Leadership

Leadership as a structural condition rather than a personal trait—and some thoughts on why most leadership development programs don't work.

12 posts
Speaking Leadership Teams Transformation

Permission to Move

The organizations that win with AI won't be the ones with the best models or the biggest budgets, although those things will help. They'll be the ones where permission isn't something you ask for. The ones where permission is baked into how the system already works.

Structure Leadership Brand Strategy

Good Design is Good Will

Paul Rand, org designer. I also especially like how the essay's title hints at *willfulness* and the last line points at an economic outcome. #nice

Structure Roles Leadership

The Unbundling of the CFO at Coke

Coca‑Cola is radically reshaping how it leads and innovates to accelerate digital transformation and better connect with consumers—shaking up top roles and creating an entirely new executive seat to unify tech and strategy.

Leadership Management

Great Leaders are Great Followers

...an unpopular and uncomfortable truth for the already powerful. Also: is followership a _stage_ of development or truly a permanent practice? Probably the latter, but how do we reinforce that?

Artificial Intelligence Leadership Culture

Five OD Things N° 12

Selling personal super-intelligence; trust & safety heading for the exits; raw compute vs. the junk drawer; Wall Street loves shrinking payrolls; the first targets are email jobs

Economics Leadership Transformation

Five OD Things Nº 11

Krugman on enshittification; a mission-driven reset at Microsoft; how Y2K wasn't a thing because of massive multiplayer cooperation; Medium's reboot story; Figma's S-1

Culture Leadership

Five Creativity Things

Challenges facing creativity; owning ideas from beginning to end; opinionated palettes; are we doing zines again?; randomness that didn’t fit in the first four categories

Decision Making Meetings Leadership

Why Nothing Gets Done Around Here

Hundreds of thousands of hours are getting wasted on bad decision-rights. It’s got to stop. (Contains at least two good ways to fix this problem.)

Structure Power Leadership

The Trouble With Hierarchy

Hierarchy lets leaders learn more; it pushes the org to learn about itself, not about customers; it creates busywork. A network of teams is the answer.

Transformation Leadership

Peeling Carrots

As I was peeling carrots for soup last night (snow day!), I realized that I always do it the same way: by doing the big end first. If you peel the carrot the other way, starting with the skinny end, the diameter and the newly wet surface don't

Strategy Leadership

Forty Business Tips

These are all really two tips: focus on service and execution; if it’s not working, get out.

Roles Culture Leadership

Building People

Something I wrote but never hit publish on, back in 2011. It’s funny to read this now with the benefit of 10 more years experience and think — yeah, I still mostly believe this stuff!