Leadership isn’t reserved for people with the right title. Increasingly, career success in the technology industry comes down to something far more valuable: influence.
That’s a key theme set to be explored at the upcoming ARN Leadership Program on 28 October in Sydney, where keynote speakers Rhody Hill, founder of Ecosystem Alchemy, and Moheb Moses, founder of Channel Dynamics and author of Everything I Know About Selling, I Learned from a Tennis Racket, will share lessons on building influence, trust and leadership capability.
Register here for the ARN Leadership Program 2026 on 28 October.
For Hill, one of the biggest misconceptions organisations make is assuming top performers automatically become great leaders.
“The best person in the role is not necessarily the next leader,” she said.
Instead, she believes leadership potential is often revealed through behaviours long before a promotion arrives. Early in her career, Hill made a habit of understanding her leaders’ challenges and asking how she could help, unintentionally building strong sponsors along the way.
She also states that one of the most common leadership habits to unlearn is being too quick to provide answers.
Reflecting on her own experience, Hill said she realised that constantly solving problems for her team created dependency rather than confidence.
“Without meaning to, I created a team that relied on me,” she said.
Her solution was to ask more open-ended questions, helping team members develop their own judgement and decision-making skills.
For Moses leadership is fundamentally about selling ideas.
“Leadership is fundamentally about getting people to believe in something and commit to it,” he said.
Whether influencing employees, peers, customers or partners, leaders are constantly seeking buy-in. The best leaders, like the best salespeople, listen first, ask good questions and make their message relevant to the person in front of them.
Importantly, Moses believes authority alone is no longer enough.
“Authority can create compliance, but it rarely creates commitment,” he said.
This is especially true in the channel, where success often depends on influencing partners and stakeholders who don’t directly report to you.
Both Moheb and Hill stated that leadership is a skill that never stops evolving. Hill learned that lesson early after stepping into a management role at the age of 25 and assuming she was expected to already know how to lead.
“The title doesn’t make you a leader,” she said. “It gives you responsibility for leading people.”
For the next generation of emerging leaders, Moses believes the qualities that matter most will be curiosity, empathy, commercial acumen and clear communication.
Together, the pair offer a timely reminder that leadership isn’t defined by hierarchy. It’s built through behaviours, relationships and the ability to bring others along on the journey.
Register here for the ARN Leadership Program 2026 on 28 October.