Leadership Beyond Strategy: Why People Matter More Than PowerPoints

[INTRODUCTION]

"Alex Cullimore: Whatever the outcome is, the system made that. It's not that the system isn't the intentions. The system isn't what you – you can have a strategy, and you're like, "This is going to increase growth." That's great, "if you implement it". And then everything falls apart, that's not what you implemented." 

Alex Cullimore: Welcome back to this episode of Uncover the Human. It's just a host episode. Today, it's Christina and I recording on God only knows what day of the week it is. I think we both lost track sometime around. That's why I didn't even try. I was like, whatever I try is going to be wrong. I have a one in seven chance, but, really, I have a zero in seven chance.

Cristina Amigoni: And it's more like one in five because we don't record on weekends. 

Alex Cullimore: That's true. It's just one in five. I have 20% chance. And I still wasn't going to take it because I have been wrong every single time I've guessed this week.

Cristina Amigoni: It's not Wednesday, but it's going to come out on Wednesday. So, it's Wednesday for whoever's listening. 

Alex Cullimore: Maybe. Or you found this later. 

Cristina Amigoni: Happy Wednesday. Yeah, maybe they're listening on another date. 

Alex Cullimore: All I know is that my trash can is full because I forgot what day it was and didn't take it out. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's a problem. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah, that's a problem for another week. 

Cristina Amigoni: That also sounds like a very good analogy for life right now. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. I can't believe I'm the only person right here. Here we were recording in early February, and I can't imagine I'm the only person whose brain fog has really won the day on 2026 so far. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. And trash cans are full. 

Alex Cullimore: Yes.

Cristina Amigoni: There's a lot of full trash cans that need to be dumped out. The world's dumpster fire. What are we going to say? 

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah, exactly. 

Alex Cullimore: So, now that we're tired, confused, and in an odd space, we thought we'd talk about one of our favorite topics, which I say about most things, but we do have a lot of favorite topics. And this one is particularly near and dear to our heart. This one, leadership. Talking about some of the challenges people face in leadership, developing leaders. Where you are? If you're in the middle. What are the difficulties people see that we see, that we hear about? All of the above. Leadership. 

Cristina Amigoni: Again, full trash can. 

Alex Cullimore: Full trash can. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, leadership. I loved your post on LinkedIn today, which, for anybody that wants to go back and find it, it is Thursday, February 5th, 2026. So, you can look for that. 

Alex Cullimore: Just look for the boardroom full of bots. That's the image. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. The image is a room full of bots. And I love how your post, because we've talked about that quite a bit, but how in your post you point out how the whole strategy of AI is here, let's replace the humans from a leadership decision perspective, kind of ignores the fact that the leader's job can be replaced just as easily, if not way more easily. Because if you think that your job is to create strategy decks and models and frameworks, AI can do it faster, better, more thoroughly, and you're not really needed. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. And if your board doesn't see through that, either you hired a board full of gasmen or your board just doesn't know AI yet. And that's fine. What I'm frustrated by when I watch people with AI is like, "Oh, we're going to go replace –" exactly what you said. We're going to replace the people. A, why? Why are we in a rush to – what is the point of replacing all the people just so you can throw people out and cut some budgets for, what, five people who also can be cut, which is the point. Everybody can be cut if you want to cut that deep. If that's how you want to do it, you don't care about the outcome, great. Cut everything. Just have bots negotiating bots. And I guess we all, I don't know, retire to the street? 

Cristina Amigoni: And then the economy tanks because nobody has the money to actually buy the products and the services that you're selling. So, what's the long-term strategy on cutting people? From an economic point of view, it makes zero sense. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. And I can hear people probably frustrated already listening to this being like, "No, there's important jobs in leadership. I'm necessary. I need to be done." Sure. Yes. But here's the argument then that we have for leadership. It's that then your human portion of leadership is what's important. The fact that you're guiding people, the fact that you can get people on board with something, the fact that you can make critical decisions, respond to needs, not just respond to what has been done, because that's what all predictive text is doing. It's trying to figure out based on what is around. It's not creating new things. It's just trying to do the best of what already exists, which, to be fair, is what I've seen most strategy decks be. It's some regurgitation of somebody's idea or some analogy of something else. And that can be found. Whereas the actual leading people there, or choosing the right one, or figuring out why right now is the right time to do that, those are human decisions. Those are things that humans can do, need to do, and that's what leaders should be a part of. 

