Communication – mardihumphreys.com

Driver Training

Last week we talked about being the driver instead of living like a passenger. I got a great question in response: “Is there anything you can do to prepare for these kinds of situations? Kinda, sorta, like, driver’s training?” I love that! And, you know me, my first thought was, “Let’s make a process!”

Start Here

A process is just a repeatable way of deciding how you’ll act when the outcome is uncertain. Long before anyone gives you a leadership title, you’re making choices about how you respond under pressure, how you treat people, how you handle uncertainty, and what you do when the answer isn’t obvious. Those choices shape your influence. Your influence shapes your leadership. Leadership starts with how you lead yourself. A reliable process gives you something steady to return to when emotions are high, information is incomplete, or people are pulling you in different directions. Instead of depending on your mood at the time, you have a way to think.

Define Your Wins

We tend to define success by the result. For example, the conversation went well, your idea was accepted, the conflict was resolved, or everyone agreed. Those outcomes are satisfying, but they depend on more than you. A stronger measure is how well you handled it because that’s what you control. For example, maybe you:

prepared for a difficult conversation instead of winging it
asked a better question this time
listened more carefully before responding
stayed calm while someone else was frustrated

That’s progress! Self-leadership gets stronger when you measure yourself by the quality of your actions instead of only by whether everything turned out the way you hoped it would. To determine wins you can actually own, ask yourself:

Did I prepare?
Did I communicate clearly?
Did I act in line with my values?
Did I treat people fairly?
Did I make the best decision I could with what I knew?

Practice on the Small Stuff

Good judgment grows through repetition. Every day you have chances to practice. For example:

Someone sends you an irritating direct message. Do you fire back or give yourself a minute?
A teammate asks for help when your plate is already full. Do you automatically say yes or pause and think about what you can realistically give?
A meeting starts going sideways. Do you add to the tension or help bring the conversation back to the issue?

These moments are ordinary and they build leadership habits. Before long, the way you respond becomes more consistent. People begin to know what they can expect from you and that consistency builds trust.

Let It Go

One of the hardest parts of leadership is accepting that a good process does not guarantee a good result. You can communicate thoughtfully and still be misunderstood. You can make a fair decision and still disappoint someone. You can prepare carefully and still get surprised. You can make the best call available and learn something important the next day.

A disappointing result does not automatically mean your judgment was poor. Look at the process behind your decision.

Did you gather all the information you reasonably could?
Did you consider the people affected?
Did you think through the trade-offs?
Did you act in line with your principles?

You are responsible for the quality of your thinking and the integrity of your actions. You are not responsible for controlling every reaction, consequence, or circumstance that follows. That distinction gives you room to learn without endlessly second-guessing yourself.

Review is Part of the Process

Reflection turns experience into better judgment. Keep it simple. A note on your phone works. Over time, patterns will appear. Build a regular habit of asking yourself:

What worked?
What felt off?
What did I miss?
What did I learn about myself?
What would I do differently next time?

Maybe you communicate better after you have had time to think. Maybe you avoid tension until it becomes harder to address. Maybe you are at your best when you ask questions before offering solutions. Those patterns teach you how you lead. And once you can see them, you can improve them.

Pick One

Choose one process-driven habit to practice this week. For example:

Pause before responding when you feel defensive
End the day by writing down one decision you made well and one thing you learned
Ask one more question before giving advice
Take a few minutes before a difficult conversation to decide how you want to show up
When you feel overwhelmed, ask yourself, “What part of this is actually mine to influence?”
Commit to the practice itself

A consistent process gives you something predictable to lean on when circumstances are unpredictable. And the more consistently you lead yourself well, the more likely people are to trust your leadership.

What process helps you make better decisions when the outcome is uncertain? Please share in the comments.

Take the Wheel

Are you a passenger or are you the driver? A passenger goes where the car takes them. A driver takes the wheel. You don’t always get to choose the road. Your company reorganizes. A difficult client changes the scope. Again. Your manager makes a decision you disagree with. The job you once enjoyed starts to feel like a dead end. You may not control any of that. But you do control what you do next.

Who’s Driving?

This week I learned psychologists use the term locus of control to describe how much influence you believe you have over what happens in your life. There are two kinds.

If you have an external locus of control, then you believe outcomes are mostly determined by forces outside you. For example, you tend to think, “There’s nothing I can do. Leadership decides everything. The client is impossible. The company is a mess. I’m stuck.” (Passenger mindset)

If you have an internal locus of control, then you believe your choices and actions can influence your outcomes. For example, you tend to think, “I may not control this situation, but I do control my response.” (Driver mindset)

Sometimes those external locus of control statements contain plenty of truth. Leadership does make decisions you can’t change. Some clients are difficult. Companies will reorganize without asking your permission. You don’t have to pretend those realities don’t exist. At the same time, you also don’t have to allow them to drive your life. Let’s talk about what the different loci of control can look like.

