What makes a successful business leader?
This article is a part of our second annual Risk + Reward series. Capital One Business and Inc. partnered to survey 349 business leaders in November 2025 to explore how they navigate risk and rewards in pursuit of business growth. View our key findings and other articles in this series.
Leading a growing business today takes risk tolerance, high energy and the ability to make decisions, among other attributes.
Survey respondents say that the necessary traits for building and leading a small-to-midsize company are:
| Ability to fail fast | 29% |
| High energy | 44% |
| Strategic vision | 36% |
| Risk tolerance | 49% |
| Personal fortitude | 37% |
Decision-making matters
- 57% of business leaders say that growth is more dependent on their decision-making than on external factors.
- 53% of business leaders say that business decision-making is less challenging than it was a year ago.
- 56% of business leaders assess the level of uncertainty they face when making decisions about business growth as low.
How leaders make decisions
Business leaders describe their approach to decision-making:
- 76% are made fast (24% are deliberate)
- 62% are intuition-driven (38% are data-driven)
- 58% are risk-tolerant (42% are risk-averse)
- 56% are incremental (44% are radical)
- 54% are individual (46% are collaborative)
- 51% are long-term driven (49% are short-term driven)
Source: Inc. and Capital One Business Risk & Reward Survey 2025
Read more about the factors that affect how business leaders make decisions.
