Changing Your Team from the Inside: A Practitioner's View on Leadership, with John Poelstra

Changing a team is often imagined as a top-down initiative — a new structure, a new process, a new framework. But in practice, some of the most meaningful change starts much closer to the work, through everyday leadership choices.

In this episode of Le Podcast on Emerging Leadership, I share a conversation with John Poelstra about the ideas behind my book Changing Your Team From The Inside.

A conversation worth revisiting. This conversation was originally recorded on John's show. John later suggested that we cross-publish it on our respective podcasts. To do that, I had to re-listen to the episode — and I genuinely enjoyed it. Yes, there is some ego involved in listening to yourself talk. Fittingly, ego is also one of the topics we explore.

What makes a team great. Beyond the book itself, the conversation explores broader questions: what makes a team truly great, how leadership shows up in everyday interactions, and how individuals can influence their environment without waiting for permission. We talk about leadership not as a role or a title, but as a practice that shapes how teams work together.

Leadership from the inside. A central idea throughout the episode is that changing a team does not require being "in charge". It requires attention to how work is done, responsibility for how we show up, and the willingness to experiment and learn. This is what Changing Your Team From The Inside is really about.

If you are looking for practical ways to improve how your team works — without waiting for a reorganization or a new mandate — this episode is a good place to start.