As businesses recover from global disruptions and face a rapidly evolving marketplace, new CEOs must deliver results quickly while shaping a future-ready strategy. It’s not a choice between vision and execution—it’s about synchronizing both with precision and purpose. For first-time CEOs, this balancing act can be especially challenging. A structured approach over the first year can help. The initial 90 days should prioritize grasping the company’s core operations. The next phase must focus on enhancing and expanding that core. And finally, the last six months should establish long-term growth paths, fostering innovation and strategic transformation.

Why Getting Both Right Matters

Today’s CEOs are expected to think big and act fast. But many struggle to strike the right balance between strategic vision and operational execution. While experienced leaders might intuitively manage this tension, new CEOs often lean heavily toward long-term planning, inadvertently neglecting day-to-day realities. Boards, however, expect swift operational command before strategic overhauls.

A frequent pitfall? Misaligned expectations. Boards assume the CEO will stabilize the core business, while the CEO rushes to reimagine the future. This disconnect can lead to a loss of trust and missed opportunities.

Common Mistakes New CEOs Make

1. Overlooking Operational Weaknesses New leaders may not dig deep enough into current performance gaps or cultural inertia. They risk building strategies detached from real-world constraints.

2. Rushing Team Decisions Eager to drive change, CEOs may replace key leaders too quickly, overlooking those who offer crucial operational strength.

3. Ignoring Frontline Relationships Delegating daily operations too early can alienate employees who are essential to executing the new strategy.

4. Failing to Connect Strategy with Execution Without a clear implementation plan, even the best strategies remain theoretical. Execution suffers when buy-in and clarity are missing.

A Three-Phase Leadership Framework To guide their transition, new CEOs can adopt a structured, year-long approach focused on three key phases:

Phase 1: Stabilize the Core (Days 1–90)

Early days should be about immersion—learning how the business truly operates. CEOs must align with leadership teams on short-term goals, fix critical inefficiencies, and set the tone with decisive, credible actions. Success here builds credibility.

Focus Areas:

1. Core business assessment

2. Immediate operational improvements

3. Stakeholder alignment

Phase 2: Expand the Core (Days 91–180)

Once stability is achieved, CEOs can pivot to growth—exploring adjacent markets or products and reevaluating the company’s value proposition. This phase demands both internal alignment and external market analysis.

Focus Areas:

1. Portfolio diversification

2. Strategy refinement

3. Cross-functional execution planning

Phase 3: Reinvent for the Future (Months 7–12)

With the core business strengthened, it’s time to lay the foundation for long-term transformation. This means fostering a culture of innovation, testing new models, and building capabilities for the future.

Focus Areas:

1. Innovation pipelines

2. Cultural transformation

3. Long-term strategic bets

Real-World Impact

When implemented effectively, this framework fosters clarity, discipline, and momentum. We’ve seen CEOs win board support and build high-performing leadership teams by sequencing their focus. One CEO we advised revised his board pitch to prioritize current challenges and execution plans before outlining future ambitions—and gained full board backing to pursue bold strategic initiatives.

Final Thoughts

The first year is a make-or-break window. By balancing the urgency of execution with the promise of innovation, new CEOs can earn trust, drive growth, and set a course for sustainable success.