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Leaders worry about making the wrong decision. But some of the greatest leadership risks emerge after they make the right one. They hire the right executive. Approve a sound strategy. Restructure the organization. Promote a high-potential leader. Invest in growth. Make the difficult call they have postponed for too long. Then something happens between the decision and the result. The new executive struggles to gain traction. The strategy is clear, but the leadership team interprets its priorities differently. The restructuring creates new roles, but decision authority remains unclear. The CEO delegates responsibility, yet important decisions continue finding their way back to the CEO. None of these necessarily means the original decision was wrong. The decision may have been right. The risk emerges in what happens next. Leaders understandably put enormous energy into consequential decisions. They gather data, seek advice, debate alternatives, assess risk, and build consensus. Eventually, they almost always decide. But a decision alone does not create the intended value. The Gap Between Decision and Performance Between a consequential leadership decision and the organizational performance it is intended to enable is a period I call the Risk Zone. It is where: Expectations can become unclear Alignment can weaken Decisions can slow Candor can become filtered Leadership behavior can drift Execution can stall Organizations often invest heavily in the front end of important decisions. They conduct executive searches. They build strategic plans. They redesign structures. They select new systems. They announce change initiatives. Then the meeting ends. The search closes. The strategy is approved. The new leader starts. And attention moves to the next priority. But organizational value has not been created yet. The decision creates the opportunity. What happens next determines the return. Why Good Decisions Still Produce Poor Results There is a temptation to assume that if the decision was good, the result should follow. Organizations do not work that way. Consider hiring a senior executive. Selecting the right person matters enormously. But the executive still has to understand the culture, establish credibility, build stakeholder relationships, clarify expectations, navigate organizational dynamics, make decisions, and begin producing results. Research on CEO succession indicates that leadership changes can affect strategy, governance, stakeholder relationships, and organizational performance. Or consider strategy. The strategy itself may be sound. But if the senior team isn't aligned on priorities and trade-offs, if decision rights remain unclear, or if leaders leave the room agreeing only to behave differently afterward, strategy becomes increasingly difficult to execute. The same pattern appears during growth. Systems and leadership practices that worked when an organization was smaller can become constraints as complexity increases. A highly involved founder who once accelerated decisions can eventually become the bottleneck through which too many decisions must pass. These look like different leadership problems. But they share something important: the organization made a decision intended to create value, and risk emerged while trying to turn that decision into performance. The Risk Leaders May Not See The higher a leader rises in the organization, the harder it can become to receive unfiltered information. That does not necessarily mean people are dishonest. Positional power itself changes conversations. Employees become more careful about what they say. Bad news may travel more slowly. Disagreement may happen after the meeting rather than during it. Assumptions may go unchallenged. Research on psychological safety connects interpersonal safety with behaviors such as speaking up, asking questions, learning, seeking feedback, and discussing mistakes. Research on employee voice and silence likewise highlights leadership’s influence on whether employees communicate concerns upward. For an executive, that makes candor more than a culture issue. Filtered information is a decision risk. The challenge is not merely whether leaders have enough information. Most already have dashboards, reports, advisers, peers, employees, boards, and increasingly artificial intelligence producing more analysis than they can realistically absorb. The harder challenge is seeing the situation clearly enough to act well. Evidence-based management offers a useful discipline: integrate scientific findings, organizational information, professional expertise, and stakeholder perspectives rather than relying too heavily on any one source. The question becomes less: Do we have enough information? And more: Are we seeing the situation clearly enough to act well? Diagnose Before You Prescribe Leadership risk rarely has a single cause. Suppose a CEO is frustrated with an executive who no longer appears capable of operating at the level the organization requires. The obvious conclusion may be to replace the executive. Maybe. But several other explanations are possible. Has the organization outgrown the role? Has the role changed without expectations changing with it? Is decision authority unclear? Has growth created complexity the existing structure cannot support? Has the executive received clear feedback? Has the CEO avoided a difficult conversation? And perhaps the most uncomfortable question: How might the CEO’s own leadership be contributing to what is happening? The visible problem may sit in the leader, the system, or both. A strategy, structure, role-design, or decision-rights problem may require an organizational solution. Avoidance, control, fear of conflict, overconfidence, or unexamined assumptions may also be contributing to the problem. The work is to diagnose the actual constraint before engaging the solution. That is why effective leadership work often should not be limited to either coaching or consulting. Some moments require reflection, ownership, and behavioral change. Others require organizational diagnosis, operating-mechanism redesign, evidence, options, and