The Met Gala has long captivated the world with its dazzling display of haute couture, celebrity glamour, and thematic elegance. But behind the velvet ropes and couture gowns lies an operation so complex and collaborative that it offers remarkable insights into leadership, workforce orchestration, and power distribution—topics at the heart of Human Resources and executive leadership.

For CHROs and CXOs navigating a future shaped by distributed teams, gig workforces, and heightened demands for inclusion, the Met Gala is more than a red carpet event—it is a masterclass in distributed leadership, collaboration, and people power.

The 2025 Met Gala, held on May 5 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, ran with the theme “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion.” But the real awakening lay not just in what attendees wore, but in how the entire event was executed—through meticulous planning, cross-functional coordination, and deep trust in distributed teams.

Dozens of departments—from logistics, security, and catering to event design, talent coordination, media production, and artistic curation—worked in unison for months. Anna Wintour, while the face of the event, doesn’t run the show solo. She empowers a cohort of creative and operational leaders to design, delegate, and deliver a seamless global event. There are brand partnerships to negotiate, museum curators to align with, fashion houses to coordinate with, and media protocols to enforce.

This mirrors what HR leaders face in orchestrating business transformation. One cannot rely solely on top-down command structures. HR leaders must foster ecosystems where power is distributed across teams who bring in cultural, creative, and operational fluency.

Power distribution over power dressing

While power dressing may still dominate headlines, the real conversation this year revolved around power distribution—both in the fashion industry and in leadership models. The red carpet glamour is a result of labour, leadership, and coordination behind the scenes. Fashion stylists, production crews, brand sponsors, museum conservators, media planners, and junior staff—all hold crucial power in delivering success.

For HR leaders, this is a powerful metaphor. Too often, leadership power sits concentrated at the top, limiting growth and resilience. But in dynamic business environments, power needs to flow—to be distributed across layers of creative and operational stakeholders. This is what makes the Met Gala an exceptional case study in distributed leadership.

India's evolving business environment—hybrid workplaces, younger workforce demographics, ESG pressures, and DEI expectations—demands a shift from command-and-control models to inclusive, distributed leadership. Let’s unpack how the Met Gala’s execution aligns with trends HR must champion:

1. Empowered functional leadership

The Gala has an overarching vision but entrusts domain experts to execute it—from set designers and fashion historians to logistics heads and tech teams. Similarly, HR must create environments where functions like L&D, DEI, and employee experience are not just support roles but strategic leads.

2. Cross-functional collaboration

From museum staff and public relations to celebrities' teams and fashion houses—cross-functional coordination is the Met Gala’s backbone. Indian businesses can take note: silos kill innovation. HR must champion agile pods and collaborative workflows across business verticals.

3. Temporary yet purpose-driven teams

Many Met Gala execution teams are short-term project-based teams—gig workers, freelance talent, and creative consultants. This reflects the growing gigification of work. HR must learn how to onboard, integrate, and manage these temporary yet essential workforce segments with dignity and efficiency.

4. Inclusion at every touchpoint

From featuring Black designers and queer stylists to including fashion from underrepresented cultures, the Met Gala has grown more inclusive. For HR, inclusion cannot be a checkbox; it must permeate hiring, career growth, cultural initiatives, and leadership succession.

5. Experience as strategy

The Met Gala is ultimately about experience—for attendees, for the public, for the fashion world. Employee experience should be treated with the same reverence. HR leaders must curate intentional experiences—from onboarding to exit—that inspire loyalty and pride.

Think about the strategic roles HR plays in orchestrating a leadership summit, an offsite, or even the annual general meeting (AGM). These events mirror Met Gala’s complexity in intent and execution. Every touchpoint matters—how guests are welcomed, how sessions flow, how tech is integrated, how feedback is captured.

HR’s task is to treat such events not as logistical checklists but as culture-defining moments. The Met Gala succeeds because every aspect—down to the museum layout and lighting—is designed to reinforce its theme. Imagine what would happen if every HR event was designed to reinforce values like belonging, innovation, or trust.

Anna Wintour is not approving every flower placement. She trusts the team she’s built. This is a crucial takeaway for Indian CXOs: build strong teams and then step back. Over-controlling leads to burnout and mediocre results.

In HR, this means allowing line managers to take on more people responsibilities. It means equipping leaders at every level to resolve conflicts, provide feedback, and drive performance—without waiting for top-down interventions.

A shift in mindset

In earlier decades, power dressing meant shoulder pads and designer suits that projected authority. Today, power lies in who you uplift, whose ideas you platform, and whose voice is heard in rooms of decision-making.

The 2025 Met Gala saw celebrities working with underrepresented designers. That wasn’t just fashion—it was strategy. Similarly, HR must reframe influence—not as who looks most ‘corporate,’ but who brings others to the table.

Additionally, inclusion is not about representation alone. It’s about infrastructure. At the Gala, accessibility, cultural respect, backstage treatment, and team safety are part of planning. That’s inclusion in action.

For HR, inclusion needs an infrastructure of policies, leadership accountability, pay equity audits, inclusive tech tools, and safe reporting channels. Culture does not change by slogans—it changes through systems.

Another aspect is that the fashion world is increasingly linked to Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) values. Sustainable materials, ethical labour, and representation are hot topics. The Met Gala subtly reflects these themes. Remember to align with ESG goals—whether it’s mental health access, LGBTQ+ inclusion, or sustainable practices. Soft power, when scaled, becomes real power.

The Met Gala is not about celebrity indulgence. It is a microcosm of how distributed power, strategic coordination, inclusive practices, and trust-based leadership create culture at scale. For HR leaders and CXOs, it offers more than fashion inspiration. It offers a blueprint. As our workforce diversifies and decentralises, the ability to lead like a Met Gala curator—visionary, collaborative, distributed, inclusive—may well define the next generation of transformative leaders.