected] (it is important to note that this email is the authorized channel for such matters, sending multiple emails to multiple addresses does not necessarily help expedite your request). Our committed team will be readily accessible round-the-clock to address your concerns within 8 hours and take appropriate actions to rectify identified issues or support with press release removals. Ensuring accurate and reliable information remains our unwavering commitment.
Forbes
18-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Talent Vs. Toil: Taking Care Of Business
Agur Jõgi, CTO of Pipedrive and expert in scaling technology and organizations. Experienced as an innovator, founder and C-level manager. getty One of the lenses through which tech leaders view their plans for success should be balancing talent and tedium. That is, the skills, attitudes and capabilities of your team versus the toil they must overcome in their day-to-day activities. One of the major keywords you've probably already flashed up is "burnout." Most of us can't maintain our best focus and output over either a long or acutely stressful period. The easy analogy is that of an athlete. A 100-meter sprinter trains for their event, and they may well be pretty good in a longer race. However, they haven't prepared for a marathon—mentally or physically. Tech workers are—either naturally or by career development and practice—primed for certain types of roles and responsibilities. If these are inconsistent, too onerous or often simply too tedious, then attention can slip, and the risk of burnout or disengagement rises. For teams with complex and mentally taxing tech roles that are facing mercurial economic pressures and rapidly changing tools and products, it helps to have a methodical approach to monitoring and supporting the right working environment. Time And Motion, Toil And Team In the mid-20th century, time-and-motion studies became a big business efficiency technique for improving work methods. Factories (or anywhere where there was physical motion, such as assembly lines) were increasingly optimized for better business efficiency. This kind of thinking influenced businesses of all kinds as it evolved, and the IT industry may be the most obvious inheritor of this style of process management. It would be reasonable to say workers didn't tend to get the better end of the drive for efficiency in times past. Speak of "the factory floor" or an "assembly line worker," and many people may have a bias that such working practices make a person a cog rather than an active agent. It's now well understood that employee experience and productivity are known to be entwined. Only leaders who keep their finger on the pulse of the holistic employee and business experience will keep their project and business performance in the green over the medium to long term. Leaders must understand the processes of their teams and be on hand to offer the benefit of experience. They must also advocate if the cost of toil and poor experience ever degrades their ability to deliver on business goals. KPIs, OKRs and metrics define the company goals and deliverables, but these must be translated into "human-readable" behaviors and processes to avoid work becoming a rote lever-pulling exercise. Starting Right And Continuing The Same Way Culture begins in many places, one of them at the point of hiring. Right from the get-go, find people during recruiting who know why they want to work for this company, fit in and strengthen the existing culture. A person with the right "why" will collaborate on the "how." Of course, it's good sense to offer great pay and benefits to go with a great culture as part of the whole employee experience. Equally importantly, choose people who want to develop and want to do it themselves rather than waiting for someone to develop them. Showing agency and a future orientation is a great way for employees to show they can overcome challenges, show resilience and positively support their teams. From there, every manager has a major task—to ensure the continuous professional and cultural development of their people and help out those whose desire for development has stopped. As a guide, my team members know that if they decide to leave, they will generally be trained and experienced enough to get a job offer from the market that's a level higher. Other companies will see a mid-level Pipedrive developer as a new senior as a result of our culture and drive for individual development and excellence. Experience Supporting Excellence The "greed is good/work 18 hours a day in the boiler room" style of management doesn't build a culture of excellence or long-term success. Collaboration and trust are what's needed to unlock really compounding strength and value. That's not to say the best teams don't have some high targets, tight deadlines or some healthy stress. That's how all athletes and professionals maintain a winning mindset and overcome challenges. What's needed is a culture of trust and a great working experience that supports teams in delivering their best over sustained periods. Working experience is very hard to get perfect. It's probably not perfect. People and their varied circumstances are always changing. Leaders at every level must regularly consider the kind of environment they want for their talent and make the right choices to balance experience, resources and expediency to stay on top of the challenge. Leaders must avoid "setting and forgetting." Culture changes with every act made and impression received. A poor hire, the wrong decision, a disruptive customer demand—anything can change it. Culture is made up of so many parts that it doesn't take much to send it down a different path. The mission/vision set from the top is a great start, but it must be backed by evidence that it's taken seriously and meaningfully across the majority of working activities. Taking Care Of Business "Taking care of business" in terms of making a great working experience means tending to factors like employee autonomy and empowerment. Merely taking a temperature check as part of an annual review cycle is a great way to uncover problems a long time after they should have been solved. Some areas, like recognition and appreciation, don't require much more than a thoughtful and empathetic approach to management. Toil must be transformed into meaningful work, and taking care of business doesn't merely refer to delivering on company goals. The company is an organization of people collectively. When they pull together, they grow collectively. When they lose the rhythm, that growth is hampered. Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?