The Difficult Client

Let’s say you have a client who changes direction constantly. You deliver what they asked for on Monday. On Wednesday, they want something different. By Friday, they’re frustrated because the project isn’t moving fast enough. Passenger thinking sounds like: “This client is impossible. There’s no way to please them.” Driver thinking asks: “What can I steer here?” Maybe you document changes in writing. Maybe you clarify who has final approval. Maybe you establish what happens to the timeline when the scope changes. Maybe you bring your manager into the conversation before the project completely derails. You still can’t control the client. But you can control how you manage the client.

The Reorganization

Teams disappear. Reporting structures change. Priorities get moved around like somebody hit the Shuffle button on the org chart. You probably didn’t make the decision, and you probably can’t undo it. Passengers wait to see what happens. Drivers gather information: What does your new team own? What does your manager need from you? Which of your skills are suddenly more valuable? What relationships should you strengthen? What do you need to learn? You may discover the reorganization creates an opportunity. You may also discover it’s time to prepare for something outside the company. Either way, you’re making a decision instead of waiting for one to be made for you.

Feeling Stuck

When you feel stuck in your role, it’s really tempting to tell yourself there are no opportunities, your manager doesn’t notice your work., or nobody has offered you anything better. And, maybe all three are true. Now what? A passenger waits for their manager to recognize them, for an opportunity to appear, or for the company to change. A driver starts looking for what’s available. For example, ask your manager what skills you need for the next level. Volunteer for a project that gives you visibility. Update your resume. Reconnect with former colleagues. Take a course. Apply for a different role. Start conversations with people doing work you’d like to do. No dramatic career move, just clarifying the difference between what you can control and what you can do.

Take the Wheel

Being the driver doesn’t guarantee life will go your way. The best you can do is recognize where your influence begins and use it. When you feel yourself slipping into passenger mode, try this:

Separate: Divide the situation into two categories: what you control and what you don’t. Spend your energy on the former.

Question: When you hear yourself thinking, “There’s nothing I can do,” ask yourself, “Is there anything I can do?” Even one useful action changes your mindset.

Respond: Give yourself a little space between what happens and what you do about it. A frustrating email doesn’t require an immediate frustrated response. (Full disclosure: I’m still learning this lesson.)

Ask: Get information instead of making assumptions. Your brain insists on complete stories. If you don’t have enough information, your mind will make stuff up. Ask your manager about priorities. Ask the client to clarify expectations. Ask what options could exist before deciding there aren’t any.

Act: Take one small step. Schedule the conversation. Document the issue. Update the resume. Learn the skill. You don’t need to control the entire road to make the next turn.

Where do you need to move from the passenger seat to the driver’s seat? Please share in the comments.

That’s the Spirit

I stumbled across a proverb of unknown origin that I haven’t been able to get out of my head:

“Lions and tigers are cool, but you won’t find a wolf in the circus.”

Huh.

I think it means while lions and tigers can represent strength the wolf can represent independence, resilience, loyalty, and/or freedom. It’s an image connected to an ethos.

Your ethos is the distinguishing characteristic, sentiment, moral nature, or spirit behind who you are. It’s the culmination of your experiences and the beliefs you’ve developed because of them. It reflects what you aspire to do and how you behave. Which makes me wonder: How do you know what your ethos is?

What Do You Believe?

You can describe yourself with words like, I value courage. I believe in treating people with respect. I’m dependable. I’m fair. I speak up for what’s right. Do those words match your behavior? For example, you say you value courage, but do you stay quiet when a meeting takes a bad turn? You say you value respect, but when a client disrespects you, do you snap at them? You say you believe in boundaries, but do you agree to every request because you’re afraid of disappointing someone? Your ethos is defined by what you do when what you say about yourself is inconvenient. Your stated ethos is what you believe about yourself. Your demonstrated ethos is what everyone else experiences. When those two things align, leadership happens.

Pressure

Your ethos becomes easiest to see when work gets hard. Let’s say you’re responsible for a project that suddenly starts slipping. The deadline hasn’t moved, senior leadership wants answers, and your inbox looks like it has developed the ability to spontaneously reproduce like Mogwai (Gremlins) getting wet. Do you panic and start blaming people? Do you hide the problem and hope you can fix it before anyone notices? Or do you calmly acknowledge what happened, identify the next decision, and communicate clearly? Pressure reveals which beliefs you actually practice.

Boundaries

Your ethos also shows up in what you’re willing to protect. Maybe you believe good leadership requires sustainable performance. Then your behavior should reflect that belief. When another assignment lands on an already full plate, do you automatically say yes? Or do you say, “I can take that on. Which of my current priorities should move?” Setting a boundary is both a time-management technique and an expression of your ethos. If you believe good work requires focus, then protecting your focus is part of acting on that belief.

