Your nervous system is running your career

 

A few weeks ago, I was listening to an interview with Miss Excel - Kat Norton - the woman who turned dancing with spreadsheets into an eight-figure business.   But what stopped me wasn’t the business model or the virality.   It was this one line she said almost casually: "I train my nervous system more than I train my business skills." I paused the episode.   Because as I've been growing my own business, I've been asking myself the same question everyone asks when they're headed toward a new level: What do I need to learn next? What strategy do I need to master? What skill am I missing?   And I had the same thoughts when I was working on becoming a VP. But the deeper I go, the clearer it becomes: The next level usually isn't blocked by your skillset. It's blocked by your capacity.   The capacity to stay grounded when everything feels uncertain. The capacity to handle pressure without shutting down. The capacity to make decisions even when your stomach drops. The capacity to take risks when your entire body is telling you to play it safe.   In other words… Your nervous system decides what you do long before your brain ever gets a vote. And if you don't train it, it will run the show for you.   When Your Nervous System Takes Over Let me take you back to one of the most humbling moments of my career.   Years ago, I was leading a high-stakes meeting I had prepared for weeks. Slides rehearsed. Talking points memorized. Every detail under control.   I opened strong. Confident. After all I was prepared.   Then halfway through… something shifted.   My heart started racing. My throat tightened. My vision narrowed. And suddenly my mind went blank.   No words. No voice. Just… nothing.   For 30 to 40 seconds - which felt like an hour - I stood there frozen while a room of executives waited for me to speak.   I had rehearsed every scenario except that one.   People asked if I was okay. I nodded, even though I wasn’t.   Somehow I pulled myself together and finished the presentation, but the truth is: My nervous system had hijacked me.   And it wasn’t the only time.   There were meetings where I stayed silent even though I had an idea that could have changed the conversation. There were senior leaders I wanted to connect with… but my body shut down before I could reach out. There were roles I was absolutely qualified for… but fear convinced me not to apply.   And afterwards, I’d watch someone else get the job and think, that could have been me. I wasn't being held back by my capability. I was being held back by my biology.   Fight. Flight. Freeze. Repeat. Here's the part I was never taught: Your nervous system reacts before you do.   Long before your rational brain says, "You've got this," your survival system is scanning for threats - real or imagined - and choosing one of three options: Fight: tension, defensiveness, over-talking, sharp responses Flight: avoidance, overworking, perfectionism, staying busy Freeze: blank mind, shaky voice, silent in meetings   Sound familiar?   This is why you can be brilliant and still choke in a moment that matters.   It's why your voice shakes before tough conversations. Why your mind goes blank when a senior leader asks a question. Why you procrastinate the thing you care about most. Why visibility feels terrifying even though you want more of it.   It's not weakness. It's not lack of discipline. It's not "imposter syndrome." It's an untrained nervous system doing its job a little too well.   And here's the irony: The more you avoid discomfort, the more the nervous system learns that the discomfort is dangerous.   Avoidance reinforces fear. Exposure rewires it.   So today, we're going deeper into how you actually build that capacity to prepare yourself for the next level.

Why This Matters Even More the Higher You Go As you rise in your career, the pressure doesn't go away - it amplifies. More visibility. More uncertainty. More responsibility. More eyes on your decisions. More moments where you're expected to show leadership even when you're not sure yourself.   And every one of these moments is a nervous system moment.   If your body interprets pressure as danger, you'll do what you've always done: shut down, play small, delay decisions, avoid conversations, or retreat into the comfort of "being busy."   But if you train your nervous system - even a little - you build the capacity to stay grounded when things get hard.   You speak up instead of staying silent. You take risks instead of playing safe. You handle difficult conversations without spiraling. You show up as the leader you actually are, not the one fear tells you to be.   This is why doing hard things matters. This is why growth requires discomfort. And this is why we need to talk about the Nervous System Olympics - your new training ground for expanding what you can hold.   The Nervous System Olympics These 3 simple trainings are designed to help you expand your capacity without overwhelming your system. Think of it like interval training for your emotional resilience.   1. The Sit With It Minute When discomfort shows up - anxiety, frustration, fear, embarrassment - sit with it for one full minute. No fixing. No distracting. No numbing. Just notice the sensation.   This is emotional strength training. You're teaching your system that discomfort is part of your work, which means your tolerance expands. And in high-stakes moments at work, this matters - because the leader who can accept discomfort will thrive in chaos instead of falling apart.   Want the advanced version? After you sit and just feel the feelings you can label them. The nervous system loves ambiguity. Naming what’s happening immediately reduces activation.   “I’m in freeze.” “I’m in flight right now.” “This is a spike, not a problem.” Once you name it, the body calms. Because you’re showing it the one thing it needs most: awareness.   2. The Story Flip When your chest tightens, stomach drops, or your heart races your brain interprets it as danger.   "My heart is racing - something's wrong." "My chest feels tight - I can't do this." "My stomach dropped - this is too risky." Try flipping the story: "Nothing is wrong. My body is preparing me." “I’m not nervous, I’m excited”   Same sensation. Different meaning. Instantly more capacity.   Performers, athletes, and elite operators use this technique for a reason. It turns physiological chaos into usable energy - and that's exactly what you need when you're speaking in a meeting, taking a stand, or leading through uncertainty.   3. The Future-You Check-In Before reacting, ask one question: "What would the version of me I'm becoming do right now?"   Not the stressed version. Not the scared version. Not the tired version. The future version. The grounded, decisive, capable leader you're growing into.   This reframes the entire moment. And when you practice this consistently, your nervous system starts to follow the identity you've chosen - not the one fear is trying to protect.

