Twenty-five years ago, I was a mainframe developer. Today, I coach senior IT leaders through the exact transition I once needed myself. In between: leading global delivery and agile transformation across the US, UK, Europe and India, and one turnaround that taught me more than any framework could. In 2017, I inherited a €2M+ programme in France that was deep in escalation, bleeding financially, customer trust gone. The instinct was to push harder. Instead, I chose clarity over fear and coaching over control. Six months later, the trend had reversed. The programme, and the team, hadn't just recovered, they were operating differently. That experience showed me something I now see in almost every senior IT leader I coach: the higher you climb, the more the system rewards firefighting and punishes the strategic thinking that actually moves things forward. I didn't arrive at that insight from a textbook. I spent years mistaking constant motion for success until my own life forced me to rebuild how I operate, not just what I do. 🖊️ I write about that rebuild every week in my series, From Pressure to Flow. If you're a Director, VP, or senior executive in IT, still delivering, still respected, and quietly running on empty as AI reshapes the pace of everything around you - this is the work I do now, as an ICF PCC Executive & Leadership Coach and Agile Transformation Leader: ✅ I help the senior leaders driving those transformations upgrade their own Personal Operating System™ — so they lead from clarity, not pressure. ✅ I help organisations embed AI- Agile and product operating models at scale. I'm currently running The State of Experienced Technology Leadership 2026 — a short survey for senior IT leaders on what's really driving the pressure right now. Takes under 5 minutes, and completely confidential. Aggregated results will be published in LinkedIn. Tap the link in my Featured section below to take it. 📩 And if you're a senior IT executive or leader who knows the personal operating system needs to change but isn't sure where to start —Let's connect. Just a conversation between two people who've spent time in the arena Follow From Pressure to Flow for the weekly version of this work.