Hi,
I asked 100 CEOs this question, and here are the top 5 answers:
“Good companies survive a crisis, but great companies are defined by one. Eight weeks before the pandemic, we were preparing for one of the biggest IPOs in history. Then suddenly, headlines asked, ‘Is this the end of Airbnb?’
There were questions; not just whether the company would survive, but whether I could lead us through it. That moment became our defining test. I told our board: ‘This is our defining moment,’ even when I had no evidence. I decided to treat it that way.
In a crisis, you make principle decisions, not business decisions. Business decisions predict outcomes. Principle decisions are made regardless of outcomes based on who you are and how you want to be remembered. I wrote down what mattered: act decisively and fast; act with all stakeholders in mind; never lose empathy.
The hardest thing to manage in a crisis isn’t the company. It’s your own psychology. If you think you’re screwed, people will see it in your eyes. But if you’re optimistic and grounded in reality, that optimism becomes the condition for creativity.
Because in a crisis, you often face two bad options. Creativity is the third path, the one you have to invent. That’s what we did. We rebuilt Airbnb from the ground up, made painful choices with humanity, and found clarity in what truly mattered.
A crisis brings you clarity about what’s important. Pressure doesn’t just test creativity, but defines it.” Listen to the full conversation here.
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Jonathan Mildenhall, Co-Founder & Chair, 21CB, CMO of Rocket, and named one of the world’s most influential CMOs by Forbes. |
“Throughout my career, the ability to stay creative and deliver under pressure has been essential to success.
Over the last two decades, whilst transforming brands including Coca-Cola and Airbnb into cultural catalysts, I’ve developed a simple system to keep my creativity sharp and consistent. I call it my “one better” approach - the idea that creativity doesn’t always come from big leaps, but from the smallest, deliberate, 1% moves that make the work stronger. These are the three key principles I use to sustain my creativity when things get intense:
Principle one: Don’t design your first idea.
We’re all creative by nature, but creative discipline is learned by nurture. Before I touch any tools, I run a 20 ideas in 20 minutes sprint to push my thinking past the obvious. The aim is breadth to get beyond that first impulse and find stronger directions. Protecting my mental energy for strategy, storytelling, and concepting is how I make sure that pressure never limits creativity.
Principle two: Build creative fluency through critique.
Inspired by RISD’s critique process, I run weekly reviews, ruthlessly assessing work against past campaigns and world-class benchmarks with one question in mind: What does excellence look like here? This habit builds fluency in spotting quality and turns work that’s simply “good enough” into work that’s world-class.
Principle three: Curate a personal board of directors.
I never create in isolation. Solopreneurs can feel lonely, and I share my thinking early with a trusted group to see ideas through different lenses. I filter the feedback and make deliberate, small adjustments. Under pressure, those micro-improvements compound and that’s where excellence comes from.“
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Georgia Burne, Co-founder and creative director of BOMA Projects, a high-end residential renovations agency in London. |
“Pressure sharpens my work but deadlines force the much needed clarity. I create spaces that make people feel calm, even if they don’t know why.
My process begins with deep research into a building’s history. I might discover a coal cover from 1846 and weave it into the mouldings, or explore 19th-century American ranch fabrics for a coach-house conversion. I love the hidden details that few would notice but everyone can feel.
Growing up, my creativity was dismissed as daydreaming. I felt ashamed that I could draw but couldn’t spell. That daydreaming became my greatest gift. I can make a space come to life in my head before it exists in reality. Often I wake at 3am, mentally walking through it, moving walls like a game of Tetris until everything flows.
I love it when I think I’ve finished a layout and constraints appear. It forces me to design something better. Pressure makes me sharper. I thrive on deadlines because they help me lock in, get inventive and solve problems fast.
The clearest time pressure becomes a creative tool for me is when something goes wrong. When a structural constraint disrupts my original design, I have to find a better solution fast. That’s when my focus sharpens. I stop resisting the problem and start reworking the layout until the space feels balanced again. Those moments always lead to a stronger design than the one I began with.
As a founder, the pressure of my team’s livelihoods means I have to protect my creative fuel. I’ve learned to delegate and trust my team so I can focus purely on the craft. If you’re creative, spend time each day doing something you love that gets you into flow. Hone your skills and everything else will follow.”
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E-J Roodt, CEO and Co-Founder, Epowar, a UK based wearable-tech company developing AI-powered safety solutions for women. |
“Pressure used to crush my creativity. Now it fuels it.
Six months ago, I faced the most pressure in my five years as a CEO. My business was weeks from running out of money after a slew of investor rejections. There was no room for mistakes, and the pressure was choking me. My creativity vanished.
Out of ideas, I picked up The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron to ‘recover’ my creativity. It taught me 3 habits that turned pressure into creative fuel:
1. Trust that if you leap, the net will appear.
It wasn’t pressure that drained me; it was being too attached to outcomes. I was so scared of imperfection that I played it safe, overthought small decisions, and delayed big ones. The course taught me to reward progress, not perfection. When planning a new social strategy, instead of pressuring myself to “think something up,” I told myself, “just get something down.” The results were immediate.
2. Release the pressure.
Pressure builds internally too. Journaling three pages of free-flowing thoughts each morning clears my mind and frees space for new ideas.
3. Nurture your creativity.
Time alone recharges me. I schedule weekly solo dates: a talk, gallery, class, or walk without headphones to reset and refocus. Whenever I give myself the grace to be alone, I return sharper and more imaginative.
Pressure no longer crushes my creativity; it powers it. Because of that, I’m leading my business toward a North Star that once felt impossible.”
“Pressure used to silence my creativity. Now, it teaches me when to pause and when to listen.
For a long time, I equated creativity with movement. If I kept going faster, louder, longer, then the ideas would keep coming. My creative world mirrored my physical one: notebooks piled high, thoughts scattered, space chaotic. I wore busy like armour, mistaking momentum for imagination.
Then came my diagnosis with Ménière’s syndrome, and with it, a mirror I couldn’t turn away from. The condition, triggered by stress, became my body’s built-in warning system: dizzy spells, fatigue, moments that forced me to stop. At first, I saw it as a limitation, but it became my teacher. It showed me that my creativity depends on caring for the system that carries it: the right kind of movement, nutrition, and space to breathe.
Creativity for me is rhythm, not rush. I’ve learned to bring structure into my process, to create clarity before chaos takes over, to protect the quiet where imagination finds its way back in. Ménière’s reminded me that pace is the protector of creativity slowing down where it doesn’t matter, so you can move fast where it truly does.
Today, when pressure builds, I don’t push through it; I re-pace it. I invite clarity instead of chasing control. I write, walk, tidy my space, or simply breathe until focus returns. Creativity doesn’t bloom in chaos; it thrives in rhythm. Sometimes, the most creative act of all is knowing when to stop.”
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Talk soon,
Steven