Most of us aren’t seeing many good leaders right now.
We’re watching. We’re bracing.
We’re trying to make sense of what’s happening at the highest levels of power, and what we’re seeing is leadership that is loud, relentless, and doing real damage. Centering an exclusive few at the expense of everyone else. Treating care, inclusion, and listening as weaknesses to be mocked or erased.
It is exhausting to witness.
And it can quietly start to warp our sense of what leadership even is, because the worst examples are the loudest, and loudness has a way of feeling like truth when it never stops.
So I want to ask you something different today.
Who are you following?
Not on Instagram. Not on LinkedIn.
I mean, whose leadership are you actually absorbing right now? Whose example is shaping how you see what’s possible?
Because the leaders we need most right now are the ones who refuse to believe that moving toward our goals requires leaving care behind.
The ones who believe we can care for each other across difference, that access to economic power and a seat at the table should not belong to an exclusive few, that listening more is what moves us forward. That’s how we show up with the person in the meeting and the stranger on the street, both matter, and neither is small.
These leaders still exist.
At the Lead Well Summit, speaker after speaker brought them into the room, including Kirin Bhatti, who pointed to a clerk at her local post office as a genuine leader because of how his attentiveness and warmth toward every single person who walked through that door changed the whole experience of being there.
But we have to notice them, actively and deliberately, because they are rarely the loudest voice in the room.
I count myself very lucky.
As a leadership nerd and someone always working to improve my own leadership, I get to learn from my clients all the time. My clients are my leadership role models.
Navigating enormous pressure and real political headwinds — and still slowing down before hard meetings.
Still saying the difficult thing.
Still asking who is not in the room yet.
Still repairing when they get it wrong.
Leading in a way that includes more people, not fewer.
And then there is my mother-in-law’s leadership.
I am not just saying this for points, y’all, my MIL is a true leader.
She has faced significant health challenges and loss this past year, and she is still here, leading through listening, care, and consistency.
Sharing her truths without taking over the room.
Making space for others without disappearing from herself.
She holds clear values and real warmth at the same time, and she reminds me of this constant dance in leading well: to know yourself, your own values and worth, to know the direction you are leading, and to remain kind, to care and listen, to release the grip of control and dance more with the ideas of others.
This is not a call to look away from what is hard.
The damage being done right now is real and lasting. We need to name it and fight for an end to greed-filled leaders.
But if we focus only on the worst, we lose our reference point for what we are building toward.
We need leaders who remind us that it is possible to lead with joy, compassion, and courage toward a better community and world for the majority and not an exclusive few.
And we cannot wait for those leaders to appear somewhere above us.
We must all work toward being the leaders we want to see leading us in all of our small and large leadership opportunities.
In our neighborhoods, our families, and our workplaces.
This moment is asking something of us right now.
Who are the good leaders you are noticing?
(Really send me an email! I would love to know.)
🏮 BEACONS
Notice who you are absorbing. The loudest leaders are not always the ones you choose, but they may be shaping you anyway. Get intentional about who you are emulating.
Notice leaders who center the many, not the few. Who is holding firm to care and inclusion right now, even under pressure? Follow them.
Notice them in unexpected places. The post office. The school pickup line. Your own team. Find one person you appreciate for how they show up and lead, then tell them.
Close the gap between the leaders you admire and the leader you are. This moment needs you.Your Team
🌊 TIDE TURNERS
Good leaders are out there
In our communities, Bri, a Minneapolis mom, has been running a grassroots network that delivers breast milk, diapers, and food to families affected by ICE raids. Reasons to be Cheerful, Minneapolis Moms Have Each Other’s Backs
In our workplaces: Oregon’s 2025 Principal of the Year, Erik Lathen, personally and publicly thanks every staff member every November. Education Week, A Principal Publicly Thanked Each Staff Member.
In the boardroom: When nearly every major corporation quietly dropped its DEI commitments under pressure, Costco CEO Ron Vachris held firm. Why Costco CEO Ron Vachris is Fast Company’s Visionary of the Year.