Keystone Leaders
Keystone Leaders
The prevailing leadership still runs on outdated assumptions of control, separation, and short-term gain. This episode explores keystone leadership, a new paradigm rooted in stewardship, ecology, and long-term regeneration.
Keystone Leaders
Boardroom Briefs with Frans Versteeg
The prevailing leadership frameworks of today still assume that we are separate from nature. We extract. We compete. We control. And we wonder why long-term sustainability feels out of reach.
In my work with leaders and boards, I’ve come to believe that what we truly need is not a tactical shift, but a paradigm shift. One that challenges the very assumptions underpinning how we lead and why we lead.
It begins with the metaphor of the keystone species, and from there, the concept of keystone leadership emerges.
What is keystone leadership?
In ecology, a keystone species is one whose role is disproportionately vital to the health of the entire system. Remove it, and the ecosystem collapses. Support it, and everything thrives.
Keystone leaders act the same way. They don’t dominate, they connect. They don’t extract, they regenerate. They don’t control, they steward.
Why our current paradigm is breaking down.
Today’s dominant leadership model rests on four deep-rooted assumptions:
We are separate from nature
Human needs justify exploitation.
Progress means control
Success equals short-term profit.
From these come many of our most damaging behaviours: short-termism, hyper-competition, and the idea that sustainability is “nice to have” rather than foundational.
This mindset doesn’t just limit business. It limits life.
A shift toward interconnectedness.
Keystone leadership begins by re-establishing connection:
• Between humans and the natural world
• Between spiritual and material values
• Between long-term purpose and daily action
It moves from ego-centric to eco-centric. From human-centred design to life-centred design. From growth at all costs to balance with all life.
Learning from those who came before us.
Indigenous cultures have long practised this form of leadership. Not by isolating nature, but by collaborating with it. Stewarding ecosystems rather than abandoning or exploiting them.
The lesson: we need not be afraid to engage. We can participate in the balance of life, not just observe it.
The role of business in the age of restoration.
Organisations today are not just economic engines. They are social and ecological actors. Keystone leaders recognise this and act accordingly. They prioritise reciprocity over rivalry. Balance over dominance. Preservation, regeneration, and participation over extraction. And crucially, they help their companies shift from short-term profit maximisation to long-term sustainability not by pushing harder within the old paradigm, but by stepping into a new one altogether.
Final Thought.
Do we need a new kind of leadership? No, we need a fundamentally different kind. One that doesn’t just fix the machine, but questions why the machine was built the way it was. Keystone leaders do just that. And in doing so, they make space not just for success, but for stewardship.
Highlights:
00:00 Introduction: The Need for New Leadership
00:48 Defining Keystone Leadership
01:37 The Paradigm Shift: From Disconnection to Interconnectedness
04:08 Embracing an Ecocentric View
05:42 Learning from Indigenous Practices
08:37 The Role of Organisations in Sustainability
09:09 Conclusion: The Call for Keystone Leadership
Links:
Website: https://www.fransversteeg.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fransaversteeg/
Transcript:
Okay, so you're asking me whether we need a new kind of leadership? Mm, actually we do. I guess the, uh, in the last years I have been, uh, doing a lot of coaching, counselling, advisors of boards, and, uh, basically about. Purpose about sustainability, but also about the, the very basics of, uh, leading people, uh, be that giving and receiving feedback, uh, building teams, uh, whatever have you. What would be, uh, the simple, uh, craft of leading people? But more and more I've become convinced that we do need a real paradigm shift. And that paradigm shift, uh, basically, uh, can be called, in my opinion, Keystone leaders and keystone leaders refers to the notion of a keystone species and both humans as say, uh, animals within an an ecosystem.