Your Next Level Requires This Work Your nervous system is the bridge between the life you have and the life you want. The bigger the goals, the more capacity you need to hold the pressure that comes with them.   You don't have to overhaul your life. You don't need a complicated routine. You just need to strengthen the part of you that decides how you show up when it matters.   Three practices. A few minutes a day. A little discomfort on purpose. That's it.   Your next-level self isn't waiting for you to be fearless. Just regulated enough to move anyway.

Stop shrinking in senior rooms

 

You can be brilliant in your domain… and still shrink the moment you enter a senior room. You know your numbers. You know your strategy. You run your team well.   But put you in a room with the SLT team, the board, maybe the CEO… and something shifts. Your voice softens. You hedge. You wait to be invited in.   Not because you’re not capable. Because the room feels bigger than you.   Silence at this level signals uncertainty.   When you shrink in senior rooms, people don’t think you’re humble. They wonder if you believe in your own strategy. And that kills your presence (and your promotion).   The First Time I Shrunk in a Board Meeting The first time I joined a board meeting, I was intimidated.   I barely spoke. I didn’t ask questions. I didn’t push back. I was a very quiet mouse. I knew I didn’t make the best impression, but I didn’t realize the impact until later.   My CEO had to circle back with the board to answer follow-up questions about our marketing strategy. They weren’t fully convinced. And I believe now it wasn’t because the strategy was weak.   It was because I kept myself small in that room.   My silence was interpreted as a lack of confidence in the plan. And if the person closest to execution doesn’t sound convinced… why should the board be?   That’s when I learned something critical: Shrinking in senior rooms doesn’t protect you. It undermines your presence and your power.   I knew I had to change that, so I worked with a coach.   Not on my slides. Not just my talking points. On my belief.   Specifically: that my voice mattered in that room.   The next board meeting, I showed up differently.   I volunteered to speak. I anticipated objections and addressed them before questions were asked. I prepared deeply, not just on content but on positioning. And I spoke with conviction.   This time, there were no pushbacks. No insecurity about the direction.   In fact, one of the board members circled back afterward and offered to get on a call to get better acquainted.   That’s the difference between shrinking and holding your ground with executives. And you can do it too.   Why Shrinking in Executive Meetings Is a Career Liability I’ve coached enough executives to know shrinking is a common reaction. But I want you to see the real cost isn’t just visibility. When you shrink in senior rooms: You get labeled “strong operator” instead of “strategic leader.” You weaken sponsorship because no one bets on uncertainty. You slow your path to VP without realizing it.   Executives are not just evaluating your ideas. They are evaluating your behavior under pressure.   If you keep shrinking in high-stakes rooms, you will not be trusted with higher stakes. Here’s what you can do to overcome this instinct and stop shrinking yourself:

