See the rule. Name the aim.
Take one real situation apart. See what your response is protecting you from, and name what you actually want this part of your business or life to be like.
Both need to be visible before the next choice has a direction.
Inner Architecture Work
For founders, owners & CEOs
YOU KNOW.
WHAT TO DO.
You still can't do it.
Let capable people lead. Have the conversation you keep putting off. Build a business that can stand without you in every room.
Learn to see why your decisions keep moving you away from what you want, and build the capacity to choose differently.
Schedule a 20-minute chat Virtual / No pitch
"My emotions and reactivity have been replaced by a
calm confidence"
Kevin GrayCEO, Scotsman Guide
01 / RecognitionThree ways it can show up
What you want.
What feels safer.
You want a team that can lead. Yet taking the work back feels safer than letting them make the call.
An old operating rule can make that move feel like good judgment, even when it takes you away from what you want.
One decision. Two directions.
You hire capable people.
Then take the work back.
What you want
A team that uses its own judgment, with room for you to do the work only you can do.
What may feel safer
"If I'm not in control, something will go wrong."
What it costs the thing you want
Stepping in settles the worry. Your people get less opportunity to develop their judgment. The business stays dependent on the person trying to free it.
An example to recognize, not a conclusion about you.
When protection works against what you want
The relief is immediate.
The distance grows.
02 / The workSee it. Meet it. Choose.
Seeing the rule
is only half the work.
You also need to know what you are choosing for.
An aim is what you want your work or life to be like. A team that uses its own judgment. Working relationships where important things can be said and dealt with. A business that leaves room for the rest of your life.
Often, what you want requires the very move your rules have taught you to avoid. The work is learning to recognize that pressure, then choose toward what matters to you now.
Meet the pressure while it's live.
The alarm. The reasonable explanation. The urge to take over, stay quiet, or push harder.
Learn to recognize the old instruction in the very moment it starts steering your response.
Choose toward what you want.
Let a capable person make the call. Say what you have been withholding. Hold a line you keep moving.
Practice choosing for what you want to build, with the old pressure still present.
From Inner Architecture
"Of the two moves in front of me, which one takes me toward what I am aiming at, and which one takes me away?"
03 / Client voicesTheir words.
What changed
for the people
who did the work.
"Thanks to our work together, I'm already 10x more capable in situations that once felt overwhelming, and I'm only just getting started."
Alex FederationCEO, Talus Bio
01 / 16
David HeapsFounder, Leadering
04 / The person in the roomI didn't find this
I didn't find this
in a boardroom.
But I've sat in that seat.
I'm a former COO and Vistage Chair. For 11 years, I've worked with founders, owners, and CEOs who can move almost anything in their world, except the thing inside them that keeps getting in the way.
10,000+
hours in isolation in the Amazon,
developing and doing this work on myself.
What came out of that was a way to see the mechanisms underneath my own decisions. And a way to work with them that doesn't require leaving your life.
I'm still doing the work, too.
Talk with me
Concept cover / ForthcomingThe book / For founders, owners & CEOsINNER
INNER
ARCHITECTURE
Finding and Freeing Yourself from the Invisible Rules That Are Ruling You
A method for seeing the rules that steer you away from what you want, and learning to choose toward it.
05 / Begin hereComplimentary. No pitch.
Bring the thing
that keeps
coming back.
70min
One situation.
A written map.
A place to begin.
A written map.
A place to begin.
The Inner Architecture Audit
The decision you keep postponing. The work you keep taking back. The conversation you know needs to happen, but keep finding a reason to delay.
We examine one situation from both sides: what you want to be different, and what keeps steering your response in another direction.
You leave with a written map of the pattern, its cost, and a concrete place to begin choosing toward what you want.
- 01Name what you want.
Make the recurring situation specific, and name what you want that part of your life or business to be like.
- 02See what pulls you off course.
Examine the response that keeps taking over and what it is trying to protect.
- 03Understand the cost.
See how the relief of the familiar response can keep you further from what you want.
- 04Find your next step.
Leave with a written map and a concrete place to begin practicing a choice that serves your aim.
Before we meetA few
A few
straight answers.
Do I need experience with inner work?
No. Bring a real situation from your life. We begin there, in plain language. No framework or special vocabulary required.
What should I bring?
One specific situation that keeps troubling you. A recent example helps. Bring a willingness to be open and honest.
Is this a sales call?
No. This is a working session with a written map to take away. No pitch. No obligation to continue.
What if I want to keep working together?
Individual work is offered in a defined six-month engagement. Work with partners and executive teams is also available. If you want to continue, we can discuss what fits.