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Elise Hu
Hey, TED Talks Daily listeners, I'm Elise Hu. Today we have an episode of another podcast from the TED Audio Collective, handpicked by us for you. If you're feeling a little mediocre at something at work, consider this that could actually be the key to succeeding at something else. In this episode of Fixable, business leaders Anne Morris and Frances Fry dare listeners to be bad in order to get good. Using Steve Jobs and Apple as an example, Frances and Anne share insights on why phoning in certain things at work isn't lazy, but rather exactly what you need to do to excel where it matters most in your life and career. Whatever you're dealing with at work, Fixable is there to help. Listen to Fixable wherever you get your podcasts. And if you've got a problem that you want fixed, call their hotline at 234-fixable. That's 234-349-2253 to leave Ann and Frances a voicemail with your workplace problem.
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Elise Hu
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Anne Morris
Hello, everyone. Welcome back to a brand new season of Fixable from the TED Audio Collective. I'm your host, Anne Morris. I'm a company builder and leadership coach.
Frances Fry
And I'm your co host, Frances Fry. I'm a Harvard Business School professor. And I'm Ann's wife.
Anne Morris
Happy New Year to all of our fixers out there. We missed you desperately. And we could not be more excited to be reunited today. We have so many great episodes in the works, we can't wait to share them with you. And in the meantime, please keep sending us questions so we can keep answering them on the show. And let us know if you want to join us to solve some problems together.
Frances Fry
Really? This is our idea of a good time.
Anne Morris
We're at a point in our lives where we are not fighting it anymore.
Frances Fry
No more.
Anne Morris
So, for instance, to kick off this season of Possibility and New Beginnings, we wanted to explore an idea that you and I are really passionate about, which is that we all must have the courage to be bad at some things.
Frances Fry
It sounds like it's a path to mediocrity or a path to laziness, but the truth is we need to make sacrifice in one area in order to make progress in another. And so we want to be as intentional about that which we're going to be great at as that which we're going to be bad at.
Anne Morris
Yeah. This is insight that got you tenure at the Harvard Business School.
Frances Fry
How important the insight that got me tenure at the Harvard Business School was to ask you to marry me. Let's be super honest.
Anne Morris
Oh, that's a whole other episode, my dear.
Frances Fry
All right, we'll wait till the Marry.
Anne Morris
Up episode, but yeah, what we want to get into today is how important it is in organizations to be willing to suck at some part of the value proposition. And the basic idea is that in order to excel where it matters most, as you said, you have to be willing to underperform. And according to your research, not just under form, really phone it in some other areas. And the key is to be very intentional about those other areas as well.
Frances Fry
If you have five things that you want to make investments in, if you invest in all of them, you equally that's one strategy. Another strategy is pick some that you want to over invest in, but then you have to under invest in other things. It's almost an emotional obstacle that gets in the way. We have forgetfulness.
Anne Morris
Yeah. No, in our experience, this is not an intellectually difficult idea, but what's hard in execution is to really have the stomach for it.
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Elise Hu
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Anne Morris
All right, Frances, let's start this conversation with an example, because I feel like this is an idea that people really need to touch and feel, to internalize.
Frances Fry
So the example that brings it to life most deeply for me is the example of the MacBook Air. I still remember when, about 20 years ago, Steve Jobs strode across the stage carrying a manila envelope and every geek.
Anne Morris
It wasn't just the geek. We were all paying attention to this moment.
Frances Fry
Yeah, we were all paying attention, and he was carrying a manila envelope. And nobody had any idea what he had in that manila envelope. None of us dared to think that he was going to slide out a computer from that manila envelope. It was just unprecedented at that time. And he presented to us the MacBook Air, as thin as an envelope. Now, to do that, to be best in class at weight, which is what his ambition was, he had to be worst in class at physical features. So to be the lightest weight laptop on the market, he couldn't have an internal CD ROM drive.
Anne Morris
Kids, ask your parents what that was, but am I hearing this right, Francis? So Jobs and his team of incredible designers, they imagined this machine that had never existed before, Right. That was the lightest laptop ever with this beautiful design. And in order to deliver on this thing that they wanted most, right, this radically lightweight, beautiful design, they had to give up some other things. Now, the example of the CD ROM is literally something they gave up, Right? There was no CD rom. But the other provocative part was that there were other things that they had to include. They had no choice but. But to include them. Like a battery. Right? That was good enough, but it wasn't great.
