The teacher was screaming from backstage, ”Linish, don't be an idiot. Do not invite the dignitaries back on stage. They're already on stage." I was in seventh grade, president of the Interact Club, a division of the Rotary Club. It was tradition for the president to deliver what was essentially a state of the club address. The entire high school would be in attendance, along with dignitaries from the local Rotary Club. The protocol was: the dignitaries would be seated in the

Leadership problems often disguise themselves in different ways. Too often, it’s a question of focal length. But, hardly anyone sees it that way. Get too close and you start solving problems your team should be solving. You add control, meetings, check-ins. You become to bottleneck for everything. Get too far and you rely on vision decks and town halls. You don’t find the right focal length by reading about it. You find it by testing the edges. Step in closer than feels comfo

A year ago, I wrote my first post on my website. I had no sense of where it would lead. I was simply trying to get thoughts out of my head and onto the page. It was not natural, I had to force it out. Why? I still don't understand why at that moment I thought this was something worth doing. Surprising still, I dont know how I stuck with it. What forcing myself to write and publish has since taught me is that many of my ideas stand tall when they live in my mind, but the momen

When I was 19, I met someone I knew only for a few months. We weren’t especially close. But we spoke about the most obscure things: About what it would be like if everyone had 3 hands, what if everyone in the world spoke the same language. You get the idea. In these conversations, I realised that they saw the world differently from me. Not dramatically different, but enough to wonder. There were two huge realisations in retrospect It was unsettling because I couldn’t agree wi

A useful rule of thumb. Not every question deserves an answer. Not every invitation to explain is made in good faith. Some are simply traps disguised as curiosity. Some people aren’t confused. They’re invested. Invested in missing the point.Invested in circling the same argument until you’re tired enough to surrender.Invested in turning explanation into a tax you keep paying. They don’t want clarity.They want leverage.They want you busy proving what they’ve already decided to

There’s nothing glamorous about showing up the same way every day. The discipline of doing the basics well. Again. And again. And again. Most people don’t fail because they lack talent. They fail because they chase intensity instead of consistency. Sprint for a week. Take on more responsibility for a couple of weeks at work. Overdeliver once. And then drift. Consistency looks dull from the outside. From the inside, it’s demanding. Because it asks for the same standard on good

Free advice gets consumed casually. Nodded at. Rarely acted on. When you give advice away freely, you teach people an unhelpful lesson.That your thinking required no effort. When someone pays (quantum being irrelevant) for your opinion, your words are taken far more seriously. They listen. They question. And act on it. Putting a premium on your opinion, contrary to popular belief, isn’t arrogance. It signals: This perspective was earned. This insight was shaped by mistakes. T

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

Every company loves to say they are customer obsessed. But obsession ends at being a line. And it usually ends there. True customer obsession is culture. And culture does not start at the front-lines. It starts at the top. And no, this does not apply only to customer experience teams. Here is some translation for you: Leadership says "Push harder" Team hears "Say yes even if you don’t know how" Customer hears "We will get back to you" for the fifth time. Leadership says “Let’

Leadership debt doesn’t come from bad intent. It comes from urgency. From wanting progress. From wanting it too much that they do so much.

We judge potential the same way we judge milestones: by timing, not by depth. A late start often hides quiet preparation, while an early lead can fade just as quickly. Growth rarely follows a schedule, in children or in leaders.

Why so many leaders unconsciously lean toward being fixers instead of preventers? The system rewards those who arrive at the scene of a crisis, not those who made sure one never occurred. The heroes work in daylight. The wise ones, in shadows.

Mental shortcuts help you act fast, but bias rides along quietly. What feels obvious to you can look random to everyone else. Speed is fine, until trust is lost. The fix isn’t slowing down. It’s showing your work so people see the reasoning behind the move.

In today's world, happy customers aren't just a nice-to-have, they're a MUST-HAVE. Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a secret weapon for...

In a world where customers are more demanding than they ever were, customer experience is key. Welcome to the wild, ever-shifting circus...

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