Failure and Bounce Back Plans (8-25-26)

Last week was about choosing how to use failure. This week is about failure and having bounce back plans.

I have an important presentation to give later today. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a bit nervous. As good as I am and as confident as I am in my skills, I know that there is a 100% chance that I’m going to fall short somewhere. I am 100% confident that someone will make a comment or ask a question that I won’t necessarily have the best answer for. It’s inevitable.

On one hand, this is scary. On the other hand, this clarity gives me something. It gives me the ability to focus on having a bounce back plan. Bounce back plans are things I put in place to help when things go sideways. In this case, the bounce back plan will likely look something like: “Clarify the question. Share current perspective. Acknowledge the gap. Align on follow-up plan to close the gap. Pivot back to the key objectives of the presentation and move forward.” I have drilled this in my head over and over and over again, so when I do stumble, this will take over and I’ll bounce back like muscle memory.

Let’s connect some dots. We talk about embracing failure a lot. We talk about dusting ourselves off after failure a lot. We often don’t talk about HOW we get back up after failure. We don’t talk about what dusting yourself off looks like. We don’t talk about the actions we take to reorient situations when they go sideways. Since we don’t talk or think about these, it’s easy to get caught flat footed when failure occurs. By spending a little time anticipating that failure will occur and having a plan to help you bounce back, we can spend less time knocked down and more time getting up and moving again.

The challenge: What is your bounce back plan for failure?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Choosing How to Use Failure (8-19-26)

Last week was about failure, perspective, and avoiding downward spirals. We are going to build on that by reflecting on how we choose to use failure.

I lifted weights this past weekend. I had a goal number of reps I was trying to hit for each exercise. Things were going great, until they weren’t. Suddenly, I couldn’t hit my rep goals anymore, and I fell short on my last few exercises. At this point, I had failed, and I could use this failure in two different ways. I could take this failure and use it as conclusive proof that I was a weak sauce loser. The other option would be to use the failure as fuel, admit I had missed today, and come back ready to triumph. I chose the latter. As I left the workout, I was proud of everything I had accomplished AND fired up to push myself harder.

Let’s make some connections to work. No one is perfect. If you are setting a high bar for yourself then falling short is inevitable. I’ve shared before that my high bar for my role is to deliver magic, to crush all my goals and make it look effortless. There are some places where I’ve delivered this level of magic. There are others where I’ve fallen short of my goals. In those shortcomings I can see how I could have done things differently or better. I could use these failures and shortcomings in two different ways. I could use these as evidence that I’m a horrible at my job and should give up. (I’ve been down that rabbit hole. Have you? It’s not fun.) I can also use these failures and shortcomings as learnings and as motivation to do things differently and do better.

Now take a moment to think about your work. The last time you made a mistake, did you allow it to eat you alive, or did you use it as fuel? No matter who you are failure is inevitable. How we choose to use that failure is up to each of us.

The challenge: How will you choose to use failure?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Harvesting Failure (8-5-26)

Happy Wednesday,

Last week was about failures and premortems. This week is about harvesting failure.

Pretend for a minute that you are a farmer. Pretend that you were supposed to plant a field full of corn. The crops start growing you and notice something interesting. You have a lot of corn, but you also have potatoes. You weren’t trying to grow potatoes. They just showed up.

At this point, you’ve failed to plant a field full of corn. With that said, when it’s harvest time what will you do? Will you only harvest the corn, leaving the potatoes to rot and fall apart? Will you harvest the potatoes too and see what you can do with them? Will you spend time analyzing the soil to see what happened?

What does this have to do with failure? This week’s analogy is all about learning from and making the most of what happened. I would hope that even though you didn’t plant the potatoes, you’d still harvest them and do something with them. I hope you would spend time analyzing the soil to see what happened.

We talk all the time about being okay with failure. We say how we should fail forward and that we should celebrate failure. What we don’t spend enough time thinking about is how we should harvest failure. Rather than failing and trying to forget it, what learnings can we bring forward with us? I’m not happy that I failed in various points in my career, but I am thankful for what I’ve taken from that to make me better.

