his is part four of my weekly series on the Digital Leader Canvas — a free self-assessment framework with 11 dimensions of leadership. If you're new here, you can download the canvas and catch up: https://www.digital-leader-program.de/en/digital-leader-program-digital-leader-canvas

This week we're looking at Quadrant ③ — Resources & Limitations. The canvas asks:

Where am I limited? What am I afraid of? How can I balance my own, my teams and company goals? What resources support my leadership development?

This is the most uncomfortable quadrant on the canvas. And that's exactly why it matters.

A leader who gave up on AI after one wrong answer

A client of mine recently tried out a Microsoft AI product. He asked it to run a calculation. The answer was wrong.

Worse: he discovered that some of his employees had been using the same tool, copying and pasting AI-generated calculations into their work — without checking them. They sent those wrong numbers up the chain.

He drew two conc...

This is part three of my weekly series on the Digital Leader Canvas — a free self-assessment framework with 11 dimensions of leadership. If you're new here, you can download the canvas and catch up: https://www.digital-leader-program.de/en/digital-leader-program-digital-leader-canvas

This week we're looking at Quadrant ② — Leadership Style. The canvas asks:

What are my values? How can I become more flexible in my leadership? In which situations should I lead differently? When should I tell more? When should I coach more?

Let's get into it.

The two extremes

I think every leader moves between two extremes:

On one end: telling. Giving answers, making decisions, directing. Some people call it bossing — I'll use that word too, because that's how it often feels to the person on the receiving end.

On the other end: coaching. Asking questions, guiding, handing over responsibility. Trusting the other person to figure it out.

Most leadership advice today tells you to move towards coach...

Last week I released the Digital Leader Canvas — a free self-assessment framework with 11 dimensions of leadership. If you missed it, you can download it here: https://www.digital-leader-program.de/en/digital-leader-program-digital-leader-canvas

This week, we're diving into the first quadrant: Team Vision & Motivation.

But first - let me give you some tips on how to work with the canvas.

You can print it and fill it out or use post-its, you can use the online whiteboard and fill it out digitally. You can work on it by yourself or with a colleague, friend or together with your team. OR you use some LLM to be your counterpart:

Happy to hear your thoughts and feedback on that!

Ok, let's get to work now: Team Vision & Motivation

The three questions

This field asks you to reflect on three things:

What motivates me? Not the polished answer you'd give in a job interview. The real one.

What motivates my teammates? Not what you assume. What actually drives them.

What i...

Big news today! Andre is launching his new Linkedin Newsletter called Human Skills in the Age of AI - feel free to subscribe here: https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7444678645496860672

AND we released our Digital Leader Canvas! (Which we will cover in detail and step by step in the next newsletters)

Why a canvas?

Over the years, I've seen leaders struggle with the same question again and again: "I know I should develop as a leader — but where do I actually start?"

Most leadership tools are either too abstract (personality tests that label you but don't guide you) or too rigid (competency checklists that miss the human side). I wanted something different.

Inspired by the logic of the Business Model Canvas, the Digital Leader Canvas breaks leadership down into eleven concrete dimensions — and gives you a structured way to reflect on each one.

It's not a personality test. It's not a scorecard. It's a thinking tool.

The 11 dimensions

The canva...

Why coaching skills don’t survive the inbox — and what actually helps. 

Many leaders proudly add “Certified Coach” to their LinkedIn headline. On Monday morning, they still mostly tell people what to do.

I don’t say this with judgment. In hectic times, directing feels faster than coaching. When deadlines are tight and inboxes are full, giving a quick answer looks like the responsible thing to do. Coaching, especially at the beginning, feels slower and sometimes even inefficient.

It is important, but rarely urgent — and that is exactly why it loses against day-to-day business.

The Pattern I See Over and Over

I meet more and more leaders who have completed serious coaching programs. They know open questions, active listening, powerful silence. Many of them genuinely care about their people. 

And then I observe them in their regular meetings: 

• They start with a question — and then jump in with the solution.
• They ask “What do you think?” — and steer the conversation back to their
...

On stage, they talk about AI, new work, and agility.

In their calendar, they still run leadership like it’s 2005.

I’ve sat in so many leadership meetings where the official story is bold transformation, but what actually happens in the room keeps the organization firmly in the past. Weekly leadership meetings and big transformation programs are usually the places where this contradiction becomes painfully visible. And very often, the bottleneck is not “the organization” or “the employees”. It’s the way senior leaders still work.

In this article, I want to talk about that gap. Why do senior leaders block the change they ask for? What does this look like in daily business? And what can HR and L&D leaders actually do when the leadership “operating system” is still stuck in the early 2000s?

I’m writing this based on my work with leadership teams and transformation programs across Europe.

The uncomfortable truth: senior leaders as bottleneck

Most companies today say they are “in tra...

🚀 Our podcast is live - in English and German!
🎙️ It's called *3 minutes max.*
💡 And it asks a question that affects us all:
**What makes us irreplaceable as humans in an AI world?**

Three times a week. Maximum 3 minutes. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
With concrete tips, food for thought, and a co-host named Jules—my AI partner.

🎧 Listen now & subscribe

Für mehr Umsatz, Produktivität und Motivation in Eurer Organisation.

Michael Geerdts (Storytelling Profi mit mehr als 15 Jahren Erfahrung aus so gut wie jeder Branche und Unternehmensgröße) gibt Lösungen für bessere hybride Präsentationen.

Schau rein und optimiere Deine hybriden Meetings

Around the end of the year we typically adjust our products to our transforming customer needs. We restructure and refocus. This has an impact on the words I am writing here since this will be our last newsletter article for some time.

In 2020-2022 Covid and its consequences for remote leadership were one of the biggest challenges for teams out there. Since 2023 the teams gradually changed to hybrid setups (what can mean many things…) These new challenges demand new solutions.

We are going to refocus our resources - away from online marketing and blogging more towards speaker activities at exhibitions (check out L&D pro online conference on March 19th). In 2025 we will head out from our beloved home market Europe and especially Germany and direct our attention a bit more towards the US.

We will combine our AI Chatbot, Knowledgebase, Leadership Framework, Workshop Series online Whiteboards and Membership into one concept that companies can buy all at once.
Supporting internal and ext...