What I Have Learned From the Great Leaders I Have Encountered
What I Have Learned From the Great Leaders I Have Encountered
- Over the course of my career — startups, track and field, McKinsey, building a multi-family office, and teaching finance at Concordia — I kept noticing the same things in the best leaders around me.
- Great leaders engage in discourse. Even when they deeply disagree. Especially then.
- Great leaders bring people along. They never operate under a scarcity mindset. They create flex, create opportunity, and share the light.
- Great leaders have uncomfortable conversations quickly. Vulnerability is not a weakness. It is the foundation of trust.
- Great leaders do not know seniority. You can be a leader today. Right now. You do not need permission.
- The offering: The lessons I believe are most actionable for young professionals — things you can take home and act on immediately.
Over the course of my career, across very different environments, I kept noticing the same things in the best people around me. Whether it was during my time running track and field, building startups, working at McKinsey, teaching finance at Concordia, or now as I build a multi-family office with incredible partners — the patterns repeat.
The great leaders I have encountered are not great because of their title or tenure. They are great because of how they make other people feel and how they show up when things get difficult. And the interesting thing is that these lessons are not reserved for partners or executives. They are available to anyone willing to pay attention.
Here is what I have learned from watching them closely.
Some conversations carry real weight. The kind where the outcome matters deeply to everyone in the room, where views are not just different but fundamentally opposed, and where the stakes feel personal. During my time at McKinsey, I found myself in one of those conversations. A conference room with about 15 people — a mix of HR professionals, associate partners, managers, and others. The topic was deeply sensitive and divisive. It impacted several people and it was clear from the outset that we were not going to see eye to eye on the outcome.
The most senior leader in the conversation was calling in virtually from somewhere else, which made it that much more important to be agile in how we engaged — and also made it a bit strange to take the lead and speak up while also showing empathy and attention on both sides. Funny enough, one of the associate partners in the room nudged me through Slack mid-meeting to speak up. And it went from there.
What followed was a head-to-head exchange between me — a second-year Business Analyst — and someone who had been at the firm for over 20 years. We had deeply opposing views on a decision that was already made. It was emotional. It was real. And I will not pretend that I walked out of that room feeling enlightened or having some grand revelation.
But here is what I did walk away with: a deep respect for my counterpart. We shared our thoughts. We disagreed on some of it. But we were able to engage on it in a respectful and thoughtful manner. We heard each other out. We were empathetic to where the other was coming from. And before that conversation, I would not have appreciated the extent to which there was pressure, a tremendous sense of duty, and personal ties behind the decisions on the other side. It was never black and white. Context matters.
I think you intuitively realize that during the conversation — or at least you want to believe — that both sides are operating from a place of truth. And your duty as a leader is to find common ground. That was a signal of good faith that both parties were acting upon. And more power to them for being willing to be that vulnerable and that honest in front of a room full of people.
To this day, I see that exchange as one of the more mature conversations I have ever been a part of. And I have taken lessons from it. When you start your own business and you are literally asking people to trust you with their hard-earned money, you are bound to have clashes — with professional service providers, advisors, clients, competitors, and sometimes even your own business partners. But what is beautiful is that you come out of it understanding that it is never as far off as it first seems. We all operate from a place of truth. It is a question of hearing each other out and working toward a shared outcome.
Having a little of an incredibly large pie is always better than having everything of a small one. The great leaders I have worked with understand this deeply. They operate under a larger world view that goes beyond themselves. It is about the collective. It is about impact. And it takes a village to do it well.
One partner I worked with from the Montreal office at McKinsey was the embodiment of this. They always had a very specific view of what the recipe for fantastic, distinctive work looks like — and first and foremost, it is not something you do alone.
This partner would always find a way to create opportunities for others. They created workstreams for me to start doing my first due diligences. They brought me along to client proposals when I honestly had no real value-add at the time — or maybe that was just me being hard on myself. They carved out roles for me to build knowledge, credibility, and legacy within the practice they led. It always felt like such a purposeful effort, and it was deeply appreciated.
To this day, this person is the hallmark of what an incredible and thoughtful leader looks like in my view. Their approach went far beyond the examples I just shared, but the principle is consistent: great leaders take the lead and bring people along. They ask for help. They seek allies. They see the forest for the trees. And they share the light.