Decisions

Ethos becomes especially useful when the right answer isn’t obvious. Your ethos gives you something solid to stand on while making difficult decisions. For example:

You’re choosing between two good candidates
You’re deciding whether to deliver something quickly or ask for more time to improve it
You have information your manager may not want to hear
There may not be a policy telling you exactly what to do

These are all situations where your ethos becomes a decision-making tool. If one of your core beliefs is fairness, ask: Am I being fair, or am I letting convenience, favoritism, or pressure influence me? If it’s courage: What would I do if fear weren’t making this decision for me? If it’s stewardship: Which choice protects the people, resources, and responsibilities entrusted to me?

Conflict

Anyone can be gracious when everyone agrees with them. Conflict is the test. Let’s say a coworker challenges your recommendation in front of the team. Your first instinct may be to defend yourself, interrupt, or mentally begin preparing their performance review despite having absolutely no authority to give them one. Your ethos creates a pause between instinct and action. If you value curiosity, ask a question. If you value respect, listen before responding. If you value courage, address the disagreement instead of avoiding it. Leadership lives in these unexpected moments, even when nobody calls them leadership.

Define Yours

You probably already have an ethos. Have you named it? If not, you may find this exercise useful.

Reflect: Think about experiences that shaped you. What did they teach you about the kind of person you want to be?

Choose: Identify three to five qualities or beliefs that matter most to you. Courage? Curiosity? Compassion? Discipline? Fairness? Independence?

Test: Look at your recent behavior in the past month or quarter. Where are your actions aligned with those qualities or beliefs? Where are they contradicting them?

Apply: Before a difficult conversation or decision, ask, “What would someone with my ethos do here?”

Create a touchstone: Choose an image, object, phrase, or symbol that reminds you of it. Maybe it’s a compass because you want to stay guided by your principles. Maybe it’s an oak tree because you value steadiness. Maybe it’s a wolf.

What image represents your ethos? Please share in the comments.

Someone Is Watching

You probably don’t think of yourself as a role model when you’re answering texts, updating a project plan, or trying to make it through a meeting that should have been an email. But someone is watching how you work. A newer teammate notices how you respond when a deadline slips. A coworker pays attention to whether you share credit. A client remembers how you handled a mistake. A peer may quietly borrow the way you organize meetings, communicate bad news, or protect your time.

If you think you’re not a role model because you don’t have a fancy title, please think again. You often don’t get to choose to be a role model. You get cast because of how you behave when other people are watching. And yes, they are watching. With a little bit of intention, being a role model can help you get promoted more quickly. Here are five qualities that make you the kind of human other humans want to emulate.

Humility

Humility is being confident enough to admit you don’t know something. Let’s say you’re leading a project meeting and someone asks a technical question you can’t answer. You could bluff your way through it and hope nobody notices. Or you could say, “I’m not sure. I’ll find out and get back to you.” That response builds credibility because people learn they can trust your answers. Humility also shows up when someone else has the better idea. If a teammate suggests a faster process, acknowledge it. If a coworker spots a risk you missed, thank them. It seems counterintuitive, but you actually gain authority by recognizing someone else’s contribution because you’re making it safer for people to speak up.

Empathy

Empathy helps you understand what is happening around the work, not just the work itself. Let’s say a coworker misses a deadline. You could immediately assume they’re careless. Or you could ask them what happened before deciding what the problem is. Maybe they were waiting for information from another department. Maybe their workload changed unexpectedly. Maybe the assignment was less clear than you thought. Empathy requires getting enough context to respond intelligently. If you manage people, empathy is crucial. Before piling another assignment onto someone’s workload, ask what they’re already carrying. Before criticizing a quiet direct report for not participating, consider whether your meeting style gives them room to speak. People will actively try to be on a team whose leader treats them with respect.

Service

Being useful is one of the fastest ways to gain respect. Having said that, resist volunteering for every task until your calendar looks like a game of Tetris. Discern what would genuinely help. Maybe you send a new employee the document you wish someone had given you during your first week. Maybe you explain a confusing process instead of telling someone to check the portal. Maybe you notice a teammate is preparing for a major presentation and offer to review their slides. Small acts of service builds trust and business moves at the speed of trust. When you routinely make someone else’s job easier, it triggers the rule of reciprocity. This is when the receiver feels an urge to return the favor. I trust you to use this superpower for good.