1. Anchor the Business, Not Your Nerves Most high performers walk into senior meetings thinking: “Do I belong here?”   Executives walk in thinking: “What decision will move us forward?”   The moment you focus on yourself, you contract. The moment you focus on the decision, you expand.   Not to mention, if you are in the room you don’t need to earn the right to be there, you need to justify their choice. They already believe you belong, prove them right.   The Business Anchor Method Before any senior meeting, run your input through this filter: Risk → Business Impact → Recommendation   Not updates. Not activity. Not effort.   Instead of: “We’re making progress, but there are a few challenges.”   Try: “If we don’t address X, we risk delaying revenue by a quarter. My recommendation is we reallocate resources now to protect the launch.”   This is what I did differently in the second board meeting. I didn’t wait to defend the strategy. I pressure-tested it out loud before anyone else could.   That’s ownership.   2. Don’t Wait to Speak, Take Space Before You Are Ready In senior rooms, silence is rarely neutral. It is interpreted as agreement, or lack of perspective.   None of those help you. Especially if you have something to say.   But I know it’s scary to speak. You’re thinking: what if I say something stupid? What if they don’t agree?   Those are possible scenarios, but that’s part of being an executive. Driving a meaningful discussion.   To roughly quote Leila Hormozi: the best executives are those who question your thinking. They shift your perspective or belief and make you reevaluate. It’s not those who agree with you all the time.   The First 3 Rule If you are too worried about being the first to speak, but you want to avoid missing your chances, follow the rule of 3. Be the third person to speak.   It takes of the pressure of being first, you can see where the discussion is going and tailor your pitch. But it’s not too late that the room is convinced and there’s nothing to add.   Being specific about your place in line also forces you to speak early instead of waiting for an opening.   In my second board meeting, I didn’t wait to be asked. I volunteered to speak.   That one decision changed the entire energy.   3. Anticipate Objections Before They Surface One of the biggest differences between shrinking and holding your ground? Preparation.   Shrinking can be a byproduct of uncertainty. When we don’t know how people will react, whether we’ll get support or push back we choose to avoid the conflict altogether. The result? Shrinking.   That’s what I did in the first board meeting. I stayed quiet hoping they won’t ask me tough questions.   The second time, I expected them. And answered them before they were asked.   Instead of hiding I chose to prepare and confront. That’s what executives do.   Practical Shift: Pre-Wire the Tension Before a high-stakes meeting, write down: The three toughest objections you might face. The data or logic that addresses each one. The tradeoffs you’re willing to acknowledge.   Then speak to those proactively.   “Some of you may be wondering about X. Here’s how we’re thinking about it.” When you surface tension calmly, you signal control. That’s executive presence in action.   The Real Identity Shift To Stop Shrinking Here’s what changed for me more than anything: I stopped entering rooms to be evaluated. I started entering rooms to elevate the quality of the decision.   Employees protect themselves. Executives protect the outcome.   If you are still shrinking in senior rooms, it’s not because you’re incapable. It’s because part of you is still trying to survive the room instead of lead it.   And that’s an identity decision, not a skill gap. Choose to make it.

Your Next Steps Pick one of these for your next senior meeting: Use the Business Anchor Method. Apply the First 3 Rule. Pre-Wire the Tension For Your Next Presentation

What to Do If Your Boss Sees You as a Threat

 

No one prepares you for this moment. You hit your goals. You become strategic. You raise your visibility. You start thinking like a VP. And suddenly… things shift.   Your boss questions your ideas more aggressively. You’re left out of meetings you used to attend. Promotion conversations stall. Feedback gets vague.   You feel it. Something changed.   For me, it was being removed from a cross-functional meeting that directly impacted my work. For one of my clients it was being asked to stop networking with senior leaders so they don’t “bug” them.   These are all signs your manager is threatened by you. Now this may be uncomfortable to hear (because you really want to avoid politics) but the higher you rise, the more your growth overlaps with someone else’s territory. And that triggers fear.   So what do we do? Most high achievers fall into two buckets: They either shrink themselves to avoid stepping on toes. Or react emotionally when their frustration hits a breaking point. None of these work to solve the problem.   If you want to get to VP, you cannot handle power issues reactively.   You handle them strategically. That’s what this newsletter is about.

