Last night I ran a coaching session with a group of cross-functional leaders.

We were talking about the relationship between priority and capacity, and the temptation to blame inadequate capacity, when the problem often stems from unclear or undisciplined prioritisation.

The conversation turned to perfectionism and how it constrains capacity.

"We keep telling people to focus on progress over perfection, but then we all get judged when the work isn’t right”.

The group went quiet. They’d all said some version of it to their people. Test and learn. Done is better than perfect. Ship it.

These aren't careless leaders. Most quietly admit to perfectionist tendencies. It’s not about lowering the bar. It’s about freeing their teams from paralysis. A perfectly reasonable leadership lever when you’ve got big goals and limited resources.

Perfectionism, when it's unchecked, is expensive. It slows execution and increases anxiety. It turns leaders into bottlenecks. When accuracy genuinely matters, the instinct to get it right forms the DNA of individuals and the team. For senior leaders, it becomes more complicated as pace, learning and commerciality form part of their decision criteria.

When was the last time someone thanked you for paying attention to them?

Not for solving their problem or making a decision or moving things forward - just for being fully present. For not paying partial attention while monitoring Slack. Or splitting your attention between them and your mental to-do list. Complete, undivided, you-are-all-that-matters-right-now attention.

If you're drawing a blank, you're not alone. And if someone has thanked you recently, I wonder what it says about us when our presence has become remarkable enough to name?

You know that leader who seems like they tick every box? Clear vision and values, results-oriented, while balancing genuine care for their people. But somehow, they can't gain traction even though they seem to be working incredibly hard.

It’s likely to be a context problem.

I've been thinking about this as I’ve watched talented, thoughtful leaders exhaust themselves trying to lead with purpose and values in organisations that prioritise something different. They're not failing because they're doing it wrong. They're struggling because there's a fundamental mismatch.

Leadership success requires alignment between your values and style, role requirements, and organisational culture.

Picture this...You're heading into a retreat designed to transform your newly formed leadership team into a true 'first team.

When you think about your 'first team', who comes to mind?

Is it the team you lead, your function, and your direct reports? Or is it the team you're a member of?

The most common response from coaching clients is the team that they lead. The problem with that, according to Patrick Lencioni in his work on Organisational Health, is that when the leadership team comes together, conversations are focused on lobbying and jockeying for power rather than making decisions in the best interest of the organisation. And it leaves functional teams arguing with each other over priorities.

Questions are one of the most powerful tools in our leadership toolkit, but as highlighted by Abraham Maslow in 1966, when all you’ve got is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

The ‘coaching trap’ isn’t the only pitfall to be aware of.

The ‘research rabbit hole’ shows up when leaders fear making the wrong decision, so they make no decision at all. They mask their fear by using questions as a delay tactic. Seemingly endless questions asked with no clear purpose risk leaving team members more confused and wondering why they bothered to consult in the first place. You’ll recognise the research rabbit hole when the response to a very direct, pointed question is...yes, you guessed it, another question.

The ‘grand inquisition’ tends to bombard our team members with questions, often while we try to show interest and engagement or attempt to demonstrate our intelligence. This can feel like too many questions, inappropriate questions, or both, often masking our own discomfort. A common example of the grand inquisition is a question (or three) that feels overly personal, intrusive, or asked at the wrong time.

The ‘hamster wheel’ is an endless cycle of exploring and choosing, as we pursue a (false) sense of control over a situation.  Often referred to as ‘analysis paralysis, this can look a lot like the coaching trap, and based on my observations of coaching leadership teams, they often co-exist. If you’ve ever presented a series of recommendations only to be asked, ‘but what about...?’ (after multiple revisions), then you’re probably experiencing the hamster wheel.

Last night was my first visit back to the gym. Wow! My strength had gone backwards. Not just a little bit. A lot. The phrase 'use it or lose it' clanged in my ears throughout the workout as I struggled to get close to the levels I had achieved before the flu took me out.

I began to wonder about how investment in building and speed of loss applies to team growth and development. When targeting physical strength, we know the muscle groups to focus on and the set of exercises to do it. But what about leading teams?

How do you ensure your team is building the right muscles to deliver your strategy? What happens if a critical muscle atrophies?

Last night was my first visit back to the gym. Wow! My strength had gone backwards. Not just a little bit. A lot. The phrase 'use it or lose it' clanged in my ears throughout the workout as I struggled to get close to the levels I had achieved before the flu took me out.

I began to wonder about how investment in building and speed of loss applies to team growth and development. When targeting physical strength, we know the muscle groups to focus on and the set of exercises to do it. But what about leading teams?

How do you ensure your team is building the right muscles to deliver your strategy? What happens if a critical muscle atrophies?

Trust isn't what we think it is. That was my #1 takeaway from listening to the world-renowned expert, Rachel Botsman, last week. How often have you asked yourself or one of your team a question about 'building trust'? Apparently, that's the wrong question.

Trust isn't built - it's earned or given.

By changing the framing from built to given, we're forced to ask ourselves a new question:

Is this person or situation worthy of my trust?