a clear recommendation. Often, leaders need both. Insight Is Not the Finish Line Even correctly diagnosing the problem is not enough. A leader can leave a meeting with greater self-awareness and still change nothing. A leadership team can agree on a new operating model and continue behaving exactly as it did before. Knowing is not the same as doing. Insight has to become visible through decisions, conversations, habits, accountability, and follow-through. The practical questions are: What will you do differently? What conversation needs to happen? What decision needs to be made? What behavior needs to change? What will tell us whether it is working? That is where insight becomes traction. Start With the Risk This changes the way we should think about leadership support. Instead of beginning with: Does this executive need coaching? Or: Does this organization need consulting? A better starting question is: Where is the risk? Is the risk in a leadership transition? Is something important stuck? Has growth outpaced the organization’s leadership systems? Is seniority filtering the information reaching the executive? Is the executive team insufficiently aligned to make trade-offs and execute? Is the organization unprepared for a critical succession? Those are different leadership risks. They require different interventions. Sometimes the leader needs someone who will ask the question no one else is asking. Sometimes they need evidence. Sometimes they need an organizational diagnosis. Sometimes they need a recommendation. And sometimes they need someone willing to challenge the assumption beneath the entire conversation. Where Is Your Greatest Leadership Risk? The decision still belongs to the executive. But making the decision is only the beginning. The real leadership question is what happens next. I developed the white paper, Executive Advisory: Where Coaching and Consulting Come Together, to explore that question more fully. It introduces the Risk Zone, examines six recurring forms of leadership risk, and outlines an evidence-informed approach for moving from consequential decisions to organizational performance. Download the white paper: Executive Advisory: Where Coaching and Consulting Come Together References Berns, K. V. D., & Klarner, P. (2017). A review of the CEO succession literature and a future research agenda. Academy of Management Perspectives, 31(2), 83–108. Doolittle, J. (2023). Life-changing leadership habits: 10 proven principles that will elevate people, profit, and purpose. Organizational Talent Consulting. Edmondson, A. C. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–383. Edmondson, A. C., & Bransby, D. P. (2023). Psychological safety comes of age: Observed themes in an established literature. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 10, 55–78. Morrison, E. W. (2023). Employee voice and silence: Taking stock a decade later. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 10, 79–107. Rousseau, D. M. (2020). Making evidence-based organizational decisions in an uncertain world. Organizational Dynamics.

The hidden risk may be your executive team's decision architecture—not your analytics. Two executive teams can have access to the same information, comparable analytical capability, and equally experienced leaders, and still reach decisions of very different quality. That gap has economic consequences. Research on group decision-making shows that when the best decision depends on combining insights, groups are far less likely to identify the optimal answer. The difference is not just data. It is often the discipline around how the team challenges assumptions, distinguishes symptoms from root causes, responds to unfavorable findings, and converts conclusions into results that matter. This makes decision quality observable. Teams that consistently make better decisions demonstrate recognizable patterns in how they use evidence, not because data replaces judgment, but because it refines judgment. For executive teams, this distinction matters. Better decisions are not simply the product of smarter individuals or more sophisticated dashboards. They emerge from habits that reduce bias, expose flawed assumptions, clarify what the evidence actually supports, and connect conclusions to action. The Value of Data-Driven Decisions Data-driven decision-making has become somewhat of a buzzword as organizations invest in analytics, artificial intelligence, and other technologies designed to improve decision quality. A useful working definition of data-driven decision-making is: Using facts extracted from data and metrics to guide business decisions that support business goals rather than relying on experience, intuition, and stories alone. This does not mean experience and intuition are unimportant. Executive judgment remains essential, especially when leaders operate with uncertainty, incomplete information, or rapidly changing conditions. The problem occurs when intuition becomes the default, evidence is selectively considered, or data is introduced primarily to support a conclusion already reached. Data can speed up and improve decision-making. It can help leaders understand what is and is not working. It can expose patterns that are difficult to see through experience alone. Predictive analytics can improve strategic foresight and preparedness as market conditions change. Data-driven decisions can be descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive. Descriptive analytics helps leaders understand what happened. Predictive analytics considers what may happen. Prescriptive analytics addresses the more consequential question: What should we do? But data alone cannot answer that question. Leaders still have to interpret the evidence, evaluate competing alternatives, exercise judgment, decide, and act. The quality of that process matters. The following seven characteristics distinguish teams that use evidence not simply to become more informed, but to make better decisions. 