Executive Careers with Fexingo: VP, C-Suite, and Senior Leadership Career Strategy

Episode 57 of Executive Careers with Fexingo dives into how senior leaders track and benchmark their own compensation. Lucas and Luna examine the case of a former Fortune 500 CFO who, after a year of interviewing, discovered his total compensation was 30 percent below market because he relied on outdated survey data. The hosts walk through the specific steps senior leaders take to build accurate c...

Episode 56 of Executive Careers with Fexingo explores why senior leaders increasingly take interim or fractional roles as a deliberate career move. Lucas and Luna examine how a former Fortune 500 chief financial officer turned a six-month interim CFO stint into a permanent board seat and a private-equity operating partner role. They break down the difference between an interim role and a consultin...

In this episode of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore the strategic use of counteroffers by senior leaders. Lucas shares a specific case: a chief marketing officer at a mid-cap fintech who received a $200,000 higher offer from a competitor, then used it to negotiate a promotion to chief revenue officer with a board seat at her current company. They discuss the risks—a 2024 stud...

Episode 54 explores a career inflection point many senior leaders face: the first board seat offer. Lucas and Luna examine the due diligence process that separates a career-enhancing board role from a reputational liability. Using the cautionary tale of Anne Mulcahy's early board experience at Target, they break down the three-phase vetting framework: governance audit, liability mapping, and cultu...

Episode 53 of Executive Careers with Fexingo explores how senior leaders shape decisions before the meeting starts. Lucas and Luna dig into the tactic of pre-meeting influence—the informal conversations that set the stage for critical boardroom calls. They use the example of a CFO who secured budget approval for a $400 million ERP transformation by meeting with each committee member individually f...

In this episode of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore a counterintuitive career strategy for senior leaders: writing your own job description before you interview. They unpack the case of a former Fortune 500 CFO who drafted a 3-page role charter during a confidential search and used it to land a board seat. The hosts discuss why most executive job descriptions are vague or wro...

Episode 51 of Executive Careers with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna explore a counterintuitive senior leadership tactic: drafting your resignation letter before you accept a new role. They break down why this forces clarity on deal-breakers, how it creates leverage during exit negotiations, and what a real senior-level resignation letter actually contains. The hosts walk through a case study of a chief r...

Episode 50 of Executive Careers with Fexingo: Lucas and Luna dive into a rarely discussed power move—how senior leaders negotiate not just the offer but the timeline of their own departure and start date. Using the real example of a chief operating officer who secured a six-month phased transition from a Fortune 500 company before joining a PE-backed firm, they unpack the mechanics of crafting a t...

Lucas and Luna dive into the concept of 'reputation pre-loading'—the deliberate work senior leaders do to shape how they're perceived before they even start a new role. Using the case of a former McDonald's executive who moved to Sweetgreen, they explore why a leader's reputation is 80% set in the first 90 days, and how preparation before day one determines whether you're seen as a visionary or a...

In this episode of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore the art of offer negotiation for senior leaders. Rather than focusing on salary alone, they drill into a specific case: a VP of Product who secured a $50,000 signing bonus, a guaranteed board seat, and a four-day workweek by using a 'decision memo' strategy. Lucas explains why senior leaders must negotiate the role itself, n...

Episode 47 of Executive Careers with Fexingo explores the counterintuitive hiring philosophy that senior leaders are using to build stronger executive teams: hiring for gaps in their own skill set rather than for cultural fit or comfort. Lucas and Luna unpack a 2025 study from the Center for Creative Leadership showing that leadership teams with complementary skill diversity outperform homogeneous...

Episode 46 of Executive Careers with Fexingo tackles a tricky dynamic: senior leaders who rely on executive recruiters but refuse to be passive candidates. Lucas opens with a specific story about a former client — a chief revenue officer who turned a cold LinkedIn message into a VP role at a competitor, without ever formally applying. He and Luna break down the three-phase framework: pre-relations...

