AGILE Leadership Across the Green Economy:

Identifying Top Tier Talent with FLARE

By Corina Acostoaei, Principal Researcher, Green Executives

I spend my days talking to leaders. No two conversations are ever the same. Some are candid, some are unexpectedly inspiring, most teach me something — and every now and then, one stays with me for days.

After ten years placing senior leaders, one thing has become very clear: the best people rarely walk into a room trying to prove they’re the best.  The qualities that matter most in the green sector — foresight, adaptability and a quiet tenacity — tend to show up in subtle ways. The way someone talks about their team rather than themselves. The question they ask when they think the interview is over.

This is why I keep returning to a framework that, for me, cuts through the noise:

FLARE.

Developed by Les Csorba at Heidrick & Struggles, FLARE stands for Foresight, Learning, Adaptability, Resilience and Execution. Csorba added Execution to Heidrick's original four-pillar agility model because, as he rightly argues, without decisive action, even the sharpest strategic mind is just idling in the driveway.

Agility isn’t easy

The research behind it is eye-opening. Heidrick's analysis of thousands of executive assessments found fewer than 40% of leaders rate as high-performing on agility — and fewer than 15% demonstrate real proficiency in foresight. In the green economy, where the pace of technological, regulatory and market change is relentless, that gap is a serious problem.

So how do you spot FLARE in top-tier talent?

Foresight doesn't always look like a grand strategic vision. Sometimes it's the leader who quietly repositioned their BESS business ahead of a regulatory shift, or the CEO who began building a grid-integration team two years before anyone else saw the need. In conversation, it may sound counterintuitive, but I can learn more from what people ask than the answers they give. It’s a window into self‑awareness; maybe others would call it emotional intelligence?

Learning can be described as intellectual restlessness. Daniel Pink's research in Drive tells us that mastery — the urge to get better at something that matters — is one of three pillars of intrinsic motivation. I look for leaders who are still students of their sector. The ones who read beyond their specialism, who admit what they don't know and who are energised rather than threatened by new information.

Adaptability is deeper than flexibility. Flexibility is short-term. Adaptability is structural — a willingness to rethink your operating model when the market signals it. I once placed a COO who had rebuilt two different organisations from the ground up after regulatory upheaval. What stood out wasn't the turnaround itself. It was how matter-of-factly she talked about walking away from a strategy she'd spent eighteen months building. No ego in the decision. Just clarity.

Resilience is often romanticised, but in practice, it looks ordinary. It's the leader who maintained team cohesion through a brutal funding winter. The founder, who lost a major contract, was back on the phone the next morning. In a sector where project timelines span political cycles and policy can shift overnight, resilience is infrastructure.

Execution ties everything together. Purpose without delivery is just aspiration. And here, Pink's third motivator — purpose — becomes especially relevant. The green economy attracts people who want their work to mean something. That intrinsic drive, when combined with the discipline to deliver, is extraordinarily powerful.

5 Agile Leaders who I see as possessing FLARE

At Green Executives, we work beyond a checklist. We look for the story behind the CV — for evidence that these five qualities are woven into how someone actually operates. FLARE gives us a common language for something we've always known instinctively: that agile leadership is what separates good hires from transformative ones.

The green economy can't afford to get this wrong. The stakes are too high and the window too narrow. Our job is to make sure the right people are in the room when it matters.

Corina Acostoaei

Principal Researcher, Green Executives

With an extensive background in executive search and talent intelligence, Corina brings over 8 years of specialised expertise in the green energy sector to her role as Principal Consultant at Green Executives. Corina leads strategic initiatives to secure high-calibre leadership talent for Board-level, Senior leadership, and team builds, and is deeply committed to promoting Energy Transition, Cleantech, and Sustainability. Corina holds a master’s degree in international relations and Globalisation from the University of Salford and is fluent in English, Spanish, and Romanian.