Blog, culture and engagement | Ambition In Motion

by Julia Gonzalez

Fri 31 October 2025

Organizational change is rarely welcomed with open arms. Consider the story of Carla, a newly hired executive brought into a fast-growing company. The CEO had recruited her to drive growth and implement structure, but there was one problem: no one else had been consulted.

Carla walked into her first leadership meeting and could immediately feel the tension. Legacy team members were all thinking, “Who is she? Why is she here?” For years, the company had operated with a startup mindset—when a problem arose, everyone jumped in, hacking together a solution on the fly. It was scrappy, it was fast, and it worked… until it didn’t.

As the company scaled, issues continued to arise. New hires were being “trained” in 50 different ways to solve the same problem. The lack of standardization caused things to fall through the cracks and for problems to be overlooked or swept under the rug. Carla’s objective was to bring in processes and efficiencies to standardize operations. But to succeed, she would first have to convince those in the organization that her presence was not a threat, and rather an opportunity.

Her challenge wasn’t just about implementing processes. It was about earning trust, integrating into the culture, and showing the team that structure is the foundation for sustainable growth.

Four Strategies to Gain Trust and Drive Change

1. Frame Standardization as Empowerment, Not Control

Legacy employees often fear that processes will strip away their autonomy. This narrative is harmful to progress for a few reasons:

Processes aren’t about bureaucracy; they’re about freeing people from chaos.
Standardization ensures that no one has to reinvent the wheel or firefight the same issue repeatedly.
By reducing confusion, employees gain more time to focus on creative, high-value work.

The team should know that changes won’t take away their freedom, and rather it will give them the clarity and consistency to do the best work possible.

2. Integrate Into the Culture Before Changing It

Walking in with a clipboard of “fixes” is a surefire way to trigger territorialism. It’s important not to rush into an organization and try to change it before you understand it. Executives in this position should take the time to get to know the people and the organization, this will not only make integration easier by building trust, but will also make the changes more longstanding and effective. Some ways to get to know the organization are the following:

Sitting in on team huddles to observe how problems were solved. This way, it's clearer what is currently working, and where things are falling through.
Asking colleagues what frustrates them most about the current operations, to identify areas that they may be more open to change.
Recognizing and celebrating the startup spirit that has gotten the company this far. Acknowledging that the hard work of a team makes it feel less like you’re implying that what they’re currently doing is wrong. It will help to frame change in a more exciting way, that it is a “next step.”

3. Show Quick Wins That Benefit the Team Directly

Abstract promises of “efficiency” don’t resonate. Tangible improvements do. Identifying small but visible issues that can be relatively easy to solve, should be the first change on the radar. If there is currently inconsistent onboarding, then implementing a single, streamlined training guide will pay off immediately with new hires. Legacy employees will see this change and be relieved they no longer have to retrain hires over and over, and they will be able to trust the work that they do more easily.

Each quick win is proof that implementing process is not about control, and it will make everyone’s lives easier.

4. Recognize Outcomes and Share Ownership

Change sticks when people feel ownership. Making sure to recognize success as a team effort is a crucial aspect of being seen as a part of the team, rather than an outsider. It will make the entire organization feel more unified and like they have achieved something together. Additionally, recognizing team members as key players in the successful implementation of new processes will make them more empowered to make change. Some ways to do this are as follows:

Offer rewards for effective implementation. Even something as simple as a giftcard for fast and effective adopters recognizes that they are making an effort to achieve a common goal.
Publicly recognize teams when standardized processes lead to better outcomes. Shoutout key players for the work that they’re doing.
Share metrics that tied improvements to company growth (e.g., faster onboarding, higher retention). AIM insights can be particularly helpful here to better track these metrics using goal reports.
Position process adoption as a collective achievement, not a personal victory. It takes a team to make change successful, and recognizing such will make everyone more attached to the progress.

The Takeaway

Ultimately, Carla’s success will not come from enforcing change through authority alone, but from demonstrating that structure and culture can coexist. By framing processes as tools for empowerment, taking the time to integrate before transforming, delivering quick wins, and celebrating shared outcomes, she can shift skepticism into alignment. Growth requires more than implementing new strategies– it requires a foundation that allows innovation to scale. When leaders approach change as both a strategic necessity and a cultural opportunity, they not only strengthen the organization’s future but also earn the trust and commitment of the people who will carry it forward.

by Garrett Mintz

Wed 22 October 2025

Growing pains are a great problem to have. However, they are one of the biggest challenges for a company to achieve success. Success at scale means transitioning from a scrappy entrepreneurial mindset to one that follows processes and procedures meant to ensure consistent, measurable, and reliable results.

There are a few reasons this transition is so difficult. One is simply the change in atmosphere necessary for this transitional growth. This seat-of-your-pants entrepreneurial hustle mindset is simply incompatible with success in the scaling and process-driven phase.

In an up-and-coming organization, the best team members thrive by working with all hands on deck. When a problem arises, these team members don’t wait for permission to solve the problem, they just jump in and help. This builds cohesion and shared buy-in, but it isn’t sustainable long term. When processes don’t exist, these types of employees and leaders thrive on the freedom. Their can-do attitude and ability to be a self-starter is critical to success. The wait-and-see employees who need permission before they can act are likely managed out of this business or are not nearly as acknowledged as their counterparts who are jumping into the fire ready to firefight.

But as an organization grows, especially if it has taken on investment like private equity or venture capital, operating in this entrepreneurial all-hands-on-deck style is untenable. You need to find ways to delegate responsibilities.

