Why it works

Almost every CEO has someone to think with.

95% of CEOs rely on a professional coach or informal advisers. 69% say their board doesn't know about the informal ones, or they aren't sure.

Source: 2025 CEO Coaching and Kitchen Cabinet Survey, Stanford GSB, Hoover Institution and The Miles Group (90 CEOs).

Discuss Next Move

Two marble figures in conversation at a round table, one speaking, one listening.

The problem

The input every big decision needs is the hardest to get at the top.

01

Filtered

People around you have a stake in what you decide, so some things never reach you.

In interviews, 85% of employees said they had stayed silent to their boss about an issue they felt mattered.

Source: Milliken, Morrison and Hewlin, Journal of Management Studies, 2003 (40 interviews).
02

Alone

Half of CEOs report loneliness in the role. 61% of them say it hurts their performance.

Source: RHR International survey of 83 CEOs, 2012, as reported by Inc.
03

Exposed

Some issues can't go to the board, the team or an AI tool.

27% of organisations had banned generative AI at least temporarily over privacy and data security risks.

Source: Cisco 2024 Data Privacy Benchmark Study (2,600 privacy and security professionals, 12 countries).

And AI tends to side with you. Where people had judged someone to be in the wrong, AI still took that person's side about half the time.

Source: Cheng et al., Science, 2026 (11 AI models tested).

The norm

A private place to think is standard practice at the top.

95%

of CEOs rely on a professional coach or informal advisers.
58%

use a professional coach, up from 34% a decade earlier.
90%+

rate their advisers extremely or very helpful.
Tens of thousands

of business owners and CEOs belong to peer advisory groups such as Vistage, YPO and EO.

Sources: 2025 CEO Coaching and Kitchen Cabinet Survey (90 CEOs). Membership figures as published by Vistage, YPO and EO.

The stigma around asking for help has lifted.

David F. Larcker, Stanford Graduate School of Business, lead author of the 2025 survey

Steve Jobs, Larry Page and Eric Schmidt all worked with the same trusted adviser, Bill Campbell.

Source: Trillion Dollar Coach, Schmidt, Rosenberg and Eagle, 2019.

The mechanism

Process beats analysis. Six to one.

In a study of 1,048 major business decisions, the quality of the decision process explained results six times more than the depth of the analysis behind them. Good process included openly discussing views that contradicted the senior leader's.

Source: Lovallo and Sibony, McKinsey Quarterly, 2010.

FOCUS is that process: Facts, Outcome, Constraints and Cost, Upside, System. See the method

The evidence on structured one-to-one work

Across 37 randomised controlled trials with 2,528 participants, executive and workplace coaching proved effective on every leadership and personal outcome measured.

Source: de Haan and Nilsson, Academy of Management Learning and Education, 2023.

Asking is a sign of judgement

In experiments, people rated those who asked them for advice on a difficult task as more competent, not less.

Source: Brooks, Gino and Schweitzer, Management Science, 2015.

Why someone outside your world

Near enough to understand your business. Far enough to have no stake in it.

What I hear in first conversations

I wanted someone I can trust, outside my network and my workplace, who still understands my business.
I can say what's really on my mind, because you're not my friend, my peer or my colleague. There's no risk of being judged.

The pattern is well documented. In a survey of 2,000 US adults, 45% of the people respondents discussed important matters with were people they did not consider important to them.

Source: Mario Small, Social Networks, 2013.

What it is, and is not

Confidential. One to one. No agenda but yours.

Not a coaching package.
Not therapy.
Not consulting.

What you say stays here.

About the research on this page: most studies cited here look at executive coaching and informal advisers. They are the closest published evidence for what a confidential thinking partner does.

What clients say

In their own words.

“I’ve been speaking with Ilja as a thinking partner for several years now. Not coaching, no programme. Just a trusted sounding board for thinking and decisions that I’d rather not discuss in my usual circles.
Ilja doesn’t push an agenda or follow a rigid process. What he brings is an outside perspective, helping me see valid points that blind spots can otherwise prevent you from noticing, including the obvious ones. That’s where I’ve got the biggest value.
Seeing and hearing various topics from an outside perspective is another thing that’s important to me. It always helps separate what looks attractive from what is genuinely the right choice. He brings a straightforward, grounded perspective, without a political agenda.
If you keep dwelling on important topics and would appreciate a confidential outside perspective, you’re only a conversation away from stepping outside the usual rooms. I’d highly recommend speaking with Ilja”

Ulrich AltorferCEO, Datakraft

“Few people are suited to assist others, and it takes a rare individual to understand precisely how and when to guide them. Ilja is that person.
My time with Ilja has prompted so many shifts that I lost count, and the outcomes are clear. He has redefined focus for me in unexpected ways. So much so that he is the undisputed thinking-partner. I believed I understood how to concentrate on what matters, mentally and emotionally, for business and personal life until I met this remarkable person. I can offer only so many words to recommend Ilja, so I can sincerely urge you all to let him help you.”

Andre StivalaCo-Founder, ODIT · Archives

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Bring the question that has no safe room yet.