"I want, by understanding myself, to understand others." Katherine Mansfield

Photo Credit: Kevin Jordan, Snow Canyon State Park, UT, May 2026

Greetings -

I hope you, your families and friends are well! And I do hope you are staying (relatively) cool. It's been a hot summer!

July finds us enjoying the additional daylight hours with extended walks during the weekday evenings and longer adventures on the weekends to our favorite hiking, dining and wine tasting spots. Our daughter is delighting in her summer near her alma mater. She is pleasantly preoccupied with finishing up her summer internship, embarking on her first full-time job at a small law firm and prepping for her graduate studies. We will have some fun family time at the upcoming Labor Day weekend. We are looking forward to her visit!

As many of you know, service has (and continues to be) the throughline of my career. Each year I look for new opportunities to pay forward the many great gifts I have received over the course of my career. This year, a very different and exciting opportunity arose; I was asked by the lovely folks at Braven to apply to be a volunteer leadership coach and mentor to undergraduate college students. Recently, I was chosen and will be working virtually with a cohort of students at Spelman College in Atlanta starting in September and running through the end of this calendar year. For those not familiar with Braven, it is a national non-profit, with a mission "to equip promising college students with the skills, networks, confidence, and experience necessary to transition from college to strong economic opportunities, which lead to meaningful careers and lives of impact." More to come as this great experience unfolds!

This edition has lots of great reading and listening, especially in the Research section. Here you will find an array of thought-provoking recent findings and analyses. Of particular note are the first two studies re: how men and women experience leadership and the implications for both the workforce and workplace of the future. The first one looks more globally at the experience of men and women. Drawing upon a study that has been replicated every 20 years since 1965, the researchers conclude (troublingly) that "..men and women now diverge sharply on whether women are judged more harshly, held to higher standards, and advance through genuinely meritocratic systems. The findings point not to overt hostility but to “underground bias”: informal sponsorship, subjective performance criteria, and unequal access to P&L roles." Good news: there are a fair number of structural tools and infrastructure in place to close this gap. Not so good news: there appears to be a lack of leadership and organizational will (at least among these study participants) to consistently and systematically act in meaningful ways.

The second, with an emphasis on the experience of Gen Z women, illustrates (hopefully) that "they are less likely than their male peers to aspire to senior leadership — but the data suggest this isn’t a story about women's lack of drive. The gap closes when young women believe companies genuinely want women at the top. When Gen Z women believe this, their aspirations rise to match Gen Z men’s." These young women have the two A's: Aptitude and Attitude. What they are lacking, and what will close the gap relative to their male peers, is the will and commitment of their employers. 

I am enjoying all of the podcasts and they are on regular rotation for my long walks and drives. I have become a big fan of the Curiosity Shop (great title and a doorbell rings at the start of each episode as you "enter" the shop), which is co-hosted by two of my favorite scholars: Brené Brown and Adam Grant. They are back this week from their summer hiatus, so give them a listen as they cover a wide-range of leadership and organizational topics weekly.

With respect and deep admiration for you all, happy reading and listening!

Be well, take good care of yourselves, families and community. 

-kj

PS - (Missed a newsletter? Past editions can be found here: https://www.kevinjordan.coach/blog. And if you hit paywall on an article(s), feel free to send me a note and let me know what you need. I have subscriptions to many of the sources that I cite.)

Featured
"I need to make the decision." "My experience here is paramount." "I should be there."

As thoughtful and accountable leaders, many of us have wrestled with these and other mindsets. They get to the core of our professional identities (both real and perceived) and what we value in ourselves and others. They speak directly to our beliefs in what and how to lead effectively. And they may have served us well and played a meaningful role in our past successes. 

Until they don't...

Left unnoticed or unquestioned, our mindsets can calcify. Rather than enhancing our leadership currency, they can create stasis and (however unintentional) self-imposed obstacles to our future growth and that of our teams. What got us to our roles today, likely won't keep us there, let alone move us forward.

Naming what is inhibiting us is the key first step. What follows is the heavy lift; we must sit with and reflect on their role and the cost to us and our teams. Understanding can then fuel action, which will likely entail the work of re-framing these narratives and developing appropriate actions plans to move forward. 

Self-awareness and curiosity create space for structured and generative introspection. 

Articles
Harvard Business Review: When to Open Up at Work—and When Not To. "Disclosure isn’t a one-shot choice; it’s a campaign. Calibrating between openness and restraint, candor and composure, takes practice—and missteps are part of it. Each conversation offers another rep in the skill of revealing wisely. Have some self-compassion as you do. Every day we face quiet, constant choices about when to open up and when to hold back—and how to do both with intention...In the end, the goal isn’t to reveal more—it’s to reveal on purpose, and correctly. That’s how a leader can reliably turn openness into trust."

