In this episode of The Science of Leadership, host Dr. Tom Collins sits down with Daniel Atlin—strategic advisor, executive coach, adjunct professor, and host of the Messy with Daniel Atlin podcast. Drawing from three decades in senior leadership across higher education and government—as well as his Oxford Saïd and HEC Paris research interviewing 25 university presidents—Daniel unpacks how leaders navigate complexity through the science of sensemaking.

Tom and Daniel break down why control is an illusion, how to avoid the dangerous trap of "premature closure," and why course-correcting along the way is not an admission of failure, but an essential leadership discipline.

• The Two Levels of Sensemaking:

  • Making Sense of Yourself: Uncovering inner triggers, imposter syndrome, and the "parrots on your shoulder" before walking into difficult rooms.

  • Making Sense of the Organization: Building real-time dynamic maps, gathering signals, and telling a coherent story amid ambiguity.

• The "Premature Closure" Trap: Why rushing to action treats surface symptoms instead of root causes—and why leaders mistake immediate motion for effective progress.

• Why Leadership Is Inherently "Messy": Understanding complex institutions like universities and healthcare systems as living, evolving ecosystems rather than simple machines.

• Moving Beyond the "Main Character" Myth: How pop culture and social media have fostered solitary hero syndromes, when real organizational challenges require diverse coalitions and collective sensemaking.

• The 70–80% Rule & Dynamic Course Correction: How to know when you have enough data to act, why small directional pivots are normal, and how to stay connected with your team so you don't "get so far ahead of your troops you're mistaken for the enemy."

"It is not the ability to control; it is the ability to adapt to the given circumstance. Course correction is not an admission of failure—it is part of the mess."

Whether you are steering an enterprise through institutional change or managing daily team fires, this episode offers a grounded blueprint for leading with curiosity, patience, and clarity when there are no simple answers.

Don't miss out on this essential resource—order your copy today at Amazon or Barnes & Nobles and share your thoughts with me!

Sharpen your leadership skills: Subscribe now on your favorite podcast app to ensure you don't miss an episode dedicated to helping you become a better leader.

To learn more about the Science of Leadership, visit https://www.fourstarleaders.com/

References

Al Essa, A., Schmidt, H. G., Mamede, S., Knezevic, K., Zwaan, L., & Magzoub, M. (2026). Premature closure underlies bias in medical diagnosis in students: A randomised controlled experiment. Medical Education, 60(10):1102-1109. https://doi.org/10.1111/medu.70229

Ancona, D., & Perkins, D. N. T. (2022). Family ghosts in the executive suite. Harvard Business Review, 100(1), 92–101.

Dries, N., Pepermans, R., & Carlier, O. (2008). Career success: Constructing a multidimensional model. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 73(2), 254–267. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2008.05.005

Dweck, C. S. (2007). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Ballantine Books.

Haidt, Jl, & Rausch, Z. (2026). Social media is harming adolescents at a scale large enough to cause changes at the population level. World Happiness Report, Chapter 3. https://doi.org/10.18724/whr-g490-bg86

Savickas, M. L. (2005). The theory and practice of career construction. In S. D. Brown & R. W. Lent (Eds.), Career development and counseling: Putting theory and research to work (pp. 42–70). John Wiley & Sons.

Savickas, M. L., & Porfeli, E. J. (2012). Career Adapt-Abilities Scale: Construction, reliability, and measurement equivalence across 13 countries. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 80(3), 661–673. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvb.2012.01.011

Sun-Tzu. (2003). The Art of War (J. Minford, Ed.). Penguin Books.

Welles, O. (Director). (1941). Citizen Kane [Film]. RKO Radio Pictures.

When leadership repeatedly celebrates and protects a toxic star producer, what lesson does everyone else in the room learn? In Part Three of this five-part series on managing difficult personalities, The Science of Leadership hosts Dr. Tom Collins and Dr. Justin Hamrick explore how organizational reward systems shape workplace culture and drive employee behavior.

Using the rise and fall of Lance Armstrong and the US Postal Service cycling team, Tom and Justin illustrate how an obsession with winning can normalize corrupt methods and toxic conduct. When leaders look the other way because results are high, they send a clear, unintended message: this is how you succeed here. They explore why collaborative employees stop going above and beyond when they feel like "suckers," why teams adapt to lower behavioral baselines, and how leaders can reset organizational standards before the entire culture erodes.

Key topics include:

• The Lance Armstrong Lesson: How rewarding victories while ignoring the methods created a culture of complicity, fear, and eventual structural collapse.

• Espoused Values vs. Enacted Values: Why mission statements and posters on the wall mean nothing when day-to-day promotions reward selfish behavior.

• The "Sucker" Effect & Cultural Regression: Why collaborative workers disengage, stop sharing ideas, and adapt to self-focused behavior when they see selfish stars rewarded.

