The biggest misunderstanding about mindfulness is that it is some kind of squishy self-help luxury item, that you can take or leave it. That it is only for people seeking inner peace or deeper spiritual meaning. The truth is, mindfulness is now table stakes for leaders who want to be great, who want to build great companies. Being a good leader is super hard, particularly if you run your own company. You need your mind to be sharp and clear at all times. In other words, mindful. And yet, when the pressure is one and there seem to be “more important” things going on, a focus on mental fitness and clarity is one of the first things to go out the window.

The current wave of AI represents the largest impact on social and economic life since the Enclosure movement of the 17th and 18th centuries. That movement shaped the modern world, but left behind a path of destruction as livelihoods were uprooted and sacrificed in the name of progress. Now, as we are faced with changes of similar scale, we have the opportunity to learn from the lessons of the past in order to create world that benefits the majority of humankind.

The best practices and approaches of modern digital product development—from technical methods like Lean, Agile, and Human-centered Design, to support for psychological safety and growth mindset for employees, and even the leveraging of more authenticity, diversity, and sustainability in strategy, branding, and marketing—are all increasingly embraced by bold and progressive companies that are not only more successful in the market relative to their competitors, but also lauded as great places to work. Our diagnostic helps you build your company into one of them.

The humanities are more important for senior leadership than technical skill or domain knowledge. The best CTOs have a strong command of language and a good sense of people, in addition to their technical background. And you get that from studying the humanities, whether formally or informally. The humanities exposes one to the nuances of the human experience. Technical skill only focuses on machines, abstract or concrete, not how they affect the people who build them or the people who use them. A tech leader with letters under their belt is more likely to succeed at the top than one with only numbers in their toolbox.