Frances Fry
Yes. And I think that you just detailed two of the most important parts of strategy, which is, what am I not going to do? And what am I not going to do?
Anne Morris
Well, I love that because we, you know, what am I not going to do? That is like a famous definition of strategy. But what we hear a lot less about is what am I going to do but not do very well? And I think that is the emotionally hard part of what you're trying to.
Frances Fry
Quite honestly, it's much more difficult to do something poorly than to not do it at all.
Anne Morris
The other example that brings us to life for me is the impossible triangle. So tell us about the impossible triangle.
Frances Fry
Yeah. So in construction is where it's usually used, which is there is very famously cost, quality, speed, pick two.
Anne Morris
I remember this from when we renovated our kitchen.
Frances Fry
Indeed. And what it essentially means is that you can't beat the competition at all three of these. And so if you're going to pick two you have to. One of them has to give. It's bad in the service of good, it's sacrifice to make progress. So if you want to speed up the project at the same quality, it's going to cost more.
Anne Morris
And that's intuitive because I got to hire more people and get them to work after hours and. Exactly. It's not free.
Frances Fry
So in the world of physical products, this, in order to be great, you have to be bad is not a very emotional conversation.
Anne Morris
Right.
Frances Fry
And it's because physics applies. Like, if I make something that I can drop on my foot, I can't pretend that there aren't trade offs. I can't pretend that I can be best in class at weight and. And best in class at physical features. Right. That they literally physically trade off against each other. In the world of services, the same physics applies, but we seduce ourselves into thinking that we can be great at everything. So this is more difficult to do in service business. So we often say, as shorthand, people think they can defy gravity. It means they're talking about a service and they're acting as if trade offs don't apply to them. And they do.
Anne Morris
Right. And it's our shorthand for saying you think delusionally that you can be great at everything.
Frances Fry
Yes.
Anne Morris
And we know from the science that that is physically impossible.
Frances Fry
Yes.
Anne Morris
So the moment of truth that I think about a lot is Herb Kelleher, the iconic founder of Southwest Airlines. And he had built this company that was deeply aware of the strategic trade offs embedded in its model. In the beginning, you didn't get an assigned seat and you didn't get a full meal, but in return, you got cheaper prices and you got more frequent flights. And there's a whole bunch of operational reasons why those two things trade off. So at one point, Herb gets this letter from a very frustrated grandmother, and she is like a very sympathetic customer. And she's describing how she travels to see her grandkids frequently. And this is a huge part of her life. She has to transfer airlines, and Southwest has a policy where they won't transfer bags. And this was a very big decision.
Frances Fry
Because this is a moment of truth. This is a poignant moment of truth.
Anne Morris
Totally because they're in this cutthroat game with all these other airlines, and all the other airlines are providing the service. All the other airlines are going to transfer your bag. So he gets this letter and he responds very thoughtfully. It's basically like we've built an airline that is profitable and doesn't make you sad. Right. We're the only ones. But in return, we're going to ask you to make some of these sacrifices. And this is why, if we transferred your bag, the whole model would start to fall apart. You know, they have this strategic discipline that is like unprecedented in this industry and in many industries. The other thing I love about this story is he basically ccs the entire company.
Frances Fry
That's the breathtaking part of it and.
Anne Morris
Is like, this is what it looks like to absorb the emotional tax of these kinds of trade offs, which is really the hard part in our experience.
Frances Fry
And which means it's the part that the leaders should model.
Anne Morris
But what we find must model. I just want to underscore, like, just dial it up. You have to. Because if you start to like waver even a little bit, it gets amplified.
Frances Fry
Through the rest of the organization.
Anne Morris
Yeah. You know, we're going to, we're going to think, oh, oh, then this, they're not serious about this. So I'm not going to work as hard as I'm working right now because this shit is hard.
Frances Fry
And what we find that most people, the further they are away from the front line where the trade off is occurring, the more likely they are to forget.
Anne Morris
Yeah.