• 3 Landmark Behavioral Studies:

  • Ethical Decision Making (Ashkanasy et al.): How organizational rewards and punishments signal acceptable conduct to managers.

  • Social Learning Theory (Brown et al.): How ethical leadership directly impacts employee trust, dedication, and problem reporting.

  • Self-Focused Climates (Biron-Graeber et al.): Proving that counterproductive behaviors among managers weaken ethical systems and create self-interested workplaces.

• The "Now What?" Action Plan: A 3-step blueprint to address high performers without dismissing their measurable achievements, hold your ground against egocentric pushback, and tie future promotions directly to how much they elevate their team.

"Culture isn't created by what we print on the wall. It’s what we live out, what we tolerate, and what we reward. When selfishness is rewarded, everyone learns: this is how we do things around here."

Tune in to discover how to align your lived values with your organizational expectations, protect psychological safety, and turn high-producing individuals from a disruptive force into team builders.

Also, I want to remind listeners to checkout my book, my latest book, "The Four Stars of Leadership Development Guide," whether used individually or as part of a group or cohort, this guide is built for leaders and emerging leaders who want more than ideas. If you are looking for a practical way to become more trustworthy, more credible, and more effective as a leader, this guide was written for you.

Don't miss out on this essential resource—order your copy today at Amazon or Barnes & Nobles and share your thoughts with me!

Sharpen your leadership skills: Subscribe now on your favorite podcast app to ensure you don't miss an episode dedicated to helping you become a better leader.

To learn more about the Science of Leadership, visit https://www.fourstarleaders.com/

References

Ashkanasy, N. M., Windsor, C. A., & Treviño, L. K. (2006). Bad apples in bad barrels revisited: Cognitive moral development, just world beliefs, rewards, and ethical decision-making. Business Ethics Quarterly, 16(4), 449–473. https://doi.org/10.5840/beq200616447

Bellora-Bienengräber, L., Radtke, R. R., & Widener, S. K. (2022). Counterproductive work behaviors and work climate: The role of an ethically focused management control system and peers’ self-focused behavior. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 96, Article 101275. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aos.2021.101275

Brown, M. E., Treviño, L. K., & Harrison, D. A. (2005). Ethical leadership: A social learning perspective for construct development and testing. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 97(2), 117–134. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2005.03.00

When an organization relies on a toxic star player to win, what message does that send to the rest of the team? In Part Two of this five-part series on managing difficult personalities, The Science of Leadership hosts Dr. Tom Collins and Dr. Justin Hamrick tackle the hidden organizational cost of endorsing, protecting, and promoting the selfish high performer.

Using the controversial career of MLB legend Barry Bonds and his infamous "four-locker" setup with the San Francisco Giants, Tom and Justin explore the difference between short-term speed and long-term capability. They reveal why showering a selfish worker with special privileges, extra staffing, and zero accountability might accelerate individual output, but ultimately destroys collective trust and creates a dangerous single point of failure.

Key topics include:

• The Barry Bonds Bargain: Examining how the Giants accommodated 73 home runs with four lockers, a leather recliner, and a private entourage—and why individual milestones failed to yield a World Series ring during that era.

• The Amplification Effect: Why giving extra funding, space, and protection to a collaborative leader builds the team, but giving those same resources to a selfish high performer only deepens organizational dependency.

• Actions vs. Values: Why employee behavior is driven by what leaders reward and protect—not by slogans printed on a mission statement.

• 3 Key Research Insights:

  • The Security Analyst Study (Groysberg et al.): Proving that star performance rarely transfers to new firms without the underlying system, relationships, and support staff.

  • Collective Intelligence (Woolley et al.): Demonstrating that high-performing teams depend on equal participation and social sensitivity rather than having one genius in the room.

  • The Shadow of the Star (Zhao et al.): Revealing how star players trigger entitlement and counterproductive behavior in high-performing peers working near them.

• Reframing Support: A 2-step blueprint to attach concrete institutional expectations to every resource allocated to a star worker.

"If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. When you make exceptions for a star player, you aren't just rewarding output—you are telling your entire organization what success actually looks like."

Tune in to learn how to break the cycle of star dependency, protect your team's collective capabilities, and ensure your organizational investments elevate every boat in the harbor.

Also, I want to remind listeners to checkout my book, my latest book, "The Four Stars of Leadership Development Guide," whether used individually or as part of a group or cohort, this guide is built for leaders and emerging leaders who want more than ideas. If you are looking for a practical way to become more trustworthy, more credible, and more effective as a leader, this guide was written for you.

Don't miss out on this essential resource—order your copy today at Amazon or Barnes & Nobles and share your thoughts with me!

Sharpen your leadership skills: Subscribe now on your favorite podcast app to ensure you don't miss an episode dedicated to helping you become a better leader.

