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The Empty Suit a.k.a. The Innovation Killer
There’s a particular employee persona that in my belief poses one of the greatest threats to innovation. They are eloquent and persuasive but pay attention long enough and you’ll begin to notice a lack of depth or substance to anything they’re saying. Oftentimes being a “remix” of someone else’s idea wrapped in a buzzword sandwich. They are the smooth talkers whose delivery style is designed to mask the void of meaningful content. The Empty Suit Empty suits often excel in the art of buzzwords, appear easy-going, and can navigate organizational politics with superhero levels of adeptness. However, beneath this is a lack of knowledge, experiential insights, and often, any genuine…
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Failure – The Best Teacher
Today, I want to discuss my first and most significant failure and how it was the best-worst thing that could have happened to me professionally. Not to brag, but in general, I have always had a fairly high success rate with whatever I’ve chosen to pursue… Enter Pino Napoli. My husband always had a desire to own his own business and as his partner and wife, I have supported that decision. Prior to our marriage, we agreed to live as though we had only one income and save the rest for our business endeavors. For ten years, we visited businesses for sale across the country and considered franchises or real…
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From Chaos to Clarity: Making SaaS Implementations Agile with Governance
SaaS implementations are sold on speed and flexibility, but anyone who’s led one knows that without structure they can quickly descend into confusion. With multiple teams involved, priorities changing midstream, and competing expectations, what was supposed to be a smooth rollout often feels like chaos. The real differentiator is governance, not as bureaucracy, but as the framework that keeps agility on track. For me, governance starts with clarity. Clear roles, decision rights, and escalation paths prevent project tasks from getting bogged down in debates over ownership. Good governance also means visibility. Everyone, from executives to project team members, should be able to see where things stand and how their work…
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Projects vs. Tasks – Why the Distinction Matters in SaaS Implementations
SaaS implementations move quickly and involve many moving parts across HR, IT, Finance, and Operations. Without structure, the details blur and accountability slips. One of the biggest pain points I see is when teams blur the line between projects and tasks. Get this distinction right, and you create clarity. Get it wrong, and you risk missed deadlines, wasted effort, or an incomplete go-live. Projects: The Big Picture Projects are the containers for major outcomes. In an HCM implementation, a project might be Core HR Data Migration, Payroll Integration, or Change Management and Training. Each one represents a collection of related work tied to a deliverable and timeline. Projects answer the…
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Frontline Frustration and the Role of Agility in Building Skills
Frontline workers often carry the heaviest load in an organization. Schedules change with little notice. Processes are handed down without input. Training is minimal, and career growth can feel out of reach. It is no surprise frustration runs high on the front line. I saw this firsthand when I co-owned and operated a tile flooring retail and on-site fabrication business (two businesses my husband and I purchased and merged into one. We had 2 showrooms with hourly staff, a fabrication shop, forklift drivers, and delivery drivers moving heavy product in the warehouse and to job sites. Each role was critical, but the work was often seen as just “tasks.” People…
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Making Early Career Roles Meaningful with Agility and AI
Early career employees often start in gig or entry-level jobs. For workers, it can feel frustrating when schedules change suddenly, tasks repeat endlessly, and growth feels out of reach. For employers, it creates churn, disengagement, and missed opportunities. Agility is one answer, and AI makes it stronger. Agility is about adaptability, feedback, and building skills step by step. AI helps by making feedback faster, learning more personalized, and connecting daily work to long-term growth. For Early Career Workers Set small learning goals. AI-powered micro-learning tools can suggest short lessons that fit into a week, not a year. This makes it easier to build momentum and see progress in any role.…
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What Gen X Wants Now: Expectations, Challenges, and Opportunities
Generation X, often defined as those born between 1965 and 1980, sits in a unique position in today’s workforce. Many have decades of experience, are in mid to senior stages of their careers, and balance pressures from both older and younger colleagues. Their priorities are shifting in ways that employers need to understand if they want to retain this highly experienced group. One of the clearest themes is recognition. Gen X workers want their experience to be seen and valued rather than overlooked. They bring a blend of analog and digital knowledge, leadership through change, and institutional memory that younger employees simply cannot replicate. Yet surveys show that many still…
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Competencies Leaders Need to Attract Gen Z Talent
Gen Z, born between the mid 1990s and early 2010s, is no longer the upcoming generation. They are already a major part of today’s workforce. This is the first fully digital native generation, shaped by rapid technological change, economic uncertainty, and global events such as the pandemic. They bring fresh expectations to the job market, and leaders who want to attract them need to adapt thoughtfully. Values That Drive Decisions For Gen Z, values matter. Deloitte’s 2023 survey shows that climate change, community impact, and fairness all play a role in how they choose employers (Deloitte Global 2023 Gen Z and Millennial Survey). They look for organizations that balance performance…
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The Purpose-Driven Journey
My very first office job was at a small project management consulting firm in Atlanta, GA. The firm provided week-long in-person workshops to prepare project managers for the PMP certification exam. They had a team of 10 project managers who traveled across the country to deliver corporate training sessions, and I’d been hired as an Assistant/Receptionist. The best thing about this job was the down time. I immediately took to project management. I didn’t have the experience to qualify for the PMP, so I read the PMBOK instead. I loved helping the PMs edit training materials and would sit in on classes when they were held locally. They were all…
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Embracing Fluidity: An Agile-Oriented Approach to Life
I was first introduced to the concepts of “agile” in 2007 as a newbie in the product management world. A small recruiting software company in Florida had poached me from a competitor to help expand their product offerings with the addition of a new performance management solution. Seeing as how we were given less than a year to accomplish this, the company decided to pilot a new software development methodology with our team, agile (Scrum, specifically). So off to training we all went and got certified. We returned and for 8 months we worked together in a tiny room to make it happen. And it did… …just in time for…
