Why I Built This

Most organizations say the right things about their people.

They talk about trust. Transparency. Being student-centered, or employee-first, or people-focused. And many of them mean it, in the conference room, in the strategic plan, in the all-hands meeting where the vision gets presented.

But somewhere between the stated values and the daily reality, something gets lost. The people closest to the work, the ones who understand what is happening on the ground, are rarely in the room where decisions get made. And the people making decisions have often lost touch with what it feels like to be inside the work every day.

Susan Scott, in Fierce Conversations, makes an argument that applies here: the answers are in the room. Not in the strategy deck. Not in the consultant's report. In the room, with the people who are living closest to the problem, who understand its texture and nuance, who have tried things and watched them fail, and who could tell you exactly what would help if someone would finally ask and then listen to the answer.

Three things that make the difference:

●  Transparency: people understand why decisions are made, not just what was decided.

●  Proximity: the people closest to the work have a real voice in the response to it.

●  Patience: real improvement is slow, unglamorous, and looks like failure before it looks like progress.

Reflective Questions

●  In your organization or team, who has the most accurate picture of what is happening? Are they in the room when decisions get made?

●  Think of an initiative that launched with energy and faded. What would honest input from the people closest to the work have changed?

●  What is one conversation you've been avoiding that, if you had it, might change something important?

Listen to Episode 10 of Move Toward: Unlocked for the season finale, the frustration, the framework, the people this work was built for, and the reason that started it all.