Blog on The High Cost of Bad Listening.

The High Cost of Bad Listening

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The quality of communication is not in the mouth of the sender.

A few miles off Highway 15 in the idyllic Pennsylvania countryside sit quiet farms and boulder-crested hills. 163 years ago, this same area around Gettysburg was the scene of the largest battle ever fought in North America. Miscommunication left Confederate General Lee in the dark about the Army of the Potomac’s size and movements as his cavalry commander, Jeb Stuart, rode around the Union Army instead of keeping Lee informed. Lee’s miscommunication with one of his direct reports, Dick Ewell, left the critical East Cemetery Hill in Union hands.

I hosted six extraordinary people for a leadership retreat there last week. Communication arose as a vital topic, both in the battle and in our personal and business lives.

Pain and Perspective

People learn through pain and perspective. The latter is usually more fun and less bruising. I learned about miscommunication the hard way.

I used to think communication was about exchanging ideas, until an Afghan elder sighed in frustration while I offered unsolicited advice on improving his village’s prosperity. I was so focused on the best advice to give that I stopped listening to the rest of his story. He was concerned about the struggle for legitimacy against militant leaders, not which projects would be best.

I learned to slow down and listen to understand. After all, we were communicating through interpreters of varying capability, across very different cultures, experiences, and outlooks. I had to be very intentional about getting their meaning.

I started paraphrasing what they said and asked, “Did I get that about right?” They either affirmed me or restated what I’d missed. Then I explored their points with invitations like “Help me to understand ___” and open-ended questions like, “What would be the next steps in achieving this goal?”

Once I put this process in place, the impact was massive: people believed they’d been heard and felt safe exploring ways to cooperate. We took steps that led the biggest insurgent group in the area to stop fighting and become allies.

You’re Not Hearing Me

When I returned to the States, I fell back into my old ways. I assumed that sharing a language and culture meant we shared an understanding. I could shortcut to offering ideas that solved problems, whether we were debating policy in the White House Situation Room or, later, meeting with a business prospect.

My ideas, advice, and support had far less impact than they could have, and I struggled to figure out why. Over coffee in a Milwaukee shop, it finally hit me as I offered advice and my prospect shook her head. “You’re not hearing me.”

I thought I served people best by contributing ideas and finding silver linings in troubled situations. I thought I was being supportive, but people took it as being tone-deaf, self-centered, and out of touch. I was devastated.

It’s in the Heart of the Receiver

The wake-up call helped me realize that the quality of communication isn’t in the mouth of the sender; it’s in the heart of the receiver. The listener’s experience matters more than the speaker’s intention when it comes to getting things done.

No matter how brilliant (or not) my idea might have been, if the receiver’s heart registered, “I don’t feel heard,” the transmission would simply bounce off like a rock skipping across water. People don’t feel safe when they feel that you don’t get them, so the heart stays guarded, and your ideas go nowhere.

Looking back on my Afghanistan days, I recognized that listening to understand made people feel heard and safe, which opened the heart to cooperation. Why not apply that at home?

Listening to Understand

I’ve seen four modes of listening. Distracted Listening occurs when your mind is on your smartphone or task, so you barely register what the other person is saying. Listening to Respond occurs when someone triggers a reply in your head, and you focus on formulating your response instead of listening to the rest of their point. When people talk past each other in meetings (like I saw repeatedly in the White House Situation Room), they are probably in this mode. Listening to Win is the more sinister twin of the previous, where you formulate your response to show how smart you are and how dumb the other person is.

Listening to Understand is when you focus your attention on what the other person has to say. It’s particularly powerful when you paraphrase what you heard and ask, “Did I get that about right?” When the answer is yes, explore their ideas with open-ended questions and invitations, like “What outcomes do you want to achieve?” and “Tell me more about ___.”

