Just because something makes you uncomfortable doesn’t mean it’s wrong. It might just be more real and true than what you consider to be acceptable. “Touch-feely” is creepy in a variety of ways. When I even think about it, I make an involuntary cringe face. A significant effort is made on my part not to use these words… and also not to roll my eyes when others do. Working in Organizational Change Management, it gets tiring to hear people talk about the human-centric work we d

Yes, I know I have been a strategist for a long time. My success rates are relatively high as I think of strategies as infrastructure and direction; I create for uncertainty. They are designed to illuminate the field and provide action steps for navigating obstacles. I have invested time, energy, and sometimes my heart and soul into being a better strategist; to enhance my natural capability for the work. But, as we shift into a future arriving faster than we anticipated, is

Off the top? Bias. Controlling behavior. Gatekeeping. Dismissal of the expertise of others. Little perspective diversity. Diminished quality of work. Ineffective and small-minded teams. Lack of collaboration and performance. Failure to achieve desired outcomes. Words matter. They are how we program our thinking, which becomes our actions, followed by habits, then behaviors, and finally mindsets. And mindsets, well, those can be the hardest things to change. It is essential th

I was asked recently what my favorite thing is. Before I knew it, “thinking” popped out of my mouth. This response first surprised me and then didn’t. One of my values is Discovery after all. The act of thinking has always interested me- how I think, how others think, how groups think- all of it. I experiment and invest a lot of learning time in different ways of thinking and mindset development. I have practices that cultivate a curious, explorer’s mind, and I don’t allow my

We are all goldfish. Throughout my career, I have had to activate teams to achieve big objectives… with limited resources while keeping people motivated and healthy. As I was problem-solving in one particular situation, I started to think about goldfish. The truth about goldfish is, of course, more nuanced. But- the idea got my mind working. None of us had time. We were under pressure. I could not possibly micro-manage and be involved in everything. So, I tried an experiment.

If I had a theme song, I think it might be “One of These Things” from Sesame Street. My life has been a series of moments that told me “one of these things is not like the others, one of these things is not the same.” Words like unusual, weird, and different have been thematic. Profiles, assessments, and tests have been retaken many times because “that is an unusual result, I think we should try it again; “Make sure you answer more sincerely this time;” “Don’t overthink it;”