Frances Fry
About why the trade offs need to exist. And so if you find your way to call the CEO, like the CEO is a guaranteed yes. If you can finally get through the gatekeepers to get there. And that's really bad posturing. The CEO should say the same no as we want the front line to say, which isn't a mean no. It's a contextual no.
Anne Morris
It's a strategic no.
Frances Fry
It's a strategic no. And the reason that he cc'd the rest of the company is it was an educational moment. The reason he doesn't do it is we would have to slow down the turnaround time of airplanes. And if we slow down the turnaround times of airplanes, they calculated it even 30 minutes slower would correspond to the entire annual profit of the airline. I think southwest had a 30 minute advantage. They could turn their planes around 30 minutes faster because of many of these choices that gave them essentially the entire profit of the airline.
Anne Morris
Wow.
Frances Fry
And so anything that got in that way, they can't do. But they didn't do it because they didn't care. And you got the sense that other airlines, when they say no, it's just the person you were unfortunately assigned didn't care. And if I was, if I was given a more empathetic person, I would have gotten a yes. This was an empathetic no. And that is the key on Dare to be bad.
Anne Morris
Okay, so say I'm convinced. I'm ready to get in touch with my inner herb, and I want to do this for my own organization.
Frances Fry
Where do I.
Anne Morris
Where do I start in bringing this kind of thinking into the system?
Frances Fry
I think you start with your customers. So you have some. You have an idea of what your service is, what your product is, and who you're serving. So when you have those, you start with a customer. And what is it that the customer values most? And so I often think about this. When the customer is thinking of giving you a dollar, who else are they thinking of giving that dollar to? That's your competitive set. And so when the customer is thinking of giving me a dollar, why? What's the most important thing to them? Write it down. What's the next most important thing to them? Write it down. And so on. It's really important that we know the ordering of attributes. Otherwise we could make the wrong decision. If we're going to be great at some things and bad at others, goodness, we better be great at the things they value most.
Anne Morris
When you think about your most important customers, the markets that you really want to win in, what do people care about? And what is the order in which they care about those things?
Frances Fry
And the reason that we have people simulate the customer before going and talking to them is twofold. One, it gets you fluent in the language you're like. It's the pre conversation, so that you're ready to go and be able to participate in the conversation. And you have a hypothesis of what you might hear. But here's the second reason. I want people to realize how little they can trust their instincts. Because when you simulate it.
Anne Morris
Super humbling.
Frances Fry
Oh, my God, it's so humbling because people have so much confidence. Oh, our customers care about this, this, and this. I want them to do this as a group exercise because they're going to be in a group with people who are just as confident and think very differently. Well, first of all, you're both not right. So imagine, and this is what's going on. But imagine if you had two people in the organization pulling the company in different directions. That's what's going on. And so by doing this first, by simulating it first, you get to surface, oh, my gosh, we're not all going in the same direction. We need to go in the same direction. And then let's go get guided by the people who know the answer, which is the customer.
Anne Morris
It's a really powerful conversation for Surfacing these implicit assumptions, not only what do customers want, but which customers are most important to us at this time? Like a lot of stuff, really important stuff comes to the surface. Okay, so let's say I get to a confident list. We work through all of these things, we bring in some external data, we're confident in the list. What's my next move?
Frances Fry
So if you're going to be successful in that market, look at things at the top of the list. If it's not 1, I sure hope it's 2. And if it's not 1 or 2, I sure hope it's 3. Otherwise, don't be in that business. Yeah, look at things at the top of the list. And what do you have the operational capability to be great at? Not what are you great at today? What do you have the potential to be great at? If you gave that more attention?
Anne Morris
Yep.
Frances Fry
And then if I gave that more attention, I have to acknowledge where am I taking attention away? And please don't take attention away from something that's also at the top of the list.
Anne Morris
Right.
Frances Fry
Take attention away from something that's at the bottom of the list.
Anne Morris
Exactly. The order you're suggesting here is start at the top, where do I want to win? And then reverse engineer what do I have to give up in order to get there?
Frances Fry
And all of it is guided by the customer's preferences.
Elise Hu
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Frances Fry
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Elise Hu
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Anne Morris
So where do my competitors come into this story?
