This week’s podcast is from the Continual Planning book. Enjoy!
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The Podcast:
The Transcript:
This is 60 Seconds of Writing in Public with Johanna Rothman for August 21, 2026, where I read an excerpt of just a minute of some writing in progress.
This is from the Continual Planning book.
Have you ever been in a meeting where you had to work with a HiPPO? HiPPO is an acronym for the Highest Paid Person’s Opinion.
Too often, the HiPPO thinks their opinion is the only opinion that matters. While that might be true, their opinion is not as useful as they often think it is. Worse, HiPPOs often destroy psychological safety in the rest of the team who is supposed to decide.
The more difficult the decision, the more a collaborative team needs to discuss it. Especially if you want to avoid costly delays and deliver what your customers want, as fast as possible.
Without psychological safety, organizations persist in keeping all those old ideas in place, instead of considering alternatives. If your teams are frantically busy, feel as if they are always behind, and persist in trying to do a little something on everything, you might not have the safety to discuss planning alternatives.
The Video:
The video link is here.