In Episode 45 of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore how senior leaders can leverage artificial intelligence to accelerate their careers — not by automating their jobs, but by carving out 'AI rooks' that create unique value. They dissect the case of a chief marketing officer who used generative AI to build a proprietary customer sentiment analysis tool, cutting analysis time fro...

When a senior leader leaves a company, the exit package is often the most important financial negotiation of their career. In this episode, Lucas and Luna break down the hidden levers of executive severance—from acceleration of equity vesting to extended health coverage and outplacement support. They walk through a real-world case: a chief marketing officer at a mid-cap tech firm who negotiated a...

In this episode of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore a rarely discussed career strategy: how senior leaders proactively plan for their own succession to strengthen their legacy and create new opportunities. They dive into the case of a Fortune 500 CFO who mapped her own succession 18 months ahead, which gave her board confidence to let her transition to a CEO role at a smaller...

Lucas and Luna explore a powerful but rarely discussed career tool: the personal decision playbook. They break down how senior leaders create structured frameworks to evaluate job offers, promotions, and pivot opportunities without getting distracted by ego, money, or short-term pressure. The episode centers on a real scenario: a VP of Product at a mid-size tech company deciding whether to accept...

Episode 41 of Executive Careers with Fexingo: Lucas and Luna explore how senior leaders create 'career moats'—unique, hard-to-replicate expertise that protects their market value. Using the example of a former CFO who became the go-to expert for AI-driven supply chain finance, Lucas breaks down the three-layer framework: deep domain knowledge, cross-functional fluency, and a track record of measur...

In this episode of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore how senior leaders leverage emotional intelligence to make better hiring decisions. Using a recent case from a Fortune 500 technology company, they unpack why EQ often outweighs IQ in C-suite recruitment, how to assess it during interviews, and what one senior VP did when her gut told her the perfect-on-paper candidate was w...

Episode 39 of Executive Careers with Fexingo explores the hidden career leverage senior leaders have when their company mandates a return to office. Lucas and Luna break down the real power dynamics at play—using the 2025-2026 wave of RTO policies from major banks and tech firms as a case study. They discuss how VPs and C-suite executives can negotiate flexibility, restructure their teams around h...

What happens when a senior leader realizes the job they fought for is actually unsustainable? In this episode, Lucas and Luna examine the case of a Fortune 500 chief marketing officer who resigned after just seven months — not because she failed, but because the role was structurally impossible. They break down the warning signs that a C-suite role is broken before you accept it, the difference be...

Episode 37 of Executive Careers with Fexingo tackles a high-stakes move: the senior-level career pivot into a completely different industry. Lucas and Luna break down a real case—a former healthcare COO who successfully transitioned to lead operations at a renewable energy firm. They explore the frameworks that made it work: translating leadership competencies rather than domain expertise, using a...

Episode 36 of Executive Careers with Fexingo explores a counterintuitive career move: senior leaders who orchestrate the hiring of their own next boss. Lucas and Luna dissect a real case from a Fortune 500 technology company where a VP of Product effectively wrote the job description for a new Chief Product Officer and then helped recruit the person who would oversee her. They walk through the thr...

In Episode 35 of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore how senior leaders strategically use external coaches—not as a sign of weakness, but as a competitive advantage. They drill into the specific case of a Fortune 500 COO who hired a coach to navigate a post-merger cultural integration, and walk through the three distinct phases where coaching delivers the most value: career infl...

In this episode of Executive Careers with Fexingo, Lucas and Luna explore the concept of a personal board audit—a structured review of the advisors, mentors, and peers a senior leader relies on for career guidance. Using the example of a fictional CFO named Sarah, they walk through how to assess whether your personal board has the right mix of industry expertise, functional diversity, and candor....

Episode 33 of Executive Careers with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna explore the concept of a 'career contract'—a written agreement between a senior leader and their organization that defines role scope, decision rights, resources, and exit terms. They walk through the case of a Fortune 500 CTO who used one to secure a $2M budget and veto power before accepting a promotion. They discuss why verbal assuran...