Dispatch: On the Architecture of Leadership
Every executive role carries a contradiction at it’s center
I’ve been thinking a lot this week about the nature of c-suite executive work and what makes it different than leading a function. I dug into some of my older work on executive tensions. It led me into writing this Dispatch, and I’d love your thoughts.
Every executive role carries a contradiction at its center. The value of leadership lies in how it carries tension, not how it resolves it.
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Insights from Me
Executive Tension Isn’t Dysfunction: Every executive role exists to lead a tension that cannot be conclusively resolved. The CFO holds the tension between discipline and dynamism. The COO balances efficiency and adaptability. The CHRO navigates empathy and enterprise. To earn a seat at the table, a role’s tension—or an executive’s range of contribution—must be relevant to the decisions at hand. Defining yourself by traditional functions is self-limiting.
Tension Is The Value: An executive who tries to eliminate the central tension in their role—through authority, process, or control—has abdicated their responsibility. A wise executive wields that tension to productive ends on behalf of the organization. The central tension of a role defines its contribution. The CFO doesn’t just manage the people who manage the numbers or serve as a roll-up function. If that were all they did, they would not often be invited to senior executive meetings.
Engineered Tension Is Sustainable: To stay effective, an executive must structure the tension in their role—consciously, selectively, and in alignment with the system they are a part of. The question isn’t whether cybersecurity deserves a “seat at the table.” The real question is whether the tension the CISO is meant to carry can productively shape the conversation. Those are not the same. The ability to distinguish between being a functional representative and the embodiment of a strategic tension—and between technical expert and tension navigator—is one of the clearest predictors of executive readiness.
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Wisdom from Others
“Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are.” —Chinese proverb
While counterintuitive at first, the take-away here is that one must lead through the tension without taking on the tension. Being clear about your role and the central tension you manage potentially creates space to relax into it.
“A good leader is a person who can stand firm amid contradictions and still keep the bridge intact.” —Adapted from James MacGregor Burns
Contradictions are the load-bearing forces of leadership. Engineered systems hold not because strain disappears, but because their parts work together under tension. Seeing your own tension clearly makes it a more balanced and distributed load to carry.
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What happens if you assume that your purpose in an executive role is not to resolve a tension, but to give that tension form on behalf of your organization?
(P.S. I often work with CISOs on structuring this role’s tension so it becomes influence, not exhaustion. If that resonates, feel free to hit reply and we can discuss it.)