Should the CFO be handling a customer complaint ticket because they were the first to notice the ping and the other customer success employees were busy with another task?

Should the new hire, who has been shadowing and learning from one employee, receive a completely different set of instructions to accomplish the same task from a different employee the week the original trainer was out on vacation?

Should the account executive who is one of the biggest revenue earners for the company be able to skip updating the CRM because “he doesn’t feel like it” and points to his track record as to why he is going to be able to hit his numbers for this quarter?

In a scrappy, entrepreneurially minded organization, these types of situations slide through. They happen because action is rewarded over process.

But they are very inefficient, and every one of these behaviors causes workload debt to build up in the company. The CFO missed an hour they could have spent preparing for the next quarter. The senior team members are forced to redo the newbie’s work half the time because nobody finished training. And the best client just got a second call this week from a different account executive and just called the CEO to see what was going on. Hours and days of lost time will drag the company down.

And in an organization that wants to grow and drive consistent profitability, something needs to change to ensure people are being held accountable and that there is consistency across the organization.

And the ironic thing about this change is that oftentimes, the person who created the original process for how things are done is excited to update it. They will readily admit that they just threw something together using whatever resources were at their disposal and they are optimistic that the new system could be better. However, this won’t be the case for every team member.

Change is hard, and those who become accustomed to a routine or way of operating are incredibly difficult to change.

If you have ever upgraded your ERP or CRM systems you likely have felt this pain and are acutely aware of how hard it is to get people to change.

Here are 4 steps to driving strategic change in an organization:

Have a Change Plan
Share what’s in it for the individual implementing the change, not just the company
Get middle managers to share in their own words why the change is happening
Get quick wins and celebrate them

1. Having a change plan is critical to successfully driving strategic change in an organization. The key changes need to be laid out, prioritized, and planned so as to avoid too many changes happening all at once. Everyone feels more comfortable following a well-laid plan. Too often organizations try to cram too many changes in at the same time - leading to confusion, change fatigue, and loss of confidence in the executives driving the change.

For strategic change to occur, trust must exist between the executive team driving the change and the employees implementing the change.

2. Too often change efforts are described using words that emphasise what’s in it for the company and not the individual. “With this change, we expect to improve our EBITDA by 67%”. Unless employees have equity in the company, they don’t really care about how the books will change because of this extra work. What they really care about is what is in it for them.

Therefore, every message needs to be crafted for each employee. What drives one person might not drive another. Some people are motivated by work/life balance, and they’ll appreciate how the new processes will reduce emergency all-hands-on-deck situations. Some are driven by professional growth, and they’ll be excited for the new opportunities that come with scale. And others are driven by their passion and their personal and professional mission alignment, and growth can help them make their mark on the world. The Work Orientation of an individual should help the company understand how to portray the change to each individual.

3. Middle management is at the core of where a change initiative succeeds or fails. If middle managers buy into the change, they are much more likely to hold others accountable when they aren’t behaving in alignment with the change. Therefore, they need to be able to communicate the change in their own words and they need to have the space with the executive team to have their questions answered and concerns assuaged.

For example, let’s say you are changing CRM (customer relationship management) systems. There was a separate system for managing support tickets and another for managing potential new deals. The new system brings it all together so when support answers a customer inquiry, they can quickly touch base with the accompanying account executive to help make sure that the client is successfully onboarded and can cover the concerns the customer has shared without having the customer repeat herself. If a customer support representative accidentally inputs notes about a customer in the wrong spot in the new CRM system because he couldn’t figure out where to put the notes, it is on the customer success manager to educate the representative on why this was wrong and educate them on how to do it properly. If the customer success manager doesn’t fully understand why the change to the new CRM system was implemented in the first place, they may intentionally or unintentionally not correct the bad behavior. If the bad behavior isn’t corrected, bad habits form and it will likely lead to a follow-on change to a system that didn’t get fixed in the first place.

4. Getting quick wins and celebrating (even if it feels over the top) is vital to getting the team to buy in to change. Let’s say a technical team is implementing a kanban board to identify where their weekly sprints are and their upcoming product roadmap and the Director of Product Management is wanting to get the sales team involved with adding issues/product development opportunities to the kanban board. It is critical that the Director of Product Management publicly and privately celebrate anytime anyone from the sales team puts something on the board. It may seem like a small task to the sales team but the Director of Product Management knows that if she wants the sales team to engage in the kanban board and the development of their product, they need to be effectively communicating with each other and she needs to provide dopamine to the sales team for following along with what she wants them to be doing.

These are the 4 steps to driving strategic change in an organization. For resources on how to learn how others are handling this transition, consider joining an executive mastermind group to connect with other executives going through similar challenges as you.

by Ritika Vijay

Fri 17 October 2025

When the weekly project updates stopped coming in, Morgan Patel, the COO, figured something was wrong with the productivity of her company. Her team at a mid-sized tech firm had always prided itself on collaboration and quick turnarounds. But over the past quarter, deadlines were slipping, group chats had grown quiet, and the few deliverables that did come through felt rushed and incomplete.

At first, Morgan assumed the silence was temporary—an overload of client work or fatigue after a major proposal cycle. But as weeks passed, she began to see a pattern: the same few people carried the heaviest workload, while others contributed the bare minimum. When she asked for input, she was met with vague replies like “Working on it” or “I’ll circle back.”

Morgan’s experience reflects a challenge many business leaders face today: team disengagement masked as busyness. In hybrid and remote settings especially non-responsiveness can quietly erode accountability, communication, and performance long before results begin to show it.

