I have not lived in Glasgow in an uncomfortably long time, but I still remember what the week surrounding this day felt like DEEP in my bones.

While I lived there, I worked as the head door steward (head bouncer) for a relatively well known Irish pub in a fairly nice part of town called Jinty McGuinty’s (RIP, Jeanette 😭).

Most nights were fairly chill, though with the occasional bit of sectarian chaos, some football stars pissing in the corner, and the equivalent of drunken fratboys deciding that the absolutely WOULD NOT be welcomed out of the door by the American thrown in to keep things lively. But it was generally just students rubbing shoulders with presenters from BBC Scotland. The normal hospitality chaos that I could handle by myself or with one or two others.

Then St Paddy’s would roll around.

I am serious when I say that I had to hire just about everyone I knew that was willing for at least that day and ideally those surrounding it. Everyone. Because it didn’t matter how “not Irish” someone might claim to be the rest of the year. It didn’t matter how complicated their feelings were about (as Flogging Molly called it) “The Old Free State”, or politics, or history, or any of the messy stuff that comes with identity. They would be absolutely God. Damned. if they would be caught dead drinking in a Scottish pub on that day. They might as well go and drink with the English at that point, if they’re not in a proper Irish pub (these are direct quotes, before you come after me)!

They might not be in Ireland. They might not even really want to consider themselves “Irish” anymore. But in those moments, they had the most human instincts of all. They gathered with their people, they sang the old songs, and they remembered the things that made them . . . them.

I think about that a lot, especially now, living far from the places that shaped me, watching the world get weirder by the hour, and trying to build something that still feels human for myself and my children.

Community is such an ephemeral thing. It’s not something I’ve ever been good at creating, much less maintaining. I’m the epitome of “How does an introvert make friends? An extrovert finds them and forces them to be friends.” But joking aside, it is not some sort of social accessory. Community is how we survive distance. Grief. Repression. It’s how we resist the quiet slide into “just keep your head down” as a way of life.

Relevant to today, diaspora is not just nostalgia. It is a built-in network. Working the crowds those . . . UGH many years ago at Jinty’s . . . I saw it over and over again. Men and women who had clearly never met before finding instant camaraderie through a shared story. Did that story also include an approximate keg’s worth of Guinness? Each? Yes, yes it did. But the foundations were in the shared background and the mutual stubborn refusal to become isolated, even when geography (and sometimes . . . often? . . . governments) would really prefer that you did.

I appreciate the community I have managed to keep long distance. And I appreciate the community we have been building here. I appreciate the people who check in . . . DESPERATELY so. I am aware of how awful I am at such things! The people who show up for both myself and my terrible children, and the people who remember your name and said terrible children’s names, and what you said you were worried about last week (sidenote: look at that grown-ass man who just yesterday was a little boy and how he’s trolling his sister by shoving his face in front of hers. I couldn’t be more proud! *sniff*).

On our side, please know that no matter where you are, we bleed for you. For all that is going on in your world. Because I have no doubt that no matter where you are, it is . . . not great. And I hope everyone reading this knows that too. If we only protect “our own,” we are not building community. We are building a smaller circle to stand in while the world burns.

So . . . with all of my rambling I say: Put on your greens, sing the songs (I recommend Flogging Molly, if that’s not clear), and raise your glasses to toast your friends and those who cannot be here. And if you are out drinking, be kind to your door staff, and don’t drink and drive.

But also remember what the Irish diaspora has always known: you can leave home, but you do not leave who you are. And none of us can ever leave our responsibility to resist, even from our new homes.

Happy St Patrick’s Day. Sláinte mhór . . . and take care of each other.

I have a truly love-hate relationship with my birthday.

Which is apropos because it is in a single-digit number of days from today.

Love, because who doesn’t appreciate having a day where they get cake, presents, and a whole bunch of well-wishes from folks?

And hate because it is within 10 days of one of the largest holidays in the western world and not only have I not gotten any (and I do mean ANY) of the above on more than one occasion, I have also had the whole spectrum of horror, including those embarrassing parties where only two people show up and have even been dumped (though yes, I almost certainly deserved it).

“So? What’s the point?” I hear you ask.

The point is that, just like me with my pity party about my birthday, everyone likes to feel seen, appreciated, and safe in their world.

That includes the people who work for you.

The instrument of our own destruction.

When we talk about “safe” work environments, the conversation often drifts toward customers, deadlines, or external pressure. And those things matter! For sure. But they are not what can quietly break a team. What does the real damage usually comes from inside the house.

From us. Leadership. WE are the problem.

• It’s the poorly delivered criticism that feels personal instead of corrective.