Cristina Amigoni: Supporting. That is literally the only job leaders are there for is support the humans. If you take the humans out, guess where your job goes? In Alex's full trash can. 

Alex Cullimore: Which I will accidentally leave for a week. So, you're going to be cold, you know? Think about it. 

Cristina Amigoni: Okay. Yeah. And possibly smelly and filled with Cheetos orange dust. 

Alex Cullimore: Look, I admitted one time I like cheese puffs, which I do. And I know what wines pair with them. Don't test me. Also, here's a pro tip that you didn't know you were going to get on this podcast. If you don't like cheesy fingers, use chopsticks. Just chopstick your way out of some Cheetos. It's great. Life hack you didn't know you were going to get. Now, back to leadership. 

Cristina Amigoni: It's fascinating. Yes, back to leadership. Why does leadership exist? What is your actual job? What is our actual job? We're leaders. 

Alex Cullimore: I think this is a funny thing you mentioned. We started at the top. We started at the executive level of like, "Hey, you need to be able to support." And if you have a strategy, you're both choosing and discerning a strategy as well as making sure the environment is ready for that. And that means external and internal. So, it's trying to make sure the world is going to respond well to this as well as make sure everybody understands what it is and is supported, has everything they need so that they can actually make that a reality and make sure they understand why it's important to them, why it's important at all. Make sure you're tying that back. All of that kind of support comes from the top level. Honestly, every level of leadership. 

And I think it's funny that we talk about some of those gaps at the top levels because those are the same gaps you see at the very beginning. You see people promoted into leadership, and they don't really know that that's their job. The job is now that support, coordination, organization. That's where you now exist. You don't exist in doing all of the tasks. You exist in making sure everybody can complete the things they need to complete, are collaborating well, organized well, know what they're going to do, and they can actually move forward on the strategy that is given. And I think it's interesting that there's kind of that missing understanding in how we tend to treat leadership from top to bottom. 

Cristina Amigoni: Oh yes. Yes. And then you've got the middle layer, which I don't think it's on any kindergartener's list of that's what I want to do when I grow up is be a middle manager. 

Alex Cullimore: I want to manage. And they go, "Please." I want to be stuck with all the responsibility and none of the authority. I'd love this. 

Cristina Amigoni: I want to be able to support my people, but I am not allowed to because I've got random shit coming from above that my people will never be able to do. Yes, it's a great layer. I imagine no kindergarten teacher is posting that, as like, "Look at what most of my kindergarteners want to do when they grow up." 

Alex Cullimore: I feel like that actually relates really hard to what people say about the sandwich generation. That's the generation of people who have both kids and parents who are still alive where you're both taking care of them as they age and taking care of your kids as they age, as they grow basically. And trying to deal with both of those things and getting basically all of the flack sometimes from your own parents and resistance there as well as from your kids, and living in that in between. I don't think people love that notion. And it is a lot of pressure from both sides without a lot of feeling of possibility. A lot of blame coming from all directions, and a lot of difficulty moving up. 

Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. Yes. And being in that generation right now and in that position right now, I keep telling my friends who are in the same generation is like, "Stop saving for college and start saving for your kids' therapy. Because they're going to need a therapy fund when they get older." Because as parents, we're doing the best we can, but we are split in that like, "Oh, they need that. They need this. What? Who? What? Me?" 

Alex Cullimore: Who? What? Me? Why? Me? Yes. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. And then you get like, "Mom, you're not doing enough." "Daughter, you're not doing enough." And I'm like I just – 

Alex Cullimore: You guys are lucky I'm just not fleeing to Timbuktu right now. 

Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. Here's your therapy fund for the future. Here's whatever you need for now. 

Alex Cullimore: I put $2,000 aside for a one-way ticket for me anywhere.

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Exactly.

Alex Cullimore: Anywhere far away. This is why it's understandable that there's so many struggles in leadership. I don't see this as just like lambasting blame on everybody. It's not somebody's particular fault. It's just that there's a misunderstanding, I think, of what leadership is or can be, or maybe should be, in our opinion of what it should be, and where you can actually have impact. And I think, as will not surprise anybody who's heard any episode of this podcast before, it really comes down to the humans. It really comes down to supporting the humans and being human. 

Cristina Amigoni: Wait, we're talking about humans in this podcast? 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah, once in a while.

Cristina Amigoni: But they're getting replaced by AI. What are we going to talk about? 