1: They Seek Truth Rather Than Confirmation Deming is often attributed with saying, “In God we trust. All others must bring data.” The underlying principle is important. Data-driven teams use evidence to seek truth rather than confirm what they already believe. This sounds straightforward. In practice, it can be difficult. Leaders naturally develop beliefs about markets, customers, employees, competitors, and organizational performance. Experience creates valuable pattern recognition, but it can also create assumptions that become increasingly difficult to question. The real test occurs when credible evidence contradicts a strongly held position. What happens when the data challenges a preferred strategy? What happens when an investment fails to produce the expected result? What happens when evidence contradicts the prevailing explanation for a performance problem? Teams that consistently make better decisions are willing to examine evidence that challenges their assumptions. The objective is not to eliminate judgment. It is to prevent judgment from becoming immune to evidence. 2: They Look for Patterns and Root Causes Data-driven teams aggregate information to identify patterns, predictions, and potential root causes. They treat problems as possible symptoms of deeper issues rather than isolated events that simply need resolving. Organizations can become very efficient at solving recurring problems without ever addressing the systems producing them. Turnover may look like a recruiting problem when the underlying issue is leadership. Declining performance may look like an employee problem when decision rights are unclear. Customer complaints may appear to be a service issue when the root cause exists upstream in process design. Looking for patterns changes the leadership question. From: How do we fix this problem? To: What is causing this problem to continue occurring? Identifying root causes protects the organization from repeatedly treating symptoms while systemic problems remain unchanged. 3: They Examine Variation Rather Than Relying on Averages Averages can distort organizational reality because they conceal variation. An enterprise-wide average may look acceptable while significant problems exist within particular teams, departments, geographies, customer segments, or business units. Average employee engagement can obscure a struggling division. Average customer satisfaction can conceal deterioration among strategically important customers. Average operating performance can hide substantial differences between locations. Teams that consistently make better decisions examine information at a sufficiently granular level to understand what is actually happening. The goal isn't greater analytical complexity for its own sake. Granularity helps leaders distinguish isolated events from patterns and determine where attention, accountability, or resources are needed. Sometimes the most consequential insight is hidden inside an acceptable average. 4: They Use Data to Interrogate Assumptions and Stories Stories and anecdotal evidence provide powerful personal connections. They are also dangerous when treated as representative evidence. One customer complaint can redirect executive attention. One successful employee can reinforce assumptions about an entire talent strategy. One memorable failure can shape investment decisions long after the underlying conditions have changed. Teams that consistently make better decisions do not eliminate stories. They test them. They ask whether the story represents a broader pattern, an isolated exception, or something the organization does not yet understand. Data provides a way to examine the narratives that naturally develop inside organizations. The question is not whether the story is compelling. The question is whether the evidence supports the conclusion being drawn from it. 5: They Value Negative Findings Finding out that something does not work can be as valuable as finding evidence that supports an idea. This is one of the more difficult characteristics of a genuinely data-driven team. A major initiative may not create the anticipated value. A long-held assumption may prove incorrect. A strategy may underperform. An investment may fail. Unfavorable findings can create defensiveness, particularly when significant resources, executive credibility, or organizational identity are attached to the decision. But negative findings are still information. The strategic value of evidence is not that it continually proves leaders right. Its value is that it enables an organization to discover when an assumption may be wrong before the consequences become more expensive. Teams that consistently make better decisions do not treat unfavorable evidence as failure to be hidden. They treat it as intelligence to be understood. 6: They Convert Evidence Into Decisions and Action Analysis without action creates little organizational value. Teams can have excellent analysts, sophisticated dashboards, and extensive reporting while repeatedly failing to act on what the evidence reveals. Data's purpose is not simply to improve understanding. It is to inform a decision. What are we going to do differently because of what we now know? What will we stop? What will we continue? Where will resources move? Who owns the action? When will the decision be evaluated? These questions connect analysis to execution. Teams that consistently make better decisions don't let evidence stay trapped in presentations, dashboards, or meetings. They translate what they learn into decisions, ownership, and action. 