ATHENA BLOG

We have no funerals for careers, no ceremonies for the day the badge stops working. Mariangela Zanchetta writes honestly about the grief that follows work’s endings, and why the wound is proof of how much you cared.

AI can give you a perfectly accurate answer to the wrong question, and catching that takes judgment, not code. Drawing on a recent salon conversation with Liat Ben-Zur, we look at why the leaders who’ve spent careers questioning the criteria may be best equipped for this moment.

Boards say they’re desperate for new skills, yet fewer of them are opening seats to find them. The leaders who break through anyway are the ones who get specific, not just qualified.

With the U.S. midterms approaching, Andrea Bonime-Blanc led this month’s Ripped from the Headlines Salon on what’s at stake for business, democracy, and leadership.

After decades advising the world’s top leaders, Kelli Richards has a name for the invisible force shaping every room they enter. She calls it Leadership Resonance—and it may be the most underrated skill in leadership today.

Most founders wait until the business is “done” to call themselves an investor — but as Hilary DeCesare and Lilia Shirman revealed in a recent salon, that wait is quietly costing you the deals, rooms, and capital already trying to find you.