To learn more about the Science of Leadership, visit https://www.fourstarleaders.com/

REFERENCES

Groysberg, B., Lee, L.-E., & Nanda, A. (2008). Can they take it with them? The portability of star knowledge workers’ performance. Management Science, 54(7), 1213–1230. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.1070.0809

Woolley, A. W., Chabris, C. F., Pentland, A., Hashmi, N., & Malone, T. W. (2010). Evidence for a collective intelligence factor in the performance of human groups. Science, 330(6004), 686–688. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1193147

Zhou, J., Li, N., Xu, S., & Chi, W. (2025). High performers in the shadow: The adverse effect of star employees on their peers. Journal of Applied Psychology, 110(6), 776–797. https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0001254

In this foundational kickoff to a five-part series on managing difficult workplace personalities, The Science of Leadership hosts Dr. Tom Collins and Dr. Justin Hamrick confront one of the most complex challenges a manager will ever face: the highly productive, selfish team member.

These are the "prima donnas" and high-volume producers who deliver undeniable individual numbers—sales, publications, patient volume, or touchdowns—while quietly corroding the culture and performance of the system around them. Drawing on the legendary NFL case study of NFL Hall-of-Famer Terrell Owens and the Philadelphia Eagles, Tom and Justin unpack the "squeeze vs. the juice" dilemma and demonstrate why visible metrics often hide a devastating net loss for the broader team.

Key topics include:

• Individual Production vs. Organizational Productivity: Why a high performer who generates 200% output can still cause an overall net loss if their behavior reduces the output of those around them by even 15%.

• The "Prima Donna" Bias: How organizations develop a protective blind spot for top producers, mislabeling toxic behavior as "high standards" or "focus on excellence."

• The Psychological Safety Trap for Leaders: Why frontline managers often feel powerless to discipline a selfish high performer because C-suite executives evaluate talent strictly through surface-level financial dashboards and rankings.

• 3 Landmark Behavioral Studies:

  • Harvard Business School (Housman & Miner): Proving that avoiding one toxic worker is worth more than twice as much as hiring a top 1% producer.

  • NICU Resuscitation Study (Riskin et al.): Demonstrating how mild interpersonal rudeness directly degrades technical performance, diagnostic accuracy, and life-saving procedures.

  • The Toleration Study (Quade et al.): Showing how organizations systematically overlook unethical behavior when output remains high.

• Shifting the Unit of Analysis: A practical, step-by-step framework to audit the ripple costs of a toxic worker, confront specific behaviors without attacking character, and raise the organizational baseline.

"A dashboard can show revenue, publications, or sales, but it won't show the people who stopped asking for help, the colleagues who learned to work around a toxic teammate, or the talented staff who quietly left the organization."

Tune in to discover how to measure the true performance of your system, protect your group's psychological safety, and transform your workplace standard from simply "producing a lot" to making everyone around you better.

Also, I want to remind listeners to checkout my book, my latest book, "The Four Stars of Leadership Development Guide," whether used individually or as part of a group or cohort, this guide is built for leaders and emerging leaders who want more than ideas. If you are looking for a practical way to become more trustworthy, more credible, and more effective as a leader, this guide was written for you.

Don't miss out on this essential resource—order your copy today at Amazon or Barnes & Nobles and share your thoughts with me!

Sharpen your leadership skills: Subscribe now on your favorite podcast app to ensure you don't miss an episode dedicated to helping you become a better leader.

To learn more about the Science of Leadership, visit https://www.fourstarleaders.com/

References

Housman, M., & Minor, D. (2015). Toxic workers (Harvard Business School Working Paper No. 16-057). Harvard Business School. https://www.hbs.edu/ris/Publication%20Files/16-057_d45c0b4f-fa19-49de-8f1b-4b12fe054fea.pdf

Quade, M. J., Greenbaum, R. L., & Petrenko, O. V. (2017). “I don’t want to be near you, unless…”: The interactive effect of unethical behavior and performance onto relationship conflict and workplace ostracism. Personnel Psychology, 70(3), 675–709. https://doi.org/10.1111/peps.12164

Riskin, A., Erez, A., Foulk, T. A., Kugelman, A., Gover, A., Shoris, I., Riskin, K. S., & Bamberger, P. A. (2015). The impact of rudeness on medical team performance: A randomized trial. Pediatrics, 136(3), 487–495. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2015-1385

In this deeply moving conclusion to a special two-part biographical series, the tables remain turned on The Science of Leadership. Guest host Lindsey Turner (CEO of be Frank) pushes host Dr. Tom Collins further into the hot seat to explore the vulnerable evolution from a kid running away from his Appalachian roots to an elite clinical and military leader fully stepping into his identity.