The Silent Cost of Unclear Accountability

Research shows that only one in three employees strongly agrees they know what’s expected of them at work. Without clear expectations and communication norms, even talented teams can underperform.

For Morgan, the lack of responsiveness wasn’t a sign of laziness—it was a symptom of diffused ownership. Team members weren’t sure what was truly theirs to lead. Tasks were delegated verbally in meetings but rarely followed up in writing. And without visible milestones, small delays snowballed into missed deadlines.

The Turning Point: Making Accountability Visible

Determined to turn things around, Morgan began with a simple change: clarity through visibility.

She introduced a shared project tracker where every deliverable had three clear columns—Owner, Deadline, and Check-In Date. No vague hand-offs, no unspoken assumptions. Every task was attached to a name, a due date, and a midpoint check.

Next, she restructured weekly meetings. Instead of open-ended status updates, each person gave a concise report:

What was completed since last week
What’s currently in progress
What’s blocking progress and who could help

This change shifted the culture from “updating the boss” to team-based accountability, where silence no longer passed as progress.

How Managers Can Apply This Approach

Morgan’s turnaround offers a clear playbook for leaders who want to rebuild accountability without slipping into micromanagement. The key is to create structure that empowers, not controls. Here’s how other managers can do the same:

Make ownership visible.
Use shared tools — whether a project tracker, task board, or dashboard — where every deliverable is linked to a name, a deadline, and a progress status. When everyone can see who owns what, accountability becomes natural rather than enforced.
Set measurable checkpoints.
Instead of waiting until the end of a project, establish mid-point check-ins. These quick touchpoints help surface roadblocks early and make it easier for the team to self-correct before deadlines are missed.
Redefine communication standards.
Clarify what “responsive” looks like — for example, same-day replies to internal messages or weekly updates on shared platforms. When expectations are explicit, silence stands out.
Encourage transparency, not perfection.
Managers should model openness about challenges and mistakes. When leaders show that transparency is valued over flawless execution, team members become more willing to speak up before small issues become big ones.
Recognize visible follow-through.
Publicly acknowledge team members who deliver on commitments or proactively communicate progress. Recognition reinforces desired behavior and rebuilds momentum across the group.

By focusing on visibility, consistency, and recognition, managers can transform disengaged teams into accountable, communicative ones — just as Morgan did. The result isn’t tighter control; it’s a healthier rhythm of ownership and trust that keeps teams aligned and motivated.

What Business Leaders Can Learn

Morgan’s story offers a blueprint for leaders grappling with non-responsive or underperforming teams:

Define expectations publicly. Every task should have a visible owner and timeline
Normalize midpoint check-ins. Accountability doesn’t mean surveillance—it means shared awareness.
Reinforce responsiveness as a professional standard. Silence is not neutral—it’s a missed opportunity for collaboration.
Celebrate visible follow-through. Recognition builds the behavior you want repeated.

In the end, Morgan didn’t just fix a communication issue—she re-built her team’s trust in one another. Her experience reminds business leaders that accountability is not enforced; it’s engineered through clarity, culture, and consistency.

by Julia Gonzalez

Fri 26 September 2025

Digital transformation is rarely easy, and organizational change can often create friction, requiring a thoughtful approach to shifting employee practices. Consider a financial firm’s Chief Technology Officer, Anna. She had effectively promoted a new system, one meant to replace the old, outdated technology. This switch was projected to save the firm millions of dollars annually, but the only challenge was connecting the people to the potential of the new solution.

To smooth the transition, Anna had conducted three months of required webinars. However, staff members seemed to remain distant or hesitant, resulting in push back against the new system. The root of the challenge wasn't a flaw in the technology, but a gap in the organization's willingness to adopt change.

Anna's initial strategy treated the transition as a simple technical training exercise, when in reality, it was a crucial opportunity to align the organization's workflows with its strategic goals. Her role evolved from being solely the technology executive to becoming the leader of a strategic business mandate. The change now needed to be guided by Anna with conviction, rather than simply suggested.

Anna's pivot in strategy must move from passive persuasion to one of active, deliberate integration. Her success depends on clearly defining the path forward and gently, yet firmly, showing the organization that the new system is the best, most sustainable way to work.

Four Steps to Confident, Integrated Adoption

Anna's path forward requires her to exert leadership, transforming hesitation into a shared commitment.

Establish and Communicate the Confident Vision

The initial perception that adoption is optional needs to be dissolved by presenting the system as a clear, strategic necessity. When the firm is saving millions, the executive vision sets the strategy.

Executive Unified Endorsement: The CTO, the CEO, and the CFO must stand together for a company-wide address. The message, delivered by the CEO, must be consistent: "This system is a strategic imperative that ensures our future competitiveness. Moving forward with this system is an essential component of our collective success." This transforms the implementation from a departmental request into a firm-wide business opportunity.
Clear Timelines: Clear, supportive cut-off dates for the legacy systems must be announced. There must be a detailed schedule for a gradual, supported transition: "Effective December 1st, all new accounts must be processed in the new system. The legacy system will be retired and archived by January 1st." By gently guiding the organization away from the old alternative, the primary roadblock to forward motion is eased.
ROI as the Guiding Principle: Anna must confidently reference the projected millions in ROI when any hesitation surfaces regarding customizations or procedural changes. She must clearly state that the savings are directly tied to adopting the standard, efficient configuration. Any proposed "tweak" must be framed in terms of its potential to undermine efficiency and value, encouraging stakeholders to prioritize the company's financial health over immediate personal comfort.

2. Strategic Insights and Peer Guidance

While cultivating confidence internally, external guidance from peers can help Anna validate and refine her approach.

