
7 Unexpected Ways to Exceed Expectations
The article outlines seven practical ways leaders can exceed expectations by intentionally breaking everyday rituals. It first highlights the seven joys of ritual—predictability, stability, energy, freedom, trust, speed, and belonging—showing how routines free mental bandwidth. It then proposes specific disruptions, from turning greetings into personal probes to encouraging managers to ask where they create friction. By inserting surprise into familiar patterns, organizations can boost engagement, creativity, and performance.

Joe Liemandt: Alpha School and the Future of Education
Serial entrepreneur Joe Liemandt, founder of Trilogy Software and ESW Capital, has launched Alpha School with a $1 billion investment in AI‑driven learning. The model delivers two hours of personalized AI instruction each day, allowing students to master material before moving...

Strategy Deployment: Are You Playing Catch Ball or Chucking Rocks?
The article contrasts two approaches to strategy deployment: the collaborative "catch ball" method, where goals flow down and feedback flows up, versus the authoritarian "chuck rock" style that pushes top‑down targets without input. It illustrates how catch ball refines metrics—like...

🏋🏾 The Personal Bottleneck
The post warns that founders and executives often become the very bottleneck that stalls growth, as personal capacity hits its limit. It introduces a self‑assessment framework across three categories—Decision Tax, Control Trap, and Internal OS—rating habits that drain time and...

Power Vacuum at Oxnard College
Oxnard College is facing an unprecedented leadership vacuum as President Roberto Gonzalez and the vice president of business services have been placed on leave, while two other senior positions remain vacant. Interim administrators have been appointed, marking the first time...
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The Barriers to Collaboration [Survey]
The post introduces a 20‑minute, one‑page survey adapted from Morten Hansen’s research to pinpoint why teams fail to collaborate. It outlines four barriers—Not‑Invented‑Here, Hoarding, Search Problems, and Transfer Problems—splitting them into motivation and ability issues. The guide walks leaders through...
Culture Amp: Strong Culture Drives 47% Higher Market Value
Culture Amp unveiled its Performance Culture Quadrant (PCQ), a diagnostic that maps a company’s engagement and performance confidence into four distinct culture states. Research covering 1,800 firms found that organizations in the "Peak Performance" state—high engagement and high confidence—outperformed peers,...
Guns & Rosslyn
Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner is set to announce the next editor‑in‑chief of Politico within days, a move that marks a watershed moment for the 20‑year‑old outlet. The appointment underscores Springer’s broader strategy to build a transatlantic media empire that...

The Psychological Safety Audit
Leadership coaches argue psychological safety cannot be mandated by policy; it emerges from a leader’s everyday demeanor. The new Psychological Safety Audit evaluates what leaders signal, how they react to challenges, and whether team members perceive genuine curiosity. By focusing...

The Feedback Mirror
The post introduces the “Feedback Mirror,” a leadership‑coaching approach that blends Jungian psychology with organizational behavior. It argues that formal feedback captures only what people are willing to say, while the gap between official statements and lived experience holds deeper...

The Conflict Beneath the Conflict
The post argues that most workplace disputes are surface symptoms of deeper psychological dynamics. It highlights how competing needs and threatened identities often drive apparent disagreements over strategy, process, or personality. By applying depth psychology and systems thinking, a leadership...

The Stoic Decision Framework
Leadership coach Jason Rigby outlines a Stoic Decision Framework grounded in the teachings of Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, and Seneca. He argues Stoicism isn’t about denying emotions but about preserving inner stability when external conditions are uncontrollable. The framework separates what...

The Authenticity Gap
Today's leaders often project polished personas that diverge from their private decision‑making realities, creating an authenticity gap. The gap is not about full transparency but about consciously managing the distance between public image and internal truth while preserving integrity. Many...

EBay Appoints HomeAway Co-Founder Brian Sharples to Its Board as the Platform Shifts Its Marketplace Strategy
eBay announced the addition of Brian Sharples, co‑founder and former CEO of vacation‑rental platform HomeAway, to its board of directors, expanding the board to 12 members. Sharples also chairs GoDaddy and has board experience at Yelp, Kayak, Avalara and RetailMeNot,...

Why Business Shortcuts Slow Growth Later
Business leaders often choose shortcuts to meet tight deadlines and investor pressure, but these quick fixes create hidden operational debt. Over time, the accumulated debt forces teams into rework, erodes culture, and makes growth fragile. Experienced COOs counter this by...

What Ethical Leadership Grows
The article argues that ethical leadership is inseparable from everyday business decisions, shaping the culture and outcomes of an organization. It uses the tree metaphor to illustrate how leaders’ actions produce visible "fruit" such as trust, employee engagement, and customer...

How to Communicate Risk to the C-Suite and Board
The NC State ERM Initiative released a practical guide for enterprise risk management leaders on how to communicate risk to the C‑suite and board. It outlines four pillars—focusing the message, structuring the process, designing concise materials, and ensuring messages are...