4 Strategic Moves If Your Boss Feels Threatened by You First, let’s talk about what not to do.   Do not: Confront emotionally. Gossip about their insecurity. Over-perform to win approval. Threaten to leave as leverage. Shrink to make them comfortable.   These reactions won’t solve the problem and might even make it worse.   Below are four strategic power moves to consider if you suspect your manager is feeling threatened and how to use them wisely to protect your growth and your mental well-being.   1. If They Start Micromanaging You —> Increase Strategic Transparency What it looks like Work that used to be trusted is suddenly reviewed line by line.   You’re asked for excessive detail. You’re blocked from presenting directly.   Micromanagement often isn’t about quality. It’s about control.   When your thinking isn’t visible, your manager feels exposed. Exposure triggers insecurity.   Strategic move Instead of pushing back defensively, increase transparency around your thinking and next moves.   Before key meetings, send a concise summary: Context Options considered Tradeoffs Recommendation Business impact   It’s not about asking for permission. Your goal is to remove surprises and align in advance.   Managers can get insecure when there is uncertainty. When they don’t know where you are coming from or what your plans are, they start making assumptions. Those are never positive. But, when your thought process is visible, when they know in advance what you’re up to the insecurity decreases.   And sometimes overcommunicating for a while can rebuild trust and help them relax.   2. If You’re Quietly Removed from Important Conversations —> Build Distributed Credibility What it looks like You’re no longer invited to strategic discussions or removed from ones you’ve been part of.   Information arrives late. Decisions are made without your input. Influence is being contained.   It sucks. Especially if you had access before and it was removed. It feels like losing power (and it is), but you can’t fight it with rage.   Strategic move Strengthen lateral credibility across the organization to broaden your exposure.   Build relationships with: Cross-functional partners Peer leaders Program owners Adjacent teams   Not secretly behind your manager’s back, but intentionally.   When you engage outside your reporting line, frame it in alignment with team goals: “I’ve been collaborating with X to better align our roadmap. It strengthens our position long term.”   Your reputation should not depend on one person’s comfort level. Distributed your credibility to protect your career.   3. If Your Wins Are Minimized —> Control the Narrative Professionally What it looks like Your ideas are reframed as team effort. Your name disappears in executive updates. Impact gets softened.   At senior levels, whoever controls the narrative controls perception.   Strategic move Adopt executive-level reporting to help your impact travel.   After major milestones, send structured, business-focused summaries: Outcome Impact Forward plan   For example: Outcome: Reduced churn by 12% Impact: $3M retained revenue Next: Expanding pilot to two regions   No emotional tone. No correction of anyone else. Just clear ownership of impact tied to business outcomes.   Don’t wait for your manager to craft your narrative, create it and protect it.   4. If You’re Assigned Low Impact Work—> Propose Strategic Scope What it looks like You’re given operational cleanup. Side projects without visibility. Or maybe your role hasn’t changed in more than 12 months and you're stuck doing the same things over and over.   That can only lead to stagnation and shrinking scope.   Strategic move Proactively propose ownership of high-leverage initiatives that will give you more exposure.   Attach yourself to: Revenue growth Market expansion Cross-company transformation Executive-level presentations   Frame it clearly: “I’d like to lead the Q3 strategic initiative and present the roadmap to ELT. Here’s how it aligns to company growth priorities.”   You only need one yes to break the cycle, so keep asking.   BONUS MOVE: If your manager isn’t giving you the scope, find a way to be pulled in by other leaders. Make a case to show how you’ll support their project and then have them get your manager’s approval.   When Your Boss Is Truly Threatened and Won’t Move Now let’s address the uncomfortable reality.   Sometimes you can do your best to reduce ambiguity and build trust, and your manager will still be too insecure to let you grow.   Some leaders experience proximity to their own level as a threat and no amount of alignment changes that. At that point, the strategic question shifts.   It’s no longer: “How do I fix this dynamic?” It becomes: “Do I stay and wait, or do I move?”   In my case, I chose to leave. After a year of rebuilding trust and strategically networking, I realized no amount of effort would change the fact that my manager saw me as competition.   But I didn’t randomly quit. I made a move up with a new company and a manager who saw me as an amplifier, not an enemy.

Your Next Steps If you’re sensing tension right now, don’t panic. Identify the pattern.   Is it control? Containment? Narrative dilution? Vague sponsorship? Safe assignments?   Choose one of the 4 strategic moves and implement it deliberately.   In many cases, increasing transparency, forcing clarity, and expanding scope resets the dynamic. It’s worth trying.   But if you execute strategically and nothing changes, don’t ignore it and hope for the best. Make an informed decision.

Managing up when your manager is absent (or chaotic)

 

our VP is: Always in firefighting mode Avoiding hard decisions Giving vague feedback like “keep doing what you’re doing” Changing priorities every two weeks Or worse… politically fragile and protecting themselves   And now you’re stuck.   No clear KPIs. No aligned expectations. No real feedback. No advocacy. Just ambiguity and hope.   If you’re ambitious, this is not just frustrating. It’s dangerous.   Because the longer you operate without clarity, the more you start managing for survival instead of for promotion.   And here’s the uncomfortable truth: At the Director and Sr. Director level, you no longer get to wait for clarity.   You have to manufacture it. Let me show you how.