Join an Executive Mastermind Group: Joining a group of like-minded executives can provide immediate, practical insights on how other companies have successfully navigated large-scale changes like this. These peers can offer guidance on training methods, supportive enforcement tactics, and political dynamics unique to sweeping technological migrations. This external perspective ensures Anna's integration strategy is based on proven, real-world experiences, not just internal theories.

3. Empower Managerial Oversight and Engagement

Mid-level managers are the most crucial layer in translating confidence into daily practice. They must be empowered to take personal ownership of the outcome.

Mandatory Collaborative Sessions: Anna should mandate that all managers dedicate a set time to do a "collaborative session" for the first two weeks post-launch. They must sit with their team members, observe them actively using the new system, and offer immediate support and feedback. This makes the adoption process their direct responsibility, replacing passive oversight with active, supportive mentorship.
Confidence and Usage Scorecards: Managers must be required to submit weekly "Usage and Confidence Scorecards" detailing adoption statistics, remaining training needs, and employee comfort levels. This ensures that slow adoption is reframed as an opportunity for targeted managerial support in the eyes of Anna and the executive team.

4. Utilize Phased Rollout and Gently Remove the Safety Net

To prevent sticking to old routines, the old systems must be deliberately and visibly transitioned out.

Phased System Sunset: Launch the system in phases, but follow each launch with a firm, irreversible system sunset. For example, launch the new system for creating new records first. Then, two weeks later, make the legacy system read-only for that function. This encourages the use of the new tool while retaining access to old data for reference, mitigating initial panic and building system trust.
Visible Demonstration of Progress: Anna should have her IT team clearly mark the old servers as retired or archive the legacy application icons on desktop screens. This symbolic act reinforces the forward momentum and the finality of the successful transition.

By executing this shift from asking for tentative participation to confidently guiding the organization toward its new, efficient process, Anna can eliminate organizational doubts and ensure an invaluable return of millions. The battle for technology adoption is won by leading with confidence and ensuring the path of least resistance is the path of compliance and success in her own system.

by Julia Gonzalez

Fri 5 September 2025

A simple staffing request can easily reveal a fundamental clash of priorities in corporate leadership. Alex, a CEO, reviews the latest hiring report, an affirmation to the company's growth trajectory. He has hired six new people for the Operations team. Their resumes are impressive, and they were brought on as a strategic investment to scale capacity. Though, their potential is only valuable when it's put to use.

Ben, the VP of Operations, is focused not on his new hires, but instead an upcoming project for his team. He’s the brain behind the company’s operational success, and has built that success on a small, trusted team. His two best team members, Jenny and Mark, are the kind of employees who can perfectly see his vision and execute flawlessly. While he knows Jenny and Mark are his best associates, they are both already handling a significant percentage of the work of the entire operations team, leaving Ben with the stress of meeting a crucial deadline without them. Ben’s stress regarding his upcoming project leaves him walking into Alex’s office with a request: a budget to hire one more person.

The request highlights a difference in priority. The CEO, seeing a surplus of talent, pushes back. In his mind, he had just hired six new people for this exact purpose. Ben the VP, however, sees it differently. He views the new hires not as an asset, but as an investment he didn't approve. Because he didn't lead the hiring process, he lacks a fundamental level of trust in their capabilities and has been slow to integrate them with meaningful responsibilities. In his world, these new hires are just liabilities that could derail the entire project. He is unwilling to risk giving them a chance since he didn't select them. This is a classic conflict of priorities: the CEO's need for strategic resource optimization versus the VP’s need for guaranteed project delivery, by a team he trusts.

A Dual-Perspective Solution

Resolving this tension requires both leaders to step back from their immediate positions and embrace a shared, strategic vision. The solution isn't about one person "winning" but about creating a framework for success that aligns both operational needs and long-term organizational health.

From the CEO perspective:

For Alex, the challenge is not just about the hiring decision. It’s about building a culture of trust and ensuring the company’s investment in talent is maximized. The CEO's role is to facilitate a solution that is satisfying for Ben while safeguarding the company's resources.

Acknowledge and Validate the VP's Position: The CEO Alex’s first action shouldn't be to reject the request outright, but to validate Ben's ownership over his team. Instead of saying, "Just give them a chance," he can say, "Ben, I understand that it's challenging to integrate new people you didn't hire directly. I hired them because I thought they were a good match for the team you’ve built, and I’d like you to allow them to prove that to you. Give them some time and if they aren’t a good fit, we can reassess." This approach works better because it reframes the conversation from a conflict to a collaborative problem-solving session. By acknowledging his concerns about a lack of familiarity, Alex can address the root cause of the issue.
Define a Shared Integration Plan: The CEO must work with the VP to create a tangible and low-risk path for the new hires. This involves setting a clear, short-term trial period with well-defined, objective metrics. For example, "Let's assign two of the new hires to a specific, manageable task within the first phase of the project. We’ll measure their output against this baseline over the next four weeks." This transforms the unknown into a measurable experiment. Providing a safety net will ease Ben’s worries about the new hires jepordizing his project and provide a timeline to exploring alternatives if they don’t preform to standard.

From the VP’s Perspective:

For Ben, the instinct to rely on his trusted team is not a sign of poor leadership but a natural response to the pressure to deliver. His challenge is to shift from a mindset of risk aversion to one of strategic team building and scalability, even with talent he didn't select.