• It’s the job uncertainty disguised as “keeping people sharp.”

• It’s micromanagement that communicates a lack of trust.

• It’s “just giving feedback” that somehow only shows up when something goes wrong.

• It’s holding people to standards that were never communicated.

None of this may look overly dramatic in isolation, which is why it can be so dangerous . . . it accumulates.

I have watched capable, motivated representatives slowly shrink in environments like this. They will stop asking questions, offering ideas, or even raising red flags for fear of standing out. They do exactly what is asked and nothing more, because doing more has proven risky.

And then leadership wonders why initiative has disappeared.

Be the safe place.

Remember that internal safety is not about protecting people from expectations. It is about protecting them from unnecessary fear.

In their place of work, I don’t believe that anybody should be afraid:

• About being publicly embarrassed.

• About being judged instead of coached.

• Of losing their job over a single mistake.

• Of a manager monitoring every move they make.

Fear can be a powerful tool if you want automatons for a short period of time, but you cannot build accountability on top of fear. You can force compliance, sure. But ownership requires trust, and trust requires consistency.

Where I have seen things fall apart is when leaders expect perfection and when it fails they resort to harsh and sometimes public criticism. Good leaders still give hard feedback. They still hold people responsible for outcomes. They still make tough calls when someone is not meeting the bar. The difference is that the feedback is about the work, not the person. Negative feedback is delivered privately. The expectations are stated plainly. The process is not a mystery.

In a chaotic job, provide order.

One of the most stabilizing things you can give a team is predictability in how you lead.

Create an environment so that your agents know what is coming. If someone does well, they know that they’ll be acknowledged for it (and the topic of how they’ll be recognized is a topic for a whole other post!). If they miss the mark, they know how it will be dealt with. If they raise a concern, they know that it will be taken seriously,

And perhaps most importantly, if there is change coming, they know and trust that they will hear about it from you absolutely as soon as possible.

This kind of environment does not happen by accident. It requires self-actualized leaders to manage their own impulses. Those urges to react emotionally or to try and control everything in your domain . . . we all have them, and I am no exception! But those instincts serve no positive purpose and long term it will only harm your employees and your relationship with them.

Playing for keeps.

Here’s the thing: We all also need to constantly remember as leaders that there is a power imbalance any time that we are working with our team.

A passing comment that I genuinely forgot five minutes after I said it stuck with a rep for literally YEARS. I know because when I ran into her at a mutual friend’s wedding, she brought it up. I had been a BABY supervisor and was not . . . great at it. I still cringe at the memory of her telling me about this and the clear pain in her eyes.

Whether it be a word said in frustration, in anger, or even just a sarcastic remark dropped in a meeting, careless communications can permanently change how safe someone feels in speaking up. Not just for a while, not just in your team. For years. Forever.

Leadership behavior is amplified, whether we like it or not.

Last bit, I promise.

Back to the birthday analogy one last time.

The reason those moments sting is not the lack of celebration. It is the realization that the space you thought was safe was not. That the people you expected to show up did not.

Workplaces can create that same feeling far more often than we, as leaders, realize.

If you want teams that take ownership, tell the truth to power (us) early, and actually care about outcomes, we have to look inward first. Build an environment where people are safe from erratic leadership, unclear expectations, and needless fear. Hold them accountable inside that structure. Coach them there. Expect excellence there.

Also?

Remember their damned birthdays. It’s one day.

From the applicant’s side, hiring teams never respond (even with form rejection messages) to the well-crafted and personalized resumes and cover letters that everyone has been told to create for each job. From the hiring side, there is a constant deluge of applications that are not at all relevant to the role. Teams fall behind even when they sincerely want to hand review everything.

This has created a kind of arms race. Applicants use AI tools to create their materials, and hiring teams use AI tools to review them. I have even heard stories of two AI avatars showing up to screening interviews, which immediately makes me think of those Alexa vs Siri videos.

Add to those frustrations the reality that even if you do get past the resume review, you face an often labyrinthine interview process where the end can shift or disappear entirely. Theories abound that this is caused by a practice called “phantom” or “ghost” job posting, where companies post and interview for jobs they have no intention of filling.

The companies that have taken an active interest in making their hiring process simple, human, and ethical have become known quantities in the job market. Their Glassdoor ratings are off the charts and people beg for referrals. I know because I have both worked at and built teams for some of these companies. A conscious recruiting process pays off in droves.

Bring Solutions, Not Just Problems

I am coming at this as a leader (and sometimes applicant) in the business world. Like many other leaders, I am sometimes a hiring manager, which means I have at least some say in how hiring practices go. If I am willing to do extra work and spend a bit of political capital, I can make things better and I am breaking with convention to give my ask at an awkward 1/3rd-ish through the post:

Do the extra work. Spend the political capital. Make things better. For everyone.

