Executive Leadership Forum
Deep Waters Executive Leadership Forum.
A confidential forum for business owners, chief executives and senior leaders who want clearer thinking, stronger judgement and trusted perspectives around the decisions that matter.
Small, carefully composed forums bring together leaders facing comparable responsibilities and pressures. Each provides a consistent place to step back from immediate demands, test thinking and move forward with greater clarity.
- Peer counsel
- Confidential
- Cross-sector
Who it is for
Leadership can be shared without being made public.
The Executive Leadership Forum is designed for experienced leaders carrying decisions that cannot always be worked through openly with colleagues, employees, boards or stakeholders.
It may suit you if you are:
- Leading a business, organisation or significant area of responsibility
- Navigating growth, change, complexity or competing priorities
- Looking for challenge and perspective beyond your immediate team
- Seeking practical conversations grounded in real leadership experience
- Willing to contribute thoughtfully to the development of other leaders
The forums are relevant to business owners and commercial executives, as well as senior leaders working across the public sector and civil society.
Forum composition
The right peers make the difference.
Multiple forums may run concurrently, each bringing together a small, confidential group of leaders from similar or complementary sectors and organisational contexts.
Participants are thoughtfully matched to create enough shared understanding for conversations to be immediately relevant, while retaining sufficient difference in experience and perspective to challenge assumptions and strengthen decisions. Direct competitive or conflict relationships are avoided.
You can join as an individual—there is no need to assemble a group or secure every place. Deep Waters will thoughtfully match you with leaders whose experience and context will contribute to valuable, trusted conversations.
We also welcome organisations, leadership teams and established peer groups seeking a dedicated forum exclusively for their own participants. These forums can be shaped around the group’s shared context while retaining the same confidential, facilitated approach.
The experience
A place to think beyond the immediate.
Leadership rarely provides enough uninterrupted space to examine an issue properly. The Forum creates a regular rhythm for stepping outside day-to-day demands and considering what requires attention before it becomes urgent.
The conversation is practical, focused and grounded in the situations participants are actually facing. This is not classroom-based leadership training, and there is no predetermined curriculum to work through.
Each forum provides space to:
- Examine a current decision, challenge or opportunity
- Test assumptions before committing to action
- Hear how other experienced leaders see the situation
- Draw connections between immediate issues and wider organisational patterns
- Translate insight into practical next steps
- Return over time to the decisions and commitments that matter
The value comes from continuity: trusted relationships deepen, context accumulates and the quality of the conversation strengthens over time.
How the forums work
Structured enough to create progress. Open enough to address what matters.
Forums meet monthly in a facilitated, confidential setting.
Each conversation is shaped around the live priorities participants bring. The facilitator helps the group move beyond surface-level discussion, examine the underlying issue and turn different perspectives into clearer judgement and purposeful action.
Participants are expected to contribute with openness, discretion and respect. What is discussed within the forum remains confidential.
You do not need to prepare a formal presentation or arrive with a polished answer. Bring yourself, the realities you are navigating and a willingness to think honestly with others.
Different leadership contexts
Shared responsibility. Relevant experience.
The Executive Leadership Forum is one Deep Waters offering, with separate forums formed around the contexts in which participants lead.
Commercial forums bring together business owners, chief executives and senior commercial leaders. These forums retain a strong focus on the realities of enterprise: performance, people, growth, execution and the judgement required to lead a business well.
Forums may also be formed for senior leaders in the public sector and civil society. These conversations recognise the different accountabilities, stakeholder environments and measures of success found within those sectors.
The underlying experience remains consistent: a small group, careful matching, trusted relationships, skilled facilitation and practical attention to the decisions each leader is carrying.
Investment
A sustained investment in better leadership decisions.
$249 + GST per participant, per month
This monthly fee applies to an individual place within a carefully composed forum. You are not purchasing or filling an entire group, and you do not need colleagues from your organisation to join with you.
Dedicated forums for organisations, leadership teams and established peer groups are available by arrangement. Their structure and investment are discussed separately based on the group’s context and requirements.
Before an individual place or dedicated forum is confirmed, Deep Waters holds a short, confidential conversation with prospective participants or the commissioning organisation. This allows us to understand the leadership context, discuss whether the Forum is the right fit and determine the most appropriate arrangement.
Facilitation
Commercial experience, directly applied.
Commercial forums are facilitated personally by Nick Harvey.
As a business owner, commercial adviser and leadership facilitator, Nick understands both the practical realities of running a business and the judgement required to lead one well. He creates conversations that are candid, constructive and closely connected to the decisions participants are facing.
Forums for public-sector and civil-society leaders are formed around their distinct leadership contexts and facilitated by a Deep Waters principal with relevant sector experience.
Start with a conversation.
If the Executive Leadership Forum sounds like the right setting for your thinking, the next step is a short, confidential conversation.
Whether you are seeking an individual place or exploring a dedicated forum for your organisation or group, we will discuss your context and the arrangement most likely to create value.