I also learned to resist the urge to give unsolicited advice or identify silver linings unless the person asks for it. Sometimes people just want their point of view understood. Other times they want a shoulder to lean on. Asking, “What would ideal support from me look like?” shows how you can help. If they reply, “I’d like to get your advice on this,” they will receive what you say with an open heart.

I invite you to try this approach at work and at home. Comment below and let me know how it works for you.

Listening to Understand Graph - blog on The High Cost of Bad Listening.
Blog on Time Management Isn’t the Real Problem: This Is.

Time Management Isn’t the Real Problem: This Is

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Most leaders come to me thinking they have a time management problem. They have too much on their plates, feel stressed out, and don’t have the bandwidth for strategy, growth, culture, and other matters vital to creating the future.

After a short discussion, you recognize that overload is only a symptom. The core issue: Your leadership strengths often create your biggest challenge: dependency.

No one knows the business as you do. People trust your judgment. They value your approval. Bringing problems to you produces quick answers. Being helpful feels productive and rewarding.

Over time, those well-intentioned interactions create an invisible system of dependence. Eventually, your company outgrows your ability to be the hands-on hero. You become the bottleneck. Everything feels harder. The organization’s pace slows to match your decisions.

When you’re busy helping everyone else do their jobs, who’s doing yours?

What If?

What if your organization could generate momentum on its own?

Imagine a business where people at every level understand the destination, make sound decisions, solve problems, and take disciplined initiative to advance the common good. You go from feeling trapped in day-to-day management to being liberated to focus your best energy on strategy, growth, and the future.

An earlier newsletter discussed the three levels of dependency: problem-solving, decision-making, and strategic. The diagram below helps you diagnose why dependency is showing up.

The lower left is Persistent Paralysis. Strategic Clarity exists mainly in your head, and your team is reluctant to take initiative. Leaders facing this situation typically deal with all three levels of dependency.

Learned Helplessness occurs when you have high Strategic Clarity but low levels of Team Initiative. Servant Leadership often winds up here. People come to you for permission to do things they should be able to do on their own, and you enable the behavior.

Situations with high Team Initiative but low Strategic Clarity lead to Fragmented Efforts. Sometimes it’s a chaotic culture with the office alphas pursuing their own agenda. I’ve also seen this effect in highly uncertain situations where people pursue disparate efforts. This situation can be positive as people experiment, and you quickly determine the best way forward.

Team-Powered Momentum results from clear strategic direction and high team initiative. You become the pilot, guiding a ship that is functioning effectively: solving problems, making routine decisions, and proactively innovating and anticipating your next moves.

What opportunities would that situation provide you?

Graph on time management and dependency.

My Scar Tissue Is Your Short Cut

I’ve walked a mile in your shoes and experienced the costs of dependency firsthand. I’m a recovering “servant leader” who learned that being service-centric is a much healthier place. Over time and after many mistakes, I developed a repeatable process to create disciplined team initiative.

Those lessons shaped how I led 800 paratroopers in one of Afghanistan’s most dangerous regions. The culture we created helped earn the trust of a skeptical population and motivated a major insurgent group to stop fighting and become an ally.

Since then, I’ve advised 4-star generals, cabinet secretaries, NFL teams, CEOs, and senior leaders on building team-powered momentum. I’ve distilled those lessons into the 3-Discipline Leadership System™.

Time Compounds All Things

Dependency invariably leads to drift, and the longer you drift, the harder getting to Team-Powered Momentum becomes. You are as close to achieving that outcome today as you will ever be.

When you replace dependency with team-powered momentum, you gain the time, energy, and confidence to focus on what only you can do: create the future. The 3-Discipline Leadership System™ aligns people around a common playbook, creating unbeatable positioning, an unstoppable workforce, and unwavering inspiration that fuels lasting prosperity.

Prosperity-Builders like you deserve to go from owning a job to owning a business and having the life you desire.

Blog on It’s OK to Have a Happy Memorial Day

It’s OK to Have a Happy Memorial Day

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The Memorial Day scolds come out annually. You can honor the day in your own way.