Leadership

Leadership is what happens when your behavior makes other people better at their jobs. You can practice it long before anyone gives you direct reports. For example, you demonstrate leadership when a project gets messy and you help clarify the next step. When people are frustrated and you keep the conversation productive, you’re leading. When a mistake happens and you focus on correcting the process instead of finding someone to blame, that’s leadership. You also prove leadership by being consistent. If you tell people to protect their focus time, protect yours too. If you encourage people to take vacation, don’t send them twelve messages while they’re gone. If you say everyone’s input matters, make room for it. People notice what you do more than what you say.

Self-Awareness

Self-awareness means paying attention to how you affect other people. You can only improve the behavior you acknowledge exists. For example, do you tend to dominate meetings because you process out loud? Do your direct messages become abrupt when you’re under pressure? Do you insist on being included in every decision because you’re worried something will go wrong without you? None of these habits automatically make you a bad coworker. They become a problem when you never examine them. Watch for patterns. If people stop contributing to the discussion after you speak, ask yourself why. If coworkers regularly misunderstand your requests, look at how you communicate them. If your team seems hesitant to bring you bad news, consider what happens when someone does.

Your Role Model Self-Audit

At the end of this week, ask yourself:

Did I admit when I didn’t know something?
Did I try to understand someone before judging their behavior?
Did I make a teammate’s work easier?
Did I notice how my behavior affected the people around me?
Did my actions make it easier for others to do good work?

You don’t need to answer yes to every question. That would be suspiciously perfect. Pick one question where your answer makes you uncomfortable and work on that area next week. You’re building your reputation in hundreds of tiny moments. Every meeting, decision, response, and interaction teaches people something about how you operate. Your goal is to teach them something worth learning.

Who is your role model and why? Please share in the comments.

Are You Experienced?

You’ve been in your field for five years. You know the systems, understand the personalities, and can spot a problem before everyone else realizes there is one. People come to you because you get stuff done. That sounds like experience, right? But is it five years of growth or is it the same year repeated five times? Repetition can make you faster and feel more confident. It can help you build good judgment and become a trusted subject matter expert. At the same time, if your work isn’t challenging you, then you may be very busy while your career stands still.

Competent vs Comfortable

Competence is valuable. It’s also comfortable. Why could that be a problem? You meet your deadlines. Your manager rarely needs to check your work. Coworkers rely on you to solve familiar problems. You can complete tasks that once took hours in a fraction of the time.

Once you master a task, you use fewer brain cells to complete it. That makes your day easier, but it also means the work may no longer be building your skills. You are producing more because you know the routine, not because you’re learning something new. You need to ensure being good at your current job helps you prepare for your next one.

More Work Does Not Equal More Experience

Does your workload keep growing, but your abilities don’t? For example, let’s say you prepare six reports every month. Then your manager adds six more. You are now responsible for twice as much work, but you are still using the same skills. That is more volume, not necessarily more development.

Now let’s say you learn how to automate part of the reporting process, identify patterns in the data, and present recommendations to senior leaders. The original task has become a development opportunity because it requires new abilities. More responsibility makes you grow. More repetition makes you tired. Are you being stretched, or are you being weighed down?

Some Warning Signs

Being trusted for a strength is useful. Maybe you are the spreadsheet person, the meeting rescuer, or the calm one who fixes every last-minute crisis. It can turn into a trap when people keep giving you work you have already mastered. Here are a few clues:

Your work rarely makes you uncomfortable.
You already know how to handle nearly every assignment.
You cannot remember the last time you needed to learn something before moving forward.
You are known for one thing.
Your résumé has stopped changing.
Your job title may be different, but your accomplishments sound almost identical to the ones you listed two years ago.
You cannot name a skill you developed recently.

Ask yourself, “What can I do today that I could not do one year ago?” You don’t necessarily need to name a certification, but there should be an answer. Have you learned to manage conflict? Influence leaders? Mentor a colleague? Make decisions with incomplete information?

Three Types of Experience

It can be useful to separate experience into three categories.

Repeated experience is performing the same work under similar conditions. You need this to build mastery.

Expanded experience is doing familiar work with greater complexity, visibility, or responsibility.

Developmental experience is building a capability you can use in future roles.

For examples: Creating the same monthly presentation is repeated experience. Presenting it to executives is expanded experience. Learning how to turn the information into a recommendation that changes a business decision is developmental experience.

Stretch the Work You Already Have

You can build all these types of experience today. Start by adding one stretch element to familiar work. For example, lead the meeting instead of preparing the notes. Present the recommendation instead of only gathering the information. Train a coworker instead of remaining the only person who knows the process. Ask to participate in planning instead of waiting for someone to hand you the final assignment.

You can also request experience. In your next 1:1 with your manager, instead of telling them you want to improve your leadership skills, you could request to build experience by leading a cross-functional project. Find out if there Is an upcoming initiative where you could own part of the work. Even if there isn’t one right away, now your manager knows to think of you when assigning the next one. A course can teach you concepts. You need a real assignment to prove you can apply them.

