Robin Weninger

Most of what we call progress is just motion. Like Skinner’s pigeons pecking for pellets, we keep pressing buttons—emails, dashboards, tickets—mistaking activity for achievement. The comfort of busyness feels safe because it produces signals we can count, charts we can show, and rituals that look productive. But these are illusions. Fake wins hijack energy, distract from outcomes, and slowly make leaders worse. Real progress looks different: it’s narrow, uncomfortable, and leaves a bruise when it’s absent. If no one feels it, it wasn’t progress.

Great leadership isn’t tested on calm days but in chaos. Our best days depend on the habits, processes, and outcomes we’ve drilled when it’s boring. Standards of Excellence anchor behavior, Standard Operating Procedures scale process, and Statements of Outcome align results. Miss one, and progress collapses. Together, they form the invisible architecture of progress.

Great leadership isn’t tested on calm days but in chaos. Our best days depend on the habits, processes, and outcomes we’ve drilled when it’s boring. Standards of Excellence anchor behavior, Standard Operating Procedures scale process, and Statements of Outcome align results. Miss one, and progress collapses. Together, they form the invisible architecture of progress.

Success doesn't eliminate imposter syndrome. It's a by-product of growth at the top. This doubt, if unchecked, undermines leadership through paralysis, false certainty, and isolation. Reframe it as a spark for Activated Progress, signaling new territory. You can't kill the doubt, but you lead with it by seeking counsel, facilitating clarity, and getting real feedback. If you've stopped doubting, you've stopped taking risks worth taking.

Don't tell your team to "only bring solutions." This mantra creates a culture of silence, training people to hide early warnings until they become catastrophic crises. Instead, great leaders embrace a nuanced approach: they encourage team members to raise a problem as soon as it’s discovered, even if the solution is still unknown. This allows leaders to use frameworks like the Delegation Compass to assign clarity and action early, turning bad news into a competitive advantage.