Forbes
18-05-2025
- Business
- Forbes
How Entrepreneurs Can Attract Top Passive Executive Talent
Hiring executive talent Entrepreneurs chasing growth often focus on solving immediate hiring needs—but the most impactful leadership hires often come from a group that isn't even looking. Passive executive candidates—those already delivering results in demanding roles—rarely surface through job boards or recruiter inboxes. Yet they represent one of the most powerful untapped levers for scaling with confidence and capability. To gain a competitive edge, founders must think beyond résumés and rethink how executive hiring actually works. Instead of relying on inbound interest or traditional search methods, recruiting passive leaders requires proactive engagement, insight into candidate motivation, and a willingness to go well beyond the familiar. Building a passive talent strategy from the ground up How can entrepreneurs effectively identify, engage, and recruit high-caliber individuals who aren't actively job hunting? It starts with recognizing that traditional pipelines don't reach these candidates—and neither do generic outreach messages or vague promises of "impact." To win the attention of high-level talent, founders must learn to think like headhunters: zeroing in on logic-based career progression, delivering personalized value, and crafting opportunities that align with both professional aspirations and life priorities. 1. Look beyond active job seekers to elevate your leadership team The strongest candidates for C-level and VP roles are almost never looking. These individuals are already leading teams, running P&Ls, and solving complex challenges. But that doesn't mean they're not open to something better. Startups and growing companies can gain a serious advantage by exploring the passive market. Passive candidates often bring stronger business judgment, more relevant experience, and a track record of stability. While they take longer to engage, they typically deliver more long-term value—and help companies skip the costly learning curve that comes with less experienced hires. 2. Use non-traditional outreach to engage top talent Traditional hiring funnels—job boards, LinkedIn posts, and recruiter blasts—rarely reach passive talent. The only way to attract these professionals is through targeted, personalized outreach that speaks directly to their goals and values. That means defining the exact role, industry, and company size you're hiring from—and going to market accordingly. It also means picking up the phone. Executive hiring is relationship-driven. The best results come from warm, specific conversations, not automated requests. Outreach should feel like an invitation to solve meaningful challenges, not a generic job pitch. 3. Make passive talent recruitment a strategic priority In a competitive labor market, startups and mid-size companies often lose out to bigger brands with deeper hiring pipelines. But passive recruitment is one area where agility wins. By committing to outbound hiring efforts, engaging niche networks, and prioritizing leadership succession, smaller companies can build a leadership edge. Passive talent recruitment should be seen as a growth lever, not a side task. Founders who prioritize it—from building industry relationships to enlisting expert help—are better positioned to attract transformational leaders before competitors even know they're available. 4. Align outreach with candidate motivations, not your pitch Passive candidates aren't impressed by vague promises of "making a difference." They're more likely to respond to clearly defined opportunities that make sense based on where they are in their careers. According to Shawn Cole, founding partner and president at Cowen Partners Executive Search, career moves must be logical to be compelling. "Founders often rely too much on sentiment," he explains. "But passive candidates think in terms of progression—compensation, equity, location, leadership, and long-term potential." Cowen Partners frequently fills senior roles by identifying industry-specific leaders and presenting them with high-growth opportunities tailored to their expertise and goals. This approach—rooted in targeted outreach and real-world value—has led to dozens of successful placements across sectors, often with individuals who weren't actively looking but saw a meaningful reason to move. Reach further to lead smarter The best leaders don't wait for talent to find them—and the best hires aren't always raising their hands. For entrepreneurs, tapping into the passive executive market isn't just a workaround—it's a winning strategy. By building relationships, targeting outreach, and aligning your pitch with what truly motivates high performers, you can find the leaders your business needs to scale. The candidates may be invisible to traditional recruiting methods—but they're out there, and they're worth the extra effort.