Audit Your Experience

Review your projects and calendar from the last six months. Label each major activity as repetition, expansion, or development. If most of your work falls into the repetition category, do not panic. Treat that information as a prompt.

Choose one skill you want to strengthen and look for a practical way to use it. Volunteer to facilitate a discussion, mentor a new employee, improve a process, learn a new tool, or present your work to a different audience.

Aim for one meaningful stretch experience each quarter. Four new experiences a year can change the direction of your career especially when they build on each other.

Your experience should compound. Each year should add better judgment, broader skills, stronger relationships, and/or the ability to solve more complex problems.

What type of experience has helped you build your career in the past year? Please share in the comments.

Keep It Moving

Let’s say you met with three interesting people last week. You had good conversations. You exchanged ideas. Maybe somebody even said, “We should definitely stay in touch.” Fantastic! A calendar full of one-on-one meetings makes you feel productive.

What exactly did you produce?

Networking supports business development, but they aren’t the same thing. Networking helps you build relationships. Business development requires you to understand where there may be a need and you intentionally move the relationship toward an appropriate next step.

This does not mean you turn every one-on-one into a sales pitch. (Please don’t.) Just be mindful to deliberately move through three relationship stages: connection, relevance, and action.

Connection

This is the know part of the know-like-trust factor. The first part of a one-on-one conversation should still feel like a conversation between two humans. Learn what the other person does. Ask about their work. Find out what they care about.

Good questions help you understand context, avoid misunderstandings, spot roadblocks, and build rapport. Your questions should be clear, specific, and asked with a goal in mind. Instead of spending 45 minutes comparing career histories, ask questions that reveal what is happening in their business right now. For example:

What are clients asking you for most right now?
What are you trying to grow this year?
What is getting harder in your business?
What kinds of problems keep landing in your inbox?

Then listen. Don’t spend their answer time mentally rehearsing your pitch. Actively listen to understand what they’re telling you and use what you hear to formulate your follow-up questions. Because that’s where business development starts to get interesting.

Relevance

This is the like part of the know-like-trust factor. Once you understand what’s happening in their business, look for where your work may be relevant. Listen for sentences like:

We’re expanding.
Our team is overwhelmed.
We’re struggling with…
Our clients keep asking us for…
I wish we had someone who could…

Resist the temptation to launch into a five-minute description of everything you sell. Instead, get curious. For example, you could ask a follow-up question like:

You mentioned your team is struggling with that. What is making it so difficult?
How are you handling it now?
What happens if that problem does not get solved?

Now you’re learning whether there is a genuine business problem, how important it is, and whether you may be able to help.

They start to like you when they clearly see how you can relieve their pain. This is the appropriate time to make your work easy to understand. If someone leaves your one-on-one knowing you’re a consultant whose organization does several things involving strategy, communications, leadership, and organizational effectiveness, then they don’t know what problem sends someone to you. Try something like: I help companies solve X so they can achieve Y. Or: The people who usually call me are dealing with X. That gives the other person something memorable with language they can repeat when they encounter someone who needs you.

Action

This is the trust part of the know-like-trust factor. You had a wonderful one-on-one. You both said you should get together again. That was six months ago. Business development requires movement. The next step doesn’t have to be, Would you like to hire me? It might be:

I know someone you should meet. Would an introduction be useful?
You mentioned that challenge with your team. Would you like me to send you a few ideas?
That is exactly the type of problem I work on. Would it make sense to schedule another conversation specifically about it?
Who else in your organization is involved in solving that?

Action turns an interesting conversation into a developing opportunity. Your follow-up matters too. Skip the generic, Great meeting you! as your entire message. Refer to something specific the person said. Send the resource you promised. Make the introduction. Confirm the next conversation. Reliability builds trust, and trust makes it much easier for someone to give you business or put your name in front of someone who can.

Do This Before Your Next One-on-One

Take five minutes to prepare. Know what you want to learn. Think about the problems you solve.
Prepare two or three questions that might uncover needs, priorities, or opportunities.
Remind yourself that during the conversation, you’re going to listen for relevance.
Make yourself a note that before you leave the conversation you will ask yourself: Is there a natural next action? Then take it.

Please don’t make every one-on-one meeting transactional. Relationships need time to grow. At the same time, acknowledge the difference between activity and progress. Drinking a lot of coffee is networking. Creating connection, finding relevance, and moving toward action is business development.

How do you move a networking conversation toward action? Please share in the comments.

F or F The Sequel

Wow! Thank you for your responses to Part One of Frustrating or Fatal? In my networking last week, it became pretty obvious pretty quick this topic is a bigger conversation than I was aware. Here are a few more things that came up when deciding if your workplace is toxic, or you’re just having a bad week.

