In a world where 18-month strategic plans are considered "long-term," what does it actually take to lead effectively? According to John Spence, a leadership expert with over three decades of experience coaching Fortune 100 companies, the answer isn't what most leadership books will tell you.
On a recent episode of the #DynamicDecisionsPodcast, Spence challenged nearly every conventional wisdom about leadership, strategic planning, and decision-making. His insights aren't theoretical—they're battle-tested across 31 years of working with organizations like Apple, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, and IBM. And his message is clear: most leaders are focused on the wrong things.
When asked about the most critical leadership quality organizations need today, Spence didn't hesitate: "The single most important leadership quality bar none is honesty, period. End of discussion there."
It's a deceptively simple answer in an age obsessed with innovation, disruption, and transformation. But Spence's reasoning cuts to the heart of why so many organizational initiatives fail: "If I make a decision that runs contradictory to my values and the values of the organization, I've just told everybody that works there, we don't care about being honest. We don't care about our values."
Values aren't motivational posters on conference room walls. They're the filter through which every decision must pass. When leaders violate their stated values for short-term gains or expedient solutions, they signal that no value is actually sacred—and organizational culture crumbles from there.
While honesty provides the foundation, Spence identifies three "quotients" that determine leadership success in today's volatile environment:
IQ (Intelligence Quotient) – Not your test score, but your competence. Are you genuinely skilled at what you do? Do you understand your craft and continuously develop your leadership capabilities?
EQ (Emotional Quotient) – Your emotional intelligence. Here's where Spence's research reveals something critical: "As you move up the chain in an organization, EQ becomes between five and seven times more important than IQ." Technical brilliance means nothing if you can't work effectively with and through other people.
AQ (Adaptability Quotient) – This is where most leaders struggle today. AQ breaks down into two essential capabilities:
I now realize I know very little about almost nothing and nothing about almost everything else." – John Spence
Coming from someone who reads 100 business books annually and has been doing so since 1989, this humility isn't false modesty—it's earned wisdom.
One of the most fascinating moments in the conversation came when Spence revealed his evolution from "facts guy" to someone who trusts his gut. The transformation happened when he reconceptualized intuition: "I realized that intuition is just reverse pattern recognition. It's looking back over the things that have happened to you over the years and realizing that the reason you feel a little off or you can make a decision is because you've seen the pattern up to now and you're anticipating the pattern going forward."
This reframing matters because it dissolves the false dichotomy between data-driven and intuition-based decision-making. Your gut feeling isn't mystical—it's your brain's sophisticated pattern-matching algorithm running on decades of accumulated experience. For leaders who pride themselves on being analytical, this insight provides permission to trust those nagging doubts or unexpected convictions.
Spence is an enthusiastic adopter of artificial intelligence, using it extensively for client research and analysis. But he draws a crucial distinction: "AI basically has four levels. Level one is data. Level two is information. The third level is knowledge. But it ends there. The next one is wisdom, which is only what people can do."
He learned this lesson the hard way when preparing a major keynote for 3,000 people. After using AI to generate extensive industry research, his client reviewed the report and asked, "Where'd you get these numbers? None of them are right." The AI had hallucinated data that Spence, unfamiliar with the industry, couldn't identify as false.
Now he uses AI only in domains where he has deep expertise—where he can spot anomalies and distinguish between genuine insights and algorithmic fabrications. The lesson for leaders: AI is a powerful tool for accelerating knowledge work, but it cannot replace the judgment that comes from lived experience.
Perhaps Spence's most contrarian position concerns strategic planning itself. "They always call them strategic planning retreats," he notes. "You're not making the plan in the retreat. It's a strategy retreat. We're not there to decide the specific plan. We're just there to decide the direction of the organization."
He's worked with clients for nine or ten years whose core strategy hasn't changed—because their market hasn't changed, and the fundamentals of their success remain constant. "The strategy has not changed or very, very little. Their market's the same. They're very successful. They understand the fundamentals. They know what to say no to."
This focus on "focused innovation"—figuring out what you do exceptionally well and innovating relentlessly in that specific area—contradicts the constant pivoting and reinvention that many organizations pursue. "Number two, three or four and highly profitable is a really good place to be," Spence argues, pushing back against the obsession with market dominance.
When it comes to organizational resilience, Spence offers another counterintuitive insight: "Resilient organizations are built on resilient people. You can try to make an organization resilient, but if you're working on the resiliency of the individuals, by default, you end up with a more resilient organization."
This people-first approach echoes throughout his three decades of consulting. As one of the richest men in America told him over lunch: "John, it's all about people, people, people. You can kid yourself about a lot of things, but at the end of the day, it's all about your people."
The implication for leaders is clear: stop trying to make your organization bulletproof through systems, processes, and contingency plans. Instead, invest in developing adaptable, learning-oriented individuals who can navigate whatever disruptions emerge.