Alex Cullimore: Well, eventually it'll just be us replaced by AI. And then who knows what that'll talk about? 

Cristina Amigoni: And then the bots will just take over. 

Alex Cullimore: It's just them trained on hundreds of hours of our content saying the same things over and over, but in more and more robotic fashion. 

Cristina Amigoni: You know, I'm pretty sure Gemini can do that. That may be a fairly good fun thing to try and see. Like, "Hey, like these are our podcasts. Now, create a new podcast with just bots talking and see what they talk about." 

Alex Cullimore: That would be fun. That's what we're going to do. This is leadership in action right now. We're just coming up with an idea and we're going to throw it at you. You guys are now just going to get bot content you didn't ask for. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah. Yes. Also, leadership in action is getting shiny objects to go on tangents every 5 to 10 seconds. 

Alex Cullimore: I believe we went on a bit of a soapbox against shiny objects, not only two episodes ago, maybe. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. 

Alex Cullimore: This is important. But this is what we mean by thinking about humans, because that's not what our team would just be ready for or be able to jump into. And we would need to support the actual change and alternation of that. Everybody who helps us with the podcast want to make sure they're on board with that, understand what we're promoting, what the clips would have looked like. We'd have to actually implement that. Make sure they like and agree with this, or get their input. That's leadership. 

Leadership is listening to us and making sure you understand where the actual friction is. Make sure you're addressing actual friction, not just, "Man, I'm tired of hearing about how there's friction. Can you all just stop complaining?" Which is something we hear from way too many leadership offices. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. 

Alex Cullimore: I get it. I understand it. It's understandable to feel very impatient. It's understandable to wish that things were different. But I would relate back to the parenting metaphor. How many times have you been able just to tell your teenagers, you're like, "Well, just don't do that." 

Cristina Amigoni: It works every time. 

Alex Cullimore: Success all around. Understandable. Everybody gets tired. Everybody gets impatient. And it doesn't mean it's effective. 

Cristina Amigoni: It is not. 

Alex Cullimore: The voice of tired experience. 

Cristina Amigoni: It is not effective. And it's about the humans. It's about meeting them where they are, understanding where they are as opposed to assuming where – we just had a conversation offline about what happens when you don't meet humans where they are. It's like understanding where they are and supporting, like, "Yes, come up with a strategy." Again, sorry, but ChatGPT is going to do it way faster than you can. Come up with a strategy. 

Tell GPT what strategy you want to come up with. Come up with a strategy, but then move past that. That is not the point of your position. The point of your position is can you be in the journey with the humans? Can you understand what they need so that they can rally around your journey that you want to make happen? And really get into that piece, which is a lot more listening than talking. And it's a lot more understanding than telling and imposing. 

And it does take the, "Oh, what is my job? If I can't prove that my job exists because of the number of PowerPoint I've created, then what is my job?" Change the measure of success, please. 

Alex Cullimore: Welcome bots. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. If you don't like PowerPoints like Amazon, the number of documents, the number of Word documents. If it's something else – call it whatever you want. But the number of files that go around, it is not the measure of success of a leader. The number of times you reorganize because it doesn't work. Do you know what doesn't work? What is it that doesn't work? That's not the measure of success. That's not why you're there. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. I keep going back in my head to this phrase that I heard a couple months ago, and it just gets more and more relevant every day. And it's by Stafford Beer. He was quoted as saying the point of a system is what it does. And so the idea being that whatever the outcome is, the system made that. The system isn't the intentions. The system isn't what you – you can have a strategy, and you're like this is going to increase growth. That's great, "if you implement it". And then everything falls apart, that's not what you implemented. You didn't implement the – you implement intentions. You implement a system. 

And so until you understand the system, what's actually going on, what actually can be done, it's not going to work. And this is what, actually, I think, Hillary Clinton was pretty famous for, being good at, just continually getting input for so many things. That's why when she was running for president 10,000 years ago, whenever that was, she was pretty famous for having large policy documents. 

Cristina Amigoni: On a different planet .

Alex Cullimore: Yes. I don't know. That was like 40 million years. I think it was – oh, I don't know. 

Cristina Amigoni: I'm pretty sure dinosaurs still existed, and they were really nice. They were much nicer than a lot of humans right now. 

Alex Cullimore: I'll say it. Nobody's saying it. I miss the comet.

Cristina Amigoni: I keep praying for the comet. People say, "Oh, it's a full moon. Go pray for the full moon because it's a new year." I'm like, "Can the comet hit us, please?" 

