Lumen CEO Says Boardrooms Must Trade Certainty for Partnerships

Executive leadership is no longer a solo sport, according to Lumen Technologies CEO Kate Johnson, who told a gathering of business leaders that the era of the all-knowing boardroom has given way to an operating model built on partnerships inside and outside the C-suite.

Speaking at the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit in Santa Barbara, California, Johnson said the traditional reward system for executives—being the most prepared person in the room with the strongest opinion and all the facts—no longer works in a market defined by rapid technological and geopolitical change. «This notion of the boardroom and the conference room that I grew up in—we were rewarded for being right,» Johnson said. «That is just not possible in today's market.»

Instead, Johnson described a decision-making process that resembles a machine more than a meeting: leaders form a hypothesis, watch for signals, consult experts both inside and outside the company, and adjust course continuously. «I'm getting signals every day, and we're pivoting every day,» she said. «My job is to get a grant and to allocate the capital accordingly, and you have to have a bench of partners that you can go to to deliver those outcomes.»

The shift is already visible in how chief executives interact. More than 80% of CEOs at AI-first companies are engaging partners from external or specialized networks to discuss risk and build on each other's strengths, according to IBM's 2026 CEO Study. The report attributes much of that change to the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence, which has compressed decision cycles and forced companies to break down established boundaries in pursuit of cooperation.

Johnson's own partnership strategy has a personal origin. A few years ago, she approached EY CEO and Global Chair Janet Truncale at a Business Roundtable breakfast and asked, «Will you be my best friend?» Truncale, speaking alongside Johnson, said she was happy to oblige and that the encounter changed how she meets new leaders. «In the last two years, I've frankly tried to pay that forward,» Truncale said. «So when there are new CEOs, I try to reach out and say, 'Hey, I've just been through this.'»

That relationship helped produce a concrete business alliance. In June 2025, EY U.S. and Blue Planet formed a strategic partnership to improve autonomous networking with AI, and Lumen became the project's first client. The collaboration illustrates a broader trend: as mergers and acquisitions slow, companies are increasingly turning to alliances. Boston Consulting Group found that 60% of surveyed business leaders expect joint ventures and partnerships to be more important to growth than M&A over the next three to five years.

For Johnson, the change is not merely strategic but structural. The bench of partners she described is not a replacement for internal leadership but an extension of it—a network that can be called on to deliver outcomes when no single executive can master every variable. In a market where being right is no longer a realistic standard, the ability to course-correct quickly and draw on outside expertise may become the more durable measure of executive effectiveness.

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Delaney Sawyer

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Delaney Sawyer covers public affairs, politics, business, culture and daily news for Core Memo. The role focuses on verification, context, and clear explanations for readers.

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