Frances Fry
So the competitors come in when we say, what are you going to be great at? Great is a relative term. What am I going to be better than the competition at? Well, the only way I know that is if I know who the competition is. And most of us, if we go and ask people who the competitors are. Sometimes companies think their competitors are different than who the customer thinks their competitors are. And you know who's right? The customer.
Anne Morris
Right, Right. So where do companies tend to get stuck in kind of bringing this more strategic use of resources to life inside the system?
Frances Fry
Well, one is being disciplined enough to really get to the nitty gritty of that ordering of attributes most important to least important. That's the first thing. The second thing is we tend to be a generous grader to ourselves and a really harsh grader to the competition. So we overestimate what we look like in the eyes of the customers and we underestimate what our competition looks like in the eyes of the customers.
Anne Morris
Oh, it's so good. I mean, we do it just to get through the day. And you're going to take that away from me too in this conversation.
Frances Fry
So particularly in highly competitive industries where it's the Coke versus Pepsi, Coke is great, Pepsi is bad, or Pepsi is great, Coke is bad. Oh my gosh. Don't listen to anybody on the inside about how well you think it's going. You gotta go get market research because we think we're great at everything and we think they're bad at everything.
Anne Morris
All right, so let me ask you a question that we get all the time. How does this approach apply to individuals?
Frances Fry
Oh, this is.
Anne Morris
Or does it?
Frances Fry
Yeah. So this, I think, is the most common question that we get when we do this exercise with organizations which at some point when people find like, they struggle to get it, they want to be great, they don't want to be bad. And then at some point there's the breakthrough of, oh my gosh, in order to be great, we have to be bad. And then the light bulb goes off and they're like, wait a minute, does this apply to me too?
Anne Morris
We had that same arc when we started doing this work and writing about it. We were like, oh, shit, this might explain everything.
Frances Fry
And it turned out it explained everything because even though we teach companies around the world, we were getting it wrong at home.
Anne Morris
Yeah, the home front is a great one. So you often talk about working moms as an example. And I just feel this one. But you're a better messenger for this. Too close to home for me.
Frances Fry
Yeah. So when we started studying working moms and we could line up the performance of working moms that were killing it to working moms that were just one missed handoff away from a catastrophe. I mean, you know, like just the.
Anne Morris
Like you can like see, you can see this whole spectrum and like the drop off line, you can see it.
Frances Fry
In the drop off line. You can see it so clearly. I mean, I used to joke that the tell is, are your roots done? That's a working mom who's killing it.
Anne Morris
Yeah.
Frances Fry
There's not the exasperated.
Anne Morris
Yeah.
Frances Fry
And so what we found is that the working moms that were killing it were actually internalizing this lesson and they were choosing to be best in class at a few aspects, a few aspects at work, and a few aspects at home. And they were no longer even trying to be great at being a sibling, a daughter, a sister, a friend. The PTA is a laughable acronym to these working moms.
Anne Morris
Yeah. No one at the PTA meeting has their roots done.
Frances Fry
Yeah, nobody does. And everyone on the just one missed handoff away, I loved their values. They thought, you know what? I'm going to use my own physical exhaustion as the only binding constraint, and at least I'm gonna try to be as good as I used to be before kids at daughter, sister, sibling, PTA and all of that. And so what we're saying is you can either have the nobility of effort and that's that exhausted set of moms that's exhausted mediocrity, the nobility of effort, or you can have the nobility of excellence, and that is being willing to make trade offs. And you can't have both.
Anne Morris
Oh, I felt that we wrote a book about this. If people are interested in this idea, we wrote a book called Uncommon Service. I'm sure it's in the discount bin now. It's been a good decade, but we really get into the step by step on how you do this. When we were writing that book, we were like, okay, well, we got to take this for a test drive. So we went to our young sons and we came up with an ordering of attributes. And one of the things we learned is that they did not value the time we spent volunteering at their school at all. They did not value complicated meals, like, at all. More chicken nuggets, please. They did want us to be present when we were home. Like when we were with them. They wanted us to be 100% present. They didn't want us to be checking email in the bathroom. Again, hypothetical, hypothetical example.
Frances Fry
Disappointing for conspicuously long bathroom breaks.