Alex Cullimore: If that full moon comes crashing down on my house, I will be a believer. 

 Cristina Amigoni: Exactly. I just went to New Mexico, and all I was hoping every night, I was like, "If I stand here long enough, can an alien take me, please?" 

Alex Cullimore: just get closer and closer to Area 51. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. 

Alex Cullimore: No. But anyway, she was famous for having large policy documents because it was well thought out. And that's one thing to think about. Even if you think your job is developing strategy, that is going to be, in huge part, a listening tour of understanding what the world is, what it needs. Yes, you can come up with ideas, but just having an idea is never going to be enough to be actually understanding whether that idea is the right one, whether that is usable, whether everybody is on board and can do that idea, and how long that will take. So you don't just run out of patience and say like, "Oh, I said that a month ago and it hasn't happened yet." Well, what if your idea takes a couple of years? What if it takes a couple of months?" I mean, just the adjustment cycle is going to take a little bit. 

And so it's so beyond just ideas and leadership, I think, gets misunderstood then as like, "Oh, it's the person who's announcing things and bossing people around, and choosing what direction and making sure everybody does exactly what they're told." First of all, good luck getting everybody to do exactly what they're told. That's another quote that I love, "If you'd like to get back at your boss, do exactly what they tell you."

Cristina Amigoni: If you want to practice, I'm available. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, god. So many things that I think just get missed. The idea is like, "Oh, I'm just going to command everybody. That's how leadership –" it's not going to work. 

Cristina Amigoni: I'm going to create a strategy. That's not leadership. 

Alex Cullimore: No.

Cristina Amigoni: I'm going to create a model. 

Alex Cullimore: All of those things can be important, useful. 

Cristina Amigoni: A new framework. Model is out of fashion now. So, it's a new framework. You can't say change now. You say a new framework. 

Alex Cullimore: Yes. We're transforming. We're evolving. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Not leadership. 

Alex Cullimore: That's another one that just gets me every once in a while. I get that we – because we misuse buzzwords so much, that they become poisoned. I also get tired of some of the buzzwords. But sometimes just the rebrand without actually fixing any of the issues. It's like we're not changing anymore. Now we're evolving. Okay, but have you figured out how to change? 

Cristina Amigoni: Fix anything. 

Alex Cullimore: Have you learned how to evolve? What is different about evolution that's going to make this not just a word we're all sick of in six months? 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Exactly. Yeah. And you brought up the listening tours, which is a key piece. I think I read a quote recently or something recently that we've talked about multiple times. And I'm pretty sure I did a post about it at some point, where the true leader in the room, it's the one that actually says the least. It's not the one that's loud and talks all the time, or imposes, or whatever. If you watch a true leader in the room is the one that sits back and says the least. 

And the listening piece is like you can call them listening tours, and I'm putting quotes around the "listening". But if you're going in with a bunch of questions and then when you hear the responses, you turn around and like, "Well, you all suck. This all needs to be changed," you didn't listen. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. Oh, those are my favorite listening tours, when they come in, and they're like, "We're on a listening tour. Here's what we're going to do over the next three months." So they just talk you through their idea for the next hour. You're like, "This is not listening. You're trying to get other people to listen, and it's not working. This is not a listening tour." 

Or I listened to everybody's feedback, but I'd already decided what was going to happen. So whatever you had to say, it doesn't matter. And even if you put on a nice face, and you smile, and you nod, and you listen, and then you do nothing with it, obviously, you're not going to take every piece of feedback. But if you have misheard or not listened to anybody, nobody believes they need to speak up. This is a good way to kill psychological safety. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Which is another big rule of every leader. Create psychological safety. That probably is – put it in your number one, support psychological safety. 

Alex Cullimore: Yes. Yeah. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's your entire job description. Everything else beyond that doesn't matter. 

Alex Cullimore: Yep. If you can do that, things will start running themselves. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Job of a leader is working themselves up at a job. 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. People should be able to operate more independently, and you should be able to just continue to – you're there to fix the things as they're going wrong, and that you're there to notice the things and know what's happening. And the only way to do that really, the only way to actually understand what's happening, is to have enough safety for people to bring up the right issue to you. And if they can't, then eventually the car falls over, the wheels come off. This is where things pop, and things end suddenly, dramatically, and everybody's surprised. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, exactly. One of my favorite evolutions, I'm going to use evolution now, into knowing that maybe you're somewhere close to being a successful leader is when you don't actually have to come up with big strategies and big changes and impose it and then go with the kicking and screaming. And then you do it again after 12 to 18 months or two years, because, "Well, that one didn't work." 