Acknowledge and Address the Reluctance: The VP must first recognize that his reluctance is rooted in the very real anxiety of project failure and personal reputation, amplified by a lack of ownership. He needs to confront the fact that his team’s long-term success is dependent on its ability to grow. The reliance on just two people, while effective in the short term, creates a single point of failure and makes the entire operation fragile and unable to grow.
Create a Structured Integration Plan: The VP should craft a phased plan for the new hires. Instead of assigning them to the main project immediately, he can start with a smaller task that allows them to demonstrate their skills, or pair them with Jenny or Mark to work on a task in a more controlled environment. This method will provide Ben with the data and confidence he needs to see the value of the new team members.
Embrace the Role of Team Builder: The VP’s role is not simply to manage tasks; it is to cultivate talent. By successfully integrating the new hires, he not only solves the immediate project challenge but also builds a resilient and adaptable team. He must reframe the situation from a burden to an opportunity. This demonstrates a transition from being a doer to being a truly strategic leader.

The resolution to this common leadership challenge is a powerful lesson in executive collaboration. It requires a CEO to move beyond a simple mandate and provide a supportive framework, and a VP to move beyond the comfort of the familiar and embrace the uncertainty of growth. By creating a collaborative action plan, both leaders transform a moment of conflict into a catalyst for organizational health.

by Kayla Ambrose

Fri 5 September 2025

As companies begin to encourage employees to return to the office, managers are often placed in a position to implement such changes for their teams. With many direct reports working hybrid or fully remote, it can be a challenging adjustment for them to begin following return-to-office requirements. It is a manager's responsibility to support their team members while implementing the company-wide policies promoting working from the office.

Managers should strive to ensure that their return-to-office policies are both fair and equitable for their direct reports. While this may be intuitive, it can be much more challenging in practice. When making decisions for how to create a fair and equitable return-to-office policy, managers should take into consideration the following:

In-Person Needs of Individual Roles

When designing return-to-office policies, consider what work truly needs to be completed in the office. Some roles that are more autonomous in nature may not require multiple days in the office each week, such as data analysis or individual contributor roles. These individuals may find it distracting to be in the office, surrounded by others, when their tasks can be done more easily out of the office. Other roles may be heavily team-based, including project coordination or client-facing roles, thus requiring more time in the office. While making these distinctions, evaluate whether the task should be done remotely.

By determining which roles are inherently more collaborative rather than those more independently focused, managers can create role-based hybrid frameworks for their direct reports. This structure ensures that time spent in the office is specific to the actual work requirements of each role.

2. Fairness of Policies

While accommodating role-specific needs is important, managers should also factor in the fairness of the policies. Fairness entails considering the burden of the new return-to-office policies on individuals. For example, some employees may live a lot further from the office, thus incurring higher commuting costs. Furthermore, some individuals may serve as caregivers for family members, making it more difficult for them to return to the office.

Managers may adjust their return-to-office policies to allow for flexibility in which days team members should work from the office. This allows individuals to be able to choose which days are best for them to be in person, creating a better work-life balance.

3. Requirements for In-Person Team Meetings

Highly collaborative teams may largely benefit from having dedicated in-office days for in-person meetings. Teams that require regular meetings may find it easier to mandate a specific day for all individuals to be in person.

When determining which day to dedicate as an in-person collaboration day, consider the importance of the meetings being in person and the attendance of all individuals. Managers may also find it helpful to gather feedback from employees. While gathering feedback from team members may help set the date, team members may have conflicting preferences. Ultimately, prioritize which day is best for the productivity of the team and the feasibility of team members' in-person attendance.

4. Providing Supportive Resources

To promote a fair and equitable return-to-office policy, managers should share resources with their direct reports that support them through these changes. These resources may include mental health and stress management resources, or even Employee Resource Groups (ERGs).

Some companies may have various financial support resources for employees, such as commuting allowances or discounted child care services providers. Managers should remind employees of the available supporting resources and help team members access them.

To help leaders gain insight from an outside perspective as to what other leaders and executives are doing to create a fair and equitable return-to-office policy, consider enrolling those leaders in an executive mastermind group.

Avoiding Favoritism

As a manager who works closely with direct reports, it may feel justified to make special accommodations for individuals. When implementing return-to-office policies, actively avoid presenting any favoritism biases. Return-to-office policies that demonstrate favoritism and set unfair requirements for certain individuals will cause friction within the team. Furthermore, catering more favorably to specific individuals may lead other team members to discredit the return-to-office policies and refuse to follow them.

Communicating Policy Changes

Managers must not only implement the return-to-office policies, but also develop strategies to communicate the new policies. When communicating the updated policies, managers should communicate the changes verbally and provide a written record for their direct reports to reference. After communicating the changes, provide opportunities for individual conversations with employees for them to ask questions and reassure them of the support mechanisms in place to provide a seamless transition. During this time, managers should demonstrate that they are there to help their direct reports and help them navigate the new policy.

DEI Considerations

Return-to-office policies need to be equitably applied to teams; however, DEI implications should also be taken into consideration. Parents and caregivers who previously worked mostly or fully remote may struggle disproportionately to return to the office. Those with a disability may also have an increased burden when commuting to the office and may require more individual consideration.

For both instances, work closely with the individual in such circumstances to provide means to support them while also ensuring they can adjust to a more in-person work environment. Communicate with the company's human resources department about company policies and other tools that can support these individuals.

Ultimately, the most important aspect of implementing a return-to-office strategy is to have open channels of communication. Managers who create feedback mechanisms for their employees to learn about their struggles and successes with the return-to-office policy can appropriately adapt the policy to these needs. Return-to-office policies are aimed at creating more effective teams, but this can only be achieved through communicating effectively within the team.

by Ritika Vijay

Fri 5 September 2025

When Aiden, the Chief People Officer (CPO) of a rapidly scaling tech startup, first joined the leadership team, he was excited to bring structure and strategy to a company that had doubled in headcount in less than two years. But within months, he noticed a troubling pattern: teams were bypassing their functional leaders and going directly to the founder and CEO, Michael.

