Stalled projectsNobody's blocked. Every update is honest. Nothing has actually finished in a month, and if you asked five people why, you'd get five true answers and not one of them would be the reason.Open this one

Feedback and redirectionThere's a note on the work, and it isn't bad work. That's the awkward part — bad has an obvious answer and nearly right doesn't. Somewhere between the note and whatever happens next, two people have to agree what right was meant to look like. Neither of them rehearsed that part.Open this one

UnderperformanceNone of it was big. A deadline that moved, a week quieter than it should have been — too small to be worth a conversation, each time. They don't stay separate. One day a month of them gets raised at once, and it arrives as news to everybody in the room.Open this one

Promotion and scaleThe next step is already assumed — by everybody around it, and by the person it's about. Nobody has asked whether it leads anywhere they wanted to go, or whether the thing that earned it is what the new job is actually made of. It isn't that the conversation went badly. It never happened.Open this one

Conflict resolutionAn hour ago this was about a deadline. It isn't about the deadline now. Nobody's raised their voice and nobody's going to — the thing being defended has just quietly changed from the decision to the person who made it.Open this one

DelegationMore coming