Early in a recent engagement, I was shown a meeting inventory — a list of recurring meetings, who attends each one, and how often they run. Out of curiosity, I did some quick math. Headcount per meeting. Duration. Frequency. A conservative hourly rate of $100 per person. One weekly meeting — ten people, one hour, fifty-two weeks — came to roughly $52,000 𝗮 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿. At $100 an hour per person — and that's a floor, not an average; in most organizations, the fully-loaded cost

Last month, I wrote about slowing down to get clarity — on who does what, by when, and what "done" actually looks like. This one is in the same spirit, but about a different kind of clarity: making sure you and the person you're talking to are actually looking at the same thing. Earlier in my career, I sat through a lot of calls where two people would spend twenty minutes describing something to each other — a report, a slide, a data table, an email — and only realize at the

Early in an engagement, I ask a lot of questions that might seem obvious. "Wait — who exactly is responsible for that decision?" "When you say 'aligned,' what does that actually mean?" "So the deadline is EOW — does that actually mean by close of business 5pm ET on Friday or anytime before Monday at 9am ET?" I've had people in rooms visibly impatient at these questions. And I get it. Everyone is busy. The instinct is to move fast, stay high-level, and figure out the details a

I'll say something that might be unpopular coming from a consultant: 𝗜’𝗺 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗮 𝗳𝗮𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗱 "𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝘆" — 𝗮𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆, 𝗜 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙮 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 𝗶𝘁. Not because strategy doesn't matter — it does. But because in most organizations, "strategy" has become a way to sound important without saying anything actionable. Leaders craft vision statements. Decks get built. Terms like "transformation," "alignment," and "efficiency" get thrown around

𝘏𝘪 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘰𝘯𝘦 — 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰𝘥𝘢𝘺, 𝘐'𝘭𝘭 𝘣𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘨𝘶𝘭𝘢𝘳𝘭𝘺 𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘵, 𝘱𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘴 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘮𝘺 𝘺𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘴 𝘢𝘴 𝘢𝘯 𝘪𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘶𝘭𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘵, 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴 𝘐 𝘸𝘪𝘴𝘩 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘢𝘭𝘬𝘦𝘥 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵. 𝘍𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 𝘶𝘱: 𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝘄𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴. We all love to talk about conclusions and insights from data, but nobody likes to talk about data wrangling. Yet in my years