In a market where the landscape changes weekly, the ability to cycle quickly through emotions — overwhelm, anxiety, FOMO — becomes a competitive advantage. Johannes describes feeling exponential change “viscerally in my body” as AI models and tools shift on a near-weekly basis, and recognizes that emotional clarity is what allows him and his team to keep making good decisions amid that intensity.
The key insight: when the leader is overwhelmed, the team is overwhelmed. This cascades through every layer of the organization. So the leader’s capacity to process emotions quickly directly determines the organization’s speed and decision quality.
“Getting to emotional clarity and cycling fast through your emotions is becoming a superpower when the rate of change is exponential.”
Intensity, properly met, actually helps — it prevents overthinking and keeps momentum. But organizations must also learn to “slow down to speed up,” taking time for real conversations (like council sessions) even amid urgency. As the Marines say: “Slow is steady. Steady is fast.”