Chubb's CEO Just Challenged the Entire MGA Model
In its March 17 shareholder letter, Chubb CEO Evan Greenberg labeled managing general agents (MGAs) a "bad bet" and unveiled a four‑year plan to automate roughly 85% of underwriting and claims. The initiative includes cutting about 8,600 positions and targeting...

Jim Mattis & Ryan Holiday: War, Strategy, and Stoic Leadership
In a PBS interview, retired General James Mattis warned that Iran’s regime conducts a total war against its own citizens and the United States, noting the regime’s durability despite internal fragility. He criticized U.S. military strategy as murky, lacking a clear...
Raise Your Assertiveness Dramatically in 90 Minutes
Alan Weiss promotes a 90‑minute live workshop on May 23 that teaches participants how to adopt assertive behavior by shifting underlying self‑worth beliefs. The session, priced at $500, includes role‑playing, language scripts, and case‑study demonstrations. Early registrants (first 15) receive...

Build an /Exec-Review AI Skill to Stop Guessing What Your Leader Wants
A new "/exec-review" AI skill lets product teams capture a leader’s feedback before formal meetings by modeling the executive’s decision‑making style. The skill, demonstrated with a Meta VP’s profile, uses Claude Code to generate concise, voice‑matched comments on documents. Users...

Defeat Negativity
The article reframes negativity as an explanatory habit, contrasting pessimistic (permanent, personal, pervasive) and optimistic (temporary, specific, changeable) lenses. It presents five practical steps for leaders to shift from self‑defeating narratives to constructive optimism, anchored by the ABCDE method. Action...

Stephen Catlin Steps Down as Chairman of Convex Group Board
Stephen Catlin will step down as Chairman of Convex Group Limited but will stay on the board as a director and assume the honorary title of Founder and Life President. In his new role he will continue providing strategic counsel,...

Liberty Specialty Markets Adds Kevin Demmon as Property Divisional Director
Liberty Specialty Markets, a unit of Liberty Mutual, has created a new Property Divisional Director position and appointed Kevin Demmon, effective March 19, 2026. Based in London, Demmon will report to Chief Underwriting Officer Henry Nelson and oversee the UK...

Canadian Lawmakers Blast Air Canada CEO After He Posted English-Only Video Update On Fatal Crash
Air Canada chief executive Michael Rousseau posted a three‑minute video about the fatal AC‑8646 crash that was delivered almost entirely in English, with only a French greeting and subtitles. The incident, which claimed the life of French‑speaking Captain Antoine Forest,...

Wait, That’s My Job | How AI Exposed the Organizational Immune System Nobody Wanted to Talk About
The article argues that generative AI is reshaping organizational dynamics by enabling a single employee to complete work that once required multi‑person committees, triggering a new "That's my job" resistance. It identifies five archetypal personas—Kingdom Keeper, Deep Expert, AI Evangelist...

Abselion Appoints Dale Gordon as Chair
Abselion announced that Dale Gordon will serve as Chair of its Board of Directors, bringing over 30 years of life‑science executive experience. The appointment follows the recent launch of a U.S. subsidiary and aims to strengthen governance as the company...

Aon Names Cedillo Mejía CEO, Commercial Risk & Human Capital, Mexico, Caribbean & Central America
Aon announced that Julio Adolfo Cedillo Mejía will become CEO of Commercial Risk and Human Capital for Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America, effective May 1, 2026. The veteran has spent 22 years at Aon, most recently leading reinsurance operations...

I've Worked for Some Bad Bosses. Here's What I Look For Now.
Tech professionals often overlook warning signs in manager interviews, leading to toxic work environments. The article outlines three key signals: managers who blame departing staff, lack of clear performance criteria, and shifting, undocumented policies. It advises candidates to ask targeted...

Michael Janeke on Big Architectural Projects and Leadership Challenges
Grimshaw’s Sydney studio, led by managing partner Michael Janeke, is preparing to add 30 architects to its over‑100‑person team by July, a move aimed at sustaining its pipeline of large‑scale infrastructure projects. Janeke stresses the difficulty of integrating new talent...

Phreesia Named One of Becker’s Top Places to Work in Healthcare
Phreesia has been named one of Becker’s Healthcare Top Places to Work for 2026, marking its second appearance on the prestigious list. The accolade recognizes the company’s fully remote structure, competitive compensation, flexible time off, home‑office support, generous parental benefits...

When Succession Goes Public: How NextGens Build Legitimacy Beyond the Boardroom
Family businesses are moving succession legitimacy from closed‑door negotiations to public platforms. Next‑generation leaders in markets like China are using short videos, livestreams, and behind‑the‑scenes content to showcase competence and generate measurable value. The article outlines four distinct pathways—narrative reformer,...

Nicole Ozer Named as Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Executive Director
Nicole Ozer has been appointed executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), effective June 1, succeeding long‑time leader Cindy Cohn. Ozer brings two decades of experience in technology‑focused civil liberties law, having led the ACLU’s Technology and Civil Liberties...
Geographic Solutions Named Finalist for 2026 Inspiring Workplaces
Geographic Solutions has been named a finalist for the 2026 Inspiring Workplaces Awards, marking its third consecutive year as a finalist. The company previously made the Top 50 North American list in 2024 and 2025 and earned global Top 100 recognition in...

