Strong Ground

1. Find Your Strong Ground: The Foundation for Life and Leadership

Individually and collectively, we are all looking for strong ground right now.

Personal stability. Strong ground is the unwavering stability needed to navigate uncertainty, both personally and professionally. It's about connecting your body and mind to a universal source of strength, much like an athlete grounding themselves before a powerful move. This foundation is built on self-awareness, courage, and a clear sense of one's values and contribution. Brené's own experience with a pickleball injury highlighted the critical need for a strong core, not just compensating muscles, to prevent injury and sustain performance.

Organizational strength. For organizations, strong ground means investing in people and their connections, recognizing that human wisdom and relationships are foundational. When leaders prioritize core stability and functional strength—meaning the well-being and interconnectedness of their employees—performance and impact increase. This approach counters the dangerous path of building new capabilities on top of existing dysfunction, which ultimately leads to burnout and inefficiency.

Newtonian teamwork. The "tush push" in football serves as a powerful metaphor for how a team finds its strong ground. It leverages fundamental physics principles like inertia, force, and action-reaction, where players push off the earth together. Similarly, in leadership, strong ground is composed of:

• Our own footing: values, clear contribution, curiosity, humility.
• Connection to others: grounded individuals moving towards a shared goal.
  This collective strength makes winning possible, emphasizing that individual grounding is crucial for team success.

2. Embrace Paradox: The Path to Deeper Wisdom

Only the paradox comes anywhere near to comprehending the fullness of life.

Holding tension. Paradoxical thinking is the ability to embrace two seemingly opposing ideas as simultaneously valid, rather than choosing one over the other. Humans often struggle with this tension, defaulting to certainty by dismissing the competing idea. However, tolerating this discomfort leads to a new, deeper level of understanding that reflects the complexity of human experience. Brené's personal journey with freedom and commitment, initially avoiding planning for flexibility, only found true freedom through disciplined scheduling.

Liberating insights. Jim Collins' "Genius of the AND" highlights how visionary leaders embrace both extremes—like purpose AND profit, or discipline AND creativity—to achieve greatness. The Stockdale Paradox further illustrates this: maintaining unwavering faith in ultimate victory while confronting the brutal facts of current reality. This "gritty faith and gritty facts" approach is crucial for navigating challenges without succumbing to false optimism or despair, fostering a culture where everyone is responsible for both dreaming and reality-checking.

Plumbing and poetry. James March's concept of "leadership as plumbing and poetry" encapsulates this duality. Leaders need:

• Plumbing: The capacity for efficiency, operational excellence, and applying known techniques effectively.
• Poetry: The gifts of vision, meaning-making, and inspiring collective action.
  These are not mutually exclusive but intertwined, requiring leaders to cast compelling visions while building robust systems to deliver on them. Embracing this paradox allows for a more honest reflection of the human experience and the human spirit.

3. Courage Demands Vulnerability: No Armor, No Growth

If you think you’re being brave and you’re feeling no uncertainty, risk, or emotional exposure, you’re probably not being that brave.

Vulnerability is courage. The core finding from Brené's research is that courage is impossible without vulnerability—the emotion experienced during times of uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure. Leaders often avoid tough conversations or taking smart risks due to fear, but fear itself isn't the barrier. The real obstacle is the "armor" we use to self-protect, which prevents us from rumbling with vulnerability. This armor keeps us small and disconnected from our values.

Four skill sets. Courage is not an inherent trait but a collection of teachable, observable, and measurable skill sets:

• Living into Our Values: Aligning intentions and behaviors with core values.
• Rumbling with Vulnerability: Engaging in real, tough conversations with an open heart and mind.
• BRAVING Trust: Building trust through boundaries, reliability, accountability, vault, integrity, nonjudgment, and generosity.
• Learning to Rise: Resetting after setbacks and embedding lessons into the culture.
  The foundational skill is rumbling with vulnerability; without it, the others cannot be fully practiced.

Armor's cost. When we armor up, we often behave in destructive or hurtful ways, misaligning with our values. This can manifest as avoiding honest feedback, managing problematic behaviors instead of proactively addressing fears, or diminishing trust. Brené's blunt advice: "Learn how to do vulnerability or risk being an asshole when you reach for that armor. The choice is yours, but those of us on the receiving end of your self-protection would appreciate it." True leadership requires shedding this armor to foster courageous, connected, and collaborative cultures.

