Insights
Thoughts on Leadership, Careers & People Strategy
Perspectives drawn from 20+ years of working with leaders and organizations around the world.
What School Did You Go To?
In Ireland the question is secondary school. In hiring it is the university line on a CV. Either way, it was never really about education. It was about where you started.
Read moreNo Suitcase, No Plan, No Problem
Lost luggage, jeans and a t-shirt, and interviews the next morning. What building a sales team from scratch in the UAE taught me about starting before you feel ready.
Read moreOne Company Is Not a Weakness
Two people I worked with did nothing wrong. Yet the market looked at one line on their CV and reached for the easiest conclusion. Here's how to correct it.
Read moreThe "Overqualified" Verdict: What It Really Means When You're Turned Down
A candidate with a PhD or twenty years of experience gets rejected for being overqualified. What that word is really code for, and what to do about it.
Read moreAre They Always Golden?
Healthcare, schooling, a pension that actually vests. Real benefits, rationally chosen. But at what point does a decision stop being made and start being assumed?
Read moreNo Desk to Come Back To
I came back from maternity leave to a colleague's desk, because nobody had worked out where I was going to sit. What the absence of a return plan actually communicates.
Read moreThe Friend Who's Always About to Cancel
Work chases. Everything else waits. Why the commitments without an enforcement mechanism are always the first to go, and what it quietly costs.
Read moreWhat the Room Remembers
Twenty years, no paper trail, and a thin severance number. How a company lets one person go becomes the operating truth for everyone who stays.
Read moreThe Real Cost of the Person You Won't Manage Out
One person's underperformance is a bounded problem. What grows around it while nothing is done is not.
Read moreWhat a Falling Market Reminded Me About Losing a Job
Markets recover on their own. Careers do not. The gap between what you know and what you feel is the whole thing.
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