Leadership lessons from the mayors of major global cities

Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I’m Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning. 

A year ago, amid a wave of DOGE cuts to federal agencies, Modern CEO highlighted the things government gets right, notably its ability to solve problems that businesses can’t or won’t because doing so isn’t necessarily profitable. Finding solutions to many of those challenges—including affordable housing, mass transit, and public education as well as environmental sustainability and climate change—is increasingly falling on city leaders, says Mike Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York and founder of Bloomberg LP.

“The more [that] national governments retreat from the world stage, the more important mayors become,” Bloomberg said last month at the Bloomberg CityLab 2026 summit, hosted by Bloomberg Philanthropies and the Aspen Institute. “Mayors have to move quickly and adapt to big change.” 

And, like CEOs, these city leaders must often think big while also managing minutiae. “Mayors, perhaps more than any other civic leaders, are expected to advance strategic, multiyear infrastructure and policy initiatives while at the same time being attentive to the hyperlocal needs of individual residents,” says Daniel Ramot, CEO of Via Transportation, a tech company that serves public transit systems. Adds Ramot, whom I interviewed onstage at Bloomberg CityLab: “I have always been impressed by how the very best mayors are able to manage this tension. It requires genuine empathy and attention to detail, combined with the ability to look beyond the status quo, dream big, and perhaps most importantly, ground those dreams in a reality informed, first and foremost, by data.” (Disclosure: Bloomberg CityLab covered my travel and accommodation.)  

Put another way, city hall can be as complex as a business. Here are three leadership lessons gleaned from Bloomberg CityLab sessions featuring mayors from around the world.  

Build inclusive coalitions 

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott says one of his signature initiatives—reducing the number of vacant properties in the city—“is not just my strategy; it’s the community strategy.” Other stakeholders include the state of Maryland and philanthropic partners, but Scott singles out BUILD, a community organization, as a key contributor. The program, which provides capital to transform vacant buildings into neighborhood housing, appears to be working. Scott says the number of vacant properties in Baltimore has dropped from 16,000 when he took office in 2020 to 11,800 today.  

Use the spotlight as a forcing function 

Anne Hidalgo, who served as mayor of Paris from 2014 until earlier this year, talked about how the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games helped galvanize a number of improvements, including a cleanup of the Seine River. The games provided a deadline for making the river swimmable for athletes and the added pressure of global scrutiny. Indeed, even as the games approached, officials reported health concerns about the quality of the water. Hidalgo herself donned a wet suit to take a dip in July 2024, and the city and the Paris Olympic Committee ultimately cleared the river for competition.  

But Hidalgo, who made environmental sustainability a hallmark of her mayoralty, says investment in the river wasn’t just for the Olympic Games. Last year 100,000 tourists and Parisians swam in the Seine, engaging with nature in an urban setting.  

Embrace AI on your own terms

London Mayor Sadiq Khan is an AI realist who recognizes the risks and rewards of the technology. The city, he says, is already using AI to predict traffic congestion and tackle housing challenges. At the same time, he’s aware of the impact on employment and earlier this year launched a task force aimed at helping residents strengthen skills for the jobs of the future and guiding companies on how to create new high-paying jobs leveraging AI.  

“We don’t want to move fast and break things,” he says. “We’re gonna move fast and make things—without leaving anyone behind.” 

Programming note 

As a reminder, our first live-streamed event exclusively for Modern CEO subscribers will take place on Monday, May 18, at 1 p.m. ET. I’m hosting The CEO’s Guide to AI featuring Matt Fitzpatrick, CEO of Invisible Technologies. The session aims to help leaders understand where AI can have an impact—and what’s hype. You can RSVP here, and if you’re not already a subscriber, you can sign up here. And if you have questions for Matt, you can submit them to stephaniemehta@mansueto.com.  

Read more: most innovative cities 

• Here’s how Mobile, Alabama, is fighting blight 

• Los Angeles is rethinking home ownership on vacant lots 

• Paris redesigned itself to be a city of bikes, not cars 

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