Leading Without Authority: A Key Component of the Chief of Staff's Influence Toolkit
Facilitator Bio
Theresa Friend is a senior Quality leader and Chief of Staff who has spent much of her career helping leaders and teams turn strategy into action—often without having formal authority over the people she needs to influence.
In her CoS role, Theresa has worked across functions and with senior leaders to create alignment, navigate competing priorities, challenge thinking, and move complex work forward. Along the way, she's learned that some of the most important parts of the CoS role aren't found in a job description: knowing when to push and when to listen, building trust and credibility, having the courage to challenge, and finding ways to bring people along when you can't simply tell them what to do.
Theresa is passionate about creating spaces where CoS peers can be candid about the realities of the role, learn from each other's experiences, and share practical approaches that actually work. She brings a curious, pragmatic perspective to the conversation—occasionally hard-earned—and believes we often learn the most from the situations that didn't go exactly as planned.
Leading Without Authority: A Key Component of the Chief of Staff's Influence Toolkit
One of the most important—and least defined—skills of a Chief of Staff is leading without formal authority. We influence decisions, align stakeholders, challenge thinking, and drive accountability, often without direct ownership of the people or functions involved.
This peer discussion will dig into the realities of leading through influence: How do we build credibility and trust? When do we push, step back, or escalate? How do we hold others accountable without creating friction? And how do we influence senior leaders while balancing partnership, candor, and discretion?
Through shared experiences and candid discussion, we'll explore what effective influence looks like in the CoS role—and how to lead more intentionally when authority isn't part of the equation.