What if your people problems aren’t people problems?
Tales from the boardroom by Kate Smyth
Ever wished you could sit in on someone else’s board meeting and hear what’s really going on?
Now you can.
Nine short stories. Nine different boardrooms. And a few uncomfortable truths about what really happens when businesses grow.
Join me for a weekly peek behind the boardroom door, with stories, insights and questions to get you thinking. You'll be first to know when the book is available.
“Some of these stories made me emotional.
I recognised more of my own business, and more of myself, than was comfortable.
They are human, honest and full of situations any founder will recognise.
Each takes only 15 minutes to read, but leaves you questioning how clearly your own business really works.
I only wish I had read it 12 years ago. Who knows what more we might have built?”
“it’s just no fun anymore”
You've fired people. You've hired people. Yet the same decisions still land back on your desk.
A team that used to feel energised now feels ground down.
A senior hire who looked perfect on paper isn't working out.
You've tried the away day and the culture initiative.
None of it has shifted, and you've started to wonder if the problem is you.
As the business grows, there’s more to hold than there was last year: more people, more decisions — and the structure that got you here is starting to creak.
One leader in this book decides the problem is simple: it’s all people. She’s about to find out she’s only half right…
This book is for the owner-managers of mid-sized businesses, and the senior teams around them.
Nine short stories, each one set in a different company, with a different leader.
By the end, you’ll stop firing people who were never the problem, and be able to name what’s actually wrong in language your senior team can act on.
“Prepare to have a mirror held up to the way you operate and lead.
By exposing the human fallibilities that prevent good businesses becoming great, Kate has provided founders and leaders with a list of what needs fixing first, before going for growth.
”
“Each story in the book pulls you in, then the closing question won’t let you off the hook. I found myself still trying to answer some of them long after I’d put the book down.”
Meet the Author
Kate Smyth
Founder, Author, SpeakerKate works with founders and senior teams of growing businesses when the people problems keep coming back and nobody can quite agree why.
As a board adviser and founder of Meraki People, she helps them see what’s happening beneath the surface: the decisions, roles and structures that no longer fit the business they’ve become. She is a non-executive director and accredited coach and mentor.
Her clients call her the Board Whisperer*. She’s been asked more than once whether she was hiding in the corner of their last board meeting.
Tales from the Boardroom is her first book. The characters and businesses are imagined. Any resemblance to a boardroom you’ve sat in is entirely intentional.
* the Board Whisperer is a registered trademark
Fancy a look behind the boardroom door?
The book is coming soon, and I'd love you to join me in the meantime.
Each week, I'll share a little of what's happening behind the scenes, ideas from the book and questions that might make you look at your own business differently.
And, of course, you'll be first to know when Tales from the Boardroom is available.