How to Leave a Leadership Role Well
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerLeaving a leadership role well means departing with professionalism, grace, and care — ensuring a smooth handover, supporting the transition, protecting relationships and reputation, and going out with integrity rather than acrimony. How a leader leaves is remembered and shapes their legacy and future, so […]
Stakeholder Management for Senior Leaders
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerStakeholder management means understanding, engaging, and building trust with the many parties a leader depends on — boards, investors, teams, customers, partners, and others — aligning them where possible and navigating competing interests. Done well, it earns the support, trust, and alignment a leader needs […]
Leading a Supply Chain Transformation
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerLeading a supply chain transformation means fundamentally improving how a business plans, sources, makes, and delivers its products — for cost, resilience, service, or sustainability. It takes a clear goal, deep supply chain and change-leadership capability, the persistence to drive complex change across the business […]
General Counsel vs Company Secretary: What’s the Difference?
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerA General Counsel leads a business’s legal affairs — its legal strategy, advice, risk, and legal team; a Company Secretary ensures the business meets its governance and statutory obligations and supports the board. The two overlap and are sometimes combined, but the General Counsel is […]
What Does a Head of Corporate Development Do?
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerA Head of Corporate Development leads a business’s inorganic growth and strategic transactions — identifying, evaluating, and executing mergers, acquisitions, investments, partnerships, and divestitures that support the company’s strategy. The role blends strategic thinking with deal-making expertise, helping a business grow and reshape itself through […]
What Does a Chief Procurement Officer Do?
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerA Chief Procurement Officer leads a business’s procurement — how it sources and buys the goods and services it needs, manages suppliers, and controls the associated spend. The role drives value and manages risk across often-substantial external spending, and has become more strategic as procurement’s […]
Executive Coaching: What It Is and When It Helps
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerExecutive coaching is a professional development relationship in which a coach helps a leader reflect, grow, and perform better — through structured, confidential conversation focused on the leader’s challenges and development. Done well, with a good coach and a genuinely engaged leader, it can be […]
Leading Digital Transformation: What It Takes
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerLeading digital transformation means genuinely changing how a business operates using digital and technology — not just adopting tools, but transforming processes, capabilities, and often the business model and culture. It takes leadership commitment from the top, clarity about the purpose (not technology for its […]
Decision-Making Under Uncertainty: A Leadership Skill
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerDecision-making under uncertainty means making consequential choices without complete information — which is most senior decisions. Doing it well involves gathering what information is genuinely useful without waiting for certainty that never comes, using judgement to decide with incomplete data, being willing to decide and […]
How Notice Periods Work for Executives
By Annabel Norman, Managing Partner · Norman Consultants The short answerAn executive notice period is the time a leader must give — or work — between resigning (or being given notice) and their employment ending, often several months at senior levels. It affects the timing of senior appointments, gives both sides time to plan a […]