Does Favoritism Shape Your Opportunities?

Every manager has people they naturally connect with. That alone doesn’t create a toxic culture. The warning sign is when relationships consistently matter more than performance. Certain employees receive better assignments, inside information, promotions, and forgiveness. Others are held to stricter standards or excluded from decisions that affect their work. You may deliver strong results for months, yet watch a less-qualified coworker receive an opportunity because they have better access to leadership. When employees believe outcomes depend on being liked, they stop focusing on good work and start noticing who is invited to the golf outing.

Are Mistakes Ammunition?

Healthy teams examine mistakes to improve the process. Toxic teams search for someone to blame. A missed deadline may reveal unclear ownership, poor planning, or too many competing priorities. Instead of fixing those conditions, leadership singles out one employee and uses the incident against them for months. This creates a culture where people hide errors, avoid responsibility, and document every conversation for self-protection. When your attention goes into proving that something was not your fault, you pay less attention to solving the real problem.

Are Your Boundaries Treated as Optional?

You should be able to take approved leave without being punished. You should be able to step away when you are sick. Your manager is not entitled to constant access to your hours outside of work. A toxic workplace assumes you’re available 24/7/365. You may receive messages late at night with no stated urgency, then face criticism for responding the next morning. You may get questioned about your commitment when you can’t attend a meeting outside your normal hours. A salary pays for your work. It does not purchase every minute of your life.

Do Values Only Appear on a Wall?

Many organizations talk about trust, teamwork, respect, flexibility, or employee well-being. The real culture shows up in decisions. Does leadership say it values collaboration but rewards information hoarders? Does the company promote wellness but chronically understaff teams? Does it preach transparency while punishing employees who respectfully raise concerns? Ignore the posters for a second. Notice what gets rewarded, tolerated, and repeated. That is the culture.

Is Your Body Noticing?

A toxic workplace can change how you feel about yourself. Do you get the Sunday Scaries? Do you reread your replies to emails several times before sending them because you’re afraid of typing the wrong thing? Do you lose sleep every night before a 1:1 with your manger? Do you feel drained long after the workday ends? Have you begun to question your judgment? Maybe you were once confident in your abilities, but now you second-guess every decision. You assume problems are your fault. You hesitate to apply for other jobs because you believe you have become less capable. This is useful data your body gives you.

What to Do Next

Begin with documentation: Write down specific incidents, including dates, people involved, what happened, and any follow-up. Save relevant emails, messages, performance reviews, and policy documents where legally and ethically appropriate on a device not owned/administered by your workplace.

Next, test the situation with a calm question: “I want to make sure I understand the expectations. Can we confirm the priority, deadline, and what success will look like?”

When addressing repeated behavior, you might say: “I notice this has happened several times. I’d like to discuss the impact it’s having on my work and what we can change going forward.”

Then watch the response: A healthy organization may not solve the problem immediately, but someone will usually listen, clarify, investigate, or take responsibility. A toxic organization often denies the pattern, blames you for noticing it, or makes the situation worse.

Finally, imagine that nothing changes for another year: How does that feel? Ordinary frustration may feel manageable. Persistent dread deserves your attention. You do not need to quit tomorrow. You do need to stop dismissing what you are experiencing. Strengthen your professional network, update your resume, review your finances, and learn what options are available. Clarity gives you choices. Exhaustion takes them away.

How do you decide when it’s time to leave a toxic workplace? Please share in the comments.

Frustrating or Fatal?

I’ve been listening to conversations where people are wondering if their workplaces are toxic. If you’re wondering too, please join this discussion in the comments.

Every workplace has frustrating days. A project falls apart. Your manager changes direction halfway through the strategic plan. A client schedules a meeting that could have been an email, then turns the email into a spreadsheet. Annoying? Absolutely. Toxic? Maybe not.

A workplace becomes toxic when harmful behavior is integrated into how the organization operates. The behavior repeats. People expect it. Leaders ignore it, reward it, or protect the people responsible for it. The label “toxic” may come immediately to mind at the end of a tough day. But a workplace can be demanding, disorganized, understaffed, or poorly managed without being toxic. Here are some questions I’ve learned that you can ask yourself to process what you’re experiencing.

Are You Afraid to Speak Honestly?

In a healthy workplace, you can raise a concern without spending the rest of the day wondering whether you just ruined your career. In a toxic workplace, people learn to stay quiet. You may notice your coworkers avoid asking questions during meetings. Maybe your manager softens bad news before reporting to leadership. Perhaps team members agree publicly, then complain privately because disagreement feels risky. For example, let’s say your manager proposes an unrealistic deadline. You explain the work will require two additional weeks. Instead of discussing resources or priorities, your manager calls you lazy in front of the team. One incident may be a fluke. A pattern teaches everyone a lesson: honesty comes with consequences.