So . . . what do you say? Are you willing to join me in tackling what feels like a completely systemic problem? LFG!!!

For the record, I do know that on a global scale, there is only so much we can do. We cannot force LinkedIn to not suck. We cannot single-handedly make an entire industry of recruiters and HR professionals change their hiring practices.

Although if you happen to be an HR professional and, or, recruiter and you are reading this, please, for the love of all that is holy, reach out to me. I am not mad at you. You are doing what you can, and I know you are just as frustrated as the rest of us. Let us work together to fix this.

But even if we cannot fix the entire ecosystem, there is a lot we can do inside our own organizations.

Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen

When you are scoping out your hiring process, take a step back and ask yourself: how many people really need to be involved in making this decision? And the corollary, how many interviews do we actually need?

I get it. Everyone wants a say. Your CEO. Your team leads. Every stakeholder who has ever or will ever share a meeting with this role. They all want to make sure the applicant can both do the job and fit in with the company.

The problem is that when a horde of decision makers all have a vote, at least two things are guaranteed to happen:

First, the process becomes convoluted and confusing. It slows to a crawl for applicants, who get interview fatigue. Great applicants who have the experience that you are looking for are far more likely to simply move on if they feel like you are jerking them around. Wouldn’t you?

Second, internal folks start getting attached to “their choice” and get upset if you do not pick them. Office politics might be human nature, but it is not a great way to make thoughtful decisions and isn’t doing your new hire (or yourself!) any favours.

So why not trim down the hiring committee?

Keep it lean and focused. Include enough people with relevant insight to give feedback and ensure a comprehensive review, but not so many that the process drags out forever.

My own preference is a maximum of three interviews:

1. The initial screen. I will often do this myself as hiring manager. I give an overview of the role, make sure expectations are aligned, and screen for the true must-haves.

2. The team interview. This can focus on cultural fit, technical depth, or both. It can be a single member of their future team or a panel, depending on the situation. The applicant gets a sense of their coworkers-to-be and vice versa.

3. The outside opinion. This might be someone in the C-suite, a key stakeholder, or another leader. It is a final vibe check and a chance to spot anything the core group might have missed.

That is it. No five (or . . . ugh . . . 10!) stage panel gauntlet required.

Free Labour With Extra Steps

I could not forgive myself if we did not talk about the “practical exercises” that have also been growing more and more ubiquitous over the last several years.

Raise your hand if you have gone through a hiring process, done the big exercise, and then been turned away. Later you find out through the grapevine that your exercise was used by the company anyway.

Most of us who have been around for a minute or two have a story like this. If you go through enough application processes, it will eventually happen to you as well. I could write an entire article about this alone and how to handle it (And maybe I will someday. Imaginary personal assistant, add it to the list!).

For now, let us stick with what we can control on the company side.

The TL;DR: Simply do not do this. Any of it. Free labour = Bad.

Do not assign projects that could in any way be used to further the goals of your company. If you absolutely must check an applicant’s ability to do something, ask them to do an exercise that tests only that skill.

Give them a handful of clearly fake tickets to respond to. Ask them to walk you through an abstract problem or scenario. Have them talk through how they would structure a plan, instead of actually building the full thing. Have them give an extemporaneous talk with a “direct report” who just did something REALLY bad (or really good!).

Do not ask them to present a roadmap for a “fake department” that just happens to share all of the same needs and metrics as your real one. Don’t ask them to create a capacity forecast given “sample data”. And no, you absolutely should not ask them “what their 30, 60, 90” day plans are for the team once they start. Geez.

Now if there ARE some work product-related projects that you really would like to see them complete, there are ethical solutions! There are companies that pay applicants for their time once they reach the practical stage. They narrow their candidate pool to one or two people, then show equal respect for the candidates’ time and knowledge by paying a fair amount for the project that lines up with the salary band.

You would be shocked how quickly word gets around. Companies that treat candidates with that level of respect and ethics are absolutely talked about in hushed, reverent tones.

So What Else?

There is so much more we can do to make the hiring experience better. Under the “misc” category, I would throw out a few more basics:

• Publish all salaries up front. Whatever reason you think you have for not posting the range, it will cause problems later. Transparency is always key.

• Be responsive. Every applicant tracking system on the market has built in and customizable templates. Take an hour, set them up, and use them to let people know when they are not moving forward. And do it quickly! Nobody needs a notice 2 months later that they didn’t get the job. They already figured that out on their own.

