Next up is a leadership workshop. I have a few ideas but I want to pick something that's actually useful to you right now. BTW Budgeting Part 2 recording is up in the classroom if you missed last week -> https://www.skool.com/lip/classroom/0fe3aec1?md=0f9de03009c747fd802c299551efd216

I need to do a short introduction to lean six sigma for my team, and I'd like to make a PowerPoint presentation to accompany my dialogue. To make it interesting, I'm planning to make it themed around Judo and the similarities between Judo and LSS. I am really struggling to get the AI built into PowerPoint 365 to make the modifications I am asking for. @Gerard Pietrykiewicz I know you've mentioned in the past some quality AI options for nice slides... even if paid I just want it done. Any recommendations/suggestions? Thanks! Jeff

Teams on my current project are not forced to follow any specific SLA's, but there is an expectation of a timely delivery of tasks and issues that might arise. The problem is the word "timely". What does it really mean? This past weekend, some new issues were raised, and on Monday, before 10 am, they were already escalated to the VP level in my org. How do any of you deal with this type of escalation?

I’m planning our next Leaders in Progress workshop for November, and I’d love your input before locking it in. I’m considering two directions: Both are timely… but I’d rather pick what matters most to you right now.

It’s an unpopular but cliché truth: to lead others, you need to know yourself first. This month, I faced a very deep blind spot — my own self-sabotage. Most people sabotage themselves because of fear — fear of success, fear of failure, or simply fear of stepping into the unknown. For me, the roots were very different. I realized I had invented this mechanism around the age of six as a kind of safety valve — a way to release excess energy when I couldn’t act. At the time, it was helpful: without it, that energy would have burned me from the inside. When I was a child, I carried an energy so strong it could have consumed me. A constant desire to move, change, break through walls — but there was no stage for it. When I couldn’t act, my system released the pressure through guilt, analysis-paralysis, chewing endlessly on failed conversations, and procrastination. That became my fuse. 🔥 When a stage for action exists — I become decisive, bold, charismatic. 🌊 When there is no stage — the old pattern switches on: analysis paralysis, distractions, illusions, netflix. And here’s the paradox: my biggest enemy is not when I face challenges that demand force, speed, or even disruption. I can handle those. My true enemy is stillness. People say “time defeats all enemies.” In my case, time defeats me first. Not because I lack strength or ideas, but because waiting — the inability or uncertainty of how to act — is the hardest state for me to endure. When there is no clear next step, no defined move, I don’t rest. I unravel. The pause itself becomes destructive: instead of holding ground, I start turning my energy against myself. Sometimes it looks like attachments that aren’t really mine — invented obligations, misplaced loyalty, keeping bonds that should have been cut long ago. Other times it looks like mental fog — replaying the same conversations, doubting past choices, or chasing illusions just to fill the silence. That’s how I sabotage myself: not through lack of strength, but through turning my strength inward until it consumes me.