At first, Aiden assumed this was the natural growing pain of a founder-led organization. But as he looked closer, the issue was more complex. Michael, though visionary and deeply invested in his team’s happiness, had a tendency to be a people-pleaser. When a group of engineers disliked the CFO’s directive requiring partial in-office work for regulatory and financial reasons, they didn’t raise the concern with the CFO. Instead, they went directly to Michael. Wanting to avoid conflict and preserve goodwill, Michael agreed with them on the spot, unintentionally undermining the CFO’s authority.

This cycle repeated across departments. Leaders would establish policies aligned with the company’s strategic needs, only for those decisions to be overturned, sometimes in casual hallway conversations, because Michael wanted to reassure employees. While well-intentioned, the CEO’s overstepping left the leadership team fractured, credibility strained, and employees confused about which rules actually applied.

The Core Challenge: The People-Pleasing CEO

People-pleasing tendencies in CEOs are not uncommon, especially in founder-led organizations where loyalty and culture are prized. But without boundaries, these habits can unintentionally destabilize the very leadership structure designed to support growth.

For business leaders like Aiden, the challenge isn’t just about managing their own function—it’s about managing up. The question becomes: how do you support a CEO who oversteps in the name of employee satisfaction, while ensuring other leaders maintain credibility and the company doesn’t drift into chaos?

Because objectivity diminishes the higher anyone goes in an organizational hierarchy, Aiden wasn’t getting objectivity. Fortunately, Aiden is in an executive mastermind group and those executives encouraged him to pursue the following steps:

Strategies for Managing Up Effectively

Clarify Decision Rights Publicly

High-performing leadership teams thrive on clear ownership. One effective approach is to create a “decision rights map” that makes visible which leader is accountable for which areas. For example, workforce policies might sit under the CFO’s purview, while the CEO provides input only at set review points. Codifying authority in this way helps employees understand where to direct concerns and reduces the temptation to bypass functional leaders.

Reframe Employee Requests

When a CEO agrees too quickly to employee requests, leadership peers can step in to reframe the moment as an opportunity for alignment. A useful response is something along the lines of: “That’s an important concern—let’s make sure the relevant leader is looped in so it fits into the broader plan.” This keeps the CEO connected to employees while reinforcing the authority of the leader responsible for the decision.

Create Feedback Loops

To avoid conflicting directives, organizations can set up systems where employee concerns raised directly with the CEO are logged and routed back to the appropriate leader. This preserves the CEO’s role as approachable and empathetic, while ensuring that input is integrated into structured decision-making rather than creating confusion.

Highlight Long-Term Impact

Sometimes a CEO needs help connecting the dots between short-term reassurance and long-term leadership credibility. Leaders can surface real examples—such as policies being ignored or authority eroding—to show how quick promises can undercut strategic goals. Framing the issue as a trust and alignment challenge, rather than a personal flaw, helps CEOs recognize the importance of consistency.

The Outcome

When these practices are in place, CEOs learn to respond differently: “I hear your concern, and I want you to know we value it. Let’s make sure the right leader is brought into the conversation so we can get this right.”

The result is a healthier leadership dynamic: credibility is preserved, employees know which channels to follow, and the CEO maintains their approachable style without undermining the authority of their team. Ultimately, these guardrails allow fast-growing companies to scale without sacrificing trust or clarity.

The Takeaway for Business Leaders

Fast-growing startups depend on both visionary leadership and operational discipline. When CEOs lean too heavily into people-pleasing, they risk undercutting the very leaders who drive sustainable growth. Business leaders who find themselves in Aiden’s position should remember: managing up isn’t about controlling the CEO—it’s about protecting leadership integrity and creating structures that allow empathy and authority to coexist.

by Garrett Mintz

Fri 29 August 2025

There seems to be one constant in business: change is inevitable.

Whether we are implementing something new with AI, restructuring processes, pursuing a new direction, or any combination of things that would necessitate change - one thing is certain: no industry is safe and most organizations will need to make changes to keep up or risk being left behind.

The question I am pondering is: How can people be at the center of this change?

Peter Drucker once said “Culture eats strategy for breakfast” and I would tend to agree with him.

No matter what promises we made to our board, how rosy a picture could look if we just made this one change, or how dire our situation is, if the people being asked to implement the change are not onboard with the change, it is never going to happen.

Does this mean that we should only change if our people approve of the change? Not necessarily. But it does mean that if we are going to make a change, our people must know what is in it for them and that result must be substantially better than what they currently have.

The purpose of change is typically for one of two reasons. Either:

If we don’t make this change, something really bad will happen to everyone at the company (e.g. potential of going out of business).
If we make this change now, it has the potential of improving the business and everyone involved in the business substantially.

It is typically easier to create a compelling why to the team in the first reason: if we don’t make this change, we all could be out of a job and if we like our lifestyle and the life our jobs currently afford us, then we should all be bought in to make this change. This requires a level of vulnerability from the executive team but is typically pretty compelling. This message does lose its luster if repeated too often as our people will go to a state of emergency with us but they will not live there (e.g. the lifestyle their work affords them won’t be worth it if they are constantly feeling like if they don’t make immediate changes that the company will go under).