• Scope your roles well. We have all seen the memes: “Entry level role, 5 years of experience, and a PhD in a similar field required. 20 dollars an hour.” Try not to become that meme.

At the end of the day, hiring is an exercise in trust. Trust in yourself, in your co-workers, and in the person you are inviting into your company. There are things you can do to minimize risk, but you are always going to be flipping a coin to some extent.

Given that reality, why torture yourself and your candidates with a terrible experience?

Dispense with the fucking around and get to the finding out. You are going to be so much happier, and, like I said earlier, your reputation will thank you.

We’ve all met that one person who’s phenomenal at their job. The one who keeps everything running smoothly, never misses a deadline, and who knows every system inside and out. Then that someone, somewhere, looks at them and says: “You know what? You’re great at doing this job. Let’s make you a manager of other people doing this same job. TOOOTALLY the same thing, right?”

And that’s usually where the trouble begins.

Because you see, being good at your work doesn’t automatically mean you’ll be good at managing other people who do that work. It’s a completely different skillset, and no matter what the memes might say, it’s not one that anyone is born with! It’s about task competence, sure. But it’s also about empathy, delegation, and the ability to keep calm when someone’s Slack message starts with, “Hey, do you have a sec?” 😳

What to Look For

When I’m scanning for potential leaders, whether it’s on a team I’m building or a client I’m advising, I’m not looking for the person who’s loudest in meetings or the first volunteer for projects, that doesn’t ever disqualify people -- some of us have the ADHD and need love too!

In general, what I’m looking for is a sort of “steady heat.” No flash. No noise. Just a quiet consistency that inspires confidence even though they’re not “in charge”.

Yet.

A few signs of spark to watch for on your team:

• They naturally mentor. You’ll notice people go to them for help, not because they’re told to, but because they listen well and don’t make others feel stupid.

• They don’t panic. Even when things go sideways, they don’t add to the chaos. (I once had a rep who, during an outage that included some internal coms, calmly got up from their desk and walked around making sure that everyone knew what the updates were and what they should be doing. That’s leadership right there)

• They communicate up and down. They can distill a problem in ten seconds for leadership, or walk a new teammate through it in detail . . . and know when each approach is needed!

• They are fundamentally curious. They start asking questions about why things happen, not just how to fix them.

What to Avoid

The trickier part, of course, is identifying the false positives. People who seem like they may be the perfect leaders-to-be, but they either aren’t ready or interested.

None of these should be fully disqualifying, but it’s still good to watch out for:

• The Hero Complex. They want to solve everything personally but can’t or won’t delegate. These folks have a tendency to burn out and can block others from growing. Coaching can often help, but not always.

• The Manager Enthusiast. They want the title but not the responsibility. You’ll hear: “I just feel like I’m already doing the job anyway.” Again, not always, but you might end up with someone who breaks their team rather than growing it.

• The Rule Follower. Some argue that this is the perfect protege, until you realize that you need someone who will make judgment calls in gray areas. You need folks who are able to know what rules to preserve and which can (and should) be bent or even broken.

Leadership is an attitude, not a milestone. It’s curiosity under pressure. It’s patience with imperfection. It’s showing up when things suck.

So the next time you’re building a team or succession plan (more on that soon!), look for the people who make others better without trying to. Those are your rising stars.

See you Space Cowboy . . .

Some books make me cry.

And I don’t mean a single, stoic, manly tear that comes to one’s eye or something.

No, full on shoulder heaving, soul-cleansing sobs.

Why? Because they speak to the human condition. They reveal truths that are deep within all of us. And Sir Terry Pratchett’s Night Watch is one of the best of those. A story about one of the most flawed-yet-in-the-act-of-being-redeemed characters I have ever read, Samuel Vimes, through a series of misadventures, interacting with his younger self and dealing with the grief over the fact that you can’t change the mistakes of the past because that would too irrevokably change who and what you are now.

Plus, there’s Vimes INCREDIBLE sense of reality:

I’m sharing all of this with you because a) there is a “revolution” that occurs on the 25th of May, so it’s a bit of a holiday, and b) because there are two excellent messages for anyone who is building a team (there are actually so SO many more really amazing lessons in this book. I should do a whole series of posts that teach “Forget about Zen, Sam Vimes and the Art of Leadership”):

1. Mistakes will always be made. In your life. In your business. With your team. It isn’t about not making them or going back and undoing them. It’s about learning from them and doing better in the future.

2. Lofty ideals are amazing. They capture the imagination and give people things to dream about. HAVE THEM. But make sure you also have a tangible goal or two, because you can’t eat lofty ideals.