The challenge: What will you harvest from failure?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Taking Time to Soak It All In (7-20-26)

This is a bonus blog about taking time to soak in where you are and what you’ve done.

Last Friday, my boss sent me some recognition about something I recently delivered. Within a few seconds I had read the email, thought “that’s nice”, sent a quick reply, filed it away into a folder where I keep the recognition I get, and started to move to the next thing. The email was already sorted into the folder when I paused for a second. I decided to stop rushing to the next thing. I sat there for a moment and let myself absorb what I had delivered, the feedback, and the recognition I had received. I allowed myself to feel proud and accomplished. I slowed down and spent a few seconds taking it all in and felt all the better for it. Then, and only then, did I move to the next task.

Let’s connect dots. Has anything like this ever happened to you? Have you ever been so lost in the grind that you just keep moving from thing to thing? Are you ever so lost in the grind that you don’t let the achievement and recognition sink in?

If this has happened to you before, I’m sure you can also attest to how exhausting and mentally draining this is. It’s so easy to get lost in all of this. Sometimes, we just need to slow down. Sometimes, we need to take a deep breath, look around, and be proud of where we are and how we got here.

The challenge: Will you take a moment to soak in what you’ve achieved and what you’ve done?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Pausing and Searching for Indicators of Progress (6-24-26)

This is week 5 of our series based on lessons I’ve learned working in a central role. This week is about pausing, looking around, and searching for indicators of progress.

Part of the challenge of being in a central role is that there often is not a clear scoreboard. When I worked in marketing for a brand, we had clear targets we were going after. We knew we were trying to help X number of patients and achieve Y level of market share. I don’t have that in this role. I’m trying to drive us to the future of market research. It’s hard to know how close or far away I am from an ambiguous target that is always changing.

Recently, I had a few days where I was a bit overwhelmed and irritated. I was getting swallowed up by various fire drills and other issues. In the frustration, I thought to myself, “Am I even doing anything? Am I even getting anywhere?” After being grumbly for a day or two, I snapped out of it, slowed down, and pulled my head up again. I still didn’t have a clear scoreboard. However, I could at least see indicators that I was at least moving things forward. I still can’t tell you exactly how close or far away we are from the future. I can see how far we’ve come. I can see how our momentum is taking us forward, and that’s fuel enough to keep going.

Let’s make some connections. Our story this week is about being overwhelmed, lost, and pausing to find perspective. Have you ever felt lost and discouraged in your role? Even if you’re in a role where there is some kind of scoreboard, I’m willing to bet there are moments where you have been so overwhelmed with things that you’ve felt a little lost. It’s easy to feel this way. Everything is going so fast. Technology is changing so much. There is so much pressure.

In moments like these, we have to find a way to slow down and pull up. We have to find a way to slow down, even if we think we should be sprinting. Once we slow down, we can look around, check out the indicators around us, and see how we are really doing vs the story we are telling ourselves.

The challenge: Will you slow down and look for indicators of progress?

Bonus- Many of you will be part of our annual shutdown. I hope you totally unplug. I hope you reconnect with friends, family, and yourself. I hope you stay safe and get some sun.

Have a jolly good day and a fun/safe 4^th of July,

Andrew Embry

Quarterly Self-Assessment (3-25-26)

It’s a bonus blog! I hope you’re excited 😉 For the past few years I’ve used the last Wednesday of the first quarter to share a blog on doing quarterly check-ins for work and yourself. This will be a longer email, because I’m sharing my own self-assessment.

I just had my first performance check-in of the year at work. In preparation for that I asked myself, what are 2-3 highlights? What are 2-3 opportunities to do better? What are some learnings from Q1 I can apply moving forward?

