How Do You Become a CEO When You're Stuck in Middle Management?

To become a CEO, you need to stop being the person who fixes everything and start being the person who decides what matters. A degree, experience and results get you into the room. What moves you from middle management to the top job is judgement, decision-making and executive presence, and PowerProv builds exactly those skills.

New research from The CEO Institute shows why so many capable managers stall in the middle, and what CEOs themselves spend their time on.

Why do capable managers get stuck in middle management?

Capable managers get stuck because the organisation needs them where they are. The CEO Institute's Pulse Report surveyed CEOs and business leaders across Australia and New Zealand about productivity. Two findings describe the middle-management trap.

The CEO Institute, The Pulse Report: The Work That Matters

The reliable fixer trap

When execution depends on a few people, the hard work flows to whoever is most trusted. The report describes how this plays out. The trusted person solves the problem faster, so the next problem comes back to them too. In the report's words, "the individual eventually becomes a queue."

If you're that person, you'll feel valued. You'll also be too busy rescuing work to do anything that looks like senior leadership. In Victoria, 43.0% of leaders said execution depends heavily on individuals, the highest of any state surveyed.

Stretched too thin to lead

Managers stretched too thin to coach, prioritise and support their teams was the top people-related constraint in Australia (26.8%), and far higher in New Zealand (39.1%). In New South Wales it was 30.7%.

The report calls managers the organisation's shock absorber. When your week is spent absorbing other people's unresolved priorities, coaching gets pushed back and delegation shrinks. That's the work senior leaders look for when they decide who's ready to step up.

What do CEOs spend their time on?

CEOs spend their time making choices, not doing the work. The Pulse Report sets out six decisions that need direct CEO attention. Most of them are things a middle manager can start practising now, at a smaller scale.

Notice what's missing from that list: working harder. The report is blunt that more effort can't fix unclear priorities or weak decisions. Leadership choices can.

Which skills separate a manager from a CEO?

The skills that separate a manager from a CEO are mostly human skills used in the moment. The Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) lists vision and strategy, communication, people leadership and stakeholder management among the core CEO capabilities. Here's how four of them show up day to day.

Making decisions under pressure

Good decision-making has two separate stages. First you generate options without judging them. Then you narrow down and choose. Many managers blur the two, shutting ideas down too early or never committing to one. PowerProv teaches these as distinct steps, so you can explore widely and then decide with confidence.

Thinking on your feet

Senior leaders rarely get a script. A board member asks a question you didn't prepare for. A client changes the brief mid-meeting. Thinking on your feet is about trusting your gut instinct, even in the moment you're not sure you have the right answer. That trust is built through practice, not theory.

Executive presence

Executive presence is how calm, clear and credible you are when the pressure's on. It's less about how you look and more about how you listen, respond and hold a room when things go off track. It's also one of the hardest skills to learn from a book.

Building judgement in others

This is the skill that breaks the fixer trap. The Pulse Report says delegation only becomes real when someone gets context, authority and the chance to learn from the result. CEOs build capability in others. A manager who's still rescuing every problem hasn't shown they can.

Why don't leadership courses alone get you there?

Leadership courses give you knowledge, but CEO-level skills are built through practice. The Pulse Report makes the same point: capability develops when people apply what they know to real work, get feedback and try again. It also warns that adding more learning to an already full agenda has limited effect.

That's why the path to CEO usually runs through experience, not just qualifications. Research from McKinsey on high-potential CEO candidates stresses balancing day-to-day delivery with a wider view of the organisation. Both take reps.

The question is where you get those reps before you have the title?

How does PowerProv build CEO-ready skills?

PowerProv builds CEO-ready skills by giving you a safe place to practise the moments that matter: deciding fast, responding to the unexpected and leading a room. PowerProv's workshops use improvisation techniques drawn from behavioural science. The output is professional skill, not comedy. No one learns to be funny, and no one is asked to perform on stage.

The confidence behind it comes from what PowerProv calls the ensemble mindset. Everyone in the room has each other's back, supports each other's choices and treats mistakes as something to learn from, not something to blame. That's also the kind of culture strong CEOs build.

PowerProv Personal Power Index™, 2023–present

These results come from PowerProv's Personal Power Index™, a longitudinal study that measures skills before and after each workshop. It's not a satisfaction survey.

There are two ways to train as an individual:

• PowerPlay™ classes. A six-week, in-person improv class in Sydney, one night a week, for people who want to grow their confidence and communication.
• Executive coaching. Private, one-on-one executive coaching with PowerProv founder Eran Thomson, focused on how you show up, your presence and your instincts under pressure.

PowerProv has worked with Google, Westpac, PwC, Canva and hundreds of other companies, and every workshop is backed by a money-back guarantee.

For HR and L&D: how do you grow CEOs from within?

To grow CEOs from within, give your managers real decisions before they're promoted. The Pulse Report warns that successors can be named in a plan while current leaders keep shielding them from hard calls. Without that practice, succession stays on paper.

The fix starts with reducing your reliance on a few heroes. Ask which decisions keep coming back to the same people, then spread that judgement through supervised experience.

PowerProv's workshops for teams of 12 or more build the shared skills that make delegation work: listening, trust and confident decision-making.

For lasting change, the six-week embedded class builds those skills into how your team works week to week. Senior teams can see how PowerProv works for leaders.

Ready to build the skills that get you to the top?

Becoming a CEO isn't about working harder in the middle. It's about deciding, communicating and leading like someone who's already at the top. PowerProv builds those skills through practice, backed by measured results.

Book a discovery call to find the right format for you or your team. Still weighing it up? See how it works.