If you find yourself curious, the City Watch part of the Discworld novels are well worth the read and start with “Guards, Guards!”. Despite definitely being adult books, I’ve read all of them outloud to my kids and I genuinely feel like these books have helped to make the kids into the honest and fair-minded people that they are today. 12 out of 10, would recommend.

So given my fervor for flexible work arrangements, you can probably guess my feelings about the recent trend of companies who had promised a remote work setup only to yank those benefits away like a proverbial rug. It's not just a disappointment—it's a straight-up bait-and-switch. It's a breach of trust. It's, frankly, complete and utter bovine excrement.

(Pssst: That means:)

Now, don't get me wrong, I respect a company's right to dictate its operational structure. If a business believes that having its employees under one roof will boost productivity or foster a stronger team culture, that's their prerogative.

I mean . . . they’re wrong.

And study after study after study says so.

But they have the RIGHT to be wrong. It’s extremely easy and understandable to want to return to the familiar after something as upsetting as the COVID pandemic, and even more so when making a move like that could save your company millions of dollars and potentially some decision makers somewhere their jobs, at least on paper.

I get it! We all do.

However, there is some problem with that math. If you as a company have committed to keeping your workforce remote, you have a responsibility to follow through and employees remember things like this. Employees take these promises seriously. They make life-altering decisions based on these commitments. They might move out of expensive city centres to more affordable or tranquil areas. They might adjust their work-life balance, spending more time with family or pursuing personal interests. They might have HAD families based off of the idea that they would be able to spend time that they wouldn’t have been able to if commuting and locked in a cubicle farm all day. They might even turn down other job offers, ones with similar promises of remote work.

So when you, the company, suddenly decide to claw back that promise and insist everyone return to the office? That's not just reneging on a deal. That's messing with people's lives. It's about as ethical as you can get. It’s upending whole swathes of peoples’ entire lives and forcing them to choose between you and themselves.

A Call to Accountability

Call me reactionary, but I believe that companies that are engaging in this kind of bait-and-switch tactic need to be called out. They need to understand the gravity of their actions. They need to realise that their broken promises have real-world and real-life consequences for their employees and their reputations.

In a world where corporate responsibility and transparency are (oh dear god please) increasingly being valued, these companies risk alienating not only their workforce but also their customers. After all, if a company can't keep its word to its employees, can it be trusted to deliver on its promises to its customers?

The Way Forward

My message to companies considering such a move: Don't be that guy.

Don't be the employer who jumps all over short-term convenience rather than long-term trust. Don't be the corporate equivalent of the shady used car salesman, promising one thing and delivering another.

If you've committed to remote work, stick with it. If circumstances force you to reconsider, engage in open dialogue with your employees. Explain the situation. Explore alternatives. Look for compromise. Be transparent, be respectful, and above all, be honest.

We live in a rapidly changing world. Remote work is no longer a perk or a promise—it's a necessity for many, a lifeline. Companies that understand this, that respect their commitments and value their employees, are the ones that will thrive in the future.

In short, don't bait-and-switch. Don't be a purveyor of bovine excrement. Be better. Because your employees—and the world—deserve better. In the words of the man himself, Wil Wheaton: Don’t be a dick.

I'm Ash Rhodes. Thank you SO much for joining me. It has been a busy week, so let's jump right in, shall we?

I find beginnings to be extremely auspicious and this is no exception. I have never written on Substack before, and the last time that I consistently wrote opinion pieces for public consumption was . . . wow . . . about 7 years ago! That's a hot minute, isn't it?

That doesn't mean that I have stopped having them, or that I have stopped writing. Only that I haven't been sharing them with the public at large. I have mostly figured that there were plenty of voices out there clamoring for attention, and did the world really need another one?

"Yes, self," which is what I call myself when I'm feeling particularly introspective, "The world DOES need to hear your voice."

And let me tell you why.

Recently, some discussions that I've participated in have lead me to the realization that if you don't speak up and add your voice to the positions that you support, you may be (inaccurately) thought to not care. Or, worse yet, thought to support a different position. Your passions or positions or JOB may lose out simply by default!

Let me explicitly say that I realize how easy it would be to think that I am making a case for political involvement here. I hear it! Allow me to say that I’m explicitly not making any political statements here. However, I am also NOT making a case against your own political involvement . . . It’s the exact same principle! Make your voice heard or else you won’t be counted.

But in all seriousness, I am and will be very much talking about what I'm an expert in.

Remote work.

Customer Experiences.

Leadership at scale.

All the things that you're going to be reading about here, and more!

So in short, I am here to make some cases to you, Oh Reader. To coach and to guide folks who are new (or not new!) to this chaotic work life and to get us all off of the starting line and on to that Step ONE together!

Talk soon!