Welcome to the founding cohort of the Leadership Lab. You are helping shape what this room becomes. To start, I want to hear from each of you. What leadership decision, tension, or responsibility are you currently carrying that doesn't have a clean answer? A few details that will help us support you: What role or environment are you leading right now? What part of this situation feels the most difficult or unclear? What would need to shift in your leadership for you to feel like these 90 days were worth it? There are no perfect answers here. The purpose of this room is to think clearly together about real leadership challenges. Drop your response below. Let's get to work.

I am carrying the tension of dealing with my Deputy Director who has not made the transition from regular employee to leader. I meet with her monthly. I have provided in-house and other leadership support to her but she is not moving as a leader. She is a good employee but not a leader. I am at my wits end as to how to help her. I requested that she review her job description and make a decision as to whether this is the job for her- she says it is, but she didn't think it would come with all of the decision making etc. that leaders deal with. I met with her and the entire team in November and told them I was stepping back to allow her to lead- it has not been good. My team feels like she micromanages them, doesn't know how to talk to them and my department was about to be explosive and I had to step back in. My last supervision with her was last month and I told her that I am not going to do any more informal meetings with her and the next option that I am considering is disciplinary actions or demotion. Unfortunately, I do not have any vacant positions in my department. I am exhausted from all of this. Please help......

This space exists because most leadership development feels disconnected from the actual work of leading. You sit through a workshop, read a book, consume content, and then go back to your desk with the same tensions, the same impossible decisions, the same weight. This Lab is different. It's not a course. It's not a content hub. It's a facilitated space where leaders think together about real decisions, apply frameworks that work, and build the capacity to lead under pressure without burning out or checking out. Who this is for: Leaders navigating complexity, change, and growth without a playbook. People holding real weight who want to lead with more clarity and less performance. What this is not: Motivational content. Networking theater. Surface-level engagement. Quick fixes. This is paid, intentional, and small by design. If you're here, you're serious about getting better at this work. Let's begin.