The Retail Leadership Lens

Stepping into a new leadership role often feels like being pushed on stage halfway through a play. The house lights are up, everyone’s watching, and they’re all expecting you to know your lines. The pressure is immense. There’s that constant pull between the urge to prove yourself with quick, decisive action and the critical need to avoid alienating the very people whose support you need to succeed.

Your company’s AI strategy will likely fail. So what separates that successful minority from everyone else? It often comes down to a new type of leader: the "Head of AI." From my conversations with boards, it’s clear this leader’s success depends less on their technical skills and more on their ability to operate as a true business leader. This is especially true as powerful new tools like Agentic AI, which can automate entire workflows, raise the stakes even higher.

The most powerful person in the room is rarely the one speaking the most. We call this quality ‘gravitas’. It’s a word that can feel a bit old-fashioned, but it’s the defining factor in moments that truly matter: navigating a difficult turnaround, steering a major transformation, or holding the line in a tense board negotiation. In a world saturated with noise, gravitas is what gives your voice weight. So, how do we cultivate it?