The skills that got you promoted are the same ones now capping how far you’ll go.

Confidence is running well ahead of readiness in the executive ranks — just not in the way most leaders assume. A Careerminds study published in August found that while 98% of people managers and 97% of HR professionals believe managers are prepared to lead through what’s ahead, fewer than half of managers feel highly prepared across the specific challenges now defining the job.

That overconfidence gets worse the higher up you look. Executives consistently rate managers as more ready and better supported than managers rate themselves, with 66% of C-suite respondents calling managers very ready against just 42% of those closer to the front line.

That gap has a name, and it shows up earliest for leaders who were promoted for their expertise. The instincts that made someone the best engineer, the sharpest analyst or the most reliable operator in the room are individual-contributor strengths. At the enterprise level, those same instincts are no longer compatible with teamwork.

Having coached executives across industries, I’ve watched that same gap open in almost identical ways, and it never announces itself as a crisis. It shows up first as a small, specific moment. Recognizing it is the difference between leaders who make the transition and leaders who stall inside it. Here’s what that moment looks like, and what to build once it arrives:

Moving from managing a team to leading leaders is a change in both scope and attitude.

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