For the latter (making a change that has the potential of improving the business substantially), most organizations struggle to create a clear and compelling WIIFM (What’s In It For Me) for everyone. If a CEO says that making this change will increase EBITDA which will help position the company for an exit - if the employees of this company don’t have equity, they don’t care about achieving an exit because there is no upside for them.

The company must create a compelling WIIFM for everyone involved. This takes a lot of time and effort. But it needs to happen for change to occur. Otherwise, the company will have to hire a consulting company who will charge an obscene amount of money to do the exact same thing and then leave once they gave the company the blueprint of everything they need to do to right the ship.

To align purpose when implementing change, everyone must be accounted for with a WIIFM to get the buy-in necessary for the change to be successfully implemented (and the WIIFM should be catered to people on a person by person basis, not a departmental one because what motivates one person could be different from another person, even if they are in the exact same role).

One final note on purpose, especially if it is for a brighter future instead of avoiding business failure, even if an organization successfully implements a change one time, they need to be mindful of stacking changes. Every change creates a cracking of trust that needs time to repair. The more frequent changes you ask of your people, the less receptive they will be to subsequent changes.

When it comes to aligning leadership during change, it is critical that everyone is on the same page. One of the most common hurdles companies have to overcome is misalignment of organizational goals and priorities.

The goal: the CEO sets a direction and everyone follows suit.

The reality: the CEO sets a direction, 25% of the team immediately follows suit, 50% of the team follows the old direction because the new direction wasn’t effectively communicated to them, and 25% are still following the previous direction that hasn’t been the direction for years but because of poor communication and a belief that the new changes will be backtracked and an overall lack of people holding others accountable, they are still following the old and outdated direction.

To align leadership during change, there must be a mechanism for holding people accountable and helping the executive team quickly and effectively understand when there might be a misalignment of priorities.

For example, if the CEO, with the guidance of her board and executive team, decides that the company is going to change the way they operate and transition to a new system that should be more efficient, cheaper, and minimize mistakes - there must be a way for her to know that the rest of the organization is picking up the change. If her VP of Operations says that he understands and to her face shares that he is onboard, and even sets goals in alignment with the new change, but if his team is setting goals not in alignment with the VP of Operations, the team will be working really hard to make very little progress. In this scenario, the VP of Operations thought he did a good enough job communicating the need for change to his team, but obviously he didn’t do that good of a job or else their goals would be in alignment with this new direction.

The VP of Operations reports back to the CEO that he has done an *effective* job of communicating this change and she takes him for his word. The issue with this is that most people, especially middle managers in an organization, believe that their communication skills are far more effective than they actually are. She takes her VP of Operations for his word and then 6-12 months later, some major balls drop, people quit or get fired, the VP of Operations is blaming his people saying they are incompetent and that he needs his CEO’s support to increase headcount for his team and the CEO is left wondering “where did I go wrong?”

At Ambition In Motion, we created a tool called AIM Insights that evaluates the goals of cascading levels of leadership in an organization and reports throughout the layers of leadership, in a one page format, which teams’ goals are in alignment, which are high/medium/low impact, and which are accomplished, and ultimately provide guidance for what each level of leadership in the organization can do to improve the impact, alignment, and achievement of their reporting structures goals.

Whatever tool is used, it must be easy to digest, updated regularly, and those using it must be receptive to the feedback and willing to make adjustments when they discover their are opportunities for improvement.

Ultimately, profit will be achieved when the purpose of change is clear and has accounted for what is in it for me for every person in the organization and leadership has a system for understanding and better holding the team accountable for the goals/expectations being set, their prioritization of those activities, and their willingness to change their leadership style when they discover that their are opportunities for improvement.

by Kayla Ambrose

Fri 22 August 2025

John is a manager of a marketing analytics team within his firm and is highly regarded as a positive and motivating manager. Despite these praises, John has recently noticed that his team has been decreasing in productivity and not implementing changes in response to his routine feedback sessions. With the high morale and weekly one-on-one sessions with each of his team members, John wonders why his team is becoming ineffective.

John’s Diagnosis: Not Communicating Feedback Effectively

While his weekly feedback sessions are a great tool for relaying feedback, the way in which John articulates his feedback is causing his team members to not understand it. Sometimes managers think they are being direct in their feedback, but they are actually masking their feedback with assumptions and indirect hints. Managers may spend entire feedback sessions sharing their insights, but still have their direct reports take nothing away from the meeting due to the communication barriers.

What are examples of communication barriers that cause managers, like John, to give ineffective feedback?

Lack of Clarity & Context

Providing ambiguous messages to direct reports can pose a communication barrier. When managers have unclear expectations or provide incomplete guidance, it may be difficult for team members to understand feedback. Without specific changes or advice, direct reports may be left confused, trying to guess what their managers expect from them

Overloading Information

Actively communicating through multiple messages, emails, or meetings can give managers the sense that they are communicating effectively with their team. Despite these active efforts to provide feedback, the usage of various channels and tons of messages can overwhelm employees. Flooding employees with feedback in addition to their other daily tasks reduces their attention to their feedback.

Emotional Barriers

Stress, defensiveness, and fear can muddle how feedback is delivered as well as how it is received. It is a manager's responsibility to reflect on these personal emotions to ensure their mindset isn’t causing misinterpretation. Additionally, managers should work to ensure the psychological safety of their employees to further reduce these emotional barriers.

Cultural & Language Differences

Teams comprised of individuals from various backgrounds present many strengths due to the diversity of thought. However, when communicating feedback, it is important to be conscious of this diversity. Direct reports from different backgrounds may perceive communication styles differently, causing feedback to land ineffectively.