Do Expectations Keep Moving?

Work involves changing priorities: Clients revise requests, leaders respond to new information, projects evolve. The problem begins when expectations change without clear communication, then the team is blamed for failing to meet the revised standard. For example, maybe you’re instructed to focus on quality and later you’re criticized for working too slowly. The following week, speed is the priority but mistakes are cited as evidence you’re careless. You can’t win when the definition of success changes after the work is finished. Pay attention to whether leaders clarify tradeoffs. When everything is urgent, perfect, strategic, and completed by Friday, the issue is probably not your time management.

Does Bad Behavior Get Rebranded as Talent?

Some workplaces tolerate bullying because the person responsible produces valued results. For example, a director interrupts colleagues, insults junior staff, or spreads gossip. Leadership shrugs and says, “That’s just how he is,” or “He has high standards.” Translation: the organization has decided that other people should absorb the cost of this person’s behavior. Results matter. So does the way those results are achieved. A talented employee who creates fear, confusion, and turnover is creating additional work for everyone else.

Is Overwork a Loyalty Test?

Busy periods happen. Product launches, audits, deadlines, and staffing gaps can require extra effort. Toxicity happens when overwork becomes standard operating procedure. For example, you’re expected to answer emails at night. Vacations are unapologetically interrupted. Sick days are treated as inconveniences. The team keeps losing people, but leaders continue assigning the same amount of work to fewer employees. Eventually, exhaustion is considered evidence of commitment. Ask yourself: Is the workload temporary and acknowledged? Are leaders adjusting priorities, adding support, or removing lower-value work? Or are they praising resilience while quietly ignoring burnout?

Questions to Ask Yourself

Does the harmful behavior happen repeatedly?
Does it affect multiple people?
Are employees mocked or sidelined for raising concerns?
Do leaders know what is happening?
Have leaders had opportunities to respond?
Do the same problems keep popping up and swept under the rug?
Is your health, confidence, or personal life being adversely affected?

The more yes answers, the more seriously you should take your situation.

What signs of a toxic workplace have you observed? Please share in the comments.

Comfortably Uncomfortable

Maybe you’re the one who sees the risk or spots the opportunity, but you also have no direct reports and no budget. You are expected to lead, but you don’t have authority and you’re trying to make sense of the situation yourself. The struggle is real. Leadership gets uncomfortable fast when you’re responsible for influence but don’t have formal authority.

Welcome to Paradox

You can work for a nonprofit because you care about the mission and still want to earn more money. You can invest in a certification that will help your career next year while your current manager needs you focused on this quarter’s deadlines. You can believe a project needs more discussion while your team wants a decision by Friday.

Not every tension is a problem that has to be eliminated. Some tensions need to be managed instead. Your goal is to see the trade-offs and choose deliberately. For example, you want to take a course that will improve your skills, but your workload is heavy. Instead of quietly abandoning the idea, maybe you make a smaller commitment: one hour every Thursday for six weeks, paired with a work project where you can apply what you learn. Let’s say your team is testing an AI tool to automate client reports. You could use this as a reason to take a course in AI. Because of your upskilling, you notice the AI tool your organization chose cuts drafting time, but it occasionally changes the meaning of source material. You cannot approve or ban the software. But now you know how to document the errors, propose a review step, and show your coworkers how to verify the output before using it. That is leadership without authority. You turned uncertainty into a process people can use. Yay you!

Vision + Systems = Transformation

You can be a transformative leader from any position in your organization. Transformative leadership requires two kinds of work. First, you have to help your team see what is possible. Cast a vision that gives the people in your circle of influence a reason to care. Gently remind them that their choices matter and point out how their work impacts both people and outcomes.

Then build the systems to make progress repeatable. For example, let’s say your team is tasked with improving how new employees are onboarded. You could email everyone an inspiring message about creating a more welcoming workplace. That will get everyone excited for about a week. The transformation happens when you also create a plan that’s easy for the team to follow. Give them a checklist, assign owners, set deadlines, ask for feedback, and revise the process after each new hire. Is this more work for you? Initially, yes. The benefit of this investment is in the long-term. You are laying a foundation of trust so that every other future project moves faster.

Leading Through Uncertainty

Choose clarity over false confidence. Start by naming the uncertainty. For example, you could say, “We don’t have all the information yet, but here is what we do know and here is what we need to decide right now.” Clarity builds trust. False confidence does not. Next, make the smallest useful move. Run a pilot. Draft a one-page process. Ask for feedback from the people closest to the work. A small test will teach you more than debating multiple possible outcomes will. Give people meaningful choices. Instead of announcing, Here is the new process, ask, “Which part of this process creates the most frustration, and what change would make it easier to use?” Finally, connect ideas to execution. Every conversation should produce an owner, a next step, or a decision date. Otherwise, you have just hosted a lovely meeting about future meetings.

