“Fighting For Their Survival, For Things We Take For Granted” Featuring Les Csorba, Heidrick & Struggles

Today we were thrilled to welcome back Les Csorba, Partner in Charge of the Houston office and a member of the CEO and Board of Directors Practice focused on the energy industry at Heidrick & Struggles. Les has over 30 years of experience in executive search, leadership consulting, and executive coaching and this year marks his 25th year at the firm. The catalyst for today’s discussion is a recent report from Heidrick & Struggles entitled “Lessons from Ukraine’s wartime CEOs on leading through crisis” (linked here). It’s a fascinating look at how these CEOs have adapted under duress and how they are planning for the future. As the son of Hungarian refugees that fled the country during the Russian invasion in 1956 (more on their story and parallels to Ukraine linked here), Les is very passionate about helping the people of Ukraine. It was our pleasure to visit with Les to discuss the report, the war in Ukraine, his recent trip to Kyiv, leadership overall, and the latest trends in finding CEOs and board members.

Les first shares background on the report’s creation, his experience traveling to Kyiv last month to meet with colleagues and deliver supplies, his impressions of what life in Kyiv is really like, and the resiliency, optimism, and unity he witnessed. We discuss the broader sentiment in Eastern Europe, Heidrick & Struggles’ CEO and Board Practice group, and lessons from the report that can be applied to all leaders. Les walks us through key takeaways from the report including planning for geopolitical exposure, adapting to wartime decision-making, operating in the here and now, being decisive, and speaking with radical candor. We touch on how managements have changed since Les’ last appearance on COBT in 2021 including an increased desire for leaders that understand strategy, regulations, energy policy, and have a balanced and pragmatic approach to the energy transition. Les shares trends he’s seeing in energy boards including a shift to recruiting board members with direct experience in either energy or relevant industries, large global industrial companies’ interest in board members with experience in energy, the war for talent in both oil and gas and new energy, CEO search and succession work, and more. We ended with Les’ thoughts on President Zelenskyy and where he sees energy in ten years. The Heidrick team is to be congratulated for such an interesting and unique report.

Mike Bradley started us off by highlighting that market volatility has increased due to several lingering key issues including a spike in bond yields, a looming US government shutdown, resumption of student loan payments, a selective UAW strike, and a quarter end repositioning of mutual funds. From a commodities standpoint, he noted that WTI continues to trade around $90/bbl. due to global crude oil inventory tightness and also mentioned that Cushing crude oil inventory levels are expected to draw markedly again this week and are approaching historical absolute and seasonal lows. He ended with highlighting that bond and equity prices are both “technically” oversold, both are dialing in some heightened level of risk while these issues endure, and that a resolution of one or more of these issues could result in a temporary snapback in markets. Jeff Tillery discussed the IEA’s recently released updated net-zero roadmap, which outlines significant reductions in coal, oil, and gas demand by 2030, and will likely spur a fascinating debate about the report’s impact on decision-making regarding energy sources and cost implications. You may recall OPEC’s recent reaction to the IEA (linked here).

Two other items came up in today’s discussion – one being the Heidrick & Struggles’ Talent Report which is linked here and the other being the Superpower documentary by Sean Penn which is linked here. Les told us he has watched the Sean Penn documentary three times. High praise!

It is always fantastic to spend time with Les and today was no exception. We hope you find the discussion as interesting and inspiring as we did.