Achieving true work/life balance requires escaping the corporate trap.

Here are 5 ways you can escape at any point in your career:

(thread) First, let’s understand how the trap works. It starts with our own goals and ambitions. In my career, I wanted more responsibility and more compensation. This led to more work and more stress. If you follow my writing, you likely have similar ambitions. You want to grow, be the best at what you do, and be compensated for it.

The "bad leader" who is frustrating you does not think they are "bad." You must accept this in order to navigate those relationships. "Bad" leaders have different values and think of you as "naive" and themselves as "practical." Labeling them EVIL in all capital letters and expecting them to change is foolish. My takeaway saying you can remember is:

"We are all heroes of our own story."

“Saving is the gap between your ego and your income. The fastest way to increase your savings is to increase your humility."

I decided to listen to Morgan Housel's book, The Psychology of Money, and he says a number of brilliant things in it. I highly recommend the book. The most important thing he bangs away on is how it is our savings rate that controls our ultimate wealth.

I was born and raised on a farm in a small town in Ohio. I've worked to get H-1B visas and green cards for my team members my entire career. There are three simple economic arguments for increasing legal immigration by highly educated workers: 1) If another country pays to raise and educate a child through college and that young person then moves to the US, we just gained a fully mature tax payer at zero cost. All the news about student loans? In this case, another country paid for that education. They bore all the costs, we get all the benefits.

There are 3 big areas of growth to be an effective "Chief" level executive (CTO, CPO, etc.):

1) Guiding with Strategic Influence

2) Scaling Talent on your team

3) Demonstrating Executive Presence Guiding with Strategic Influence requires you to be a Steward of the whole business.

It isn't just about leading your team, at the CXO level it is about leading the entire company to success.

"In 20 years only your children will remember that you worked late" — This quote SHOULD make you think.

Over my career, I've been a part of many close teams. Teams that worked hard together, ate lunch together every day, and attended social events together. I've also worked long hours for every company I have served. Evening and weekends.

I am sure that most readers who follow me are the same. You heed the call of the project and the deadline, you do not let teammates down.

In 15+ years at Amazon, I influenced 30+ promotions to the Director level. I know why some people get promoted while other "top performers" get overlooked.

Here's what you need to know: There are two reasons why you may not be getting promoted:

1. You are being overlooked.

2. You are being considered but not selected.

I traded my time for money for 33 years, from 18 to 51. Recently I turned 55 and now I often feel "short of time" before old age closes in.

Here are 5 lessons on how to make the best use of your time so that you live the most of the life you want, rather than just "working." was in school or working 60 hours a week from age 18 to 51. During those 33 years, I had limited personal time.

Like most people, focused on my career and money.

At Amazon, Jeff Bezos told us to "not compromise for the sake of social cohesion." I saw him tolerate lengthy, exhausting arguments as a result.

When I was a director, my VP constantly argued with Jeff and refused to back down. Their main, recurring argument was about an arcane economic model called the Prime Attribution Model (PAM).

PAM mattered because it determined how the fee paid by Prime members was divided between business units. Prime Gaming (our business) was getting almost nothing, and we disagreed with how the model was designed.

What are you sacrificing in the rat race?

I struggled with work/life balance throughout my career because the world has a clever, 2-part trap for us. Part 1 – Our own goals and ambitions.

I wanted to be successful, get more pay, and be a part of bigger decisions.

If you follow me, I bet you are the same.

You want to “be the best” and have a great career.

Aging in tech, the truth. When my hair started to go white at 40, I dyed it for many years. My sole reason was to avoid looking too old at work.

A reader asked:

"I’m a product manager leader in the tech industry. I’ve spent time at small companies and larger ones like Amazon. One thing I have seen is the age of employees ICs, managers, executives. As a male in his 40s who wants to continue excelling in the corporate world / climbing up the ladder, what are skills to help keep relevant in an industry that may have bias towards older demographics?" This topic has many Truths:

1/ Yes, there is age bias and some people assume older workers "no longer get it" or "can't keep up."

