There’s been a lot of noise lately about the “death” of consulting, especially with the rise of artificial intelligence (AI). But as Luk Smeyers aptly put it, “Consulting is not dead. Stop the nonsense.” We couldn’t agree more.

I paused at the door of my manager’s office, knocked gently, and then asked the question.

What is the biggest difference between Formula 1 drivers and business leaders?

Type the words “top leadership skills” into the search engine of your choice and you’ll get an endless list of lists. 

I was working with a senior leader who was promoted and suddenly found himself overseeing one of his companies’ largest strategic divisions. The role involved managing more than 3,000 people in multiple functions and taking full ownership of P&L. 

I recently read that amateur golfers like me should spend about three hours per week on the practice range trying to refine our games.

Video discussion with John Dale, Global Energy Practice Lead and Delores (Dee) Conway, Senior Principal

Video discussion with John Dale, Global Energy Practice Lead and Alycia Diggs-Chavis, Executive and Team Coach

Video discussion with John Dale, Global Energy Practice Lead and Brian Cole, Ph.D., Senior Principal

If you checked out the first two posts in our series on leading decarbonization/net-zero work, then you’ve been ramping up your own influence skills and verifying how to assess change in your organization. Still, you know it will take a constellation of effort across teams to make and keep progress steady.

To maximize the value of moments spent with other leaders and colleagues, dedicate some time to planning out how you’ll approach them as stakeholders and prepare them to talk about, implement, and support change consistently. When you put objectives and challenges in your own words, and help others to do so too, everyone stays on the same page – especially when it’s time to problem-solve quickly.

This is a Video discussion with John Dale, Global Energy Practice Lead and Krystyna Riley, Strategic Accounts Leader

If you’re leading a decarbonization/net-zero initiative, then you’re utilizing influence skills all the time. So, how can you confirm whether your efforts are paying off? When an overall transformation is both unprecedented and long-term, and the teams involved are variable, it’s hard to know where to look for a sign that everyone’s on board.