And it's really when it's the people have safe space and feel heard and feel that they can be their authentic self that they're the ones that actually bring up the things that need to be changed. And they're the ones that say like, "Hey, I've noticed this. It's not quite working as smoothly as it could. This is our idea. Can we go do it? And can you open these doors for us?" 

Alex Cullimore: And this is where leadership goes so much beyond a title. Because what we find in organizations all the time – and this is actually where we started Siamo originally, we noticed that there were influencers in a culture that had nothing to do with title, had nothing to do with how high you are up in the org tree. These are the people that people turn to to get information, to rely on finding answers, and to rely on asking questions that they couldn't ask other people that had nothing to do with the actual title of that person. 

And you can find these people in organizations by finding the people who are listening and finding the people who people rally around, and people want to hear. Well, we have X person on board. These things are going to go a little bit better." Like, "Oh, yeah. Oh, everybody's going to be excited if this person's in the room." Those are the natural people that people gravitate towards, find energy from. Those are leaders. It has nothing to do with the amount of direct reports they have. There's a lot of leaders that have no direct reports. They're just good at understanding the system and helping people through it. Getting that psychological safety and being the space for people to say the things they need to say and get things actually moving. Those are the important leaders in your organization. When we say leadership, it's not about your title. It's about your influence. 

Cristina Amigoni: Mm-hmm. 

Alex Cullimore: And most of the time, those are people that don't want to call themselves leaders. 

Cristina Amigoni: No, they don't want them to call themselves – they don't even know that they're leaders. Other people call them leader, which is another big thing. You're not a leader because you call yourself a leader. You're a leader because people are coming to you. They're following you. They call you a leader. Same thing as listening. You're not a good listener because you declare you're a good listener. You're a good listener because people say like, "I really feel heard when I come to you." Then you're a good listener. That's a huge thing. 

Yeah, look for those people. Who do people go to? When they need help, who do they go to? Those are your leaders. If that person, that leader needs help, needs information, needs something, do people actually respond? Can they actually ping a bunch of people, pick up the phone, and they get information easily, but with enthusiasm? Those are your leaders. 

If you can actually say like, "Hey, yeah, I'll go talk to the marketing department and come back with an answer," you're a leader because that department that has nothing to do with your department, and you're asking a question that they should not even – they have no authority or even interest in answering you. They're helping you. That's because you established safety. You established a relationship. You established something that creates this cycle of like, "Oh, yes. Alex asked me this. Of course, I'll help him." 

Alex Cullimore: And I think that, as you described that, I would imagine – because I definitely had a few in mind. I would imagine people are picturing somebody in their lives. So I imagine that you probably have some idea of a person you turn to, a person you'd feel comfortable with. Or when you have a problem, that's the person you go to. That's your leader. And maybe it is the person who also happens to be your leader on the org chart. Maybe that is. I mean, it's absolutely not out of the question. 

Cristina Amigoni: Hopefully that is. 

Alex Cullimore: These aren't usually exclusive. It's not that you're a leader or rep title. But you do have to exhibit leadership qualities to be that leader. And we've seen it on – there's peer groups where everybody's at the same level. But there's a few people who kind of end up as the natural leaders of the group. Or the people, when they need to talk to that peer group, they talk to the person they don't even report to. They need to go to that. They want an answer, and they go to the other person. It's natural in how humans interact. And it's unnatural how we've just created titles and structures and then pretend that's going to be enough to guide all of the behaviors. It can kind of influence some of them, but the real truth of the matter always comes out. If you're really listening, if you're really watching, the truth of the dynamics is always there. 

Cristina Amigoni: Indeed. Yeah. Exactly. And it really is. As a person, you want to be a leader. That's phenomenal. That's great. As we said, middle manager, probably not on the list of what kindergarteners say I want to be when I grow up. And yet, there are some phenomenal middle managers. There's some phenomenal people that are in that sandwich generation, sandwich situation, and do a great job. 

So, we're not saying it shouldn't be an aspirational role. I really wish the system and organizations treated them better. But that's a separate problem. That's not a lack of leadership problem. It's a lack of leadership somewhere else, but not at that layer. It's great. And then reframe. What am I here to do? How do I know that I'm being successful? Am I a person that – and I have a quiz actually. Two scenarios. And you can choose which one is a leader and which one is not. 