2/ The reader is male, but the focus and appearance pressure on women are higher. A remarkable woman I know was given “helpful advice” by HR (no less) as to what facial fillers and treatments would help her career.

3/ Age bias cuts both ways. Being a "gray hair" can imply seniority and wisdom.

In 2015, I went from leading a global team of 800 to an individual contributor (IC) role.

I want to share why and what I learned (spoiler: how to influence instead of giving orders). Over a 10-year span at Amazon, I had grown from leading a team of 6 as a Senior Manager to leading a team of 800 as a Vice President. I had teams in Seattle, Orange County, Bangalore, and Beijing.

The Amazon “secret” of controllable inputs for your career.

When Jeff Bezos and his team figured out how to make Amazon grow quickly, one of their key ideas was to focus on what they called the “controllable inputs.” Applying this same idea to your career can help you have more success with much less frustration.

What Jeff realized is that many companies and their leaders focus on the final outputs of the business.

Why reorgs happen and why the true reason is always hidden. 4 key takeaways: 1/ Reorgs happen because the leader cannot meet a goal(s).

1a/ If the reorg doesn’t make sense to you, then you are likely not seeing what the leader felt was not working (e.g. making money, getting users).

#OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman have hidden problems. CTO Mira Murati is leaving, after co-founders Ilya Sutskever and John Schulman left.

I do not know Sam Altman, but I do know executive teams. Executives only leave a wildly popular "unicorn" that supposedly has a $150 Billion valuation as a last possible resort.

One person might leave purely for ideology.

Too damn many Senior Managers - why you are stuck and not moving up explained.

You are smart, hard-working, and deliver a lot.

You began as a skilled individual contributor (IC) and now you have mastered leading teams of 25 to 75+. Why do you keep hearing "Maybe next cycle, after you (fill in the blank)?"

Too much good competition.

Your peers:
-Went to good schools.
-Got advanced degrees (MS, MBA, etc.).
-Work hard (long hours).
-Manage big teams.
-Solve hard problems.

A CEO I worked for seduced my wife in retaliation for my pushback on him at work. He won. I got divorced and left the company. When I say I truly understand how some executive teams can be political snake pits, I trust you will believe me. Learn from my pain - do the following: 1) When you have a good manager, lean in and take advantage of it.

2) Spot the snakes.

3) Do excellent work, even for nasty leaders.

4) Don’t confront the snakes directly

5) Don’t become a snake

Managing up to executives is different. They are busy, removed from the day-to-day details, and have big results to deliver. Here's 6 actions you can do to manage up effectively: 1. "Be bright, be quick, be gone."

Executives have less time. Come to your conversations with them prepared with well-thought-out ideas, express them quickly and clearly, then move on.

Performance improvement plans (PIPs, Pivots) almost always end in you being fired or quitting. There are psychological reasons this is inevitable. Here is why, and how to avoid them as an employee and to be a better manager. First, I know a few managers will argue with me in the comments and claim that they "do everything they can" to help employees improve. I welcome your stories and claims - please post them!

A student of mine is getting promoted despite his manager leaving before his promotion was completed. Losing your manager mid-promotion often sets promotions back, but not his. He credits two actions he applied from my class, Breaking Through to Executive: 1) After taking the class, he stopped waiting for annual review time to discuss his goals with his manager and did it in their next 1:1. He then brought it up about once a month for the last six months.

I was lucky enough to have my team grow from 6 to 800 people in 9 years. I was promoted from Senior Manager to Director to Vice President, and I had imposter syndrome the whole time. Here are 4 ways I fought it, and how you can too: It is no surprise that when my team grew 130x from 6 to 800, I ended up not fully knowing what I was doing. At the same time, it is hard to say no to opportunities when you have experienced downsizing and setbacks.