What is incredible is that this is not just about generosity — it is about results. When you give someone space to grow and they take it, the impact is disproportionate. The firm gave us just enough room to be underwater while still keeping our heads above water. That is what creating opportunity really looks like. You do not see the gaps in others as weaknesses or inhibitors. You see them as a launchpad for future growth.
And the distinctive play is actually engaging people in dialogue about this. You would be surprised how excited and willing people are to talk about their own growth. We are all human. We are all thinking about our insecurities and ambitions. Having someone willing to create that space and walk alongside you — that is genuinely a gift.
A lot of people naturally feel that feedback or tough conversations are a bad sign — a demonstration of a bad relationship or the gateway to a bad outcome. That could not be further from the truth.
I remember working with my first engagement manager at McKinsey. She is also a great friend and such an incredible person — it was a delight to work with her. The very first time we sat down for a feedback exchange, she did something I have never forgotten: she gave me an entire run-down of how feedback should work, why it matters, how we think about it at the firm, and then she did something great by also inviting me to provide feedback to her.
That set a really high bar for what a feedback exchange should look like. And I will be honest — it was a strange experience at first. Being that vulnerable, on both sides. But she was incredibly thorough. She would write her feedback in advance using a proven methodology. She would also write all of my feedback to her. And then she would compare it week to week to assess progress. She was fantastic.
What worked so well about that relationship was that it was genuinely a two-way street. She was committed to my growth, and I was committed to actioning the thoughtful advice she gave me. Feedback requires tremendous courage on both sides — they have to be willing to tell you what it is, and you have to be willing to hear it out.
And that is really the point. Having uncomfortable conversations does not damage relationships. It builds them. It creates space for vulnerability, transparency, and honesty — and those are the foundations of trust. Once you have the ability to be vulnerable and transparent with someone, you come out of it realizing that things are actually better off. If someone receives your vulnerability with mutual respect, candor, and transparency, that tells you everything you need to know about them. And if they do not — well, that tells you something too.
Great leaders do not know seniority, age, gender, or any differences. You can be a leader today.
This reminds me of something a partner from the Montreal office — the same person who brought people along so well — told me during a catch-up session early in my time at the firm. He said: "Be a Senior Partner today. You do not have to wait 10 or 15 years of career to lead or influence."
I remember thinking that was a bit funny at the time. But it also deeply resonated with me, because he was absolutely right. You can demonstrate agency and leadership right now. There is no cost to doing any of the things I have described in this post. You can engage in discourse. You can bring people along. You can have uncomfortable conversations. You can create opportunities. All of it is available to you today.
I took that advice and ran with it. For example, I was genuinely passionate about loyalty programs — airlines, hotels, the whole space. So I started building my own view on the market. I mapped out customer archetypes, modeled the potential value at stake for major airline and hotel programs, codified it all onto pages, and started cold emailing senior partners and practice leaders at the firm saying: what if we pursued this for company X or company Y, for reasons 1, 2, and 3?
I actually ended up helping on several proposals for loyalty programs and chains, and built real relationships with people I never would have met otherwise. My passion turned into knowledge that was genuinely helpful for clients, potential clients, and colleagues. I recall being pulled into conversations specifically for my perspective on customer loyalty a few times — all of this as a first and second-year Business Analyst at McKinsey. Kind of cool in retrospect.
But this is not just a professional thing. In our personal lives, it is equally important to be a Senior Partner today. That is something I take to heart — developing a perspective on the global and local stage, understanding where your contributions can have impact, and bringing people along with you. I find myself saying this to my students at university, to juniors when I was at the firm, and to my little cousins. How can you exercise your agency and voice right now?
Here are the leadership lessons I believe are most actionable for young professionals. These are things you can take home and act on immediately — no title or tenure required.
One last thing. None of these lessons came from a textbook. They came from watching real people navigate real situations — sometimes messy, sometimes uncomfortable, always human. The best leaders I have encountered are not perfect. They are just consistently willing to show up, engage honestly, and bring others along for the ride. That is something any of us can start doing today.
