AI is here, but so are human emotions. Tammy J. Bond highlights that implementing AI is not just a technical deployment; it's a massive disruption to your team's identity, sense of security, and self-worth. The core challenge for 2026 is leading the emotional side of automation, as your team is both hopeful and terrified. This episode exposes how leaders are currently dropping the ball with silence and lack of guidance, offering a playbook to intentionally build trust and human sustainability around AI usage.

Leaders are often failing to implement AI well because they ignore its impact on three fundamental human needs:

1. Certainty: Workers fear for their job security (up to 52% are worried about AI's impact).

2. Competency: The automated work challenges their sense of self-worth and ability to perform their role effectively.

3. Control: People feel a loss of autonomy when a new, vaguely understood tool takes over parts of their process.

Ignoring these fears creates camouflaged conflict in the workplace, manifesting as passive resistance, quiet quitting, and overcompensating perfectionism (driven by fear of obsolescence).

The Problem of Silence: With 40% of workplaces lacking AI usage guidelines, employees read a leader's silence as, "My leader doesn't know what they're doing," eroding trust and increasing anxiety.

Your opportunity is to stop letting fear write the rest of your organizational story and actively transform your culture around AI.

3 Essential Steps for AI Implementation:

1. Name the Change: Clarify what AI is and what it is not here to do, not just for the company, but for each position at the granular level.

2. Clarify Expectations: Define what is acceptable and unacceptable to use AI for. Set clear performance measures and expectations for the outcome if misuse occurs.

3. Invest in Skill Building: Provide training not just on the tool, but on the skill of prompt verification and critical assessment of AI output.

You must articulate to your team: AI is here to augment you, to enhance you, not to erase you. Reinforce the need for human judgment for the final output. The human is still responsible for the answer, even if the tool provided the initial data.

Tammy's challenge is to push pause and get the team involved in co-creating the AI strategy:

• Ask the Fear Question: Sit down with your team and ask: "What about AI really scares you the most right now?"

• Identify 'Dumb Work': Ask: "Where do you see that AI could remove some of the repetitive work we do so that you can do more of what you're brilliant at?"

• Co-Design an Experiment: Pick one process this month and work with your team to co-design a small AI experiment to increase familiarity and comfort.

The Bottom Line: If your people cannot say out loud what they are afraid of, AI will quietly run your culture from the shadows. Lead the human side of automation.

In this quick Thanksgiving episode, Tammy J. Bond challenges the notion that gratitude is just a holiday tradition—it's a leadership strategy. She shares that leaders often get stuck in a "scarcity loop," focusing only on what is not working yet. This episode provides four quick points to help leaders shift their perspective from lack to presence, turning gratitude into a proactive force that expands positive outcomes and boosts team performance.

• The Scarcity Loop: Leaders commonly focus on the "yet's" (what they don't have yet, who's not performing yet), leading to a perception of lack. This scarcity loop expands what you don't want to see.

• Flip Your Focus: Flip the script by focusing on the "yet." Acknowledge the positive basics (e.g., "I'm grateful Frank shows up on time every day") and then shift to what you want next. What you focus on expands.

• Shift from Missing to Present: Do not focus your attention on what's missing. Shift your thinking to what is present and what you do have. This perspective shift attracts more of the positive into your field of vision.

• Gratitude as a Strategy, Not a Tradition: Gratitude should be a constant practice. When you focus on the positive around you, you can even find a "best gift attribute" in an underperformer, simply by shifting your attention from what is frustrating to what is present.

Before the holiday distractions take over, pause for 30 seconds and ask yourself this powerful question:

"What is here that I have been too busy [distracted] to appreciate?"

Take time to breathe in gratitude—not resentment, frustration, or fear. Always remember, leadership isn't something we're born with, it's something that we grow into.

Happy Thanksgiving! Remember that gratitude is a leadership strategy. What are you focusing on today, leader?

Passive aggression is the emotional sabotage dressed as politeness that is silently draining your team's energy and trust. Tammy J. Bond pulls back the curtain on this pervasive workplace toxicity, revealing that leaders who ignore it aren't keeping the peace—they're preserving the problem. With over 50% of employees reporting being targeted by passive aggression, this episode provides direct, no-fluff strategies for leaders and middle managers to confront this "camouflaged conflict" and restore health to their teams.

• The High Cost of Avoidance: Passive aggression is leadership quicksand. Over half your team may be spending mental energy decoding tone and mannerisms instead of focusing on their jobs.

• The Source of Passive Aggression: It's not about conflict; it's about control. Passive aggressive individuals avoid direct confrontation but use sarcasm, silence, or "forgetfulness" to pull strings and be the master puppeteer.

• The Leadership Leak: Passive aggression is cowardly communication in leadership's clothing.Ignoring it rewards avoidance and reinforces the toxic pattern. Leaders must stop rescuing people from discomfort and start coaching them through it.

• Coaching vs. Dictating: Workplace coaching is not the "point, shoot, and tell" style. True coaching is being curious, asking questions, and evoking answers that help people up-level themselves.

• Directness is Respect: If you are serious about creating a sandbox where adults talk to one another, you must teach the team that healthy directness is respect, not rudeness.

You don't tiptoe through the tulips; you call the behavior what it is.

1. Name It and Claim It: Do not over-explain or accuse. Simply name the specific behavior you observe and tie it back to a core value.
   Example: "I'm noticing sarcasm when we talk about deadlines. Help me understand what's really going on, because sarcasm is not one of our espoused values."

2. Model Clarity and Accountability: Use the clear, simple framework of the SBI+E Model (Situation, Behavior, Impact, and Expectation) for a straightforward, behavioral conversation.

3. Set the Boundary and Hold It: The only way to stop the "leak" is to confront it. Document it, discuss it, and model how to clean up the conflict.

If your leader is the passive-aggressive player, don't accuse them directly. Bring the clarity back to them:

1. Expose the Behavior, Not the Person: Present the situation and the unaligned behavior you've noticed on the team.

2. Ask for Their Strategy: Ask the leader, "How would you go about approaching these behaviors when they have the impact that's causing others to shut down?"

3. Gain the Framework: Let the passive-aggressive leader give you the expectation and solution, then use that framework to present the required behavioral changes.

The next time a coworker drops an "I'm just kidding" that lands like a knife, don't laugh it off. Push pause, take a breath, and ask your next best question. Leadership is about keeping everyone accountable.