Insights · Lonely at the top
Lonely at the top: why leaders need anchors, not followers
Many founders and leaders have friends and colleagues, and yet end up doing a lot on their own. And they often feel alone, too.
By Dirk Jan Versluis, registered psychologist (NIP). Updated 26 October 2026.
Your team looks to you for direction. Your co-founder has interests of their own. At home you do not want to talk about work all the time. And the doubts that really occupy you, you share with no one.
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Plenty of people around you, and still alone
You may recognize some of this:
- you make the big decisions on your own;
- you rarely show what is really going on inside you;
- advisers give you answers, but no one asks the real questions;
- you function well, and yet it feels empty.
Why it gets so quiet at the top
The higher you rise, the fewer people contradict you. Strength and autonomy brought you here, but they also make it hard to ask for help. Being vulnerable feels like a risk.
Leadership can ask for a different kind of strength, though: the strength to dare to be vulnerable. That is scarier than it seems, and it brings more than you think.
A leader needs anchors
A leader does not need admirers or followers, but anchors: people who carry with you through their own awareness. They do not fall over from your intensity. They dare to look at you honestly and mirror you. They make you neither too small nor too big.
Two or three of those people close to you change everything. The top is no longer a sharp peak, but a stable triangle. Your strength does not have to become smaller. It only has to become less alone.
How we work with loneliness at the top
With us, you have a place where everything can be said, confidentially and at your level. And together we look at the structure around you: who in your environment can carry with you, and what is needed to let those people in. Loneliness at the top often also touches older patterns: having had to manage alone early in life, or having learned that showing need was not safe. Read more about leadership and trauma.
“With Dirk Jan I never felt like a patient, but like a fellow traveller.” (CEO, technology company)
Frequently asked questions
Why do leaders feel lonely?
Because responsibility is concentrated at the top, and because the people around a leader often have their own interests, or hesitate to tell the honest truth.
What helps against loneliness at the top?
A few people who can truly carry with you, and a confidential place to think things through. Often it also helps to look at the patterns that make it hard to let others in.
Is a coach the same as an anchor?
A coach or psychologist can be one of your anchors, especially when there is no one in your organization you can speak to freely. Read more about leadership psychology.
No one to really think things through with?
In a free 45-minute strategy session, online, we look at what is going on and whether we are a good fit. Confidential, under the professional code of the NIP.