Companies Are Refounding. Leaders Are Rebranding.
Sep 23, 2026
Companies Are Refounding. Leaders Are Rebranding.
Something interesting is happening inside established companies.
Many aren’t simply transforming.
They’re almost refounding themselves.
AI is changing how businesses operate.
Technology is rewriting business models.
New generations are changing workplace expectations.
Customer behaviour is shifting.
Entire industries are being disrupted.
Companies that may have existed for decades are being forced to ask questions that sound remarkably similar to those asked by a startup founder.
Who are we now?
What do we stand for?
Where are we going?
What needs to change?
But there’s another side to that transformation that gets discussed far less.
The leaders.
Can a company reinvent itself if its leaders don’t?
A CEO might have spent years building a reputation around one era of a business.
Then the organisation changes.
The strategy changes.
The culture changes.
The technology changes.
The expectations placed on leadership change.
Suddenly, the identity that helped that leader reach their current position may not be the identity that carries them into the next chapter.
That’s where personal rebranding becomes interesting.
Not a new profile photograph.
Not a rewritten LinkedIn headline.
Not suddenly posting three times a week.
Something deeper.
A reconsideration of:
What do I believe now?
What have I learned?
Which parts of my professional identity still serve me?
Which parts belong to an earlier chapter?
What perspective do I bring to what comes next?
And perhaps most importantly:
Who does this next chapter require me to become?
Rebranding isn’t about erasing the past
The strongest reinventions don’t pretend the previous version never existed.
They build upon it.
Experience becomes context.
Lessons become perspective.
Past success becomes evidence.
But the story evolves.
That’s why I think we’re going to see far more leaders thinking intentionally about their personal brands as organisations navigate increasingly significant periods of transformation.
Because companies don’t change in isolation.
People have to change with them.
And when a company is effectively being refounded, its leaders may need to think seriously about how they’re being rebranded too.
In my latest article, I explore the relationship between organisational reinvention and personal identity, and why the next era of corporate transformation may also become an era of leadership rebranding.