Can be, can perform that role of a keystone, uh, uh, species where they sort of have an a, a disproportional influence on the whole ecosystem. Uh, and, and basically, uh, steward the whole ecosystem system now. Let me elaborate a little bit about, say, the paradigm shift that we need and why I have come to the conclusion that that is really necessary. Um, the big, they're basically 4, 5, 6 items that you could mention that has really defined the way we lead and run organisations today. Um, and, but the basic, say, assumptions or the basic attitudes of that paradigm? Um, I would define like, well first of all, there is a, a disconnection, a real disconnection from nature.
And you could say that we have sort of separated ourselves from nature. We have also. Uh, created an a vision of we are above and separate from nature. So from that disconnect, that disconnection follows a say, anthropocentric worldview. We basically worry about human needs. And if you look at what comes from that, um. Being apart from nature, be looking basically at human needs. We start to dominate, uh, to be, uh, dominant over nature to basically extract and also we start to, uh, uh, use a dominant model. Amongst ourselves, like, okay, so we have, uh, uh, uh, humans and, and, and, and we fight, we have competition and, and, and domination.
Um, that in itself leads to, to short term focus. And so in the end, what we see is profit maximisation. On the short term, we see shareholder value. As the dominant, uh, uh, model, but we very seldom realise what are the, the, the assumptions that actually lead to that short term, uh, profit maximisation. So what we need to shift to is. An awareness about our interconnectedness with Mother Earth, but not just with Mother Earth, because we humans can also live like trees. We can have our leaves up in the air, in the, in the high sky, our roots in the earth. So we basically also connect the spiritual, uh, realm and we, so it's not just the material Earth realm, it's also.
The airy and, and and spiritual realm. So it really needs to shift from this notion of disconnection to a notion of interconnectedness. And that should then also sort of automatically lead to a, not ego, but ecocentric view, not a human, uh, so not a human centered design. But life-centred design, biocentric, uh, ecosystem-centred. And when we start to come from these assumptions, we will no longer have this need or idea about dominating nature, but we will be working together with nature. We have to learn to, uh, come from a partnership, a stewardship with nature, and simply recognise that humans are part of the web of life. Um, and that indeed we should not just care for our own need, but look at, uh, all life. And it's very interesting that when you look at the way indigenous people have taken care of their environment, almost all examples are examples where they've taken care for the whole ecosystem. And there is no nowadays also a lot of evidence that even such huge, uh, regions as the Amazon Rainforest have been largely stewarded by, by people.
So it's not just that. Also, once again, from our notion, from disconnection, we feel that the best thing to do is to create Virgin nature. Simply don't touch it. You know, let's, let's just let, let leave nature alone. But what you can see with a lot of indigenous history is that actually it's quite okay. If we work together with nature, we can be a key. Stone species. And it's not that we have to sort of, oh, keep your hands off, uh, let nature do its thing. Uh, we do, we dare not be afraid. We do, we need not be afraid. Uh, we can basically be involved with the whole ecosystem and the moment. So we, we would become partners of nature. Uh, that would also be the logical moment that competition, uh, monopolies, oligarchies uh, would become crazy because you would basically collaborate.
To build the balance to. So reciprocity, partnership balancing, these are all the, the way of thinking that I would say keystone leaders would, would show, and in the end, that would also really mean that long-term sustainability becomes. Automatic it's. Whereas, uh, now, and I realize that when I, when I talk with a lot, in a lot with a lot of companies, I can see that basically saying you have to shift from short term profit maximisation. To long-term sustainability and balancing people planet profit. Um, as long as you're still in the old four assumptions, you basically say, well, that's not doable. I, I wouldn't know where to start. Um, but, uh, the moment you see that the, the deepest assumptions are basically not okay, uh, and are actually. I would say the wrong assumptions.
Uh, that's when it starts to move. And then, uh, then I would say that, uh, we can learn to lead organisations in, in new ways, because I'm still convinced that in today's world, organisations will have a major role to play. In the preservation, in the restoration, in the regeneration, and in our participation in the, the, the miracle of creation. So yes, uh, do we need a new kind of leadership? We need a completely different kind of leadership. Uh, we need, uh, keystone leadership.