If you’ve ever made popcorn, you know the smell of freshly made popcorn is just magnifique. There are a few early pops. Then a noisy rush. And then a few stubborn kernels that refuse to play along, no matter how long you wait. Then, the most important question: When do you stop? Same question when you lead teams: How long do you wait for someone to “get there”? Do you keep the heat on because potential exists? Or do you step back before the rest burn to a crisp? Leaders tend

First time managers run into two traps. The first one is over control. You grip everything. You micromanage. You hover. You want everything run by you. You want to prove you earned the role. Eventually, the team stops taking initiative. They wait. They let you make every call. Because you conditioned them to. The second trap is the opposite. You freeze. You are scared to make a move. Your peers now report to you, and you still see yourself as “one of them”. So you avoid tou

You walk onto the pitch. Test match, day one. You’ve got your strategy: play for swing, get behind the line, play with a straight bat. Ten minutes in, the bowler realises the pitch is jagging off the cracks with uneven bounce. The bowler changes his length. And your neat plan is history. Now it’s all about reacting better, and playing the situation at hand. You walk onto court. Ready to dominate with your forehand. But your opponent clearly got the memo. Decided to pin you on

Leadership is about moving on quick. From agony or ecstasy. You don't have time to dwell. The next challenge always awaits.

Perfect ideas don’t exist. What succeeds are the logical ones that get shipped and shaped. Great leaders build teams where imperfect ideas see the light, get executed, and evolve.

Analysis paralysis isn't just overthinking. It's organizational cancer. It spreads through teams, destroys momentum, and kills companies that could have thrived. Your competition doesn't wait for perfect data. They move. And if they did wait for perfect data, they’d not be your competition, they’d be dead.

If you want to be liked by everyone as a leader, you are setting yourself up for failure.

Leadership looks different from the outside. From the outside, it’s strategy decks. Big moves. Team calls. From the inside, that’s not...

Range is underrated. Breadth of experience changes everything.

Every meaningful decision costs something. The smart ones just know what’s worth losing.

We often confuse stability with sameness. But what we don’t change, we eventually outgrow. This piece is a reminder that continuity doesn’t mean clinging to the past — it means having the courage to evolve.

I used to believe that speed was leadership. Act fast. Decide fast. Move fast. The world rewarded urgency, and so did I. Until I learned...

How Great Leaders Hold Steady in Chaos

High-performance teams thrive on empathy, listening, collaboration, and communication—not just brilliance. Culture drives success.