Today, I will be remembering the six paratroopers from my unit killed in action in Afghanistan. Their names are Private First Class Chris Pfeifer, Sergeant Adrian Hike, Specialist Jacob Lowell, Staff Sergeant Ryan Fritsche, Captain Dave Boris, and Major Tom Bostick. I invite you to watch this video about their service and sacrifice.

They died in places I directed them to go, following the orders I gave. One of the sacred responsibilities of combat leadership is to put your people in a position to succeed, knowing that the enemy acts of their own will and that you cannot control outcomes. You, alone, carry that weight, and yet, you do not have to be alone in carrying it. Each loss tore a hole in my emotional heart.

Memorial Ceremony honoring Major Tom Bostick and Staff Sergeant Ryan Fritsche, August 2007, Camp Keating, Afghanistan.

Memorial Ceremony honoring Major Tom Bostick and Staff Sergeant Ryan Fritsche, August 2007, Camp Keating, Afghanistan.

I’ll also be remembering those who have died from the effects of their wartime service – the diseases, suicides, overdoses, and other deaths of despair. Like nearly every combat unit, we’ve lost more to those causes than we did to enemy fire. Those deaths tear holes and leave scar tissue, too.

I’ve discovered another heart – a spiritual one. It was always there, but I’d kept it locked up and carefully guarded behind walls. I didn’t know that I was slowly suffocating it. Getting the right support cracked open those walls and gave me the courage to tell the sentinels to stand down.

I discovered my spiritual heart is a fire. Flames ignited in the fresh air when I opened up the walls. I call it my burning heart. The brighter those flames burn, the more warmth and light they produce.

Cultivating that flame provides the power to hold the sadness and joy, to remember the past but not be controlled by it, to honor the fallen and support the living. To me, Memorial Day is about that, too. The Saber Six Foundation is an expression of that burning heart. So is my personal and professional life.

Today, I will remember those who gave their lives defending our country and way of life. I will also enjoy the happiness of spending time with my family and friends, and reminiscing with my comrades. I can do all of these things, freely, and commemorate Memorial Day in my own way because Americans like these have defended our right to do so.

I invite you to hold Memorial Day and give it to others in a way that works for you. A memorial, by definition, is an act, symbol, observance, or place dedicated to honoring and remembering those who died in service to the nation. There’s no mandate for the emotions you are supposed to feel.

You have sovereignty. You are free, to paraphrase my friend and mentor Michelle Villalobos, to feel the emotions you feel and to cultivate the emotions you want to feel.

To Memorial Day.

Blog on Exclusive Invitation from Chris

Exclusive Invitation From Chris

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If you advise executives, you already know the ceiling on their capacity becomes the ceiling on their results. People tend to self-impose an Artificial Growth Limit that solidifies their comfort zone. You and I can do that, too.

How are you expanding your capacity in ways that lead directly to even greater client outcomes?

From September 28 to October 1, I am leading a small group of top-level executive advisors through the Antietam and Gettysburg battlefields. Not a history tour. A live laboratory for building executive capacity and performance in a volatile marketplace. It’s the kind of strategic thinking you can put to work with your clients on Monday morning.

Here is the magic I have found: capacity and performance create an upward spiral for leaders. In physical training, more capacity means you can go harder and longer, and the training itself builds more capacity.

Leadership works the same way, with one difference. Biology caps your body. Nothing caps your leadership capacity or your capacity to serve your clients.

You will walk away from this expedition with an even greater capacity to:

  1. Speed up your clients’ wins with visual models that cut through complexity, getting everyone aligned and moving.
  2. Increase client ownership and action by using storytelling and choreography that inspire follow-through.
  3. Lasting bonds with a small circle of remarkable leaders who fuel your growth, sharpen your thinking, and open doors you did not know existed.

If you feel pulled by this opportunity, leave a reply below for more information.

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Blog on how to safely stop micromanaging.

How to Safely Stop Micromanaging

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Breaking the dependency trap is much easier said than done.

