Why the best leaders and brands build from belief, not fear
Spend five minutes scrolling your news feed and you’d be forgiven for thinking the world is falling apart. Politics, markets, business - all apparently on the brink.
But step back, and the reality looks very different.
According to The Times, the City of London is booming, with 89 property deals worth over £100m completed this year, compared to just 11 last year.
The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology recently confirmed a £55 billion long-term funding commitment to UK public research and innovation - a clear vote of confidence in the country’s tech and science future.
And a new Barclays report found that over 60 % of tech businesses now see the UK as a more attractive growth hub than the US or Europe.
So why do we still feel surrounded by pessimism?
Partly, it’s cultural. Negativity gets attention. Outrage drives clicks.
But for founders and leaders, especially in fast-moving tech businesses, pessimism is a luxury you can’t afford.
Optimism as strategy
Optimism isn’t blind positivity. It’s the discipline of believing that problems can be solved and then proving it. It’s what drives product innovation, attracts investors and builds resilience among teams when challenges hit.
Every successful tech company began as an act of optimism: someone, somewhere, believed they could create something better. That mindset doesn’t stop being essential once you’ve raised Series A - if anything, it becomes more critical as the stakes rise and uncertainty grows.
The contagion effect
Optimism is contagious. In the best possible way. It builds momentum and trust.
Investors back people with vision. Teams stay motivated when leaders communicate positivity. Customers buy from brands that project confidence, not caution.
And yet so many businesses lose that spark as they scale. Layers of process, pressure and politics dull the initial sense of “we can do this.”
That’s where small, senior, fractional teams can help - not just by delivering strategy or marketing execution but by helping founders reconnect with the story they set out to tell. The story that made people believe in the first place.
Why it matters now
In a world addicted to bad news, optimism has become a differentiator. It’s the rarest commodity in business and one of the most powerful.
Optimism isn’t naïve. It’s evidence-based, fuelled by momentum and honed by experience. It’s what gets products launched, brands built, investors engaged and talent inspired.
At Rowntree², we see it every day in the founders we work with - the ones who look past the noise and focus on building what’s next.
Because the future doesn’t belong to those shouting about how bad things are.
It belongs to the ones quietly and optimistically getting on with making things better.