If Part One was about where he came from, Part Two is an unvarnished look at what he had to leave behind—and the emotional baseline that transformed his management style. In a rare, raw studio moment, Tom channels the slow-motion cadence of his late father's voice, sparking an intense reflection on what it means to feel valued, how to practice absolute baseline integrity, and why true mentorship requires an active investment in someone else's spotlight. From mending physical porches with his dad to watching his own medical proteges ascend to global stages, Tom maps out why true management is a process of complete structural transformation.

Key topics include:

• The Reality of Metamorphosis: Moving beyond cosmetic lifestyle changes ("getting a haircut") to embrace true, deep identity shifts, and why Tom views his current career phase as still being inside the chrysalis.

• The Wood Deck Saw Line: A powerful memory of Tom’s late father protecting his career during a construction project, and how that unexpected layer of care redefined his view of parental and managerial protection.

• The Pride of the 40-Cent Lunch: A humorous yet painful look back at refusing a reduced-price school lunch out of a desperate desire to hide his poverty, and how that acute self-consciousness shapes his empathy for overlooked talent today.

• Exemplar vs. Ambassador: The ongoing professional tension between staying close to home to show local youth what is possible versus entering elite spaces (like Stanford or Penn) to force those institutions to see the brilliance of marginalized regions.

• Radical Mentor Economics: Dismantling the corporate view that mentoring is an administrative waste of energy by evaluating the psychological and legacy dividends returned to the leader.

• The Faith Matrix: A candid discussion on how growing up in a tiny rural church in 1975 provided the moral guardrails that ultimately kept him from falling into systemic patterns of addiction.

"If you think you have finally arrived as a leader, you need to step down and hand the keys to someone else. Leadership is a journey of continuous structural metamorphosis—the moment you think your system is perfect, your competition will outwork you."

Tune in to experience the ultimate testament to leading with character, confidence, caring, and communication, and learn why the highest calling of your career is ensuring your team is never limited by your personal capabilities alone.

Also, I want to remind listeners to checkout my book, "The Four Stars of Leadership," a culmination of over three years of dedicated work, and I'm confident it will be an immensely interesting and helpful guide on your journey to becoming a better leader. Don't miss out on this essential resource—order your copy today at Amazon or Barnes & Nobles and share your thoughts with me!

Sharpen your leadership skills: Subscribe now on your favorite podcast app to ensure you don't miss an episode dedicated to helping you become a better leader.

To learn more about the Science of Leadership, visit https://www.fourstarleaders.com/

In this special, raw, and deeply personal episode of The Science of Leadership, the tables are completely turned. Host Dr. Tom Collins steps into the hot seat as a guest, handing the microphone over to Lindsey Turner, founder and CEO of Be Frank. Driven by listener requests to uncover the origins of his leadership philosophy, this episode marks Part One of an emotional, two-part biographical retrospective.

Tom strips away the clinical accolades of pediatric cardiology and military research to look back at his upbringing in East Tennessee Appalachia. From the warmth of a grandmother who predicted his future to the crushing weight of systemic poverty, an absent father battling addiction, and a childhood spent literally bursting out of his shoes, Tom confronts the hidden elements of his past. This is an exploration of the psychological filters we construct to belong in elite spaces and a reminder that our true physical and mental boundaries are located much further out than we think.

Key topics include:

• The Safe Haven of Service: Honoring Tom’s grandmother, whose family's Depression-era farm fed half her town, and how her radical hospitality presaged the "Caring" pillar of Tom’s leadership framework.

• The Glued-Together Swoosh: An intimate look at the pride and acute awareness of poverty during childhood, including using shoe glue to mend a size-10 sneaker over a growing size-12 foot just to look normal.

• The Academic Filter: Shifting accents and erasing roots to survive institutional biases within the Ivy League, and the hidden tax paid by first-generation professionals.

• The 247-Pound Reality Check: The 17th birthday milestone that launched Tom’s health transformation, shattering the self-imposed belief that running a single mile would literally kill him.

• The "Insane" Search for 50 Generals: The backend story of how The Four Stars of Leadership was born out of a naive, wildly ambitious quest to track down and interview the military's most reclusive four-star minds.

"A failure that humbles you but does not teach you is incomplete. A failure that teaches you but does not change your systems is still dangerous. You never truly know what your limit is until you push right past what you think it is."

Tune in to witness a story that mathematically should have ended in devastation, and learn how to stop running from the spaces you outgrew so you can lead from a place of radical authenticity.

Also, I want to remind listeners to checkout my book, "The Four Stars of Leadership," a culmination of over three years of dedicated work, and I'm confident it will be an immensely interesting and helpful guide on your journey to becoming a better leader. Don't miss out on this essential resource—order your copy today at Amazon or Barnes & Nobles and share your thoughts with me!

Sharpen your leadership skills: Subscribe now on your favorite podcast app to ensure you don't miss an episode dedicated to helping you become a better leader.

To learn more about the Science of Leadership, visit https://www.fourstarleaders.com/