7: They Know When the Evidence Is Sufficient to Decide Being data-driven does not mean waiting until uncertainty disappears. Leaders rarely have complete information. Markets move. Competitors respond. Customer expectations change. Technologies develop. Unexpected events occur. At some point, leaders have to decide. The discipline lies in understanding what evidence the decision requires, how reliable that evidence is, what remains unknown, and what risks accompany acting—or waiting. Some decisions warrant extensive analysis. Others require speed and informed judgment. The danger exists at both extremes. Leaders can make consequential decisions primarily through intuition when relevant evidence is readily available. They can also create analysis paralysis by continuing to gather information long after additional data is unlikely to materially improve the decision. Teams that consistently make better decisions understand that the objective is not certainty. It is making the best defensible decision available under the circumstances and remaining willing to adjust as new evidence emerges. Building a Culture That Supports Better Decisions These seven characteristics do not develop simply by investing in analytics. Culture influences how employees interpret and use evidence. Leaders reinforce that culture through what they consistently pay attention to, how they respond when performance deteriorates, where they allocate resources, what behaviors they reward, and who receives greater organizational responsibility. Several leadership actions are particularly consequential: Pay attention to metrics that matter and review them consistently. Respond to organizational problems by examining evidence rather than relying on anecdote alone. Allocate appropriate resources to analytical capability. Develop employees' ability to interpret and apply evidence. Recognize disciplined, evidence-based decision-making. Support constructive challenge when data contradicts established assumptions. Connect decisions to clear ownership and follow-through. Culture is also reinforced through organization design, policies and procedures, rituals, performance systems, traditions, stories, and leadership behavior. Employees pay attention to these signals. If leaders say data matters but routinely dismiss inconvenient findings, employees notice. If teams are encouraged to challenge assumptions but disagreement creates personal risk, employees notice. If analytics are reviewed but never influence decisions or resource allocation, employees notice. Over time, those repeated signals teach people how decisions are actually expected to be made. These patterns also reveal why better decision-making cannot be separated from leadership habits. The way leaders respond to disagreement, examine assumptions, seek evidence, allocate attention, and follow through on decisions becomes part of the operating environment others experience. In Life-Changing Leadership Habits, I examine the recurring leadership practices that shape people, performance, and organizational outcomes. In the context of data-driven decision-making, those habits matter because evidence does not interpret itself or act on its own. Leaders determine whether evidence creates inquiry or defensiveness, whether disagreement produces learning or compliance, and whether decisions ultimately translate into accountable action. The connection is important: decision quality is not only analytical. It is behavioral. What leaders repeatedly do becomes part of how the organization repeatedly decides. Better Decisions Require Decision Discipline The advantage of a data-driven culture is not that every decision becomes correct. No decision process can eliminate uncertainty, incomplete information, or the need for executive judgment. The advantage is that the organization becomes better at discovering when its assumptions are wrong, distinguishing evidence from narrative, identifying patterns beneath individual events, learning from unfavorable outcomes, and adjusting before errors become more expensive. That is a more demanding standard than simply being data-driven. Organizations can possess extraordinary amounts of data without developing this discipline. They can also employ highly capable people and still allow confirmation bias, anecdote, hierarchy, or analysis paralysis to weaken decisions. Better decision-making requires something more. It requires teams that can use evidence to discipline judgment without surrendering judgment to the evidence. For executives, the central question is therefore not simply: How much data does our team use? A more consequential question is: Does the way our team uses evidence consistently improve the quality of judgment, action, and organizational learning? Because the objective is not to create an organization that uses more data. It is to create an organization that makes better decisions. References Bartlett, R. (2013). A Practitioner’s Guide to Data Analytics: Using Data Analysis to Improve Your Organization’s Decision-Making and Strategy. McGraw-Hill. Davenport, T., Harris, J., & Morison, R. (2010). Analytics at Work: Smarter Decisions, Better Results. Harvard Business Press. De Smet, A., Lackey, G., & Weiss, L. M. (2017, June 21). Untangling your organization’s decision making. McKinsey Quarterly. Doolittle, J., (2023). Life-changing leadership habits:10 Proven Principles That Will Elevate People, Profit, and Purpose. Organizational Talent Consulting. Deloitte. (2019). Deloitte Survey: Analytics and Data-Driven Culture Help Companies Outperform Business Goals. Greenstein, B., & Rao, A. (2022). PwC 2022 AI Business Survey. PwC. Lu, L., Yuan, Y. C., & McLeod, P. L. (2012). Twenty-five years of hidden profiles in group decision making: A meta-analysis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 16(1), 54–75. Upadhyay, P., & Kumar, A. (2020). The intermediating role of organizational culture and internal analytical knowledge between the capability of big data analytics and a firm’s performance. International Journal of Information Management, 52, 102100