What does this have to do anything? While this is great for work, we could apply this same thinking to our personal lives as well. What are some of your goals for 2026? How did you do with them in Q1? Take a moment and CELEBRATE progress you’ve made. After you celebrate, then you can reflect on your gaps, why they exist, and how you can close them.

The challenge: Will you take the time to do a quarterly check-in? What changes will you make to set yourself up for the rest of the year?

Bonus: Here is my review based on the dimensions in my life I set goals for. Hopefully, it sparks a thought or two for you.

Make a Choice (B-) This is my theme for the year. I wanted to be more intentional about where I invested my time and energy, because things were better when I was intentional. While I did okay, there were a few areas, mainly in my physical health where I just kept falling into mindless habits.
Mental Health (B) The goal is to feel like I’m in a good, strong, solid mental state. I’m feeling pretty good right now, which is particularly impressive with all that is going on in life and work. In the grand scheme of things I think I’m doing a good job of being grounded and focusing on the things I can control. To get to an A, I need to make improvements in my physical health and I also need to be more intentional about investing in things that recharge me vs just resting.
Physical Health (C) Overall, the goal is to be healthier. On the good side, I’ve been getting pretty good sleep and I completed my yeti race. On the needs improvement side, I haven’t been able to find a rhythm where I’m working out/being active on a regular basis.
Family (B+) The goal is to feel like I’m being an amazing husband and dad. I’m feeling pretty good about things right now. My kids are 12 and almost 14, and the teenage hormones are real. There are a lot of days filled with dragons, but I’m comfortable standing in the fire and not getting burned. I do think I’ve been a bit caught up in work lately and I don’t want to lean too heavy into the work side.
Career (B) The goal is to feel like I’m delivering magic, where things are effortless and just cranking out high quality work constantly. It’s a high bar, and one I always strive for. I feel good about what I’ve done and delivered this year ranging from AI strategies to AI playbooks to evolving AI tools, but it doesn’t feel like magic yet. I’m still trying to navigate some swirl and wrap my brain and arms around a potential future that seems to change every day. Also, in the midst of all of the AI evolution and organizational change, the flood is real and trying to survive that and help others survive that feels overwhelming at times. Overall, I’m on the right path and need to keep focused on pushing the next evolution and broader adoption/utility. I’ll get there and the magic is going to be pretty incredible 😉

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

What would cause me to miss achieving my goals? (1-28-26)

This week will be the last in our series about questions we should ask ourselves at the beginning of the year. This week I want us to ask ourselves, “What would cause me to miss my goals?”

In January we spend time outlining goals and objectives. We focus our efforts on identifying what winning looks like. It’s easy to assume that things will go well, but the chances of everything going well is slim to none.

Recently, I asked myself, “What would cause me to miss my goals? What would cause me to lose?” I quickly identified a few things. I will miss my goals if I don’t invest my time in the right things. I’ll miss if I don’t carve out the time to do the right things. I’ll miss if I’m not being intentional about orchestrating change management efforts. I’ll miss if I don’t get certain projects moving in Q1.

After identifying the things that would make me lose, I took a second to look at my plan for the week. I quickly realized that I had been caught in the swirl. I was doing a lot of things, but they likely weren’t the right things. They were a distraction. As a result, I moved a few things around on the calendar, blocked time for key work, and I gave myself permission to be slow and non-responsive on a few other things. Ultimately, I was able to make good progress on things that mattered. Looking forward, I’m already blocking time and thinking about other things I can do to minimize my chance of missing and increase my chance of being successful.

How does this connect to work? The world moves fast. If we aren’t intentional about things we might end up participating in behaviors that will lead to us not reaching our goals. Spending time doing a pre-mortem and identifying the key things that go wrong brings awareness and gives us a chance to gameplan on how we will handle these things. Be honest. Take a look at this month. How much time did you spend on things that will lead to you being successful vs how much time did you spend on things that will result in you missing? What is getting in the way of you making progress?

The challenge: Will you identify what would cause you to miss your goals and then take action?