Harvard Business Review: Leaders Feel Their Agency Eroding—and They’re Starting to Withdraw. "Withdrawal is not a leadership failure—it is a signal that you may be doubting your ability to shape the future of your organization and secure your place in it. But the remedy is not to push harder or stick to the rules of the old game. At a time where the future feels less governable, leadership is no longer about chasing certainty and constructing stability...Ultimately, it’s an opportunity to see things in a new light, to question long-held beliefs, and to evolve your way of leading."

Harvard Business Review: Performance Management Needs New Metrics in the AI Era. "Organizations face the paradox of measuring performance in a way that rewards speed-to-output but fails to surface missing assumptions, reward the human who would have caught them, or hold the AI accountable. The organizations that will win are those that redesign performance management to make the invisible visible—boundary judgment, human-AI collaboration quality, and accountable outcomes. If you wait until AI agents are deeply embedded in workflows, you will be trying to rebuild accountability while the building is already occupied."

HR Dive: Total compensation not currently helping engagement much, McLean reports. "Although most workers plan to stay at their companies, work also needs to be done on career advancement and development opportunities, the firm found."

Research
Harvard Business Review: What 60 Years of Data Reveals About How Men and Women Experience Leadership. "...Organizations invested heavily in visible signals of inclusion while leaving intact the informal interpretive habits that shape who is seen, developed, and trusted with the roles that lead to the top. The tools required for a redesign—predefined criteria, structured documentation, P&L pipelines, and actionable feedback—are already at our disposal. What sixty years of evidence makes clear is that the barrier was never the tools; it was the willingness to actually use them."

Lean In Factsheet: Gen Z Women and Leadership. "More Gen Z women would seek leadership if they believed companies wanted them."

KelloggInsight: Looking Beyond Cash to Motivate Employees. "While many companies donate to win over consumers, research shows this approach can also motivate employees more effectively than cash incentives alone."

SignalFire: State of Tech Talent Report - 2026. "Flatter, leaner, more technical: The new shape of tech companies in 2026."

Blog Posts & Opinions
Kelly Corrigan Wonders: All You Need Is One Great Question. "The biggest thing I’ve learned about how to learn big things."

The University of Chicago Center for Practical Wisdom: AI-driven world: Why wisdom is the new leadership imperative."We are entering a world where information is abundant but clarity is scarce. Problems are interconnected, while solutions are rarely straightforward. In such a world, the question is no longer simply, “What is the right answer?” It is, more fundamentally, “How do I think about this situation wisely?” And perhaps, for leaders and organisations alike, that is the real work ahead."

Topline: The Operationalization Gap Separating AI-Fluent Leaders from the Rest. "The leaders pulling ahead rebuilt the job before touching the tools. Here's their playbook."

Podcasts 
TED Radio Hour: How You See Yourself. "What's the image you present to the world? And do you see yourself the same way? This hour, TED speakers add new dimensions to the idea of self perception."

Hidden Brain: You 2.0: Change Your Story, Change Your Life. "We all tell stories about ourselves, often without realizing we’re doing so. How we frame those stories can profoundly shape our lives...Jonathan Adler shares how to tell our stories in ways that enhance our wellbeing."

The Curiosity Shop with Brené Brown and Adam Grant: Are You a Preacher, Prosecutor, Scientist, or Politician? "Do you find yourself defaulting to “Preacher” mode when you’re under pressure, or starting to act like a “Prosecutor” when someone challenges your ideas? Brené and Adam unpack four mental modes – Preacher, Prosecutor, Politician, and Scientist – to explore why we often cling to being right rather than getting it right. In this episode, they discuss how these defensive stances are shaping our response to AI, Brené’s “bounce” method for emotional hypothesis-testing, Adam’s go-to “strategy of small losses,” and ways to stay curious when the stakes are high."

Arts, Music, Culture & Humor Corner
The New Yorker: Gustav Klimt's Hunger To Please. "The artist can still dazzle, but his achievements sometimes come at the cost of passion or purpose."

The Line of Best Fit: Ben Gibbard's Long Way Home. "Three decades into a celebrated career, the Death Cab for Cutie songwriter has abandoned the role of the aggrieved narrator and found a new acceptance of his past and the band's legacy."

Uncynical: Long walk. No phone. A guide to the best medicine. "But this. This 'Long walk. No phone.' This is real medicine. I swear by this. If you think you don’t need this, brother that's like saying you don’t need water. Everybody needs this."

The New Yorker: Corporate Alternatives to the Compliment Sandwich. "The Honey Bomb, the Spiralling Donut, Performance Pies, and other scrumptious snacks for your subordinates."

Reflections
“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.” ~ Maya Angelou

“Put blinders on to those things that conspire to hold you back, especially the ones in your own head.” ~ Meryl Streep

"There cannot be mental atrophy in any person who continues to observe, to remember what he observes, and to seek answers for his unceasing hows and whys about things." ~ Alexander Graham Bell