Why does strategic thinking always lose to the inbox? It's not a discipline problem; it's an evolutionary one. Our brains are wired for immediate threats like bushfires, not slow-moving opportunities. Explore the miscalibration between urgency and importance, and why willpower alone can't fix a system designed for the wrong environment

True gravitas isn't about dominating the room or winning arguments; it's about the quiet confidence of knowing you belong. Explore the difference between presence and performance... a guide to showing up authentically without the armour.

If your team is afraid to outshine you, you are the problem. True leadership isn't about being the smartest person in the room; it's about building a room where talent can exceed yours. Learn why pruning high performers destroys innovation and how to stop being the toxic boss who fears their team’s success.

The "open door" policy sounds enlightened but has two failure modes: the people who are too intimidated to use it, and the people who overuse it. Neither group is prioritising your impact. Why structured access beats open access, and how replacing the open door metaphor with a designed system makes you more available for what matters, not less.

Discover how invisible mental metaphors shape your leadership decisions. From "battle" to "orchestra," learn to spot the unconscious frames that limit your options and how to swap them for better outcomes. A guide to challenging the mental models running your work and life

The hub model of leadership breaks down at scale. Four practical shifts for moving from single hub to architect of a network with multiple, autonomous nodes, and why the decisions only you can make are the ones that carry the most weight.

When leaders move from a hundred people to several thousand, personal influence stops scaling and the old instincts start creating bottlenecks. A practical look at the shift from hub to architect, and why your success at scale should be measured by your absence

Confusing resilience with endurance is a costly leadership error. While hard work is needed and shareholder pressure is real, treating your team's capacity to suffer as a permanent strategy is a ticking clock. Discover why true resilience requires recovery and proactive system changes, not just grit. A direct look at the hidden risks of "endurance culture."

If your day gets filled by whatever arrives first, loudest or most recently, other people’s urgency or inefficiency become your operating model. That’s not high performance.

A very strong theme that comes through from almost every senior leader I work with is the desire to spend more time on thinking creatively and strategically. Here’s a simple set of triage questions that can be surprisingly powerful in helping you prioritise in the moment.

The clearest view of your work often comes right after you step away. It doesn’t last long.

From time to time, I will have a meeting with a potential client about working with them or their team.

Want to know a big red flag?

Sometimes pushing back can be particularly challenging when a stakeholder is angry and/or powerful. It requires a delicate balance between maintaining the relationship and respecting your own limits. Here are 5 strategies that you can use to push back effectively in these difficult situations.

Dispositional attribution vs situational attribution.

If someone else does something wrong in their role as a leader, we tend to attribute it to their disposition. But if we do, we attribute it to the situation. I explore the difference in this week’s blog…

Imagine two circles. One represents you, one represents your role at work. How much overlap is healthy?

Here’s an exercise to help you answer that question.

Learning and growth require stretch and discomfort AND rest and consolidation

In the zeitgeisty rush to get out of our comfort zones, don’t forget to head back there sometimes for a little R&R.

Being trusted as a leader takes more than good intent or credibility. Inside teams, trust is shaped by how you show up, what you prioritise, and what you are willing to say out loud, even when it feels uncomfortable.

Most high performers think of rest as something they’ll get to after the work is done. But neuroscience shows that recovery isn’t the reward for performance; it’s the prerequisite.
When we’re under-recovered, the very parts of the brain that handle judgement, emotional regulation and perspective shut down. If you’re leading from a tired brain, you’re flying without the tools you need most.

Like many of you, today’s my last day of work before the break. I’ll be offline until mid-January, and then heading straight into a long-planned sabbatical in Paris - three months of language school, dark and cold days, many pastries... to say I am excited is something of an understatement.

One of the reasons I love travelling is that it nudges my brain out of its well-worn grooves. What’s encouraging is that you don’t need a long-haul flight to access that shift. You can recreate many of the same effects in the middle of your ordinary week. Here are five ways travel helps your brain, and how to bring those benefits home.