Why Your Executive Team Is The Company's Bottleneck (feat. Adam Weber)

business is problems it's just a series of problems and the best executive teams are the ones who can not avoid problems but face problems in a healthy way work together as a team and do great things i think most executives when they look back on their career the moments that they're the most proud of are those moments not when things were perfect it was when we faced a hard problem and we all leaned in as a team and figured it out

Hey there, Leader listeners.

I think you're really going to enjoy this conversation with Adam Weber.

Unbelievable stuff.

We were talking all about the executive team.

It's special, obviously.

It has a lot of impact on the organization.

But we're talking about team dynamics.

We're talking about the challenges that those teams can experience.

and most importantly, the downstream effects and what we can do about it.

One of my favorite things that Adam talks about is that the hard problems live in the margins.

It's really those interfaces between a couple of functions or a couple of teams, and that's where the executives find themselves getting pulled in.

They're going to need to make sure that they have their dynamics tight before they can go down in the organization and help unblock others.

And then finally, that awareness.

We talk so much about awareness.

Once you have awareness of the dynamic and of some of the challenges, then you have a fair shot at fixing it.

When it's invisible, it's kind of in the room, but nobody's talking about it.

That's where the problems really ensue.

So have a listen to Adam's great advice for us.

I think you're really going to enjoy it.

If you sit on an executive team, here's an uncomfortable test.

Ask the room where it last changed its mind about something that actually mattered, not adjusted a number, changed its mind.

Nobody can answer that fast.

You found the problem that this episode is all about.

The executive team is the most important team in most companies, and it's the one nobody can see.

Revenue is fine, board deck is clean, something's still off.

It shows up in how a room of talented, hireable anywhere leaders behaves once the pressure hits.

Adam Weber has been on both sides of that room, first as an operator who built and sold two companies, now as a coach, CEO's call when something feels wrong.

He's back after last year's episode on leading heart in a metrics-obsessed world, this time measuring the whole team at once, candor, agility, ownership, altitude, and cohesion.

If you're the VP who joined an executive team last year and you can't tell whether the drift you're feeling is real, this one's for you.