John’s Remedy: Clearly Communicate Feedback

As John realizes that his methods for communicating feedback are ineffective, he works to implement changes to improve his communication style. Rather than having overly relaxed weekly one-on-one sessions with his direct reports, John implements the following 6 strategies to ensure clearly communicated feedback.

Be Direct

Rather than hinting at what changes direct reports should make, specifically address what actions should be taken and any applicable steps required. Along with communicating direct feedback, acknowledge that the feedback might have been confusing and open the conversation for dialogue.

2. Provide Context

Instead of simply diving into the specific changes that need to be made, create a shared understanding through contextualizing the situation. Leaving direct reports to guess what the feedback applies to can cause them to apply the feedback to incorrect tasks. Specifically address what the feedback applies to and any observations associated with it.

3. Identify Areas of Miscommunication

Reflecting on areas of potential miscommunication is a powerful strategy to prevent miscommunication early on. If there is something that a direct report says that is confusing, or vice versa, have them provide an example to ensure there is a mutual understanding. Strategizing to ensure clarification is provided during the feedback sessions will actively develop stronger communication.

4. Listen Attentively

Throughout the feedback session, make sure to listen attentively to what others share. Allowing silence for the direct report to clarify or expand on their thoughts will create a space for them to feel heard and recognized. Additionally, responding by paraphrasing what they said can help ensure their thoughts are understood.

5. Acknowledge and Clarify

When receiving feedback from direct reports, always recognize their feedback, even if there is disagreement. Further clarifying through follow-up questions and prompting them to ask follow-up questions as well will prevent misinterpretation.

6. Utilize Performance Management Tools

In order to ensure progress towards more effective feedback communication, implement tools or metrics to measure responsiveness to feedback. Utilizing performance management tools, such as AIM Insights, can help managers track their progress to support these communication changes.

John’s Update: An Effectively Functioning Team

After implementing these 6 strategies to improve his feedback sessions, John has noticed a drastic improvement within his team. Direct reports are quickly responding and adjusting their efforts to align with John’s feedback, and John is also able to receive feedback from his team. As he manages his team, John will continue to adapt and strengthen his feedback communication skills in order to best suit the needs of his team.

by Ritika Vijay

Fri 22 August 2025

When Maya Patel took on her new role as team manager at a fast-growing tech firm, everything seemed picture-perfect. The office radiated positivity with green plants adorned every corner, meetings ran smoothly, and her team of high-performing professionals appeared engaged and cheerful. Yet Maya couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing.

Over time, she began noticing whispers in the hallways and closed-door conversations in small groups. Employees praised the company’s culture in public but privately expressed frustrations about inefficiencies, communication breakdowns, and missed opportunities. The concerns never reached team-wide discussions; instead, they simmered quietly.

Maya’s situation is not unusual. Many business leaders find themselves in organizations where everything looks flawless on the surface, yet undercurrents of dissatisfaction flow beneath. The challenge lies in addressing those undercurrents before they grow into cultural cracks.

The “Two Dogs and a Fence” Problem

Maya described her challenge as “two dogs barking through a fence.” On either side, energy and passion were evident, but the fence prevented resolution. Her team members weren’t voicing issues openly, so frustrations stayed contained within cliques. When she tried to intervene, the discussions quickly escalated into defensiveness rather than collaboration.

This metaphor captures a common leadership dilemma: when teams hesitate to bring up problems directly, managers often step into the role of mediator, sometimes with little success. Without a clear path for open dialogue, teams can appear harmonious while failing to address what truly holds them back.

Lessons for Business Leaders

Maya’s experience highlights strategies any business leader can adopt when facing a seemingly “too perfect” team culture that hides unspoken tensions.

Normalize Transparency

Leaders must create psychological safety where team members can voice concerns without fear of judgment. Regularly reinforcing that constructive criticism is valued, not penalized, opens the gate for dialogue.

Introduce Structured Feedback Loops

Maya implemented monthly “pulse check” sessions where every team member was invited to share one challenge and one improvement idea. Framing this as part of continuous improvement made it clear that speaking up was not only acceptable but expected.

Redirect Energy from Complaining to Problem-Solving

Private grumbling was redirected into collective brainstorming. Maya encouraged employees to bring concerns with at least one suggested solution. This shifted conversations from venting to action-oriented dialogue.

Act on Feedback Publicly

To reinforce trust, Maya prioritized acting on small but meaningful suggestions quickly, whether it was streamlining a reporting process or clarifying project ownership. Demonstrating responsiveness signaled that voicing issues led to results.

Break Down the “Fence”

By facilitating cross-group discussions, Maya ensured concerns were addressed directly rather than passed around in silos. She often played the role of translator, reframing complaints into neutral, solution-focused language that allowed both sides to listen productively.

The Outcome

Within a few months, Maya’s team began shifting from guarded perfection to authentic collaboration. Employees no longer felt the need to whisper frustrations in hallways. Instead, they trusted that their voices would be heard and that their input could shape team practices. The metaphorical fence came down, not by silencing the barking, but by giving both “dogs” a safe yard to meet face-to-face.

The Takeaway for Leaders

For business leaders, the lesson is clear: a team that looks perfect on the outside may be struggling with unspoken tensions underneath. By creating structures for honest feedback, modeling openness, and acting decisively on what is shared, leaders can transform hidden dissatisfaction into shared growth.

Maya’s journey demonstrates that handling complaints isn’t about preventing barking—it’s about opening the gate. When leaders replace silence with structured dialogue, they build teams that are not only high-performing but also resilient, authentic, and ready to innovate together.

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