Everything had gone almost right. The paperwork. The shipment. The communication. Sometimes the most expensive failures aren't catastrophic—they're the quiet ones that slowly erode trust.

Sometimes the most important conversation isn't about the work.

It's about the person doing it.

A simple shift in my one-on-one meetings reminded me that potential often hides behind the status update.

The travel industry has a word for extending a work trip.

I've never thought it described what was actually happening.