Sadly, there is no secret formulation for fulfillment — however after talking with dozens of leaders this 12 months, I’ve a couple of concepts about what makes folks on the prime stand out.
In 2025, I interviewed round 80 executives, together with greater than 30 leaders at Fortune 500 corporations, and roughly 20 CEOs or founders. They ranged from the heads of consumer-coveted manufacturers like Whoop and Olipop, to the CEO behind CorePower Yoga, and senior leaders at main tech corporations like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon.
After talking with leaders throughout varied industries and firm sizes, I am unable to say I found the blueprint for fulfillment. Nonetheless, I did discover related themes and patterns that saved popping up in our conversations.
These are the three takeaways I noticed:
Many took non-traditional paths
A straight path to the C-suite was the exception, not the rule, among the many executives I spoke with.
Even those that began with Ivy League credentials skilled some twists or setbacks alongside the way in which. Reserving Holdings CEO Glenn Fogel, for instance, advised Enterprise Insider that after dropping his job in funding banking, he remained unemployed for 2 years and wrote a novel.
Different executives began on fully totally different paths. The CEO of Brooks Working, a billion-dollar firm, started his profession as a highschool trainer. AWS government Colleen Aubrey stated she labored as a receptionist for the Australian authorities in the beginning of her profession. The CEO of Autodesk shared that he dropped out of highschool at one level and was on probation as an adolescent.
Others, like Google Cloud’s Yasmeen Ahmad, additionally took oblique paths. Ahmad began her profession in genomics and life sciences after incomes a PhD. She stated her largest problem was accepting the unknown as she transitioned from academia into the workforce. Whereas uncomfortable on the time, she stated transferring via roles in gross sales and finance earlier than becoming a member of Google in the end gave her a broader perspective.
They keep disciplined
Most executives I spoke with displayed a excessive stage of self-discipline and curiosity that went past working additional time.
For Visa Group President Oliver Jenkyn, it means setting apart 4 uninterrupted hours every week to study one thing new. For Blackstone CTO John Stecher, it is utilizing his 35-minute subway rides to and from work to learn up on tech information in different industries.
That self-discipline extends exterior of their skilled lives, shaping every part from their diets to their exercise routines and existence.
Ben Goodwin, the CEO of Olipop, for instance, begins his mornings with a bathe that toggles between sizzling water and the coldest setting to assist construct tolerance for discomfort. He additionally repeatedly cycles between chilly plunges and sauna periods, spending 5 minutes or extra at a time in roughly 40-degree water.
For CorePower Yoga CEO, Niki Leondakis, that self-discipline exhibits up in the way in which she units boundaries for work. As an introvert, she stated recharging is essential for her. She stated her assistant blocks off half-hour on her calendar earlier than any high-stakes engagement so she will floor herself and do breathwork.
Others, like VC founder Harry Stebbings, have obligatory day by day and weekly milestones, like hitting 30,000 steps daily and strolling a marathon along with his mom each weekend. He additionally holds off on consuming his first meal, which is completely sushi, till round 8:30 p.m. on a regular basis.
They do not shrink back from threat
Many executives described a sample of daring decision-making of their careers — and a few, like AT&T exec Jennifer Van Buskirk, look to establish candidates with the identical impulse.
That boldness can manifest in numerous methods — from founding an organization in faculty, like Whoop CEO Will Ahmed, to publicly taking a stand on AI-assisted dishonest in interviews, because the founding father of Cluely did.
Others, like Google’s head of Android, Sameer Samat, displayed boldness by making the primary transfer. In 1999, he despatched a chilly e mail to Sergey Brin in the midst of the night time, asking for recommendation a few disagreement along with his startup cofounders. The alternate led to a go to to Google’s workplace, which ended with a job supply, although Samat turned it down on the time.
For AWS government Sarah Cooper, taking dangers means writing detailed proposals about new concepts she needs to implement. The technique has led her to create her personal roles. Nonetheless, it is also backfired. Cooper stated that at one job, a poorly acquired proposal resulted in her being pushed out of the corporate.
Whereas dangers do not all the time repay, the resounding message I gathered from leaders is that failing generally is inevitable, they usually’d moderately act than stand nonetheless.
