Leaders disconnected from operations make decisions in a vacuum

The first sign that leadership is disconnected from operations is not a big strategic mistake. It is a meeting that feels strangely empty. You sit in a performance review and the first twenty minutes are spent arguing about numbers. People are polite, but you can hear the tension underneath: My file shows something else. That metric is delayed. We changed the definition last quarter. Let me check with someone. The conversation stays on validation, not on performance. Decisions get postponed,...