Bonus- You can apply this thinking to your personal life. Something that will make me miss my physical health goals is pushing myself too hard too fast. My shoulders aren’t what they used to be, and after pushing them too hard with weight that was heavier than I should have been doing I needed to take a few weeks off for them to heal. I’ll go a lot slower from here on out.

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

How broken am I willing to be to achieve my goals? (1-14-26)

Last week we kicked off a series about questions to ask ourselves as we start the year. Our first question was “What one word/phrase will be our north star?” The question this week might be a bit intense and provocative. The intent is to help us think about protecting our mental health by asking this challenging question, “How broken am I willing to be to achieve my goals?”

Over the past few years, I have watched as more individuals have struggled with mental health challenges than ever before. I’ve seen more people go on leave from work because of stress and its negative impact. I’ve heard more people talk about how they were exhausted, beat down, limping, and feeling overall broken. I have also been that person. Last year was the first year in a long time that I didn’t feel I went past the breaking point. I think part of this is because I began the year by asking myself, “How broken am I willing to be to achieve my goals?” and forcing myself to contend with this answer.

How does this apply to work? While the question is admittedly intense, asking how broken I was willing to be was a wake-up call that forced me to contend with the impact of feeling broken and how that affects my role as a husband, dad, friend, and human. While I had allowed myself to go past the breaking point in the past, I realized it wasn’t worth it. If this meant not doing everything or missing out on something, so be it. I would rather be whole and be better for myself and family than be the super stressed hurting version of myself. As a result, I didn’t work myself into the ground. I was more intentional about where I put my energy. I made trade-offs and said no to things. This also led to conversations with my boss where I had to say, “I can’t do X, Y, and Z without sacrificing my heath and family, and I don’t want to do that. Can we align that X and Y are the most important and I can let Z go?” Here’s the other thing that happened, since I said no to other things, I was able to dedicate time and do X and Y extremely well, and in the grand scheme of things that’s what truly mattered. Overall, I managed to have a solid year, deliver a lot of value, and I did this while being whole. I wish this for all of us.

The challenge: We are still early in the year, before you get lost in the shuffle, I’d encourage you to ask yourself, “How broken am I willing to be to achieve my goals?”

Bonus thought/challenge for leaders- I firmly believe that leaders have a responsibility for protecting the health of their teams. The choices we make as leaders can enable people to be healthier versions of themselves OR bury them in impossible work and standards that have detrimental effects. With that in mind, here is the difficult question I’d pose to anyone leading people, “How far are you willing to break people to achieve your goals and/or the team’s goals?”

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

2026 One Word/Phrase (1-7-26)

Happy Wednesday and Happy New Year!

I hope you had a relaxing and recharging holiday. We are going to kick off a series about some questions you might consider asking yourself as we get this year rocking and rolling. Our first question is an annual tradition. What is one word/phrase that will serve as your north star for the year?

At the beginning of every year, I take time to reflect and choose a word or phrase that will be my north star for the year. I’ve found it helps ground me versus getting lost among setting too many goals. To identify my one word/phrase I ask myself things like: What went well last year that I want to continue? Where could things have been better? What do I want to achieve? What do I want to give more focus and energy toward this year?

In 2025 my word was REBUILD. I needed to rebuild after having a few years that absolutely kicked my butt. My focus on rebuilding and repairing had huge dividends and contributed to me having one of the best years I’ve had in a long time throughout many aspects of my life. This year, my phrase is Make a Choice. As I reflected on 2025, I realized that things were at their best when I was making intentional choices whether this meant being very deliberate about working out or making clear trade-offs at work. When I didn’t actively make a choice, I would default to getting lost in the grind, doomscrolling, and other activities that didn’t serve me or bring me joy. My phrase is a subtle reminder that I can either choose and have better outcomes or get swept in a current I don’t want to be in.

The challenge: What is your one word or short phrase for the year? What is your north star?