Your team trusts your judgment, values your perspective, and seeks your permission. These are clear indicators of respect and admiration. They are also warning signs of dependency.

Let’s face it, weak leaders don’t create dependency. They create avoidance.

Being a strong leader feels good, and so does supporting your people. When they come to you for guidance, approval, and permission, and you give it, they learn to repeat the behavior.

The dependency trap occurs when their need for your guidance, approval, and permission becomes addictive and overwhelms your ability to make the decisions only you can make. When you get tied down in day-to-day management, you don’t have the wherewithal to focus on strategy, growth, and future prosperity. When you carve out time to do so, it’s usually at the expense of your well-being and family.

You recognize the trap, but getting out of it safely is a fearful challenge. If you simply decide one day to stop being a hands-on leader, you will create chaos and confusion. The risk of substantial problems is too great, so you try productivity hacks and other strategies to wring more personal productivity out of each minute. It’s exhausting.

This double-axis chart illustrates the challenge. The lower left indicates inadequate team self-reliance and low leader trust in the team’s capacity, so micromanaging is the safe choice. Simply deciding to let go of the reins while your team remains low on self-reliance invites chaos (lower right).

The upper left is a frustrating scenario. You’ve expanded your team’s capacity for self-reliance while maintaining your hands-on approach. Your team is now producing more, being proactive, and innovating. Your plate piles higher, and you become the choke point, like plaque in a constricted artery.

The upper right is the only scenario where your company acts on its potential. Your team is self-reliant, and you transition from hands-on to eyes-on, hands-off. You can spend your most productive time focused on strategy, growth, and prosperity, confident that your self-reliant, proactive, and accountable team is taking care of day-to-day business.

You go from feeling trapped in micromanaging to being liberated to shape the future and pursue your life’s priorities.

The safe and responsible way forward is to develop your team’s capacity first, and gradually loosen the reins. Supporting you in that process is why I developed the 3-Discipline Leadership System™.

For the CEOs and senior leaders I’m working with now, this System has given them the confidence to let go of day-to-day management and focus on the future, because their direct reports are on the same page and have the skills to manage day-to-day business to the right standards.

If you recognize yourself in this email and want to confidently and competently liberate yourself from dependency, it might be time to use visual models that get everyone on the same page and keep them there in a dynamic marketplace.

Just comment System below, and I’ll send through more information on the 3-Discipline Leadership System™.

Blog on What Do NASA and the NBA Say About Visual Models?

What Do NASA and the NBA Say About Visual Models?

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On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 meaning your employees are rarely on the same page, and 10 meaning your employees act and adapt to change in harmony, how would you rate your organization?

A recent NASA study noted that shared mental models are the main factor differentiating exceptional teams from average ones. Author and podcaster, Shane Parrish, likewise describes the importance of mental models in getting everyone on the same page.

The challenge with mental models is the extent to which they are actually shared. What if two people name the same model but visualize it differently? What happens when the situation is dynamic rather than static?

These questions are precisely why NBA coaches use diagrams, or visual models, and why I invite you to do the same.

Blog on What Do NASA and the NBA Say About Visual Models - Basketball Example

This sketch was built by my Chatbot.

A good visual model allows your employees to:

  • See the big picture,
  • See themselves in relation to it,
  • See themselves in relation to their colleagues, and
  • Envision how everyone adapts in dynamic circumstances.

Imagine if you and your employees had shared visual models not only for process flow but also for more intangible matters like communication, expectations, proactivity, accountability, and initiative?

What would having everyone on the same page allow you to do that you don’t have the time or energy to do now?

Let’s face it, when you are trapped in day-to-day management, you neglect doing what everyone relies on you to do: focus on strategy, growth, and building enduring prosperity. You try to do them at the end of the day or on weekends, when you are not at your best, and you sacrifice time for family, friends, and other priorities.

I know. I’ve been there.

