Growing the heart of your business.
Perspectives and tools for leaders who want to build something that lasts — drawn from decades in the room with founders, owners, and the teams around them.
Root Motivations
What is your primary motivation in life & relationships? Discover what drives you as a leader — Respect, Value, or Approval — and what happens when that need goes unmet.
Heart-First Signposts: Who Loves Me?
Of the four questions from Known and Called, this is the one leaders skip. Who am I, really? They'll wrestle with. Why am I here? They'll sit with. Where am I going?…
Read →On Fathering the Next Generation
The leaders I've walked with for years almost always come around to the same question eventually, even if they don't know they're asking it. Who am I supposed to be father to…
Read →Heart-First Signposts: Where Am I Going?
A leader sat in my office last spring and laid out three years of plans. The next hire. The next acquisition. The next product line. The succession move, the bank conversation, the…
Read →The Leader You Can't Develop From Where You Sit
There's a kind of leader who's too far along to train and too early to leave alone. Maybe someone on your team. Maybe someone you're raising up to run something for you.…
Read →The False Dichotomy of Faith and Work
A leader asked me a question last week that I’ve heard in different forms dozens of times: Should my faith be the foundation driving my business decisions, or should faith and business…
Read →Heart-First Signposts: What Are You Actually Holding?
The first signpost isn’t a strategic question. It’s a diagnostic one. Most leaders I’ve sat with know something is wrong before they know what it is. The tell isn’t usually the decision…
Read →The Emerging Leader’s Fear
A leader in her early thirties sat in my office a while back and told me she’d been promoted into a role she wasn’t sure she could do. I asked her what…
Read →The Founder’s Question
A founder sat across from me last month and told me about a decision he’d been holding for six months. I asked what was keeping him from making it. He thought for…
Read →Heart-First Signposts: You Weren’t Meant to Walk Alone
There’s a difference between advising a leader and walking with one. I’ve done both for a long time, and the difference has become clearer to me over the years, not less. Advising…
Read →Emotions as Dashboard Lights
I’ve been teaching a framework lately that’s changed how a lot of the leaders I walk with understand themselves. It’s this: emotions aren’t the problem. They’re dashboard lights. When something you’re feeling…
Read →All Decisions Are Emotional – Good Decisions Understand Why
In the words of Herbert Simon, “In order to have anything like a complete theory of rationality, we have to understand what role emotion plays in it.” Emotion and cognition are very…
Read →Why is Decision Making so Difficult?
“When we’re faced with difficult and complex decisions, we typically experience difficult and complex emotions. Many of us don’t want to sit with these uncomfortable feelings, so we try to get the…
Read →Moving Relationships from Chaos to Restoration
We have developed a set of checkpoints for creating safe, compassion-based relationships: "The 5 P's" that protect our relationships from violence, manipulation, and shame and allow them to grow and flourish. If…
Read →Discovering Your Path Through Conflict
We live in a world of conflict. At this moment, that is obvious on a global scale. Nations are now in open conflict, coming on the heels of two years of pandemic-induced…
Read →The Power of Mindfulness for Your Business & Your Life
We begin a new year under a continuing shadow of uncertainty and challenges: pandemic variants, supply chain disruptions, finding, keeping, and paying employees, economic inflation, political and cultural divisions, and geopolitical tensions…
Read →Perspective is Powerful
In a recent conversation with a physician friend, she expressed regret that she had chosen to take a decade of her life to study medicine. The clinic where she works is chaotic…
Read →What’s It Like to Work Around Here?
One of the first questions I ask a company owner or leader is: “Do the people you lead love to work for you?” The next question I ask is: “Why would anyone…
Read →Downton Abbey: A Reflection of Our Hearts
Through the creative genius of Julian Fellowes, the characters of a British aristocratic family, the Crawley's of Downton Abbey, as well as the retinue of staff that serves them, come alive with…
Read →Are You Avoiding Me?
Anticipation and curiosity – what I remember sensing that morning exactly 30 years ago. I had no idea the journey I would take, nor what I would discover and learn to bring…
Read →Can I Get Your Attention, Please?
Leadership is influence. Influence requires inspiration – a vision of what is possible, knowledge of your resources, and motivation to take the risk. At the same time, inspiration is impossible if you…
Read →Why Don’t I Get Any Respect?
The popular comedian from a previous generation, Rodney Dangerfield, was known for his famous complaint: “I don’t get no respect, no respect at all!” “When I was a kid, I got no…
Read →Your Business is Sitting on a Gold Mine
What is the most unexploited business growth opportunity right now? An untapped target audience for your products? An innovative marketing strategy? A powerful sales team? A new strategic partnership? A re-focused business…
Read →The Millennial Condition
Is a generational tag helpful for understanding an emerging leader? What do young leaders need to thrive? How do we need to listen and understand those new to our team?
Read →The Industrial Revolution of Shame
Outrage is strange bait: It can feel wrong not to take it. _Salvatore Scibona, The New York Times_ Mr. Scibona is a novelist.
Read →The Value of Workplace Culture
“The most successful companies give employees a sense of belonging.” A thriving workspace is an valuable benefit for you, your people, your company, and your customers. _Sue Shellenbarger, The Wall Street Journal_
Read →Motivations
A key skill in effective leadership is learning how your root motivation shows up in your relationships and conversations. _By John D. Erickson, Author & Leadership Innovator_
Read →Looking for our earlier writing? Browse the archive →