The Other Turnover in the C-Suite
It’s become a game of musical chairs—but the board doesn’t seem to mind.
November 24, 2025
CEO departures, whether forced or voluntary, continue to set records and make headlines. But another major change has been happening much more quietly among firms’ top lieutenants.
Even with all the corner-office departures, the average CEO tenure is still hovering around 7.4 years, as those who stay tend to hang on for a long time. But take a look at the other members of the C-suite, and you’ll find that the tenure for most is the length of a US presidential term: four years. It’s a big shift from the past, and it’s one that experts say is quietly redefining how the very top operates these days—for better or worse. “There will not be a return to the decade-long executive tenures that once defined corporate leadership,” says Peter Cohan, professor of management practice at Babson College.
Within Fortune 500 firms, chief legal officers and CFOs have the longest non-CEO tenures, at 6.1 years and 4.8 years, respectively. After that, however, average tenure drops fast, with chief information and chief human resources officers at around 4.5 years, and most everyone else at four years or fewer. Clearly, many CEOs are not pleased with what their lieutenants have done lately. According to a recent Korn Ferry survey, only 10 percent of CEOs and directors were “extremely confident” that their C-suite leaders would thrive over the next three years.
Experts put a lot of the blame on stakeholder impatience: When a company isn’t performing well, investors tend to push the CEO into first dumping subordinates. Plus, while a new CEO is usually granted a honeymoon period, functional executives typically aren’t. “New executives are being asked to make a big impact in 90 to 100 days,” says Stephanie Broadright, a Korn Ferry senior client partner specializing in recruiting revenue leaders. “No one hits pause to make a new business strategy.” And the pace of change in some functional areas, especially technology, is burning out many top lieutenants.
“CEOs are so aware of today’s pressures, and their C-suite hasn’t caught up,” says Noa Gafni, a consultant and lecturer at Columbia University. One interesting solution has been to merge roles, whether it’s the CFO and COO or the CCO and CMO. Developing C-suite leaders with cross-functional experience helps firms build more well-rounded executives, as does having a CEO who encourages collaboration, rather than competition, among direct reports.
As for the CEO’s bosses—the board—directors don’t seem to mind the game of musical chairs. It makes sense to them, in today’s fast-shifting business world, to bring in one skilled executive to solve the current set of problems and another when those challenges change. “Boards increasingly view executives as strategic assets deployed for specific missions, rather than long-term stewards,” says Cohan. That’s fine, say experts, as long as directors know they need to develop top talent internally that can take over when a C-suite job opens up. “If you want the best odds and the best outcomes, that’s what boards need to do,” says Jane Edison Stevenson, global vice chair of Korn Ferry’s Board and CEO Services practice and global leader of its Board and CEO Succession practice.
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