Don’t manage people, manage conditions.

Because you can’t actually manage people. People can choose to subject themselves to your management. But that isn’t the same thing.

Once you rid yourself of the illusion that you can manage people you are no longer in control and therefore you are free. Free to manage the things you can control. The conditions. The conditions that best serve the people you no longer manage.

Meet people where they are.

I had the privilege of working with a client who was brilliant at this. And who consciously cultivated their talent for it.

They took over a company from the founder after 15 years of leadership.

They inherited a small, dedicated but trepidatious team.

They could have swung the axe. They could have frozen out. They could have made demands that couldn’t be met.

Instead they chose to meet the team, on their individual and collective terms, where they were at.

Leadership doesn’t have to be lonely.

But too often it is.

Have brilliant meetings.

In brilliant meetings, ideas are generated. Feedback gathered. Information shared. Resources allocated. Strategies aligned. Decisions made. Relationships grown. Morale boosted. Trust built. Accountability accepted. Action inspired.

In bad meetings, you stab yourself in the leg with a pencil to keep yourself awake while deciding what you’ll watch on Disney+ tonight (The Banshees of Inisherin, trust me).

So you need to stop wasting your time in bad meetings.

Even better; stop wasting other people’s time in your bad meetings.