4. True Transformation: Dismantle, Rebuild, Prioritize People

Transformation is an iterative process that begins with the application of rigorous assessment sets to identify and critically interrogate the assumptions and thinking that underpin existing systems, structures, and ways of working that are no longer creating value, driving growth, and supporting employees in meaningful ways.

Breaking and protecting. Real transformation is a rare, time-intensive, and disorienting process that requires strategic dismantling of old systems while fiercely protecting mission-critical elements. It's not incremental change, but a complete metamorphosis of form or structure. Leaders must be willing to "break everything" that no longer serves, even cherished "darlings," to build a new, functional, and adaptable core. This process is inherently painful and challenging, demanding discipline and productive debate.

People are the ground. The greatest challenge of transformation is that people are the "strong ground" on which change happens, making them the ultimate priority. Effective transformations are led by relational leaders who:

• Communicate the "why" clearly and constantly.
• Make space for questions and conversations.
• Model new mindsets and skills, openly discussing their own learning difficulties.
• Resist replacing broken systems with new, impermeable structures, instead creating evolving systems that thrive on interrogation.
  Failing to prioritize people or prematurely quitting a transformation leaves behind exhausted, distrustful individuals and spotlighted broken systems.

Transformation sets. Successful transformations involve six interconnected "change sets":

• Assessment Sets: Rigorous readiness evaluations and continuous feedback loops.
• Mindsets: Changing how people think, not just what they do.
• Skill Sets: Building new strengths and abilities, often requiring unlearning.
• Tool Sets: External resources that support change, not replace it.
• Coaching Sets: Integrated systems for practicing new skills and challenging new systems.
• System Sets: Organizational structures that reinforce new mindsets and skills.
  This holistic approach ensures that change is deeply embedded and sustainable, rather than superficial or temporary.

5. Know Thyself: Cultivate Self-Awareness and Metacognition

Self-awareness means having a deep understanding of one’s emotions, strengths, weaknesses, needs, and drives.

Understanding your inner world. Self-awareness is foundational to grounded confidence, requiring deep curiosity about one's internal life and often outside support from a coach or therapist. It involves asking "why" certain interactions trigger specific reactions or understanding the drivers behind one's behaviors. This internal excavation helps leaders understand their own "under the hood" workings, moving beyond superficial reactions to genuine insight.

Thinking about your thinking. Metacognition, or "thinking about our thinking," is a critical cognitive skill and the best defense against cognitive biases. It involves self-reflective questions to assess what we know, how we learn, and what we need to improve. For example, the Dunning-Kruger effect highlights how people with low ability overestimate their competence, while high-skilled individuals may underestimate theirs. Metacognition helps us:

• Recognize and correct biases.
• Move from overconfidence to intellectual humility.
• Understand the skills underpinning our "natural abilities."
  It's about actively analyzing and evaluating our thought processes to foster humility and accurate self-assessment.

Emotional literacy. Emotional awareness and regulation are crucial components of self-knowledge. Most people can only name a few basic emotions, but a nuanced emotional vocabulary (emotional granularity) is transformative. Language doesn't just communicate emotion; it shapes it, giving us the power to make meaning, manage feelings productively, and seek appropriate support. Understanding how emotions manifest in our biology, biography, behavior, and backstory allows us to:

• Identify and label feelings accurately.
• Manage our nervous system responses to stress, overwhelm, and anxiety.
• Cultivate calm and avoid destructive anger.
  This deep emotional understanding is vital for individual well-being and effective leadership.

6. Build Trust and Accountability: The Pillars of Connection

Trust is choosing to risk making something you value vulnerable to another person’s actions.

Defining trust. Trust is a cognitive assessment, not just an emotion, defined as risking something valuable to another's actions. Distrust, conversely, is the belief that what's important to you is not safe with another person. Conversations about trust are often difficult due to their broad nature, leading to defensiveness. Brené's BRAVING acronym provides a framework to break down trust into specific, actionable elements:

• Boundaries
• Reliability
• Accountability
• Vault (confidentiality)
• Integrity
• Nonjudgment
• Generosity
  This specificity allows for constructive dialogue and targeted efforts to build or mend trust in relationships and teams.

