"You have good people skills. Want to manage a team?"

That’s what my boss Derek asked me during a one-on-one. He was overloaded with direct reports and needed help. I’d never managed people before, and he knew that. He also knew how to move fast — and how to bulldoze.

Derek was brilliant. His Bestwork Data assessment might flag him as a very “quick information processing” communicator, absorbing and responding to information faster than most people can think. That’s not a compliment. He didn’t slow down, didn’t check for understanding, didn’t ask questions. He just downloaded information and moved on.

I knew if I answered him in the moment, I’d say yes before I’d thought it through. So I said, “Let me sleep on it.” (Pro tip: always do this when someone asks you to make a life-changing decision in an impromptu conversation.)

I said yes the next day. I wasn’t ready. I said yes anyway.

Fast Brains, Bad Communicators

I took over a team without knowing how to lead one. I wasn’t trained. I figured if I was smart and worked hard, it would click.

It didn’t click. I crashed.

I didn’t understand how to communicate as a leader — especially as someone who also processed information quickly. The faster I moved, the more confused my team became. I tried to explain everything at once. People nodded along, but they didn’t get it. They didn’t want to look dumb, so they said yes anyway. They left meetings unclear and stayed quiet until things went sideways.

Maybe Derek thought I’d be a good people person because I was wired a little like him. Quick.

Here’s what I’ve learned since: the faster your brain works, the more damage you do if you don’t slow down. Leadership isn’t about being the smartest person in the room. It’s about helping other people succeed.

That starts with communication.

And if you’re a CEO or leader? That is the job.

The Real Cost of Fast Processing

Research from Grammarly and Harris Poll found that poor communication costs U.S. businesses $1.2 trillion annually. This translates to roughly $12,506 per employee per year. For smaller companies, research by Debra Hamilton shows companies with 100 employees lose an average of $420,000 annually due to miscommunication.

Here's what happens in your organization when you process too fast:

People stop bringing you problems
Teams make assumptions instead of asking questions
Your best performers burn out trying to decode your communication style
Innovation dies because people can't explain ideas fast enough.

The lack of communication gets interpreted as lack of interest. That's not how you inspire people to follow you.

Smart Isn’t the Same as Clear

I work with a lot of founders and execs who process at lightning speed. They’re strategic thinkers, fast talkers, ambitious problem-solvers. Many of them are still terrible communicators.

Not because they’re arrogant. Because they forget their own pace is unusual.

When you’re moving fast, you expect others to keep up. You make decisions while your team is still trying to understand the context. You talk about plans five steps ahead without laying out steps one through four. Eventually, people stop asking questions — not because they understand, but because they’re tired of feeling slow.

If your smartest people are the quietest ones in meetings, this is probably why.

So, What’s the Fix?

It starts with two things: accessibility and intentionality.

You can’t communicate with people you’re never available to. Many executives think they’re accessible. They’re not.

“My Door Is Always Open” (No, It’s Not)

Back when I ran a 500-person company, my literal door stayed open. People dropped in constantly. For a while, I liked it — until I had to assign an assistant to block the chaos.

That “open door” turned into a bottleneck. It doesn’t scale.

What actually worked? I ate lunch in the cafeteria every day. That’s it. Just showed up. Didn’t hold court. Didn’t give speeches. I was present and visible, and people came to talk.

We ran 24/7 shifts, so I held breakfast office hours for the early crews and evening hangouts for the late teams. When the world went remote, doors disappeared, and calendars filled with back-to-back Zooms.

The phrase “my door is open” stopped meaning anything at all.

If you’re an exec or founder, you have to go first. Visibility doesn’t happen passively. Communication isn’t something your team chases you down for. You make space — or they assume there isn’t any.

Try this instead:

Block office hours weekly. Show up with questions and to listen
Host small group virtual coffees. Rotating cast, no agenda
Post in Slack or Teams, wherever people actually hang out virtually
Get on video if you don’t like writing, informal and unproduced
Use async tools like email but don’t rely on them exclusively

Your job is to talk to your people. Stop hiding behind the “open door” line and start doing the work.

The Meetings Are the Work

I remember coming home after my first week as a new manager, complaining to my wife, “I was in meetings all day.”

She didn’t even look up from her book. “Isn’t that your job now?”

She was right. I just hadn’t caught up yet.

As an engineer, I judged my output by what I created: code, bug fixes, tools. The feedback loop was instant. As a manager, my impact happened through other people — and that required time, patience, and meetings.

Most leaders hate meetings because they still think their real work is somewhere else. It’s not. The meeting is the work. It’s where coaching happens. Where friction gets surfaced and conflicts resolved. Where your values show up. If you’re phoning it in or constantly rescheduling, that’s the signal you’re sending to everyone else.

You don’t have to love meetings. But you do have to learn how to lead inside them.

And yes, managing your calendar is part of that.

Color-code your calendar so you know what kind of energy each block will take
Avoid constant context switching — batch/block meetings where you can
Leave time to think, or you’ll never solve anything deeply
Have an agenda, asking, “What’s the best use of our time together today?”
And stop thinking the default meeting time has to be an hour.

If you’re overwhelmed by meetings, the answer isn’t fewer meetings — it’s better ones.

Bottom Line: Communication Is Your Job

Want to fix it? Slow down. Say less. Use fewer words. Ask questions more often than you answer them.

“Does this make sense so far?”

“What part feels unclear?”

“Would you say this back to me in your own words?”

These aren’t weak questions. They’re smart ones. They build trust.

Being fast is a strength. But if you don’t learn to translate, you’ll lose your team — or worse, think everything’s fine while they’re quietly checking out.