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**** My father had one rule, and it ruined a lot of my good ideas. You want to run a restaurant? Go work in a restaurant. You want to open an indoor driving range? Go work at one. Figure out the economics before you fall in love with it. He’d challenge an idea vigorously, then support my decision unconditionally. At nineteen, I found the first half unbearable. It is the single most valuable thing anyone ever did for me. ​ Because he was forcing me to make it real instead of l

**** "Matt, you wouldn't believe it. You saved me $9 million." That's what a seasoned executive told me last week. It sounds insane. 9 Million. He'd spent 4 hours with us. That's it. Four hours. So I asked him to walk me through it. And the math was right. His company was deep in a major negotiation with a multinational client, and the relationship had soured over QA/QC issues. The client had bases in the US, France, and Germany. Different communication styles in all three of

**** Today, August 12 at 11am AT, we're running through a 45 minute version of our AI in the workplace sessions we've run for over 3,500 business leaders. We're using this run to record a new asset, so instead of the usual price tag, we're opening it up free of charge for anyone who wants to sit in. If you've already sat through this one yourself, send it to your leadership team. And if you want a refresher (because AI has likely changed astronomically since you last attended

**** A question came up recently that I suspect a lot of us have been turning over: There's been a wave of content suggesting AI is exponentially gaining self-awareness and capability, with some predicting a real tipping point as early as 2029. The question underneath it was simple: is there merit to this, and if so, how far out should we be planning? Glad it came up, because I think it's worth answering for everyone on this list. Nobody knows whether 2029, 2035, or any other

**** We are not being ambitious enough. Not with our tools. With ourselves. Everyone reading this who pays for an AI subscription sits in about the top 0.3% of the world. Early. Well ahead. And 88% of organizations are still using AI to write summaries. The constraint stopped being the model a while ago. The constraint is what we think to ask for. Hundreds of articles written in the last month. I’ve read dozens. These two articles are worth your time. An opinionated guide to

**** I was featured on a podcast a couple weeks ago and about twenty minutes in, we ended up talking about my grandfather. He was a roofer. Built the business up from nothing, hired family, had trucks running all over town. By most measures it was working. Revenue kept climbing. But nobody was really watching the bottom line, and at some point he noticed the growth wasn't making his life better. It was just making it busier. So he did something most people in his position wou

**** ​I want to tell you about a number that stuck with me this week: 27. That’s how many hours an 80-hour piece of work got optimized down to, without changing the value delivered to a client. It came from a story Chris Johnston shared while facilitating a Levership monthly check-in. He’s Levership’s CEO now, but years ago he was a client of ours running a cybersecurity firm. I’ll let Chris’ words tell the story: Chris: We had a piece of work we did, a security assessment, b

**** I want to tell you a story and then point you to a free resource. One of our clients sells medical supplies to people who can't get to a hospital fast. We started digging through their customer list to figure out who their best buyers actually were. Turns out it was fishing boat owners. Before we asked a single question, nobody on their team knew that. Fishing vessels are brutally hard to find. Most databases don't track them well, and the ones that do charge a fortune f

**** You've heard me talk about why the workflow has to come before AI. So let's say you've done that. You know which workflow needs the most help. Now what? How do you actually rewire the workflow effectively? We use a proven method called DMAIC. Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control. Here is the short version: Define the actual business problem. Not the solution someone already decided on. "We need AI in our sales process" is not a problem, that is an answer looking fo

**** Most leaders I talk to are approaching AI in the wrong order. Tools first, problem second. It's why most of it doesn't stick. I recorded a 1 min 33 second video on what the right order actually looks like, using a real business’s story. A contracting company that found its constraint first, mapped the workflow, and then pointed AI at it. What came out the other side: 600 hours saved, conversions up 17%, the business doubled in revenue in 6 months. Worth a few minutes of