The dependency trap sabotages your future. I learned that the road from feeling trapped to liberated is to get everyone on the same page about leadership skills, as well as strategy and operations.

Shared visual models unlocked self-reliant, proactive, and accountable teams that thrived in combat and business.

Across research (McKinsey, Gallup, Harvard Business Review), you consistently see differences like this:

  • 2X-3X higher revenue growth.
  • 20%-30% higher profitability.
  • 2X higher employee engagement.
  • 25%-50% lower turnover.

These visual models are so powerful that I’ve developed scores of them in my 3-Discipline Leadership System™.

For the CEOs and senior leaders I’m working with now, this System has given them the confidence to let go of day-to-day management because their direct reports are on the same page and have the skills to implement the System. These CEOs and senior executives focus on the future, knowing the daily tasks are in good hands.

If you recognize yourself in this blog and want to confidently and competently liberate yourself from dependency, it might be time to use visual models that get everyone on the same page and keep them there in a dynamic marketplace.

Just leave a reply below, and I’ll send through the information.

Blog Why Re-Read Your Favorite Book

Why Re-Read Your Favorite Book?

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Why re-read Tolkien? The books are the same, but you are different.

Last week’s article discussed self-imposed limits on our growth, what I called AGL: Artificial Growth Limitations.

Did you know that breaking these self-imposed limits can include repeating important experiences, such as rereading great books or revisiting powerful historical sites?

I periodically reread my favorite books, like Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, Plato’s Republic, Tolstoy’s War and Peace, and Homer’s The Iliad and the Odyssey, because I always derive new insights to apply.

Rereading The Lord of the Rings recently showed me a new way to appreciate Gandalf, the wizard who served as a guide and mentor to Frodo and Aragorn.

Gandalf rarely imposed his answers, because he knew that his protégés would be more likely to follow through on challenging decisions if the solutions were theirs. He would let them wrestle with the matters for a while, working through the situations and options, while providing nudges and wisdom along the way.

This insight struck me professionally and improved how I support you. I used to rapid-fire solutions, thinking that providing immediate answers was the best way to serve. I realized that doing so denied you the opportunity to wrestle with the matter.

Gandalf showed me that it’s more important for you to have a good solution you own than for someone to provide you with a better one you don’t.

I’ve read The Lord of the Rings well over a dozen times, and new insights emerge each time. To paraphrase Heraclitus, you never step into the same river twice, because it’s no longer the same river and you are no longer the same person.

Here’s the twist: The Lord of the Rings is the same, but you are different, so you experience the work differently, as if it were a different book.

I’ll call it the Heraclitus Principle of Growth: you never have the same experience twice if you derive new insights and apply them.

Heraclitus Principle of Growth graph - blog on Why Re-Read Your Favorite Book?

Six points are essential as you move along the infinity loop of growth.

  1. Observation: What are you actually experiencing?
  2. Interpretation: What meaning(s) do you derive from it?
  3. Discernment: What meaning matters most?
  4. Experimentation: What will you try?
  5. Execution: What did you implement?
  6. Reflection: What did you learn?

What great book, adventure, historical site, or awe continues paying new dividends for you?

Blog on AGL

Are You Limiting Your Own Growth?

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The most troublesome limits are the ones we impose on ourselves.

What Is Your AGL?

I did a lot of work with aircraft in the military, and setting the above-ground levels (AGL) was vital for deconflicting airspace shared by drones, helicopters, jets providing close-air support, and artillery. We would often provide lower and upper limits so each aircraft could operate with confidence knowing that everything else was operating safely above or below them.

There’s another AGL that affects you directly. It’s the Artificial Growth Limitation you impose on yourself that creates a comfort zone. Your AGL is based on common, often interrelated, fears, such as:

  • Fear of Failing. You fear that going beyond your AGL is where people watch you fall on your face, and you’ll feel foolish for trying.
  • Fear of Social Judgment. You fear that people will judge you for trying new things or growing outside of the box they have created for you.
  • Fear of Being Wrong. You overthink your personal and professional growth, fearing that you will try something new that won’t work perfectly.
  • Fear of Old Narratives. You fear that breaking through your AGL creates imposter syndrome. “You’re not cut out for this.”