Anne Morris
And the trade offs. When we put it on a map, we call these attribute maps. We put it on a map and one thing that really jumped out at us is if we took back time from some of these activities from meal prep. Obviously we're still putting nutritional meals on the table, but we're maybe spending less time. Everybody went to on the New York Times recipe list. Repetition, it's fine. It was fine for this age. If we were taking time like that, we could spend time finishing our work at the office and not bring it home. And so we were, when we were home, be totally present.
Frances Fry
I mean, you remember in preschool we used to go by we. I mean you more than me. You used to spend so many evenings at the preschool on PTA responsibilities and on governance. You were on the board of the school.
Anne Morris
Yeah. And listen, these schools are run by volunteers, but often that volunteer burden is not equitably distributed. And I made the wrong choice for our family by really leaning into that part of my obligation. And it came at the expense. Cause it was one of a list of 20 other things I was doing of being really present and connected to our kids when we were home.
Frances Fry
And the irony is you were doing it for our kids.
Anne Morris
Oh, no, that was a story in my head for sure. Yeah. This is for you, honey.
Frances Fry
You were staying there at the preschool till midnight?
Anne Morris
Well, yeah. Well, yeah, things went a little awry on the governance front, but yes, that is a true statement. There were some midnight board meetings. I love that we started the season this way because I also want us to be able to refer back to this conversation because what's interesting is I think we wrote the book 10 years ago. You did the research 20 years ago. And yet this is still a tension we see in organizations everywhere. And so this is one of the things we are are gonna push on this season, is how do you acknowledge that gravity also applies to you as a leader, as an organization, as a parent, as a human being?
Frances Fry
Yeah. In fact, the first time we wrote about it was in that bargain bin book, Uncommon Service. The second time we wrote about it was in Unleashed. And the third time we wrote about it was in Move Fast and fix Things. And it's, I think, the only thing we have written about in all three books because society has not yet. We have not yet said it in a way that people have been able to fully digest. And it's so important in this semester, in this season, we're gonna take a swing at trying to make sure that our fixers understand that in order to be great, you have to be bad and we have to be equally unapologetic about both.
Anne Morris
And Francis, I have to tell you, we're gonna be writing about it in the fourth book too, because it is a secret memo that needs to be out there.
Frances Fry
You just dropped the name of the new book, the Secret Memos.
Anne Morris
Thank you so much for listening to this episode. Your participation helps us make great episodes like this. Please keep reaching out to us in all the ways. Email, call, text usabled.com or 234- Fixable. That's 234-349-2253.
Frances Fry
We read, listen, experience every one of your messages.
Anne Morris
Yeah. Please keep communicating. Fixable is brought to you by the TED Audio Collective and Pushkin Industries. It's hosted by me, Anne Morris and me, Frances Frey. This episode was produced by Rahima Nassa from Pushkin Industries. Our team includes Constanza Gallardo Banban Chang, Daniela Balaraso and Roxanne Hylash.
Frances Fry
And our show was mixed by Louie at Storyyard.
Anne Morris
Louis.
Frances Fry
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Podcast Summary: "Sunday Pick: Why You Should Get Good at Being Bad | Fixable"
TED Talks Daily presents an insightful episode from the Fixable series, hosted by business leaders Anne Morris and Frances Fry. Released on June 15, 2025, this episode delves into the unconventional yet powerful concept of embracing mediocrity in certain areas to achieve excellence where it truly matters. Through compelling examples and thoughtful discussions, Anne and Frances challenge traditional notions of perfectionism in both organizational and personal contexts.
The episode opens with Anne Morris and Frances Fry introducing the central theme: the courage to be bad. They posit that deliberately underperforming in specific aspects can free up resources and focus to excel in areas that align more closely with one’s core objectives and values.
Frances Fry recounts the iconic launch of Apple’s MacBook Air by Steve Jobs:
“I still remember when, about 20 years ago, Steve Jobs strode across the stage carrying a manila envelope... and nobody had any idea what he had in that manila envelope. None of us dared to think that he was going to slide out a computer from that manila envelope. It was just unprecedented at that time. And he presented to us the MacBook Air, as thin as an envelope.” ([08:18])
To achieve the MacBook Air's groundbreaking thinness, Apple made deliberate sacrifices in other areas:
“To be best in class at weight, he had to be worst in class at physical features. So to be the lightest weight laptop on the market, he couldn't have an internal CD ROM drive.” ([09:16])
This example underscores the importance of strategic trade-offs—choosing what to excel at while accepting mediocrity in less critical areas.
