Greg Stevenson spent 30 years as a CEO watching capable leaders make decisions that contradicted what they knew. Under sustained pressure, their listening and judgment shifted in ways that looked like skill gaps but were actually stress-induced cognitive biases. Psychology explains why it happens and how to fix it.
In 30 years as a CEO and Managing Director, I watched highly capable executives struggle with things that had nothing to do with their capability. They'd make decisions that contradicted what they knew to be right. They'd hold on to people far too long, not because they couldn't see the problem, but because something in them couldn't make the call. They'd build strategies that were technically sound and then quietly undermine their own execution in ways they couldn't see. I watched executives who were generally brilliant in calm conditions become someone different under sustained pressure. Not dramatically different, but subtly different. The way they listened changed. The way they received information changed. And the way they made decisions changed. And the version of themselves that emerged under that pressure was often the one that determined whether they kept the confidence of their board Or lost it. I used to think this was a leadership problem, a skills problem, something you could address with better frameworks or more experience or a different approach to decision-making. 30 years of watching it told me that wasn't right, but I didn't have the language to explain precisely why. Psychology is giving me that language.