Bonus: The image is a vision board I create that incorporates my one word/phrase as well as other images that have meaning. Here is a breakdown of the vision board.

Phrase- “Make a Choice”
- 2025 was one of the better years I’ve had in a while. My focus for that year was rebuilding, and I had a lot of success building myself back up, rebuilding some better habits, etc.As I reflected on 2025, I realized that the best parts of the year stemmed from me making very intentional choices.
  - I chose not to run myself into the ground and was deliberate about ensuring that didn’t happen.I chose to make sure I took time to recharge on a frequent basis. I chose to make weightlifting more of a priority. I chose to focus my time and effort on key work projects.
  I also realized that when things weren’t as good, it’s because I did NOT intentionally make a choice. Essentially, when I wasn’t making intentional decisions, I was passively sliding into not so great habits like:
  - Doomscrolling for a long time before going to bed. Getting sucked up in the speed of life and getting lost in work while sacrificing family and health. Watching/consuming mindless stuff (food, entertainment, etc) that I didn’t enjoy vs choosing things that would bring me joy.
- Bottom line- if I can I can do a better job of ensuring I am always actively making a choice, my life will be even better.
Morpheus and the red vs blue pill
- This represents the idea of making a choice.
Spider-man swinging
- My superpower is connecting people, things, and ideas. Spider swings effortlessly between the connection points, and that’s what I strive to do.
Marvel superheroes
- I like having someone to remind me that I’m blessed to work with a lot of amazing superhumans, and part of my job is to figure out how to bring out the best in everyone.
4S
- I had copilot create a cool logo for this. It stands for strength, steps, sustenance, and sleep, the building blocks of good physical health. I want to make sure I’m nailing those fundamentals, and the logo makes it look cooler 😉
The battery
- Reminder to
  - 1. Not let my better every get too low
  - 2. Make sure I’m recharging whether that is rest, moving my body, spending time with family/friends/etc.
Momentum
- I feel I gained a lot of positive momentum last year, and I need to continue to think about how I can take advantage of that to continue to make the world a bit better.

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

I hope we are all like the Grinch (12-10-25)

This will be the last blog of 2025. If you’ve been on this distribution list for a while, you might recognize that I usually end the year with this entry. I feel it is just as relevant now as it was in years past. Besides, we watch the same holiday specials every year, so we can revisit the same holiday themed blogs, right? 😉 For our final blog of the year we will look at How the Grinch Stole Christmas!

During this holiday season I hope we are all like the Grinch. Pretty strange thing to say, right? Let me explain why I feel this way. You may know the story of the Grinch. He is a grumpy creature who decides he will try to steal Christmas from the Whos. He concocts an elaborate scheme and then steals all of the presents, decorations, etc. in an effort to ruin their holiday. This negative attitude is what we often associate with the Grinch, but this isn’t the end of his story. The Grinch grows as a character, and life is all about growing, changing, and becoming better.

The Grinch has stolen the gifts, and then he hears the Whos singing. Suddenly, it hits him right as his sleigh full of gifts starts to go over the cliff. “And what happened, then? Well, in Whoville they say – that the Grinch’s small heart grew three sizes that day. And then – the true meaning of Christmas came through, and the Grinch found the strength of *ten* Grinches, plus two!” He saves the gifts from falling over the cliff, rides into Whoville, and serves the roast beast at the feast.

The reason I hope we are all like the Grinch this year is because he grows and becomes a better person. He begins filled with apathy, malice, and grumpiness, and then he allows love in and it fundamentally changes him. How have you changed and grown this year? Wherever you are right now, we have the chance to be better. Imagine how different the world be if all of our hearts grew like the Grinch’s. Here is to all of us knowing what it feels like when our hearts grow three sizes in a day.

As always, thanks so much for reading. Your reading and encouragement throughout the year is the best gift I could ever ask for. Merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah, and happy holidays for anything you might be celebrating! I hope you disconnect and recharge. I hope you find peace, love, and fulfillment.

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry