Values don’t obey

You can post them on the wall. You can print them on the coffee mugs, stitch them into the onboarding deck, and recite them at the all-hands meeting. And then watch them do nothing. Values don’t work like policies. You cannot install them. You cannot enforce...

More than a month

March arrives, and the panels get booked. The social posts get scheduled. The spotlights get turned on. Women get celebrated, applauded, and profiled in the newsletter. Then April comes. Here is the uncomfortable question: what changed? Not in the post. In the org...

The promise problem

I have sat across from some genuinely talented leaders, and I keep seeing the same thing. Brilliant strategy. Capable people. And then somewhere between the planning session and the finish line, things quietly slip. Deadlines drift. Commitments blur. The leader is...

The standards you walk past

Steve Jobs once sent back a shipment of screws because they weren’t beautiful enough. Not functional enough. Beautiful. Most people thought he was nuts. What they missed was the standard you walk past becomes the standard you accept. Think about the last time...

Accountability changes behavior

Ever wondered where your kids’ good behaviors come from? What about the bad ones? Look no further than the mirror. Children absorb what they see. They model what they experience. They normalize what we tolerate. Why is this any different in organizations? It si...