CEO: reset, reflect and rebrand!

Week 1 – Reset: why you need another 100 days as CEO

Your original “first 100 days” are never really over.

Markets shift, teams change, your own life evolves. But many CEOs continue to operate from old agreements and routines. Week 1 invites you to treat your role as CEO as something you consciously reset, not just inherit.

1. Why every CEO needs a new 100-day window

In the first article, we look at why even experienced CEOs benefit from deliberately taking another 100 days:

• your company has changed (scale, markets, complexity)

• your environment has changed (board, investors, talent market)

• you have changed (energy, ambitions, life context)

You’ll find a practical structure to re-assess your business, your role and your next decisions.

Read the full article:
Why every new (or sitting) CEO needs another 100 days

2. How your life perspective shapes your CEO decisions

The second article in Week 1 zooms in on something most boardrooms ignore:
your perspective on life and work.

Your beliefs about success, sacrifice, family, freedom and risk leak into:

• how hard you push for growth

• how you handle failure

• how present you are at home and at the office

• how sustainable your leadership really is

Instead of treating this as “soft stuff”, we treat it as a strategic foundation for your 100-day plan.

Read the full article:
How your life perspective shapes your decisions as a CEO

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Week 2 – Reflect: blind spots, ego and the CEO mirror test

Week 2 takes you from context to confrontation.
Not with your team or your market, but with yourself.

You can’t build a structurally healthy company if you refuse to look at your own patterns, ego and blind spots.

3. How well do you really know yourself as a CEO?

The first article of Week 2 challenges the assumption that you “know yourself” just because you’re experienced.

We explore:

• the “hero complex” (always stepping in yourself)

• the “clarity illusion” (you think the strategy is clear; your team doesn’t)

• the “feedback shield” (you say you’re open, but your behaviour says otherwise)

You also get a practical exercise: ask a handful of people around you to describe your leadership in three words and look at the patterns.

Read the full article:
How well do you really know yourself as a CEO?

4. The CEO mirror test: 5 no-nonsense questions

The second article introduces a simple but sharp mirror test with five questions:

1. Would I be happy working for me?

2. What behaviour of mine creates stress or confusion?

3. Where am I keeping control because my ego doesn’t trust others yet?

4. If my management team could redesign my role, what would they remove?

5. What decision am I avoiding that everyone knows I should make?

It’s designed for CEOs of SMEs and scale-ups who want reflection without drama or buzzwords.

Read the full article:
The CEO mirror test: 5 questions to assess your leadership without bullshit

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Week 3 – Rebrand: your CEO identity and personal brand

Week 3 shifts the focus from internal reflection to how the outside world experiences you: your team, your market, your ecosystem.

In 2026, being an invisible or fuzzy CEO is a liability.
People want to know who is behind the company and what that person stands for.

5. Your personal hashtag as a CEO

The first article in Week 3 uses a simple but powerful exercise:

If your leadership was a hashtag, what would it be?

You define three words that describe how you want to show up as CEO – and then compare them with the words your team would use today.

This creates a practical bridge between:

• your intentions as a leader

• the reality your people experience

• and the work you need to do in your next 100 days

Read the full article:
What is your personal hashtag as a CEO?

6. From role to brand: you as a visible CEO

The second article tackles your personal brand as CEO:

• why talent, clients and partners look you up before they work with you

• why an empty or inconsistent online presence creates friction

• how to define a few themes and messages that align your CEO identity with your company’s positioning

You don’t need to become an influencer.
But you do need a clear, honest signal about who you are and what you stand for.

Read the full article:
Why CEOs can’t afford to stay invisible anymore

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How to use this 3-week bundle as a CEO

If you want to do something with this content instead of just reading it, here’s a simple way to work through the first three weeks:

1. Block 90 minutes in your agenda.

2. Read the six articles in order.

3. After each one, write down:

   • one insight about yourself

   • one concrete decision or experiment for the next 30 days

4. At the end, choose three actions you will commit to in your own 100-day plan.

You’ll come out with:

• a clearer view of the life you want as a CEO,

• a more honest picture of your blind spots and patterns,

• the beginnings of a conscious CEO identity and personal brand.

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From insight to action: your next 100 days

All of this ties back into one central idea from “100 Days to Make Your Mark as a CEO”:

Strategy only sticks when it is anchored in
the real person wearing the CEO badge.

The first three weeks of this series help you put that person front and centre:

• Week 1: Reset your role and life perspective

• Week 2: Reflect on your blind spots and leadership truth

• Week 3: Rebrand your CEO identity and visibility

From here, the next weeks go deeper into strategy, structure, team and growth.

If you want to turn these insights into a concrete 100-day plan for your own SME or scale-up, that’s the work we do every day with CEOs at iVolver and through the book.

And if one of these articles hit a nerve: start there.
Your next 100 days as CEO don’t begin in a workshop; they begin with one honest decision.