Glass cliff or breakthrough: four questions that tell you which one you're looking at

On a Sunday, the board chair calls you. The division has been in the red for six quarters, the two leaders before you were both women, and neither lasted eighteen months. The job is yours if you want it: a larger title, a $90,000 salary bump, a place on the executive committee, and a mandate that, read closely, amounts to "repair what two people before you could not, with the same budget and the same board." You are 53. Five years of preparation have readied you for a position this large, so you grasp exactly why the offer is landing on your desk right now. The chair wants your answer by the end of the week, Friday.

The real issue isn't whether you're capable enough. The real question is whether you're looking at a cliff or a breakthrough, and viewed from outside, those two can appear identical.

Path A Taking the role exactly as it is offered

The risk on that path is plain enough to spot. If the division can't be turned around, you become the third name on a list, and that list is what people will recall. Few organizations stop to ask why the last three leaders in a row fell short. They wonder who the fourth should be, and the fourth typically shows up with a bigger budget and more room to act. Russell Reynolds found, in a small sample so it should be read as a signal rather than proof, that women CEOs averaged 5.2 years in the role compared with 8.1 for men. When runways keep getting shorter, it starts to look like a deliberate trend rather than coincidence.

Path B Decline it politely

Here, the downside is equally obvious. Positions this large don't open up every year, and "she passed on it" is a story that spreads through Portland's business circles. Declining keeps your track record clean, though it may also mean forfeiting your single chance to show you can steer an operation that is currently bleeding money. Now and then, a cliff truly is just a cliff. Other times it's the hard job nobody else wanted, and whoever takes it gets the credit.

Path C Embrace it your way

Your answer is yes, provided the terms are committed to paper before you put your name down. A defined runway, a named board sponsor, a budget line that did not exist for your predecessors, and a success measure at eighteen months that goes beyond simply "profitable." The risk is that you may hear no, and a no to reasonable conditions is one of the most useful answers you'll get all year. Their interest in you signals they want your name attached to the role, not a real change in direction.

What executives who've been there advise

Executives who have accepted a cliff assignment and survived it usually start by putting four questions to the board.

1. In the words of the two prior leaders themselves, not the chair's account, why did they step away? Call them. They will tell you.

2. What has changed since then? If the real reason they want you is you personally, take that as flattery rather than a strategy.

3. Which specific board member will share accountability for this result with you? Without someone willing to be named, no one will back you when the first quarter lands poorly.

4. At eighteen months, what does success concretely look like, spelled out on paper? Lacking a written standard, they have no fair basis for evaluating you, yet they will evaluate you all the same.

The decision

It all rests on how you answer question one. Should the previous two have been positioned to fail, with only the nameplate swapped out, then walk away, or negotiate until something tangible changes. Should something meaningful have shifted, move forward, but lock it into writing and line up an advocate on the board. Breakthrough opportunities often arrive dressed as cliffs that happen to come with funding.

Your vote

In Portland, what would you choose to do? You can take it as offered, turn it down, or take it on conditions you set. Cast your vote below. Next week we'll share the findings, together with the question so many of you said you'd raise first.