AI is expanding analytical capacity. The greater leadership risk may be assuming better decisions will follow. AI is rapidly expanding analytical capacity in most organizations. In McKinsey’s 2025 global study, 88% of respondents reported that their company regularly uses AI in at least one business function, up from 78% the previous year. Yet only 39% reported any EBIT impact from AI. This gap between adoption and realized value matters. Generative AI is changing the availability of analysis. It enables more people, across more areas of an organization, to generate, interpret, and interact with information at a speed and scale. But just as a larger navigation system in your car doesn't determine where you should go any better, greater analytical capacity does not necessarily produce better organizational decisions. Organizations that invest heavily in generative AI, analytics, and talent while continuing to make decisions through the same authority structures, incentives, assumptions, and operating routines that existed before those capabilities arrived are doomed to create an increasingly important enterprise risk. When analytical capability advances faster than the organization’s decision architecture, more analysis can produce more competing interpretations, faster reinforcement of existing assumptions, and greater ambiguity about who is accountable for acting on the evidence. The strategic challenge is therefore larger than adopting generative AI or becoming more data-driven. It's designing an organization capable of converting greater analytical capacity into better decisions. Talent Strategy Must Follow Decision Strategy Organizations often begin their analytical transformation by asking what technology they need or what analytical talent they should hire. A more consequential starting point is the decisions the organization needs to make better. Which decisions have the greatest effect on customer value, capital allocation, operating performance, risk, and growth? Which require stronger predictive capability? Where is judgment being exercised without sufficient evidence? Where does useful analysis already exist but fail to influence action? Where are analytical resources disconnected from the business decisions they are intended to support? These questions change talent planning from a staffing exercise into an enterprise capability decision. Once critical decisions are clear, leaders can identify the knowledge, skills, and abilities required to support them. Technical competence remains essential. Depending on the organization, this may include modeling, forecasting, statistical analysis, visualization, analytical applications, and tools such as R, Python, or other specialized platforms. But technical competence alone is insufficient. Analytical capability also requires people who can negotiate, consult, communicate, interpret quantitative evidence, develop others, and translate analysis into consequential business decisions. The objective is not to accumulate analytical talent. It is to place the right analytical capability around the decisions where better evidence can materially alter enterprise outcomes. Analytical Capability Is an Enterprise Capability Treating analytics primarily as a technical function creates another organizational limitation. Analytical leadership cannot reside exclusively with the CTO, CIO, data function, or another specialized group. Leaders throughout the enterprise determine whether evidence becomes part of the organization's normal decision process. They establish performance measures. They determine which questions receive analytical attention. They allocate resources. They decide when evidence is sufficient to act. And they inform whether data is expected to challenge prevailing assumptions or merely validate decisions that have effectively already been made. The distinction matters because analysis rarely creates value in isolation. Value emerges when analytical capability intersects with business judgment, operating context, authority, and action. For executive teams, the question is not simply whether the organization has enough analytical talent. The question is whether sufficient analytical capability exists at the points where consequential decisions are actually needed. Culture Determines Whether Evidence Has Authority Even when analytical talent is positioned around important decisions, the organization's culture determines whether that capability carries meaningful influence. Culture is sometimes treated primarily as a matter of shared attitudes or employee sentiment. At the enterprise level, culture is also reinforced through concrete organizational mechanisms: what leaders monitor, how they respond under pressure, where resources go, which behaviors they model, what they reward, and who advances through the organization. These mechanisms reveal whether evidence actually has authority inside the organization's decision system. What Leaders Consistently Monitor Attention communicates priority. The measures executives routinely request, review, and challenge tell the organization which evidence matters. What is consistently measured gains organizational visibility. What is rarely examined can remain strategically invisible regardless of its importance. A useful executive question is not simply: Do we value data? It is: What evidence routinely changes our decisions? How Leaders Respond When Conditions Deteriorate Critical incidents reveal the organization's actual decision architecture. When performance deteriorates, markets shift, customers respond unexpectedly, or a strategic initiative misses expectations, leaders face a choice. They can examine evidence that challenges existing assumptions, or they can revert to familiar narratives, hierarchy, and intuition. Organizations learn from what leaders do under pressure, not merely from what leaders say during planning cycles. How Resources Are Allocated Budgets expose operating assumptions. Investment decisions communicate which capabilities the organization considers strategically consequential. Analytical ambitions unsupported by appropriate talent, technology, time, access, and decision authority remain aspirations rather than operating capabilities. What receives resources is reinforced. What Leaders Model Employees observe whether executives themselves use evidence when making consequential decisions. Leaders who expect analytical discipline from others while relying primarily on assertion, hierarchy, or selectively chosen information create an organizational contradiction. This does not mean executives should surrender judgment to analytical models. Judgment remains essential. The issue is whether evidence is allowed to inform—and, when appropriate, challenge—executive judgment. What the Organization Rewards Formal incentives and informal recognition shape behavior. Organizations may say they value analytical rigor while rewarding speed without sufficient examination, certainty over inquiry, or agreement