This week, I had the pleasure of speaking with Duarte Cabral, Delivery Lead at Mindera, and someone I’ve had the privilege of knowing in more than one context first as a colleague, and later as a client.
Duarte is one of those people you instantly trust. Thoughtful. Reliable. Calm. He’s someone who genuinely cares about helping others do well, not because it’s expected, but because he wants to see people succeed. Our conversation explored what formed his leadership philosophy.
Duarte talked about the early experiences that shaped him, moments when he didn’t yet have the skills, but leaders brought him in, involved him, and supported him anyway.
“These guys respected me enough to make me part of their world… even though I didn’t have the skill yet.”
That involvement created two things every new leader needs:
Belonging - “I matter here.”
Confidence- “I can grow into this.”
And importantly:
“You’re not failing if you ask for help.”
In fact, the willingness to ask for help is what allowed him to develop resilience, not through pressure, but through support.
Duarte’s journey reinforced something many of us know intuitively:
We learn leadership by watching leadership.
He saw leaders who:
involved him in real work
respected him without needing him to be perfect
modelled the behaviour they expected from others
shared responsibility instead of protecting ownership
Those experiences later shaped Duarte’s own leadership principles.
1. Own outcomes - together. Leadership isn’t about carrying success alone. It’s about involving your team early, recognising their contributions, and standing with them when things go wrong.
2. No information silos. Transparency builds trust. Sharing both the “good” and the “difficult” allows everyone to grow faster and learn from each other’s mistakes.
3. Team-first thinking. Your team is responsible for your success and you are responsible for theirs. It’s shared accountability, not shared blame.
We reflected on what leadership looks like today especially for newer generations coming into remote and distributed environments.
What may be lost:
Slower personal growth
Fewer natural moments of observation
Less exposure to the nuances of behaviour and decision-making
Weaker in-person connection
In past decades, you learned by being around good leaders listening to calls, overhearing conversations, watching how they responded to pressure.
Remote work removes a lot of that by accident.
But what may be gained:
Access to people you would never have met locally
Opportunities for those who previously lacked them
More flexibility and autonomy
More self-driven growth
Teams that are intentionally diverse, not just geographically convenient
The key, Duarte says, is this:
“People will need to be more self-driven in finding ways to create connections.”
Connection won’t “just happen” anymore. It has to be cultivated.
Duarte’s view on sustainable leadership was simple and deeply human:
Be creative in the way you approach problems, it keeps work energising.
Build respectful relationships, they are the foundation for long-term collaboration.
Show empathy, especially when working with stakeholders and clients who are under pressure too.
None of these require intense effort. But all of them protect your energy over the long run.
Leadership is something we absorb before we practice it. We learn it through observation, belonging, and the behaviour of those who go ahead of us.
Duarte’s story is a reminder that sustainable leadership isn’t about having all the answers. It’s about involving people, respecting them, and staying connected, even in a world that increasingly pulls us apart.
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