The Hidden Risk of Working Without Clear Leadership When leadership above you is messy, three things quietly happen:   1. Your Goals Become Guesswork Without clearly defined KPIs or agreed-upon outcomes, you start optimizing for activity instead of impact.   You overwork. You over-deliver. You try to cover every angle.   But when review season comes, you struggle to articulate what “winning” actually meant. And if success was never clearly defined, it’s very hard to prove you achieved it.   2. Your Feedback Loop Breaks If your manager avoids conflict or doesn’t give constructive input, you lose calibration.   You don’t know: Where you’re strong. Where you’re misaligned. Whether you’re operating at executive altitude.   Over time, this creates self-doubt or false confidence. Neither is helpful.   3. Your Promotion Path Becomes Fragile If one unstable leader controls your narrative upward, your career becomes dependent on their competence and political strength.   That’s not strategic. That’s risky. And the longer you tolerate it, the more it looks like you need it.   How to Lead Effectively When Your Manager Doesn’t When your manager is absent or chaotic, your job changes. Not officially. But in reality.   You stop being someone who waits for direction. You become someone who creates operating stability.   Here’s what that actually looks like.   1. Create Clear KPIs and Success Metrics Instead of Waiting for Them The cost of waiting: You drift. You stay busy. You ship things. You’re moving a million individual parts, but not the ship.   That means you don’t have leverage. And when promotion conversations happen, you can’t clearly point to what you were actually hired to win, even though your calendar is exploding.   If success is vague, your impact will be too.   Instead of asking: “What are my goals?” Propose them.   For example: “Based on where the company is headed and what our function actually controls, here are the four outcomes I believe we should own over the next two quarters. If we hit these, we move revenue, cost, or risk in a real way. Does this align?”   Notice the shift.   You’re not asking for direction. You’re offering a clear path and just asking for confirmation. It works because it takes off some of the pressure. Your manager doesn’t need to come up with the answers, just approve your direction.   But, how do you come up with a plan when there’s ambiguity and little direction? Tie your KPIs to business outcomes, not activity. Pick 3–5 real results, not a laundry list of tasks. Be explicit about trade-offs so it’s clear what won’t get done. Follow up in writing so expectations are documented.   This isn’t overstepping. It’s removing guesswork. And executives trust people who remove guesswork.   2. Build Your Own Information Flow to Reduce Political Blind Spots The cost of waiting for information to trickle down: If information from the top is inconsistent, you operate with half the story.   Then you get surprised. Then you look reactive.   When your manager is chaotic or doesn’t share information, you have to find other ways to get informed. That means building lateral intelligence. Strong relationships with peer Directors. Regular alignment conversations that aren’t just status updates. Smart, neutral questions like: “What themes are you hearing from the top right now?” “Anything shifting that could affect our roadmap?”     At senior levels, context is everything. The people with context make better decisions. The people without it look like they lack judgment. Don’t be the second one.   3. Design a Visibility Strategy That Doesn’t Depend on One Person The cost of relying only on your manager to advocate for you: If they don’t talk about you, you don’t exist.   And if they’re politically cautious, insecure, or just overwhelmed, you become invisible by default. That’s too risky.   You need a visibility plan that goes beyond your manager.   Here are a few things you can do: Send structured updates that tie your work to business outcomes Share progress in exec-facing forums when appropriate Document impact in writing (use before and after to show impact)   Instead of: “We completed the migration.” Say: “This initiative reduced operational risk by X%, improved time-to-market by Y%, and sets us up to support next year’s growth.”   Same work. Different altitude.   Visibility at this level isn’t about being loud. It’s about being clear on why your work matters.   4. Protect Your Promotion Path This is the uncomfortable one.   If your entire promotion path depends on one VP’s advocacy, you are exposed. That’s a single point of failure.   And when leadership is unstable, that risk goes up.   So you diversify credibility. Build real trust with multiple senior stakeholders. Own cross-functional work that puts you in higher-level conversations. Make sure your skip-level knows you for judgment and outcomes, not drama.   You are not bypassing your manager. You are protecting your future. There’s a difference.   The Emotional Trap to Avoid When Managing Up When your manager is absent or chaotic, resentment builds fast.   You think: “I shouldn’t have to do this.” “This is literally their job.” “This isn’t fair.”   All true, but irrelevant.   Staying in that mindset keeps you reactive. And reactive leaders rarely get promoted.   The people who rise in messy environments aren’t the ones who complain the most.   They’re the ones who quietly create order. They clarify. They connect dots. They bring structure where there isn’t any.   And over time, everyone starts to feel the difference. That is what managing up well really means.

Your Next Step: A 30-Minute Stabilization Exercise This week, pick the area where ambiguity is costing you the most: Unclear KPIs No real feedback Political blind spots Weak visibility   This week, define one area where expectations feel vague and draft the version you would operate under if you were already the VP. Send it for alignment. That’s how you stop being managed and start being seen as executive material.