Leadership begins with you, but it is not about you.
Justin came in with leadership experience already behind him, which is its own kind of challenge. Nobody was going to teach him the basics. Instead, the program gave him a mentor and a dedicated, protected block of time to look at how he was leading, rather than simply continuing to lead.
What came out of it was a shift in focus. He talks about people being how the work actually gets done, about opening avenues for informal feedback, and about a clear-eyed observation: a group of genuinely good individuals will still underperform without a good leader. The excellence is not in the people alone. It is in what the leader makes possible between them.
When did you last get uninterrupted time to think about how you lead, rather than just leading?
