On judgement, authority, and the exercise of leadership—as distinct from management, and rarely as tidy as the literature pretends.
79 essays
FranklinCovey’s Leading at the Speed of Trust offers helpful tools but oversimplifies trust. A satisficing approach—grounded in practical action and shaped by culture and relationships—builds trust iteratively, supporting resilient, sustainable leadership.
Trust underpins leadership and shared purpose. FranklinCovey frames trust as measurable through behaviours like integrity and capability, boosting speed and lowering costs. Yet trust endures only when leaders also attend to relational and contextual realities.
Gold of the Desert Kings is an engaging leadership simulation promoting strategy and teamwork under pressure, but its focus on competition overlooks emotional intelligence and ethics. Coupling it with formal leadership theory could yield deeper, longer-lasting learning.
Leadership in the digital age requires balancing timeless qualities—wisdom, courage, empathy—with responsible use of technology. AI and data should support, not replace, ethical judgment and emotional intelligence as leaders guide people toward shared goals.
Inclusive leadership goes beyond DEI by creating cultures where difference is valued and people are empowered. Grounded in empathy and practical wisdom, it avoids tokenism through transparency, mentorship, and dialogue. Used carefully, humour can strengthen inclusion and trust.
In leadership, few tasks are more consequential than making decisions — especially difficult ones. Decisions often come with uncertainty, incomplete information, and conflicting values. The best leaders manage these complexities by
High-performing teams are built on trust, psychological safety, clear roles, open communication, and shared accountability. Classical insight and modern research agree: cohesion, collaboration, and a common purpose enable teams to adapt and perform under pressure.
Adaptive leadership distinguishes technical problems from adaptive challenges that require learning and experimentation. It emphasises situational awareness, engagement, and shared leadership while preserving purpose and ethics, preparing organisations for change beyond reactive or static models.
Karl Popper's theory of falsification provides a powerful framework for modern leadership. By embracing the principles of falsification, leaders can foster innovation, agility, and resilience in their organisations. This also allows the evolution of our understanding by discarding theories that do n
Much of what passes for "strategy" is platitude dressed as direction. A real strategy is specific, actionable, and tied to organisational goals. The difference is rigorous analysis and the willingness to make hard choices.
Leadership cannot be reduced to neat models. Simple frameworks miss the deeper dynamics between leaders, followers, and purpose. While styles vary by context, effective leaders rely on consultative, supportive behaviours that build psychological safety and sustain long-term growth.
“They don’t know what they don’t know” captures a core leadership risk. Unaware managers make poor decisions and damage morale. Organisations that embrace learning, critical thinking, and ethical judgment build more resilient and just systems.
The first in a series on learning from history and its value for organisational decision-making. Today, those who draw lessons from the past risk being labelled “on the wrong side of history,” much as dissenters in business face exile for challenging dominant narratives.
Overconfidence distorts managerial decisions, fuelling poor strategy and ego. Shifting from prediction to preparation, grounding judgment in rational thinking, and valuing informed anecdote alongside data helps balance confidence with pragmatism and improves organisational outcomes.
Organisations that are above average in their track record of developing leader-managers put an emphasis on creating challenging opportunities, not just for aspiring talent but for incumbent Line Managers who can too easily become stale.