over constructive challenge. Over time, employees learn whether presenting inconvenient evidence improves decision quality or creates personal risk. That lesson can matter more than any formal analytics initiative. Who Gets Hired, Promoted, and Removed Talent decisions institutionalize organizational priorities. The capabilities and behaviors associated with advancement communicate what the organization actually values. Hiring, succession, promotion, and separation decisions therefore influence analytical culture far beyond the individuals directly involved. If analytical judgment is strategically important, it should be visible in the criteria governing who receives greater organizational responsibility. The Organizational Design Question Even organizations with strong analytical talent and supportive cultures face another challenge: where should analytical capability reside? Analytical resources need sufficient proximity to the business to understand operating realities and concentrate on consequential problems. Yet excessive decentralization can fragment capability, duplicate work, create inconsistent standards, and limit learning across analytical professionals. Centralization creates different risks. Analytical teams can become technically sophisticated while increasingly disconnected from the business decisions they exist to improve. There is no universally correct organizational structure. The appropriate design depends on strategy, analytical maturity, culture, scale, and the nature of the decisions being supported. The governance objective is more important than the organizational chart. Analytical resources must be close enough to decision-makers to influence action while connected enough to one another to preserve standards, learning, capability development, and an enterprise perspective. That is an organizational design problem, not simply a staffing problem. From Analytical Capacity to Decision Capability Data, analytics, and AI are expanding what organizations can know. They do not determine what organizations will do with that knowledge. That distinction belongs to organizational architecture. Decision rights determine who has authority. Accountability determines who owns the consequences. Culture determines whether evidence can challenge established assumptions. Incentives influence which evidence receives attention. Resource allocation determines where analytical capability develops. Organizational design determines whether analytical expertise is sufficiently connected to both enterprise learning and business action. Talent matters. Technology matters. Analytical methods matter. But their enterprise value depends on the system into which they are introduced. This is why more data does not guarantee better decisions. The advantage does not belong simply to organizations capable of generating more intelligence. It belongs to organizations designed to convert intelligence into sound judgment, coordinated action, and organizational learning. For executives and boards, the central question is no longer merely: Do we have the data, technology, and analytical talent we need? A more consequential question is: Is our organization designed to make better decisions with the analytical capability we are building? As generative AI continues to increase the speed and availability of analysis, the gap between analytical capacity and organizational decision capability may become increasingly visible. For some organizations, that gap will constrain the return on their investments in data and AI. For others, closing it may become a source of durable enterprise advantage. If you are examining whether your leadership system is keeping pace with the capabilities AI is creating, schedule a confidential Leadership Strategy Conversation. We can explore where decision architecture, leadership habits, and organizational accountability may be limiting execution. Life-Changing Leadership Habits provides a foundational framework for examining the leadership practices behind those systems and the organizational outcomes they reinforce. References Abina, A., Salaj, A., Cestnik, B., Karalič, A., Ogrinc, M., Lukman, R., & Zidansek, A. (2024). Challenging 21st-Century competencies for STEM students: Companies' vision in Slovenia and Norway in the light of global initiatives for competencies development. Sustainability, 16, 1295. Bughin, J., Hazan, E., Lund, S., Dahlström, P., Wiesinger, A., & Subramaniam, A. (2018). Skill shift: Automation and the future of the workforce. McKinsey Global Institute. Davenport, T. H., Harris, J. G., & Morison, R. (2010). Analytics at Work: Smarter Decisions, Better Results. Harvard Business Press. Doolittle, J. (2023). Life-Changing Leadership Habits: 10 Proven Principles That Will Elevate People, Profit, and Purpose. Organizational Talent Consulting. Grossman, R. L., & Siegel, K. P. (2014). Organizational models for big data and analytics. Journal of Organization Design, 3(1), 20–25. Schein, E. H. (2004). Organizational Culture and Leadership (3rd ed.). Jossey-Bass. Tambe, P. (2014). Big data investment, skills, and firm value. Management Science, 60(6), 1452–1469. Singla, A., Sukharevsky, A., Hall, B., Yee, L., Chui, M., & Balakrishnan, T. (2025, November 5). The state of AI in 2025: Agents, innovation, and transformation. McKinsey & Company.