The Plaque
Tim Cook presented a 24‑karat gold Apple plaque to President Donald Trump in October, a public tribute exchanged for tariff relief on iPhone components. The author argues the plaque symbolizes Apple’s shift from Steve Jobs’s principled “no” stance to a...
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Defense & Aerospace Daily Podcast [Mar 24, 2026] Echodyne’s Eben Frankenberg on Affordable Electronically Scanned Radars
Echodyne CEO Eben Frankenberg explained how the company leveraged breakthrough meta‑material technology to create small, affordable electronically scanned radars for both military and commercial use. Founded in 2014 within Nathan Myhrvold’s Intellectual Ventures, the firm secured $135 million in 2022 funding...

Impact of Global Integration
The article argues that global value clarity and strategic alignment turn disparate teams into a mission‑driven force. It defines an Alignment Spectrum ranging from under‑aligned silos to over‑controlled bureaucracy, with the sweet spot being high purpose clarity and local execution...

Boundaryless Influence
The article argues that modern global leadership must evolve beyond command‑and‑control to embrace cultural intelligence and systemic empathy. Leaders need to shift from a universalist to a contextualist mindset, adapting values to each region’s operating system. Trust is no longer...

Telia Norway Appoints New Head of Consumer Mobile From June
Telia Norway announced that John Sebastian Schmidt Sloerdahl will become head of its consumer mobile division on 1 June, joining the senior management team. He replaces Jonatan Asplin, who shifts to oversee brand, OneCall and Mycall. The move comes as Telia...

Use Audience Projection to Let People Discover Your Feedback
The article introduces “audience projection,” a technique where leaders ask team members to view their work through another’s eyes, prompting self‑discovered feedback. By framing questions that simulate a reader, customer, or junior colleague, leaders help employees uncover insights without direct...

Challenge All Requirements
The article urges leaders to treat every existing requirement as a hypothesis rather than a mandate, encouraging teams to actively challenge and discard rules that lack clear justification. It outlines a four‑step framework—assuming requirements are wrong, identifying the originator, rejecting...

English National Opera Fails to Recruit CEO
The English National Opera (ENO) announced the appointment of Paul Reeve, MBE, as interim chief executive after months of an unsuccessful search for a permanent CEO. Reeve, a former Covent Garden employee and ex‑head of the charity IntoFilm, will start...
Future of Work Leadership Is Changing: From Burnout to Trust, Purpose, and Performance with Kurtis Lee Thomas, Stephanie Chung and...
The Future of Work podcast episode brings together Kurtis Lee Thomas, Stephanie Chung and Jasmine Escalera to argue that employee well‑being, trust‑based leadership and Gen Z expectations are reshaping how organizations succeed. Thomas shows how companies like Nike and NASA are...
The Algorithm: The Five-Step Framework That Drives Business Success
Jon McNeill, former Tesla president and serial entrepreneur, has released "The Algorithm," the first book authored by an Elon Musk direct report. The book outlines a five‑step framework—question, delete, simplify, accelerate, automate—used to drive hypergrowth at Tesla, SpaceX, Lululemon and...

Isaacman, Jared Isaacman
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman was praised at the Washington Space Business Roundtable luncheon for revamping the Artemis lunar program. Rep. Mike Haridopolos called him a “James Bond for America,” noting a dramatic turnaround in NASA’s public sentiment over the past year....

Amazon System Design Interviews: The LP Angle Nobody Mentions
Amazon’s system design interviews embed Leadership Principles (LPs) throughout, meaning candidates are evaluated on ownership, customer obsession, frugality, and more alongside technical skills. Interviewers receive 1‑3 specific LPs to assess, and they ask explicit behavioral questions while watching for implicit...

Piko AI Appoints Steven McElhiney Vice Chairman, Chief Commercial Officer
Piko AI announced the appointment of Steven McElhiney as vice chairman and chief commercial officer. McElhiney will steer the firm’s strategy and industry engagement initiatives. The company combines artificial intelligence and blockchain to tackle inefficiencies and unstructured data challenges in...
How to Eliminate Crazy Busyness
Leadership coach Zena Everett warns that many executives mistake efficiency for effectiveness, leading to "Crazy Busyness." She attributes this to productivity drag—digital interruptions, long meetings, and low‑value tasks—that steal precious time. In her April Vistage Climb webinar, she will teach...

Chubb Appoints New Heads of Property and Casualty in Overseas General Division
Chubb has appointed Ben McGregor and Alex Forman as senior vice presidents to lead its Commercial Insurance Property and Casualty businesses within the Overseas General (COG) division. Both executives assume their roles immediately and will report to EVP John DePeters,...

Harriet Taylor Appointed ZGEBS Head
Zurich has named Harriet Taylor as head of its Global Employee Benefits Solutions (ZGEBS) unit, succeeding Arnau Vila Llavina who has left the firm. Taylor brings more than two decades of experience at Zurich, spanning global proposition development and underwriting....