When you feel these fears, it’s natural to retreat into your comfort zone. When you do so, your AGL thickens, like a protective shell, and actually shrinks your comfort zone. You’ve seen this with people who are “set in their ways,” unwilling to try new things or experiences, who procrastinate, and who become increasingly risk-averse.

Transformation zone graph - blog on Are You Limiting Your Own Growth?

Busting Your Self-Imposed AGL

But there’s another option when you feel these fears. You can recognize them as signals that you are bumping up against a self-imposed AGL. The fears are a signal that you need different kinds of support and capacity to punch through successfully.

Unlike military AGLs, where breaking them heightens the risk of mid-air collisions, busting your self-imposed AGL magnifies your growth and impact.

Courage is not the absence of fear; it’s the willingness to move forward while feeling it. Busting your AGL requires the courage to try new things and to ask for the support you need to navigate discomfort successfully and reach new transformations.

What AGLs are you ready to bust?

Blog on Hegseth’s Military Purge Shows the Value of Viewpoint Diversity.

Hegseth’s Military Purge Shows the Value of Viewpoint Diversity

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When you surround yourself with people who tell you what you want to hear, you develop a taste for silliness.

Army Chief of Staff Randy George became the last casualty in Secretary Hegseth’s war against uniformed senior leaders (Randy George and I served at the same time in Afghanistan in 2009 and have some friends in common, but we do not know each other well). In just over a year, at least a dozen three- and four-star officers have been dismissed from the services. It is a purge. I spoke about the matter on TV here.

As I’ve mentioned before, I want Secretary Hegseth to be successful and for the Department to thrive. The alternative is too troubling to fathom. I firmly believe in civilian control of the military, and Secretary Hegseth has the authority to promote, retain, and dismiss the Department’s senior leaders. It’s not a question of CAN, but SHOULD.

The pretext for George’s firing is a promotion list to brigadier general. Hegseth wanted five officers struck from the list, including two women and two black men. George, rightly fearing for the integrity of the Army’s promotion system, wanted to discuss the matter in person with Hegseth. The meeting never occurred, but the request brought about the firing.

What’s troubling is the very clear signal Hegseth is sending: disagreement is intolerable.

Strong Leaders, Strong People

Did you ever notice that strong leaders surround themselves with strong people? They have the self-confidence to seek out the best people for their team. They welcome respectful disagreement because it is the source of innovation and better ideas.

I remember getting into a substantial disagreement with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta about Afghanistan. I did not know him well at the time, but figured that he deserved to know one of his assumptions was wrong.

An hour or so later, I received a message from his Chief of Staff. I opened it, fearing the worst. “There are 20,000 people in this building who will agree with anything the Secretary says,” his chief wrote. “He appreciates how you stood your ground and told him your point of view.”

Weak leaders, by contrast, surround themselves with weak people who don’t threaten the leader’s self-confidence. They seek out people who agree with them and do their bidding.

To curry favor, their subordinates tell the leader what they want to hear and how wise they are. The most savvy ones play to your impulses, dragging you into your own fever-swamp.

Soon, you are admiring your own clothes and aroma.

Avoiding the Hegseth Trap

The military culture is sound enough to withstand a short period of top-level viewpoint conformity, but I worry the Secretaries who follow will implement the same playbook as payback.

Ambitious senior uniformed officers will see the game for what it is, and curry favor, leading to a politicized military that no longer offers professional military advice. Such sycophancy undermines the profession and puts people’s lives at needless risk.

Here’s my question to you: Are you moving toward the Hegseth trap? How often do people disagree agreeably? How quickly do they flag problems and nip them in the bud? When did you last hear a fresh idea or example of someone trying new things?

