Whole Person CEO Coaching
This week, a client in the throes of a CEO Transition shared with me the true value of our work. Yes, they appreciated the technical scaffolding: interviewing the team, assessing the dynamics, designing the transition plan, and strategizing the new President's hire. That was the easy part. What truly mattered was that our coaching was focused on them as a human being, not just as a role.
Why did this distinction matter so profoundly? Because their deepest desire was to step out of the CEO role, to finally expand their life experiences and pursue projects that genuinely energized them. They had outgrown being a CEO. While happy to mentor the incoming leader, the role itself had become a gilded cage.
But leaving was the real trial. They had tried many times before, always circling back to the familiar, absorbing too much responsibility and staying trapped.
The Mentor's Insight: Naming the Trap
How were we finally able to break this cycle? Fundamentally, it was because every session was dedicated to coaching the person, not the role.
I noticed and called out their undeniable comfort when diving into business strategy. It was their sanctuary. But rather than offering praise, I offered a challenge: “Wow, you really have this performance stuff down. It’s comfortable, isn’t it?”
They laughed, expecting a commendation. Instead, I had seen the trap. We are instinctively drawn to competence. Letting go of that strategic mind—which had become intertwined with their very identity—would be a difficult descent, especially when that energy felt so comfortable, so competent.
The Refusal and the Revelation
This moment was the turning point. By naming the addiction to competence, we broke its power. We invited the radical possibility that “competent CEO” was not the entirety of their identity. In fact, it was just a role.
To make room for the new life, they had to sit with the discomfort of watching the old one—and all its comforts—fade. How good it felt to be the most skilled, the most knowledgeable, the most essential person in the room. This was the "known world" they were refusing to leave.
But this old comfort was limiting, a shadow compared to the life they truly envisioned: a life of choice, freedom, health, and travel, where they could mentor the business and lead passion projects alongside their children. It wasn't that they never wanted to be "CEO competent" again—it was just that it was old energy.
And we all know first hand: when the old energy is comfortable, but old, it is time for something entirely new.