Practice the Paradox

This week, choose one uncertain situation at work.

Write down what you know, what remains unclear, and what decision cannot wait. Identify one person you can influence, one low-risk action you can take, and one simple system that could make the work easier to repeat.

You don’t need a title to reduce confusion. You don’t need formal authority to create momentum. You do need the courage to admit the answer is incomplete. Uncertainty will not end. You might as well use the difficulties to grow your leadership skills.

How do you lead when you do not have formal authority? Please share in the comments.

Status Symbol

A short time ago in a workplace not far away…

Status used to look like perpetual availability. If you were quick to respond, always in the loop, and constantly juggling, you looked important. Now the flex is having the luxury to do one task at a time and still deliver. That signals you can protect your focus, make hard decisions, and get projects over the finish line all without drama. It also quietly exudes confidence. Either you trust yourself to step away from the noise, or your team trusts you enough to let you. Ideally, it’s both.

The Hidden Tax

Every time you switch tasks, you lose your place. Bookmarking your work helps you remember where you stopped, but when you return to it you burn energy recalling context. The interruption makes it more likely you’ll make small mistakes that create rework later. In a Slack-heavy culture, the restart cost adds up pretty quick. Your day becomes a series of half-starts. Deep work gets pushed to later. Later turns into after hours. Monotasking interrupts that pattern. It replaces constant restarting with steady finishing.

Monotasking in Real Life

Monotasking doesn’t eliminate juggling. But setting expectations on when you are available to pause your work and communicating those expectations does allow you to justify protecting your focus time. Here are a couple of examples.

Scenario 1: Writing something that requires brainpower

Maybe it’s a proposal, a sensitive client email, or a performance review. Stopping to address multiple interruptions can make this take all day.

Before you begin the task, block one focus session on your calendar, close Slack during that block, and post this message before you start: I am in a focus block until 11:00am. I will check Slack right after. If something is urgent, please tag me and include the deadline.

Scenario 2: Customer Fires

Uncontained, they expand to fill your day.

When the notification/call/email/text comes in, set a timebox for the fire, make the next step visible before you return to focus work, and post this message in the channel: I am taking point on this until 2:15pm. At 2:15pm I will post status, owner, next step, and next update time.

Socially Safe Scripts

Monotasking can feel risky because you don’t want to look unhelpful and you don’t want to be the person who disappears when the team needs you. Try communication that is short and predictable. Here are some script suggestions:

When you need to focus: I am heads down on the slide deck until 3:00pm. The rough draft will be in the folder by then. I will respond to messages at 3:15pm.

When you get a quick-question request: I can take a look today. I have 20 minutes at 4:00pm. If it needs more time, we should schedule it.

When someone pings you mid-focus: I see this. I am in a focus block until 11:00am. If the deadline is earlier than that, please let me know and I will adjust.

Monotasking Makeover

Try this for one week.

Step 1: Choose one priority output per day
Pick the one thing that would make today feel successful. Write it down where you can see it.

Step 2: Create one focus block
Even 45 minutes counts. Put it on your calendar. Treat it like you would a 1:1.

Step 3: Use message windows
Pick two check-in times for Slack and email during the day. Outside those times, keep notifications off.

Build Better Relationships

Monotasking can improve team dynamics as well as personal productivity. It helps you respond with clearer answers, reduce back-and-forth communication, and deliver when you said you would. That builds trust and business moves at the speed of trust. Monotasking also prevents resentment. When you’re trying to do everything, everywhere, all at once, you often pay for it later with rushed work, late nights, and a shorter fuse. You become frustrated and impatient. (No? Just me? Okay.)

Reality Check

Even with monotasking, some days will be chaos because you can’t avoid every interruption. On those days you will choose responsiveness because it is the right call. The goal is to make focus normal enough that finishing your tasks becomes predictable.

Try This

Pick two days. On each day:

Schedule one 45-minute focus block, decide your one priority output before the block starts, and post a simple status message that tells people when you will respond.
At the end of the block, send a quick update: Done with the draft. Next step is review. I will be back in Slack at 2:30pm.
If you do this twice, you will notice your brain feels quieter during the day. Your work feels more complete. Your evening feels less like a second shift.

Monotasking is a power move because it tells the world you can do what most people cannot: choose, focus, and deliver.

How do you protect your boundaries around monotasking? Please share in the comments.

Did you enjoy this? I help organizations and individuals make better decisions about their time, energy, attention, and money through keynote presentations, workshops, and consulting. If you want to explore working together, message me.

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