Am I looking for approval from people above me when I really need honest peers?

Probably. Kris Kluver, in The Dysfunctional Family Office, asks rising generation leaders to test this directly. The default leadership pattern is to seek validation from senior people. The founder. The board. The longtime advisors. The mentor. Approval from above feels like proof you're doing the right thing. The proof is usually about reassurance, not insight. What most leaders actually need is honesty from peers in similar seats. People who don't have authority over your career, don't have a parental relationship with you, and aren't selling anything. Peers can tell you the thing the senior people can't, because peers don't have to manage you. The shift from chasing approval up to building honesty beside is one of the harder reorientations of leadership. It's also one of the most useful. Most leaders who make the shift discover their decisions improve and their isolation drops at the same time.