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UnitedHealth Group appoints Patrick Conway as CEO of Optum Health to restore growth, advance value-based care models, strengthen compliance, and drive digital innovation amid regulatory challenges.
Leadership Links #3 brings you five essential insights on boardroom culture clashes, authentic DEI strategies, phased leadership transitions, sustainability as resilience, and broader talent oversight.
When most people think of work, they picture the thing that pays the bills. It is often reduced to a job description, a department, or a performance review. For some, work brings energy and purpose. For others, it becomes a source of pressure, routine, or quiet dissatisfaction. No matter where you land, your relationship with work has a powerful influence on your overall well-being. It shapes your identity, controls your schedule, and defines your sense of accomplishment. Yet at some point, many professionals stop asking themselves a simple question: does this still feel meaningful?
Regis Corporation names veteran executive Jim Lain as interim CEO following Matthew Doctor’s departure, ensuring seamless leadership and ongoing digital innovation.
Discover five essential insights on shareholder activism in Japan, AI-focused restructuring at Accenture, record S&P 500 CEO turnover, leaner management layers, and Alphabet’s AGM outcomes to guide your leadership strategy.
The idea of work-life balance shows up everywhere. It appears in leadership seminars, corporate values, and wellness programs. Yet for many professionals, it feels like a phrase that belongs more in theory than in reality. Life does not move in clean, evenly divided segments. Work often flows into the evenings, family needs interrupt structured plans, and personal health is quietly set aside until it demands attention. Trying to balance everything equally can leave you feeling like you are always behind. No matter how carefully you manage your schedule, the scales never seem to settle evenly.
Our 2026 theme, Advancing Management: Managing Healthy Organizations, focuses on how managers, educators, and students can help create work environments that balance accountability, clarity, and well-being. From operations to culture, leadership to learning, we’re inviting a wide range of voices to explore how organizations stay resilient, responsive, and people-focused.
In early 2025, chief executive turnover among S&P 500 companies reached 14.8 percent, with 646 departures in the first quarter, marking the highest quarterly total on record since 2001. This surge reflects several factors happening at once, including aggressive cost-cutting initiatives that eliminated layers of middle management, changing career expectations among younger professionals and a persistent underinvestment in deliberate leadership development.
In a business landscape increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence, workforce evolution, and global uncertainty, today’s leaders must stay informed and adaptable. This edition of Leadership Links brings together essential articles and resources that explore the future of work, the rise of agentic AI, and the tools needed to shape high-performance teams. Whether you’re refining your HR strategy or navigating workforce transformation, each link below offers timely insights that can help you lead with clarity and foresight. Use these resources to challenge your assumptions, realign your priorities, and make smarter, people-centered decisions.
Many managers are excellent at setting goals. They are taught to tie objectives to key performance indicators, align targets with strategic plans, and monitor progress through data. On the surface, this seems like a recipe for success. But the truth is, many professionals continue to feel directionless or disengaged even when those goals are met. The reason isn’t a lack of effort or commitment. It’s that most traditional goals are built for systems, not for people. They keep the machine running, but they rarely speak to personal growth or purpose.
Leadership is rarely a solo act. Every decision, reaction, and insight is influenced by the people closest to you. Your inner circle shapes how you think, how you lead, and how you show up. Proximity has power, and smart leaders know that the people they spend time with can either fuel growth or slowly drain it. This applies to peer groups, direct reports, mentors, and even professional contacts. Leadership is not only about who you lead. It is also about who surrounds you while you lead. Curating that circle with intention is one of the most underrated strategies for long-term effectiveness.
The Society for Advancement of Management (SAM) is proud to open nominations for the 2025 Awards Season, a celebration of leadership, ethics, innovation, and social impact that reflects more than a century of excellence. This year’s awards program brings something new and significant. For over 100 years, our society’s International Awards Program has recognized the trailblazers and thought leaders who have shaped the management profession. From the prestigious Taylor Key to the influential Human Relations Award, these honors acknowledge individuals who transform theory into lasting influence.
At the Society for Advancement of Management (SAM), our mission has always been rooted in developing ethical, forward-thinking leaders who are ready to meet the challenges of a changing world.
Diageo, the world’s largest spirits maker known for icons such as Johnnie Walker and Guinness, announced on July 16, 2025, that CEO Debra Crew has stepped down after two challenging years in the top role. Crew’s departure comes by mutual agreement and follows a 44 percent drop in Diageo’s share price during her tenure. Stepping into the breach on an interim basis is CFO Nik Jhangiani, a seasoned finance executive with more than three decades of global experience.
This week’s roundup covers five major leadership changes shaping strategy across global consumer goods, technology, energy, insurance, and quick-service restaurants. You’ll read why Diageo’s CEO departure signals a push for cost discipline, how Snowflake is aligning its growth roadmap around AI and efficiency, and what Tamboran’s leadership shake-up means for stakeholder oversight. We also explore Munich Re’s carefully managed CEO succession and Subway’s choice of a franchise veteran to drive its modernization efforts.
For many high-performing managers, success becomes part of their identity. It creates a sense of stability, earns recognition, and builds trust with others. Over time, though, the role that once