Is your organization healthy? Take this 10-minute self-guided health check to find out. The Organizational Health Check is for business owners, executives, and team leaders with talent challenges they are unable to solve on their own. Your report includes proven, simple, custom, and transformational strategies. Are you having an organizational talent crisis? Take this 20-minute business health check to get out of crisis mode fast. GET STARTED NOW Scroll Working on Organizational Talent Health Works! Performance Health Your employees support your business goals rather than derail them. Selection Health The right people in the right positions at the right time to support business growth. Development Health Empowered and motivated employees with the skills and knowledge to drive better business performance Sustainability Health Your talent investments pursue your organization's vision. Enablement Health Your workplace has a welcoming environment that takes advantage of all people's skills, knowledge, and abilities. GET STARTED NOW How does it work How does it work? STEP 1 STEP 2 STEP 3 CLARIFY CRITICAL FOCUS AREAS TAKE THE QUIZ IMPLEMENT PROVEN STRATEGIES Take 20-minutes to complete the self-guided health check quiz. Once you submit the intake form you are provided a link to complete the quiz. You don't need anything you don't already know. Just answer the questions as best you can with what you already know. An organizational talent consultant will review your responses and prepare an easy-to-understand one-page report (sample report ). This report provides a snapshot of your organization's overall health and specific areas for improvement. The report will be emailed with an optional invite for a 20-minute debrief with a talent consultant. The debrief covers your questions and proven transformational recommendations. The fee for the report, recommendations, and the debrief is only $199. There are never any shortcuts to success. Realizing the benefits of the health check requires putting your plan into action. If needed, we will partner with you to turn your aspirations into an advantage to achieve the greatest positive impact. GET STARTED NOW Your Best Choice for Organizational Consulting THE ORGANIZATIONAL TALENT HEALTH CHECK It is for business owners, leaders, and human resource professionals wanting to make better decisions avoid costly mistakes and increase revenue. GET STARTED NOW TAKE THE HEALTH CHECK NOW Working on organizational talent health works. It’s good for your people and for your bottom line. Take the Test Do you want us to bring out the best in your organization? YES, I WANT TO THRIVE NO, I HAVE ENOUGH SUCCESS

A commitment to leadership that elevates people, strengthens communities, and creates lasting social impact through service, learning, and partnership. Driving Change for 3,000 Children by 2030 Everyone deserves the chance to thrive. Make a life-changing investment for a child in need by purchasing Life-Changing Leadership Habits, gear with a mission, and child sponsorship. 1. A book with a mission: Life-Changing Leadership Habits. 2. Gear with a Life-changing mission. 3. Life-changing child sponsorship. The Unfortunate Reality 2.2 billion children are living in our world — but about half of them are living in poverty and 1 in 3 lives on less than $1 a day. In developing countries, nearly 1 in 7 school-age children have never had a chance to attend school . 1 of every 6 school-age children works as a child laborer ; 73 million of them are under the age of 10. These children are not lacking potential. They are lacking opportunity. And that is something we can change. Changing reality—one child at a time Together, we are committed to transforming the future for 3,000 vulnerable children by raising $117,000 by 2030. Each contribution helps replace poverty with possibility and hardship with hope. When you give, you’re not just donating—you’re standing with a child and saying: your life matters. Organizational Talent Consulting is making a difference by donating over $23,000 and sponsoring 761children as of 2025 . How Child Sponsorship Works $39/month provides vulnerable children and their communities the tools to overcome threats like poverty and hunger and create meaningful educational opportunities. In-country staff connects with local leaders and parents to determine their unique needs, then partner with them on lasting solutions. Those in the local community nominate vulnerable children for the sponsorship program. Each sponsorship gift is combined with other donations invested in locally tailored solutions — ensuring long-term access. Chosen | World Vision USA Play Video Facebook Twitter Pinterest Tumblr Copy Link Link Copied The Path to 3,000 Children by 2030 STEP 1: Purchase a book with a mission. Life-Changing Leadership Habits: 10 Proven Principles That Will Elevate People, Profit, and Purpose Life-Changing Leadership Habits offers a proven approach to achieving success and significance in life and work. It’s an everyday guide on how to lead in ways that life-changing habits emerge and bad habits disappear. Reading Life-Changing Leadership Habits makes a difference. 15 percent of profits (about $1) from each book sale is donated to child sponsorship by Organizational Talent Consulting. By reading this book, you are helping a child living in poverty bring a brighter future into focus. BUY NOW BOOK TRAILER STEP 2: Gear With A Life-Changing Mission Life-Changing Leadership Habits Engraved YETI Rambler Amplify the need for child sponsorship and your commitment to the cause with this engraved Life-Changing Leadership navy stainless steel 10 oz YETI Rambler Lowball. This mug is the ideal drinking companion. Easy to stack and store, the Lowball’s double-wall vacuum insulation will keep your hot drinks hot and cold drinks cold longer than standard drinkware. Also, the stackable 18/8 stainless steel resists dents and drops and saves storage space. $5 from each Yeti sale is donated to child sponsorship. By using this rambler, you amplify the message about the need to help children living in poverty and drive change in their reality. BUY NOW $49.97 Free Shipping $5 of y our purchase goes to sponsor a child in need. STEP 3: Life-Changing Child Sponsorship Sponsor a child directly with one of these non-profit agencies we support that are making a difference for children worldwide. Making this donation provides vulnerable children and their communities the tools to overcome threats like poverty and hunger and to make meaningful educational opportunities. We suggest one-time or monthly donations of $50, $100, or $250. SPONSOR A CHILD Mail Send us a message if you sponsored a child. We would love to know and say thank you. 3,000 Children By 2030 Our goal is to change the reality for 3,000 vulnerable children by making donations of $117.000 by the year 2030. Organizational Talent Consulting has donated over $23,000 toward this goal as of 2025. If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.

