Harmonic Architecture
Values
The principles that shape how people decide — and the gap between stated values and lived ones.
Writing on Values
25 issues
Your team's mood is contagious.
You'd assume the leader sets the tone. But a resigned team infects the founder who's supposed to be infecting them.
Every value has a shadow
Ownership becomes burnout. Transparency becomes chaos. Every value, taken alone, becomes a vice.
I stole a great move from a flight attendant
Both require a verbal commitment most people aren't ready to make.
The Cost of What’s Unsaid
You can't solve what nobody says out loud, and buried problems compound.
What I Learned About the Two Kinds of Ambition
One kind of ambition builds and the other consumes. Worth knowing which one you have.
Always Happy, Never Satisfied
Staying in the productive middle between being loved as you are and striving to be better.
A lack of appreciation isn't neutral
Appreciation isn't the cherry on top. Withholding it does active harm.
Too Tough or Too Tender? Find the Mean
Keep your leadership in the sweet spot.
What's interesting to your boss should be fascinating to you
Impact is how you get paid. Align yourself to the three things your boss actually cares about.
Trust is More than a Vibe
Trust isn't binary and it isn't a feeling. Three facets that let you work with it deliberately.
Live a Life of Play
The problem doesn't care whether you frown or laugh at it. You and everyone near you do
Move Authority to Information
Information and authority don't always sit in the same place. Organizations have to figure out how to bring these two pieces together.
Are you creating an environment where your team can learn?
Leaders need to create the conditions for learner safety, which is the second stage of psychological safety.
Create a culture of practice if you want performance
How do the people around you react when you mess up at work?
See the world as it is
Our brains put so much distortion around our view. Seeing reality is not passive. It's a skill we have to develop, and actively engage with.
Are you a Multiplier or a Diminisher?
Do you multiply the capabilities of your team, or do you diminish them?
A 2000 year old idea about the power of action
It's important that you take action, not just *talk* about taking action.
Flip your org chart upside down
Put your customers at the top, and put the CEO down at the bottom.
It's important to GET right, not to BE right
In life and at work, focus on getting right, not being right.
Focus on the problem, not the person
Same side of the table, or opposite sides. That choice decides whether the problem gets solved.
How well are you managing the tension between accountability and compassion?
Accountability without compassion breaks people. Compassion without accountability breaks results.
🐩 What a scene from 101 Dalmatians tells us about what your organization looks like
A leader's organization looks like them. This can give your org. large blind spots and weak points, but you can also use this to amplify your impact.
Ask yourself: How am I contributing to the situation I don't like?
I promise you, if you consistently ask yourself this question, seek deep insight, and put in the work, you’ll be unstoppable.
Legacy in your lifetime; are you becoming an ancestor or a ghost?
Every relationship leaves someone better or worse off. Are you an ancestor or a ghost?
The absence is the invitation
What's missing around you is an invitation to become the person who supplies it.
The other eleven
No element fails alone. When one is out of tune the symptom usually shows up somewhere else in the ring.