Why Executives Get Stuck Between VP and C-Suite
By Patricia Collins ·
Founder • Blumaverick · Ex- IBM
When to Reevaluate Your Role at the Executive Level
Most executives don't stall because they stop performing.
They stall because their role stops evolving around them.
You take on more scope. More accountability.
More cross-functional complexity. But your
formal authority doesn't move with it. Your
decision rights stay the same. Your title stays
the same.
And the organization keeps evaluating you at
the level you were — not the level you're
operating at.
That's not a performance problem. That's a structural one.
Executive Authority Gap™
What's actually happening
You're already doing the executive job. The
organization just hasn't built the structure
around you to reflect it.
You're accountable for outcomes you don't fully
control. You're shaping decisions you're not in
the room to make. You're the person leadership
calls first — and the person who still doesn't
have the formal authority to match what you're
carrying.
From the outside it looks like growth.
Inside, nothing moves.
Why working harder doesn't fix it
More output won't close this gap. Neither will
more visibility, more presence, or another high-
visibility project.
The leaders who stay stuck longest are usually
the ones delivering the most. Because their
reliability makes the structural problem
invisible — to the organization and sometimes
to themselves.
When you absorb the gap, the gap disappears.
Not for you. For them.
The escalations stop surfacing. The friction
stops showing up in reports. Leadership sees
smooth execution and has no signal that
anything needs to change.
Your performance is solving their
architecture problem.
For free.
The signs your role has outgrown its structure
You don't need to wait for a formal review to
know something is off. These are the signals
worth paying attention to:
You're accountable for outcomes but not part
of the decisions behind them. Your scope has
expanded but your authority hasn't moved with
it. You're operating across functions without
clear ownership. You're consistently told you're
almost ready — but not advancing.
Each of these is a structural signal, not a
performance one. They're telling you exactly
where the gap lives.
What the authority gap actually costs
This isn't just a career frustration. It compounds.
Every quarter the gap exists, your scope grows
and your formal authority falls further behind.
The organization becomes more dependent on
your informal authority.
Structural recognition falls further out of reach.
Promotion decisions get made based on a
version of you the org chart still shows
— not the version actually running the work.
It shows up as friction. Decision ambiguity.
Executive fatigue. Being passed over despite
results that should have made the case three
cycles ago.
Why it doesn't close on its own
Organizations don't fix structural gaps they
can't see. And as long as you're absorbing the
friction, they can't see it.
The authority gap closes by design — not by
performance, not by time, and not by waiting
for the organization to catch up on its own.
It requires a structural diagnosis:
where exactly has your scope outpaced your
original responsibility and how the organization
currently perceives your role.
And then a deliberate redesign of those
three systems so they reflect what you're
already doing.
That's the work.
If you're doing the work but not being
recognized, you're already in the authority gap.
And it does not resolve on its own.
If this is the gap your carrying —
this is what Blumaverick was built to solve.
→The authority gap doesn't close on its own — it
closes by design.
→ If this resonated, I'd love to hear where you're
navigating it right now.
→ Connect with me on LinkedIn and let's
continue the conversation.
About the Author
Patricia Collins is the Founder of Blumaverick,
a private executive advisory. She served as a
Pioneer CMO and IBM VP — and now serves as
an Executive Advisor to executives and high
performers who have been passed over,
undercompensated, and underrecognized.
Through her Authority By Design™ framework
and BlueShift™ methodology, she helps
executives and high peformers —closing the
gap between higher responsibility and the
authority to match it.
I work with a small number of executive leaders
to close this gap in ~90 days.
This is not traditional executive coaching. It is
structural advisory — for leaders whose scope
has already outpaced what coaching can't fix.
Connect on LinkedIn · More from Patricia
