Author Archive | Scott Propp

Drift is Never Good: The Accidental Consulting Firm

It’s one of the biggest sand traps for firms as they start to grow – particularly for those founders that have built the firm from the ground up and who are known as scrappy problem solvers. These founders and their teams become driven by finding the next new problem, and for some time, their intuition […]

Continue Reading ·

Lessons from Marie Kondo: How Saying Goodbye Can Help Growth

It’s a familiar part of life’s journey that I’m currently experiencing up close and personally: I’m helping a close relative downsize their home as they prepare for the next stage of life.  The good news, is that this person is really excited about the change – and the focus that their smaller and more specific […]

Continue Reading ·

Is Your Blindspot Costing Your Team Results?

I found myself (in a former role) being one of the leaders in a business unit, that while strategically very important, was hemorrhaging cash. As the person responsible for product and operations, I immediately set to work getting a plan in place that would “turn things around.” We did all the right things to get […]

Continue Reading ·

Plans That Create Options – Not Endings

I recall it like it was yesterday: walking through a massive, class 10 clean room we had built for the extraordinary demands of cellular componentry.  I had the privilege of being there when it was commissioned, and in what seemed like 15 minutes, when it was no longer relevant. That time was measured in years […]

Continue Reading ·

The Unspoken Issue of Growth Work in Established Firms

“So, what do you think this looks like in sales for this year?” It seems like such an innocent question, and in the moment it may be.  Once answered, however, it can be the nail in the coffin of a perfectly good growth initiative. I call it the singularity paradox. The language of established business […]

Continue Reading ·

Dealing with Uncertainty is Job #1

I’m constantly reminded that people don’t resist change as much as they resist uncertainty. When I first began to lead larger workshops, I quickly learned that I needed to give very clear directions for group activities.  How did I know when they were unclear? Just when I expected the group to begin, they would all […]

Continue Reading ·

Coaching Note to Mid-Senior Leaders: Be Bold

I have been doing some coaching work with cross-functional teams in mature organizations and one topic that comes up over and over again is this: when a team finds some process or data that indicates something is clearly not delivering the desired outcome, how do they speak the truth to Senior Leadership? Many of you […]

Continue Reading ·