Work, Considered.

Every Boss Is a Mentor or a Lesson.

Mon, 26 Oct 2026 00:00:00 GMT

If you’ve ever watched Bar Rescue, you know Jon Taffer as the man who walks into a failing bar, looks at the sticky floor and the warm beer, and yells at the owner until a vein appears on his forehead.

He is not the first person I’d expect to quote on kindness at work. But back in 2015, in an interview with Entrepreneur, someone asked Taffer what makes a great leader. He didn’t yell at all. He said this:

The greatest gift of leadership is a boss who wants you to be successful.

— Jon Taffer

Not a raise. Not a corner office. Not pizza on Fridays. A person. Someone who is genuinely, reliably on your side.

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Got a Minute? Here, Hold My Monkey.

Tue, 20 Oct 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Norman, my three-year-old springer doodle, has one rule for life: he must be touching a human at all times. Preferably me.

Norman is large. Norman is clumsy. Norman does not knock. His move goes like this: he walks over and stares at me. Just stares. I keep typing. He keeps staring. And the second I stop paying attention, a giant paw slowly lifts and lands on my lap. No bark, no fuss. Just a paw, a pair of eyebrows, and the clear understanding that whatever I was doing is now on hold.

If the paw doesn’t work, he escalates. He parks his whole body between me and the TV. Or between me and whoever I’m talking to. A big, fluffy, breathing wall with one message: please pay attention only to me.

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Somebody Moved Your Cheese. Quit Guarding the Empty Station.

Thu, 15 Oct 2026 00:00:00 GMT

I’m about to say something that may cost me some credibility with the serious leadership-book crowd: I love Who Moved My Cheese?

Yes, it’s short. Yes, it’s a parable about mice and tiny people running around a maze. Yes, you can read the entire thing on a lunch break and still have time for dessert. That’s exactly the point. The basic ideas in Spencer Johnson’s little book are fantastic, and most of us need them far more often than we need another 400-page leadership brick for the nightstand.

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People Can Smell Fake. Especially at Review Time.

Tue, 06 Oct 2026 00:00:00 GMT

At a previous job, I received a performance review that was about as close to perfect as they come. Top marks across the board. Glowing comments about the kind of leader I was. I walked out of that meeting about ten feet tall, and I may have mentioned it at the dinner table that night. Possibly twice.

Not long after, I learned that the same person had been telling a very different story about me in other rooms. The words I’d been given and the words being shared simply didn’t match.

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Stop Holding Autopsies. Start Taking a Pulse.

Tue, 29 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Picture the scene. A small meeting room. Two chairs. A box of tissues nobody will touch and a clipboard everybody wishes wasn’t there.

Across the table sits one of your best people. They’ve given their two weeks. The desk plant is already in a box. And you, with the very best of intentions, lean in and ask the question: “So… what could we have done differently?”

Friends, that isn’t a conversation. That’s an autopsy.

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AI Is Changing Work. What Are We Making Room For?

Tue, 15 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Setting up the phone line for my new consulting business sounded simple: pick a number, record a greeting, carry on. Then came the question of what callers would actually hear. Was the automated introduction warm enough? Did it sound professional? Did it sound like a real person might answer the phone eventually?

For a brief moment, I had become the executive producer of a fifteen second telephone greeting. The awards ceremony, I assume, is forthcoming.

Technology made the mechanics easier. It could not decide what kind of welcome I wanted to give. The stakes in a phone greeting are low; the stakes in an employment decision are not. Yet the underlying distinction matters in both places: a tool can accelerate the work, while people remain responsible for what the work is meant to accomplish.

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Leadership Leaves a Wake

Tue, 01 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

I have gone camping with my family, which has made me suspicious of the phrase “We are ready to leave.” Ready can mean the bags are packed. It can also mean the bags are packed except for the things we will discover we need later. The phrase is optimistic. I respect that about it.

At work, “We are ready” can be just as flexible. A leader leaves a meeting convinced the plan is clear. Six people leave with seven interpretations and a private conversation about who is actually making the decision.

I have spent much of my career helping leaders through precisely these moments: translating intention into expectations people can act on, and finding out what was heard rather than assuming it. What people experience after a conversation with their manager often matters more than the organization’s carefully polished description of its culture.

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The Organization Is Always Talking. Are You Listening?

Tue, 18 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

For a while, our air conditioner was giving us clues. The basement was cold, the rest of the house was warm, and water was coming out where water had no business coming out. I changed the filter, watched the outdoor unit run, and tried to make sense of the noises. I briefly became the sort of person who says “the fan is definitely doing something” as though this would qualify me to repair it. It did not.

The thermostat offered one neat number while the house told a more complicated story. That is also how a surprising number of organizational dashboards work.

Organizations do this too. The dashboard says turnover is manageable. The engagement survey is broadly positive. The strategic plan has a handsome cover, which is reassuring if the cover is responsible for executing it. Meanwhile, decisions take longer, managers avoid difficult conversations, and people save their most honest observations for the meeting after the meeting.

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