One is the person that – well, I don't know if it's two scenarios. But when somebody says, "Hey, can you help me? And I'm coming to you because I'm not getting – I keep pinging my direct manager, and they're not responding. And I keep pinging their manager, and they're not responding. And I don't know what to do." Who is the leader? Is it the direct manager that has a title? Is it their boss that has also the title in a skip-level situation? Or is it the person that they go to? That's my quiz.

Alex Cullimore: Trick question. It's ChatGPT. It was ChatGPT the whole time. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. 

Alex Cullimore: No, it's the person you go to. It's the person who can provide the answers. It's the person who finds the support. And that's a great example because that has happened multiple times. We've had it multiple times. Even in our work with organizations, we've seen people cross entire departments to try and get to people, and they entirely ignore whatever the structure is because they know they're not getting an answer from who they're supposed to get an answer from. That's a problem that the leader "at the level above" should probably be aware of and be addressing. That's where the problem is. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Yes. And getting people coming to you, their manager is not responding to them 2 days after they've been trying to get to them, not a good sign. The promotion worked out. Just not. Here's new measures of success, new performance reviews. Not the number of files, decks, Word documents, notion documents, PDFs, fireworks that one creates, but are the people going to them? Do the people feel safe? And back to listening tours. The only way to find out is to actually create the space to listen. 

Alex Cullimore: That means we need to change incentive structures, too. We can't believe that leaders are the ones who speak the most. We have to see leaders as the ones people gravitate towards and speak to, not speak from. 

Cristina Amigoni: Ooh, that's a good one. Yes. The leaders people speak to, not from. 

Alex Cullimore: And the person that people would get behind or ask to deliver a message to other departments, that's the person that – that's when leaders speak. That's when they should be speaking. They should be delivering the messages that people feel unsafe to or otherwise say to do that protection work to put themselves in the hard spot. That's leadership. Nobody said it was easy. Nobody said it was fun. 

Cristina Amigoni: No, it is fun sometimes. But yes, there is a lot of this is coming down. I need to protect my people. I'll be the one protecting my people. That's my job is to protect. My job is not to throw them under the bus so that I can look good. Also, because you actually don't. Sorry, but if you're in charge of a team and the team sucks, guess whose problem that is? 

Alex Cullimore: Yeah. You're not going to look good just defending your team that doesn't do well. 

Cristina Amigoni: No. 

Alex Cullimore: And you might be able to play the politic game for a long time, but there's an endpoint to that. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yeah. And you're not going to look good telling everybody that your team sucks because you're the leader of them and you're not providing what they need to not suck. 

Alex Cullimore: And that's not to say sometimes you don't have to let some people go. That's part of the leadership job is understanding who's not helping with that team being a functioning unit. And that's absolutely a piece of leadership. It's not to say that you protect people at all costs, and that's the only job. You protect what needs to be done. You protect the safety. And safety means doing some of those hard things, diving into the conflict, making sure that you have the ability to step in and say, "Hey, this person's not working out, or this is really starting to drag on the whole team. We can't have that happen." Try to address those in all the productive ways you can. And sometimes that also means there's an end to the road. And that's okay. That's still leadership. You're taking responsibility for the functioning and safety of the team. 

Cristina Amigoni: That's our definition of leadership. Go forth and prosper. 

Alex Cullimore: Go forth and prosper. Enjoy being a leader, not a boss. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes. Yes. Thanks for listening. 

Alex Cullimore: Thanks for listening. 

Alex Cullimore: Thanks so much for listening to Uncover the Human. We are Siamo. That is the company that sponsors and created this podcast. And if you'd like to reach out to us further, reach out with any questions or to be on the podcast, please reach out to podcast@wearesiamo.com. Or you can find us on Instagram. Our handle is wearesiamo. Or you can go to wearesiamo.com and check us out there. Or I suppose, Cristina, you and I have LinkedIn as well. People could find us anywhere. 

Cristina Amigoni: Yes, we do have LinkedIn. Yes. Yeah. And we'd like to thank Abbay Robinson for producing our podcast and making sure that they actually reach all of you, and Rachel Sherwood for the wonderful score. 

Alex Cullimore: Thank you, guys, so much for listening. Tune in next time. 

Cristina Amigoni: Thank you.

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