Is Your Vision Unwittingly Blinding You?
The article launches a four‑part series called “Understanding Your Strategic Lens,” beginning with the Visionary lens that many CEOs wear as a badge of honor. It explains how optimism, abstraction and overconfidence biases can blind visionary leaders to immediate, high‑impact problems such as underperforming teams or cash‑flow gaps. By framing the lens as both an asset and a liability, the piece urges CEOs to recognize the blind spots their preferred thinking creates. A preview of the next installment promises to explore the Operator lens and practical “lens‑check” tools for better decision‑making.
When Did You Last Audit Your Value Proposition?
The article urges leaders to regularly audit their value proposition, noting that AI‑driven buyer expectations are shifting faster than many firms realize. It cites Domino’s 2009 turnaround—publicly confronting poor product perception, overhauling its pizza, and then achieving over 2,000% stock...
Are You the Thermostat or the Thermometer?
The piece uses Martin Luther King Jr.’s thermometer‑vs‑thermostat metaphor to challenge CEOs on whether they merely reflect external pressures or deliberately set their organization’s tone. It argues that leaders who tie company outcomes to their personal identity become emotional thermometers,...
Are You Solving the Noisiest Problems Instead of the Right Ones?
The article warns that leaders often chase the loudest, most urgent issues instead of the problems that drive long‑term growth. It argues that this default triage mindset stems from a brain wired for crisis response, causing strategic challenges to be...
Are You Building a Strategic Culture?
The final article in the “Building Strategic Capacity in Your Leadership Team” series argues that culture, not just strategy, determines whether strategic thinking spreads beyond the CEO. It outlines three levers—intention, repetition, and recognition—that embed strategic thinking into agendas, performance...
Are You Developing Your Team’s Thinking? Or Merely Harvesting It?
The article warns that many CEOs unintentionally train their leadership teams to harvest answers rather than develop strategic thinking. By asking fast, operational questions, leaders encourage quick responses and discourage deep judgment, especially as AI offers instant answers. The piece...
Are Your Leaders Pushing Back? Or Starting to Think Strategically?
The fourth article in the "Building Strategic Capacity in Your Leadership Team" series explains how leaders transition from pure execution to strategic competence by learning to evaluate trade‑offs. Stage 2, where leaders begin questioning the cost of saying yes, often appears...
Are You Building Strategy or Building Strategists?
The article, the second in a six‑part series on building strategic capacity, argues that most CEOs treat strategy as an occasional activity rather than a core capability. Operational leaders often excel at execution but lack the "strategic bone" needed for...
Is Your Value Obvious to Buyers, or only Obvious to You?
The article warns that tech leaders often assume their product’s value is self‑evident, falling prey to the false consensus bias. CEOs and sales teams overload prospects with technical details instead of translating benefits into the buyer’s language. When value isn’t...