Anne Morris introduces the Impossible Triangle—a construction industry principle that you can only excel in two out of three areas: cost, quality, and speed.
“If you want to speed up the project at the same quality, it's going to cost more.” ([11:04])
Frances elaborates that this concept is not just limited to physical products but equally applicable to services, where organizations often mistakenly believe they can be great in all aspects without compromise.
Frances Fry shares a poignant story about Herb Kelleher, the founder of Southwest Airlines, to illustrate effective strategic trade-offs:
“He responds very thoughtfully. It's basically like we've built an airline that is profitable and doesn't make you sad. Right. We're the only ones. But in return, we're going to ask you to make some of these sacrifices.” ([13:44])
When faced with a customer’s request to transfer bags—a service standard in the industry—Kelleher maintains Southwest’s operational model by politely declining, thus protecting the company's strategic advantages such as faster turnaround times and lower costs. This decision was communicated company-wide, highlighting the importance of leadership in modeling strategic discipline.
“This was an empathetic no. And that is the key on Dare to be bad.” ([16:24])
Anne and Frances emphasize starting with a clear understanding of what customers value most. Frances advises:
“When the customer is thinking of giving you a dollar, who else are they thinking of giving that dollar to? That's your competitive set.” ([17:01])
By mapping out customer priorities, organizations can determine where to invest and where to concede, ensuring that excellence is achieved in areas that genuinely impact customer satisfaction and business success.
The speakers caution against common pitfalls such as overestimating one's strengths and underestimating the competition's capabilities. Frances notes:
“We tend to be a generous grader to ourselves and a really harsh grader to the competition.” ([23:53])
Conducting objective market research is crucial to align internal perceptions with external realities, preventing misguided strategies based on flawed assumptions.
Transitioning from organizational strategies to personal development, Anne and Frances discuss how individuals, particularly working mothers, can benefit from embracing strategic mediocrity.
“Working moms that were killing it were actually internalizing this lesson and they were choosing to be best in class at a few aspects, a few aspects at work, and a few aspects at home.” ([25:44])
They highlight the emotional and practical challenges of prioritizing roles and responsibilities, advocating for:
Selective Excellence: Focusing on key areas that align with personal values and where one can make the most significant impact.
Letting Go of Non-Essentials: Accepting lesser performance in areas that do not contribute directly to one's primary goals.
Anne shares a personal anecdote about realizing the importance of being fully present at home by reducing time spent on less critical activities like meal prep or PTA meetings.
“We can spend time finishing our work at the office and not bring it home. And so we were, when we were home, be totally present.” ([28:21])
Anne and Frances underscore that embracing strategic mediocrity is not about slacking off but about making informed, intentional choices to allocate resources where they matter most. They reference their publications—Uncommon Service, Unleashed, and Move Fast and Fix Things—as resources that further explore these concepts.
Looking ahead, they tease their upcoming book, Secret Memos, aiming to delve deeper into these strategies and make the concept more digestible for a broader audience.
“And it's so important in this semester, in this season, we're gonna take a swing at trying to make sure that our fixers understand that in order to be great, you have to be bad and we have to be equally unapologetic about both.” ([30:42])
This episode of Fixable offers a thought-provoking perspective on achieving excellence through strategic compromise. By shedding the unrealistic expectation of being great in all areas, both organizations and individuals can focus their efforts where they truly count, leading to more meaningful and sustainable success.
Listeners are encouraged to reflect on their priorities, make conscious trade-offs, and embrace the liberating concept of being intentionally "bad" in selected facets to thrive in others.
Notable Quotes:
Frances Fry: “The truth is we need to make sacrifice in one area in order to make progress in another.” ([04:47])
Anne Morris: “What am I not going to do? That is like a famous definition of strategy.” ([10:20])
Frances Fry: “If you can finally get through the gatekeepers to get there [CEO], that’s really bad posturing.” ([15:24])
Anne Morris: “It's a strategic no.” ([15:48])
This episode serves as a compelling guide for leaders and individuals alike, advocating for a balanced approach to success by prioritizing what truly matters and accepting limitations elsewhere.