Accountability as care. Accountability means owning mistakes, apologizing, and making amends, and holding others to the same standard respectfully. It requires vulnerability and discipline, contrasting sharply with blame, which is merely discharging anger and pain without fostering change. Aiko Bethea's "Anchored, Aligned, and Accountable" framework emphasizes that true accountability is foundational to becoming one's aspirational self and creating transformative spaces. It involves:

• Identifying core values (anchored).
• Aligning actions with those values (aligned).
• Taking responsibility for impacts (accountable).
  This approach invites discomfort but leads to deeper connection, learning, and growth.

Empathy and compassion. These are critical for building trust and fostering connection. Compassion is the daily practice of recognizing shared humanity, treating ourselves and others with loving-kindness, and taking action in the face of suffering. Empathy, a powerful tool of compassion, involves:

• Perspective-taking: Understanding another's experience.
• Staying out of judgment: Listening without imposing value.
• Recognizing emotion: Connecting to what others might be feeling.
• Communicating understanding: Expressing "Shit. That's hard. I get that."
• Practicing mindfulness: Feeling emotions without pushing them away.
  Distinguishing between cognitive empathy (understanding emotions) and affective empathy (feeling emotions) helps avoid burnout and enmeshment, ensuring empathy drives connection, not exhaustion.

7. Master Lock-In and Lock-Through: Focus with Intentional Recovery

A person’s ability to seriously lock in is only as valuable as their capacity and willingness to lock through.

The power of lock-in. "Locking in" is the intense, focused concentration on a task, limiting distractions to achieve a specific outcome. It draws on various cognitive, behavioral, and emotional resources, including:

• Mental toughness: Dealing with challenges, stressors, and pressure.
• Flow: A gratifying state of deep involvement where action and awareness merge, and time distorts.
• Deliberate practice: Training just beyond current performance levels with full concentration and feedback.
• Deep focus: Directing attention like a flashlight, avoiding performance-damaging task-switching.
  While enjoyable and efficient, intense lock-in depletes cognitive resources, necessitating intentional recovery.

The art of locking through. "Locking through" is the crucial transition mindset and skill set for integrating intense focus with intentional recovery. Like a boat navigating a lock, it's about smoothly shifting between different "water levels" of cognitive and emotional demands. This process acknowledges the "cognitive bank" can be overdrawn by:

• Cognitive lift: The brainpower required for a task.
• Context switching: The cost of shifting focus between unrelated tasks.
• Domain switching: The energy drain from moving between life domains (e.g., work to home).
  Rushing this transition leads to "capsizing"—emotional turbulence and exhaustion.

Intentional recovery. Deliberate recovery is not passive; it's structured and often physical, aimed at cleaning out "attentional residue" from previous tasks. It requires understanding one's cognitive demands and engaging in practices like:

• Mindfulness and intentional breathing.
• Physical activity (running, yoga).
• Protecting transition times (e.g., 20-30 minutes after work).
  This balance of intense focus and deliberate recovery is essential for sustaining performance, protecting well-being, and preventing burnout, ensuring that lock-in power is preserved and enhanced over time.

8. Think Systemically and Anticipate: Navigate Complexity with Clarity

Systems thinking has taught me to trust my intuition more and my figuring-out rationality less, to lean on both as much as I can, but still to be prepared for surprises.

Seeing the whole. Systems thinking, as taught by Donella Meadows, is the practice of viewing systems as interconnected wholes, focusing on relationships, feedback, and purpose rather than isolated parts. It recognizes that complex systems are inherently unpredictable and uncontrollable, challenging the industrial mindset's illusion of control. For leaders, this means:

• Understanding elements, interconnections, and overall function.
• Asking questions about information flow and potential points of failure.
• Embracing uncertainty and learning from surprises, rather than imposing rigid directives.
  This holistic perspective is crucial for designing and redesigning systems that align with values and adapt to change.

