Hermione Olivia has spent much of her career in the language of business – founding a communications consultancy, launching international brands and eventually becoming one of the youngest female CEOs in her industry. Her first book, CEO Yourself, turns that language inward, using it as a framework to examine how we decide what deserves our time, attention and ambition.

But beneath the title sits a more interesting question: what happens when conventional ideas of success stop feeling particularly useful? For Olivia, writing the book became an exercise in interrogating her own answers – from workaholism and boundaries to motherhood, creativity and the persistent fiction of achieving perfect balance.

Rather than proposing another blueprint for having it all, CEO Yourself considers the value of editing: knowing what to pursue, what to leave behind and, crucially, whose definition of success you’re working towards. We spoke with Olivia about putting that philosophy onto the page.

This is your first book. What surprised you about the process of actually making one – not just having the ideas, but turning them into something that could live on a page?

It has been such an interesting psychological process, akin to running a mental marathon. Most authors suggest writing little and often. I did the opposite. Whenever possible, I created blocks of time to deep-dive into the next section and focus completely, which I found much more conducive to progress. Mentally, the hardest part was refining the philosophy and creating the book proposal, which includes the title, subtitle, contents, and sample chapters. It required complete clarity on the project and my writing style. Once I had the book deal, I felt more confident, but then I had to write it with a newborn, which created another set of obvious challenges.

You began with a philosophy that had already existed through conversations, podcasts and your own life. What changed when you had to give those ideas a beginning, middle and end?

When I was first approached by Penguin to write a book, I was still developing the CEO YOURSELF philosophy, so it was a gift that forced me to define and refine exactly what that philosophy is, quite quickly. Creating the structure of the book, researching and reconsidering what ‘success’ really looks like has been an interesting evolution – and one that continues to force me to look inwards.

Writing can expose the distance between what we think we believe and what we can actually defend on the page. Did you encounter any of your own contradictions while writing the book?

Absolutely. The greatest contradiction was writing a book about living intentionally while, at times, pushing myself incredibly hard to finish it. I now believe that being the CEO of your life means having a regulated nervous system, being present and living in flow with your true self. For me, as a self-confessed (recovering) workaholic, that requires constant recalibration. I don’t believe we ever reach a permanent state of balance or happiness; we have to keep adjusting as life changes. Only we can define what a good life looks like for us. My purpose in being part of this conversation is to remove some of the pressure we place on ourselves and say, "It’s okay.” No one is perfect, but if you are true to yourself and follow a few simple steps, you can feel really good more often.

How did you decide what of yourself belonged in the book? Was there a line between being vulnerable enough and protecting experiences that still felt entirely your own?

I’m quite an open book, so I’m vulnerable and honest within these pages. I wanted to share enough of my own journey for the ideas to feel relatable, because we live in a world of highlight reels. At the same time, I was conscious that some experiences involved people I love, so not every detail was mine to share. Ultimately, the book is practical: these steps have completely changed my life, and I hope they might help change someone else’s along the way.

We tend to talk about ambition in terms of accumulation: more responsibility, more success, more visibility. Has your own definition of ambition become more about editing – knowing what to remove rather than what to add?

Absolutely. The entire premise of this book is about working smart, not hard. I spent too many years saying yes, doing too much and lacking boundaries, and it didn’t serve me. Ambition now means being much more discerning about where I direct my time and energy. If you can work strategically, you can move further towards what matters without burning out. Identify your “no”, so you can use your all-important “yes” more meaningfully.

Life – particularly motherhood, creativity and relationships – rarely follows a plan. How do you leave room for intuition, spontaneity and a little chaos?

Through practice. I’m no expert, but I’m learning to carve out time for myself, even if it’s just an extra five minutes or walking home the long way, so I have space to think. We all know the difference putting away our phones can make, and I put block-outs in my diary, so I don’t overschedule myself. It’s about creating enough space for fun to find its way in.

Designing a life is inherently creative – deciding what belongs in it, what doesn’t, and what you want it to feel like. Has writing this book changed the way you think about creativity in your own life?

It’s interesting because I’ve never considered myself to be overly creative, and writing the book required deep, intentional thought more than anything else. But bringing its words and ideas to life – through the bookshop I’m sitting in as I write this, for example – has been such a rewarding creative pursuit. It has made me realise that creativity is all around us, woven into everything we do. Designing a life is its own form of creativity: life is a game, and we get to choose how we play it.

Now that the book is finished and exists independently of you, what do you hope a reader takes from it that has nothing to do with becoming more productive or conventionally successful?

More than anything, I hope readers come away knowing that they are enough. They don’t need to do more or be more; they simply need to create the space to think clearly about what they truly want and then move intentionally towards it. I hope the book gives them a deeper sense of agency over their own lives - the confidence to define success for themselves, trust their instincts and create lives that feel as good on the inside as they might look from the outside. Anything they want is within reach.