Handle change well and win; handle it poorly and fail. In an environment of perpetual change, the enemy of great change leadership is good change management. Discover the leadership attributes behaviors that drive change and the tools to plan and implement change well. In-Person Leading Organizational Change Produce change Handle change well and win; handle it poorly and fail. In an environment of perpetual change, the enemy of great change leadership is good change management. Discover the leadership attributes, behaviors that drive change, and the tools to plan and implement change well. About No company would brag about its status quo and sameness compared to when it began. But, change imposed is often change opposed. One of the most critical leadership challenges is leading organizational change. Any organization can move forward with small incremental changes, but building for the future in today's rapidly evolving environment means making bold changes. This workshop introduces leaders to organizational life cycles, Kotter's 8 steps of organizational change, a positive framework for change, a tool for keeping a pulse on what matters most during major organizational change . Who should attend? Leaders and managers curious about how to lead positive changes in organizations. Leaders and managers who are skeptical of the ability to create positive organizational change. Why you want to learn it? Every business is vulnerable to threats. But too few businesses and leaders stop to consider the possibility of becoming irrelevant. Harnessing the potential of company growth takes well-equipped leaders. "If you believe that training is expensive, it is because you do not know what ignorance costs." Leboeuf Well-equipped leadership makes a difference. Here is how: Team Performance: Several research studies have investigated the connection between the leader and business performance. Studies have demonstrated that effective leadership improves follower performance and promotes higher business results, follower job satisfaction, and follower organizational commitment. Innovation and Creativity: Evidence suggests that leadership is essential for driving innovation in a company. A study involving over 400 executives from 48 companies connected strategy and innovation performance directly with good leadership habits. Trust and Change: Studies have demonstrated that the level of trust in leadership directly correlates to employee retention, organizational commitment , and support for organizational change. Furthermore, when executives build trust, evidence suggests that organizational change readiness increases. Internal Communication & Relationships: Words shape worlds. Studies have revealed that influential leaders enhance two-way communication, creativity, collaboration, job attitudes, and organizational commitment. Leadership Transitions: Leadership transitions, whether successful or not, are costly. Evidence suggests that, on average, 35% of internally promoted executives fail, and direct reports spend 10-20% of their time helping a new leader transition. Successful leadership transitions increase company revenue, have 13% lower attrition rates, and are 90% more likely to achieve long-term performance goals. Leadership development is a leadership transition acceleration tool. Want to personalize or bring Leading Organizational Change training to your business? LEARN HOW Schedule US $275 Date & Time (EDT) Sorry, there are no upcoming dates scheduled for this locati on at this time. Please contact us to ask about upcoming dates! Location Railside Golf Club - Alder Room 2500 76th St. SW Byron Center, MI 49315 Language English Terms and Conditiions Here is our cancellation and refund policy . More Details Lunch is included in the registration price. Questions? Interested in training your team of 10 or more? Fill out our contact form to get started. Next REGISTER NOW Objectives At the completion of this workshop, participants will be able to: Explain the essential leadership attributes and behaviors during change Articulate the steps of Kotter's organizational change proces s Articulate the steps of the Appreciative Inquiry Utilize the ADKAR model to measure change progress and lead change How it will help you A common perception is that most changes in the workplace fail. Mckinsey and Company surveyed over 1,500 executives on their perceptions of change and concluded that most changes fail because only a third of the executives in the study indicated that changes were completely or mostly successful. No matter your perception of change, the reality of a fast-moving economy and complex business environment makes the "change problem" increasingly difficult. Change is complex, whether broad or incremental. Like running a successful marathon, the work begins well before the first steps of the race and before the visible aspects of a change take place. If organizations move too quickly or out of order, they get into trouble, leading to faulty decisions and wasted efforts. If I am unable to attend the session I signed up for can I transfer to a new date? How? Yes, you can transfer into a new session by contacting info@organizationaltalent.com and making your request in writing. Please indicate the class/date you would like to reschedule in the subject of the email. Review the available course offerings and indicate the class/date of interest. How do I get a refund on a course? To cancel your course enrollment and receive a refund, please contact our Customer Support group by calling 1-616-803-9020 or email us at info@organizationaltalent.com. What is your cancellation and refund policy? If you need to cancel your enrollment, please do so at least 72 hours before the start of your course to receive a refund. Refunds will be processed within 45 days from the cancellation date or the first day of the course, whichever comes first. No refunds are provided if you attend all or part of a course. We reserve the right to cancel a course due to low enrollment, bad weather, or other unforeseen events. If a class is canceled, we will notify you promptly, and you can choose to receive a full refund or credit for another class. Please note, we are not responsible for any cancellation costs you incur, such as airline tickets or hotel reservations. How do I contact you with questions about my training? You can reach us by phone at 1-616-803-9020 (Mon-Fri, 8 AM-5 PM Eastern Time) or email us at info@organizationaltalent.com. We're here to help! Where can I book leadership development workshops in the Grand Rapids area? Organizational Talent Consulting delivers leadership development workshops and team facilitation for organizations in Grand Rapids, West Michigan, and nationwide. FAQs