“When you drop a team in the realm of process […] they’re one step closer to getting to the human dimension.”

-Alexander Caillet

Alexander Caillet is an internationally recognized organizational psychologist, consultant, and coach dedicated to helping organizations achieve high performance through powerful teaming. As the CEO of Corentus, Inc., Alexander has worked across more than 30 countries on five continents, bringing deep expertise in both leadership coaching and large-scale organizational transformation. Alexander makes visible the invisible dynamics and patterns that shape a team’s behavior, helping them see themselves and their operational styles with renewed clarity through blends of individual coaching with whole-team development.

In this episode, Alexander traces the roots of his craft back to his own origin story: a childhood marked by constant relocation, othering, and longing for belonging. It was as a student at Columbia studying organizational psychology that he discovered his calling in group dynamics, and his experience of feeling like an outsider looking in became the foundation for a career in helping others learn to belong with each other.

This is essential listening for coaches, leaders, team members, and anyone who’s ever wondered why group work often feels so hard — and how it could be so much better.

"To be of use" by Marge Piercy The people I love the best jump into work head first without dallying in the shallows and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight. They seem to become natives of that element, the black sleek heads of seals bouncing like half-submerged balls. I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart, who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience, who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward, who do what has to be done, again and again. I want to be with people who submerge in the task, who go into the fields to harvest and work in a row and pass the bags along, who are not parlor generals and field deserters but move in a common rhythm when the food must come in or the fire be put out. The work of the world is common as mud. Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust. But the thing worth doing well done has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident. Greek amphoras for wine or oil, Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums but you know they were made to be used. The pitcher cries for water to carry and a person for work that is real.

Show Notes:

* https://corentus.com

* The Wisdom of Teams: Creating the High Performance Organization by Jon R. Katzenbach and Douglas K. Smith

Connect with Andy:

* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewjcahill/

* Instagram: https://instagram.com/wonderdomepodcast

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