When new leaders join a company, the first question they should ask is simple:
“What was already known, and what was already attempted?”
Without that context, accountability turns into retroactive blame, punishing people for outcomes they never had the authority to change.
Too often, long-standing structural issues are well known internally. They’ve been raised repeatedly by those closest to the work, but when prior leadership failed to act, the problems compounded. Calling that “lack of ownership” misses the reality, it’s an organizational stall point, not individual failure.
Strong leaders know the difference. They can tell who’s been quietly pushing to fix systemic issues versus who’s been coasting. They take the time to distinguish contribution from compliance, ensuring that institutional knowledge isn’t discarded in the name of “fresh perspective.”
I’ve spent years trying to drive meaningful change, often against inertia. But it’s difficult to stay motivated when leadership seems more focused on appeasing the next layer up than on fixing the foundation. If decisions continue to be made in haste, without understanding how we got here, the risk is simple: we’ll lose the ability to sell the products that actually work while chasing “new initiatives” that generate noise but not revenue.
Sometimes the problem isn’t that people don’t care, it’s that those who do care stop believing anyone above them is truly listening. Learn to identify them. Empower them. Protect them. Do that, and you might just build a team capable of winning again.
If not: good luck, and adios.