A Blog For Women

How leaders turn recurring frustration into useful information, better decisions, and forward momentum Frustration contains information. Something isn't working. An expectation hasn't been met. A recurring problem has resurfaced. A decision feels wrong. A relationship has become difficult. A process that should be straightforward continues to create unnecessary complications. In leadership decision-making, those reactions matter because frustration can direct attention toward

How Failure Moves Leadership Forward Leadership is shaped by failure as much as success. Leadership failure can reveal weaknesses, challenge assumptions, and develop capabilities that success alone may never expose. Success confirms. Failure reveals. When an initiative works, a strategy delivers, or a decision produces the intended result, leaders gain useful evidence about what may be worth repeating. But success doesn't always require us to examine our thinking very closely

How openness to unexpected connections can strengthen our leadership Leadership is built through relationships, and relationships often begin in places that seem entirely ordinary. A meeting before everyone else arrives. A few minutes in an elevator. A conversation after a presentation. The person seated next to us at an event. A new employee we encounter in the hallway. A driver taking us from one place to another. Most of these moments begin as simple points of contact. Two

The gap between how leaders see themselves and how others experience them Effective leadership depends on access to accurate information, including information about how others experience us. Leadership feedback helps leaders understand the impact of their communication, decisions, expectations, and behavior. That understanding becomes particularly important as their responsibilities expand and their actions influence more people. Yet some of the most valuable information a l

How Everyday Choices Shape Culture, Performance, and Results Leadership leaves receipts. Every decision a leader makes adds something to the total: what gets prioritized, what gets postponed, who gets developed, what behavior gets addressed, which standard gets reinforced, where resources are invested, and what leaders choose to tolerate. Most of those decisions don't feel especially consequential in the moment. Think about the last time you looked at a surprisingly high rece

Why Strong Leaders Pay Attention to Early Warning Signals Leadership awareness is the ability to recognize important signals before they become significant problems. It requires leaders to notice changes in their own capacity, their teams, and the organizational environment while there’s still time to respond thoughtfully. A recent experience with a rental car offers a useful analogy. We picked up a minivan for vacation, and everything appeared fine until we started the engin