The ex-Kellogg CEO who learned he had ADHD at 65 says it had upsides in the corner office
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Good morning. Carlos Gutierrez has long been a man of firsts. When he took the helm of the Kellogg Company in 1999 at the age of 45, he was the youngest CEO in its nearly century-old history and the only Latino CEO of a Fortune 500 company. He went on to become Secretary of Commerce in the Bush administration, from 2005 to 2009. After that illustrious career as a leader in the public and private sectors, he was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 65. (About 15.5 million U.S. adults have ADHD, according to the Centers for Disease Control, more than half of whom were diagnosed as adults.)
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“Looking back, it now makes sense,” he told me during our conversation at the HACR Symposium yesterday in New York, listing traits like impulsiveness, excess energy, procrastination, and disorganization. But a lot of the characteristics of ADHD were also a source of strength: the pattern thinking, how he connects with people, the curiosity and ability to hyper-focus. The diagnosis helped him understand how he operates.
Gutierrez writes about that, his early childhood in Cuba, and leadership lessons from his career in his new book, Sheer Will. Among other things, he notes that being in top leadership roles is often good for people with ADHD because you get an ecosystem of support to compensate for the weaknesses—the schedulers, handlers, EAs, coaches, and more—that frees you up to leverage the strengths.
A lot of CEOs have thrived despite, and sometimes because of, qualities that have been classified as disabilities. Palantir CEO Alex Karp recently said that he believes only two kinds of people will succeed in the AI era: trade workers or people who are neurodivergent. I wrote a book with former Cisco CEO John Chambers, who grew up with severe dyslexia to the point where his palms still get sweaty at the memory of being called on to read in class. He’s an excellent pattern thinker and problem solver, as well as a talented orator who doesn’t use notes because they slow him down. I think those skills were critical in him having the vision to turn a router company into the backbone of the internet. (The book, by the way, is called Connecting the Dots.)
Gutierrez, for his part, helped to transform Kellogg by shifting the focus from traditional high-volume products to innovative higher-margin ones, which increased profits while freeing up resources to invest in new products. In 2004, Fortune dubbed him “The Man Who Fixed Kellogg.” One thing he does regret is that he never finished college, not because it held him back, but because it’s an accomplishment he wished he had achieved. His advice to the next generation of leaders: Know yourself. If you are diagnosed with ADHD, dyslexia, or another learning challenge, take advantage of treatment to manage the good and address the challenges.
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This story was originally featured on Fortune.com