Crash Report: WeWork

There is a certain type of leader who, I will admit, drives me crazy.

They are what we might charitably call the “excitable visionary.” You have probably met one: To them, every quarter is going to be gangbusters. They’re going to do $10M in revenue—bet on it (even though they did just a fraction of that last quarter). The new release is going to change everything! And ultimately, the company is going to take over the world!

No matter the actual state of the company, this leader presents a grandiose picture. They are usually an Influence type in the DISC Model—known for their people orientation, optimism, and ambition.

Often, the excitable visionary doesn’t truly mean what they are saying. They just have a habit of wrapping their vision in a layer of hyperbole. They want to get everyone else just as excited as they are.

We CEOs are trusted with owning the vision of the company and rallying people around it. But we must continuously guard against getting too carried away like this. If you’…