Playing the movie to the end. Anticipatory thinking is the critical skill of analyzing system states, anticipating outcomes, and forecasting future events—essentially, "playing the movie to the end." This requires high-level cognitive processes like working memory, pattern recognition, and experience-based intuition. Leaders with strong anticipatory thinking can:

• Read the "room" and connect it to broader organizational and global contexts.
• Predict potential ripple effects of decisions.
• Help teams discern productive urgency from burnout-inducing pace.
• Identify and manage "horizon conflict" on teams, where different roles focus on different timeframes.
  This mindset allows organizations to proactively address challenges and seize opportunities, making them feel like they're "reading your mind."

Strategic foresight. Strategic thinking is less about static plans and more about asking the right questions and engaging in rigorous debate. Jim Collins' "hedgehog metaphor" illustrates this: great companies focus relentlessly on a single unifying idea derived from three questions:

• What are you deeply passionate about?
• What can you be the best in the world at?
• What drives your economic engine?
  This disciplined focus, combined with systems thinking and anticipatory awareness, helps leaders navigate complexity, avoid "vision and mission creep," and build strategies around learning rather than fear.

9. Communicate with Purpose: Clarity, Resonance, and Honesty

High-value, high-impact communication does not overwhelm people. It helps them find meaning and make invaluable connections.

The power of clarity. Effective communication is measured by impact and value, serving as a linchpin for successful transformation. Overwrought or unclear communication breeds distrust, burnout, and frustration. Leaders must strive for "DUPLO simplicity" in complex messages, providing a clear, inspiring, and memorable "North Star" document that connects individual roles to the broader mission. This ensures everyone understands the "why" beyond their daily tasks, fostering a sense of agency and purpose.

Emotionally resonant language. Communication should acknowledge shared humanity and evoke connection. Emotionally resonant language, like rally cries or poetry, moves people and is remembered. However, it must be used with intention and clarity, defining what it is and is not, to prevent weaponization or misuse. For example, "Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind" emphasizes directness, but not permission for disrespect. This approach builds culture with intention and a sense of belonging.

Honesty and transparency. Grounded confidence in communication means being accessible, anticipatory, clear, compelling, consistent, economical, honest, reliable, and timely. It's always in service of connection, never deception. This includes:

• Chekhov's Gun: Every element introduced must serve a purpose; avoid extraneous information.
• Aesthetic Force: Using powerful visuals to open hearts and minds, but avoiding manipulation.
• Owning Changes: Communicating shifts in direction or strategy immediately and transparently, explaining the "why" and "what is NOT changing."
• Beware of Bullshit Disclaimers: Challenging phrases like "I don't mean to be critical, but..." to foster genuine, accountable dialogue.
  Ultimately, effective communication builds trust and empowers people to contribute meaningfully.

10. Pursue Mastery, Not Perfection: Embrace the Curved Line of Learning

Mastery is not merely a commitment to a goal, but to a curved-line, constant pursuit.

The joy of mastery. Mastery, as defined by Sarah Lewis, is an "inhuman aim motivated by a concern with how others view us." Instead, it's a commitment to a "curved-line, constant pursuit" driven by intrinsic motivation, joy, and meaning. It's about becoming a student of the game, constantly seeking new challenges and embracing the feeling of "not quite" to propel further growth. This contrasts with perfectionism, which is a self-protective mechanism focused on external validation and leads to stagnation.

Discipline for growth. Discipline is the courage and commitment to do what's necessary to achieve desired outcomes, even when unmotivated, sacrificing short-term gratification for long-term achievement. Coach Dawn Staley's mottos, "A disciplined person can do anything" and "Dare to do what you don't want to get what you do want," highlight this brave, vulnerable choice. Discipline is about commitment, not compliance, and it extends to leadership, where letting oneself be seen and building trust are acts of disciplined leadership.

Learning from failure. Sarah Lewis emphasizes that "transformation comes from how we choose to speak about it in the context of story." Failure is not a static concept but a dynamic experience that, when reframed as a learning opportunity, provides "inestimable gains." It's a "blankness" that offers limitlessness. This perspective aligns with Donella Meadows' "error-embracing" approach, where mistakes are opportunities to learn and adjust course. The ability to admit errors and learn from them is a sign of courage and a pathway to growth.

Last updated: November 24, 2025