I grew up watching a founder who helped build a major business group. My father started in 1938 with the other founders and became a driving force behind its growth.

Yet through all those years, I don't remember him going on TV to explain his success. No newspaper interviews about how important he was.

The factories spoke. The products spoke. The growth spoke.

His authority came from knowing the business deeply, from decisions and outcomes, not from visibility. That distinction has stayed with me.

There's nothing wrong with a leader being visible. I use LinkedIn myself to share decades of experience. Successes, failures, decisions and mistakes.

But a question remains. Is communication carrying substance, or trying to create the appearance of it?

After a speech or post, does the audience simply know more about the leader, or do they know something more because of the leader?

That's where corporate communications carries a responsibility far greater than publicity. Its role isn't to arrange another interview, amplify another appearance, then report that it went well.

Independence sometimes requires saying, This interview adds nothing. This message may be misunderstood. You are becoming overexposed.

But that independence depends equally on the leader.

Looking back, I made mistakes. What concerns me today is not that I made them. Every leader will.

The harder question is: why, at certain moments, did nobody around me tell me I was wrong? Was that their failure, or had my own behavior made disagreement difficult?

And sometimes someone did. Expanding into Africa, we established distribution companies in Madagascar, Ghana, Mozambique and more at once. A colleague asked: why not start with two markets, let them stabilize, then add two more? I didn't accept it. I wanted our brands in four countries together to build recognition across Africa. He was thinking step by step; I was thinking scale. He was right. Going that wide, that fast, cost us things patience would have saved.

Leaders say they surround themselves with strong people. The real test is what happens after people around you repeatedly disagree.

Do they remain equally close? Are they still heard? Or does agreement subtly become the safer route to access?

That's where leadership and corporate communications intersect.

When those communicating the leader's image also become the people quietly validating it internally, a professional function can turn into a circle of reinforcement.

And corporate communications becomes corporate applause.

Perhaps every Chairman and CEO should occasionally ask: when was the last time someone close to me told me I was wrong and remained just as close?

And when was the last time my communications team told me, You don't need the spotlight this time?

The answers may reveal more about leadership than the next interview ever will.