Earlier this week, I was in Washington, D.C., at Jeff Sonnenfeld’s annual conference, where boardroom concerns—tariffs, China, national security—dominated the discussion. The mood wasn’t exactly glum, but it wasn’t chipper either.
Yet, as I sat in that packed room of corporate leaders and policymakers, I was struck by what wasn’t being discussed: Covid. Not a mention, not a question. Which is, in a way, just miraculous. It was just five short years ago this week that the world shut down.
However you feel about President Trump lately, credit where it is due: his administration led Operation Warp Speed, the crash development of the Covid-19 vaccine program and one of the most miraculous scientific achievements in human history. It literally saved the world.
Another hero of that time was in the room: Pfizer chief Albert Bourla. We thanked him on the cover of our sister publication, Chief Executive, in the summer of 2021, but I’d never done so in person. Tuesday I got a chance. Better late than never.
As the room was clearing, I spoke with one of the best industrial CEOs I know—it wasn’t an interview, so I won’t name her here—and I asked her about the present moment, navigating all the tariff craziness, and the geopolitical upheaval, AI, et. al, and she kind of shrugged. Having come of age as a CEO during Covid like a lot of leaders, she hasn’t known anything different for most of her tenure.
It made us realize that Covid forged a new generation of corporate leaders—board members and executives alike—who have been battle-tested by crisis after crisis. The experience has made them more agile, more unflappable and more empathetic.
“This is the forge for a new generation of American leadership,” we wrote in a special May, 2020 issue of Chief Executive. “CEOs who successfully navigate their organizations through this period, whether they’ve already weathered times of tumult, or have never faced a quarter of decline before, will forever be changed by this experience—and for the better.”
We were, of course, being optimistic and upbeat in a scary moment.
But it turns out we were right, too.