You have to be intentional about creating a culture of respectful candor and vigilant in maintaining it. This is particularly true as your company grows and you become more senior. Left unchecked, you suddenly find that you are getting better looking every day, your jokes are funnier, and your decisions increasingly wise.

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Small Ball; Big Wins

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It’s Opening Day for the 2026 baseball season, so I captured this interview with my friend, Kansas City Royals broadcaster Joel Goldberg.

Leaders tend to look for breakthrough strategies in moments of doubt. More often, it’s the fundamentals that decide the outcome.

Joel has spent more than 30 years watching this play out. As the voice of the Kansas City Royals, he’s seen championship teams and struggling ones operate under the same conditions with very different results. His lens is baseball, but what he really observes is how people perform together over time.

He captured these insights in his new book, Small Ball, Big Dreams.

Control What You Can Actually Control

Joel’s career didn’t begin with opportunity; it began with rejection … twenty-five times. He couldn’t control whether anyone hired him, but he could control whether they remembered him.

“I couldn’t decide whether they were going to hire me or not,” he told me. “But I could certainly decide whether they knew about me.”

So he picked up the phone, a landline back then, and started calling TV stations across the country, telling them he’d be “passing through town.” Once they agreed to meet, he made it true, driving across state lines to shake hands and deliver his demo tape.

That decision changed his trajectory. It also highlights something leaders often overlook: we spend too much time worrying about outcomes we don’t control and not enough time tightening the behaviors that actually drive them.

Joel put it plainly:

“When outcomes are uncertain, you have to control the controllables. You can control output. You can control effort. You can control the way you treat people.”

The problem with judging success by the outcome is that you often end up rewarding luck.

Joel Goldberg - Blog on Small Ball; Big Wins

Your “Perfect” Answer Can Be the Problem

Leaders often assume their job is to provide the best answer. In practice, that instinct can undermine the very performance you’re trying to improve. Your team’s decent solution is often better than your perfect one, because they own it. And because they own it, they will see it through successfully.

Joel’s story reflects the same principle from a different angle. He didn’t wait for someone to hand him an opportunity; he acted in a way that made people respond. That ownership mattered more than someone else’s perfectly scripted plan.

When people take ownership, you get commitment. Commitment leads to follow-through, which creates success.

Talent Helps. Fit Decides.

Joel has watched enough teams to recognize a consistent pattern. Talent draws attention, but fit determines whether that talent translates into performance.

“Having the most talented people is great,” he said, “but they better fit from a personality and culture standpoint.”

Joel has seen teams with strong talent gel and win championships. He’s also seen talent-packed teams come apart at the seams.

“I’d rather have less talent that fits than a little more talent that doesn’t.”

Misfit talent erodes trust, drains energy, and weakens standards until the effects become difficult to reverse. Fit isn’t static. It requires attention, curiosity, and a willingness to see what’s actually happening rather than what you hope is happening.

“Never stop asking. Never stop listening. Know your people.”

This Is a Relationship Business

Near the end of our conversation, Joel made a point that applies far beyond baseball:

“I’m in the relationship business, not the baseball business.”

Most leaders would agree with that statement. The challenge is living it consistently.

You spend a great deal of time on strategy and growth, but execution lives in how people treat one another, uphold standards, and do what’s right.

These are small things. They don’t always show up immediately on a dashboard, but they shape whether the larger strategy works. Your culture might not actually eat strategy for breakfast, but it can make your strategy unexecutable.

The Long Game Is Built Quietly

Signature successes are usually the result of small decisions executed well. You win by amassing the fundamentals: hitting, pitching, and fielding, rather than with the occasional home run.

The opposite is also true. Poorly executed fundamentals amass over time into bad habits that require enormous energy to correct.

One of the best ways to prevent crises and reduce over-reliance on you is to set and enforce clear standards on the fundamentals. As Joel tells us, small ball creates big wins.

Chris Kolenda and Joel Goldberg - Blog on Small Ball; Big Wins