July 31, 2026
Payroll is the biggest number on your P&L. It is also the only one you manage on gut feel. Your CFO would never close the books on instinct. Your sales team wouldn’t run without a pipeline. But when it comes to who gets hired, who gets promoted, and who quietly stays two years too long… Read more
June 28, 2026
In 1994, Dan Rootenberg was about to sign with the Philadelphia Phillies. He was the captain of the Binghamton University baseball team and a free-agent deal was in front of him. Then Major League Baseball went on strike and every contract froze. Three years earlier he had lost his father. He had a single mom… Read more
June 14, 2026
Trish Kendall and I are giving the full keynote on a free Vistage CEO Climb Event on June 30. Details at the bottom. April 22, 1994. Trish Kendall was twenty years old, a meth addict squatting in a bathroom in Tacoma, a moment away from her last shot. The phone rang. It was her… Read more
May 23, 2026
Not the product. Not the team. You. Every founder I work with can pull up revenue, margin, cash, and headcount in about thirty seconds. Almost none of them can tell me how they slept last week, what their resting heart rate is doing, or where their inflammation markers sit. They measure everything the business depends… Read more
December 26, 2025
If your team is “busy” but results feel stuck, you’re likely running the most expensive system in business: hope. Hope that priorities are understood.Hope that resources are aimed at the right targets.Hope that leaders are aligned.Hope that accountability will “just happen.” Most small business CEOs don’t have a strategy problem. They have an execution operating… Read more
October 30, 2025
When something breaks, does your team get truth and fixes—or politics and spin?Most companies oscillate between “be nice” meetings and witch hunts. Both slow execution, burn out A-players, and bury the real issues. There’s a third path used by high-reliability, high-performance teams: Empathetic Root Cause Analysis (ERCA)—the debriefing approach that surfaces truth quickly without blame… Read more
Most CEOs Don’t Have a Conflict Problem. They Have a Conviction Problem. Let’s talk about the real growth killer no one wants to admit. It’s not strategy.Not capital.Not even competition. It’s conflict. I’m not talking about the dramatic, HR-nightmare kind. I’m talking about the subtle but constant friction between you and your executive team. The… Read more
July 23, 2025
If you’re a growth-minded CEO in NYC running a $10M–$150M company with a strong executive team and a bold vision, this is a rare opportunity you won’t want to miss. On Wednesday, August 13, I’m hosting an exclusive, in-person CEO workshop in Manhattan from 8:30 AM to Noon, followed by a private lunch. You’ll be… Read more
