08-13-2026IMPACT COUNCIL

The CEO hiring myth boards need to let go of

Boards don’t have to always look for deep industry expertise, as learning agility can pay off in spades.

[Photo: Getty Images]

The Fast Company Impact Council is an invitation-only membership community of top leaders and experts who pay dues for access to peer learning, thought leadership, and more.

At the Exceptional Women Alliance (EWA), we enable high-level women to mentor one another to achieve personal and professional success through sisterhood. As the nonprofit organization’s founder, chair, and CEO, I’m honored to share insights from thought leaders in our peer-to-peer mentoring community.

This month, I’m joined by Jessica Poliner, a CEO, board director, and global business leader who has led public and private companies—from global industrials to founder-led technology scale-ups through growth, transformation, and strategic inflection points. Having repeatedly stepped into organizations during disruption, she believes the best CEOs aren’t defined by where they’ve worked, but by how quickly they can learn, adapt, and create value when the playbook no longer applies.

Q: Conventional wisdom says boards should hire CEOs with deep industry experience. Is that conventional wisdom wrong?

Poliner: I believe it’s becoming increasingly outdated.

For decades, deep industry experience has been treated as the gold standard for CEO hiring. The logic is understandable. If you’ve spent years in an industry, you know the customers, competitors, regulations, and business model. In uncertain........

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