Gray is a Question

Black and white are answers.

Gray is a question.

That’s why I love it.

Not for the look of it. For the challenge of it. Black and white are clean, absolute, done. Gray depends on what went into it...and how much.

If the work I do were clear-cut, it would come down to one or the other. Right or wrong.

But it doesn't.

It's gray. It's less important to answer 'Which shade is it?' than 'What's causing it?'

The shade isn’t fixed. Look at a business today, and it appears one way. Turn a light on it a week later- a new initiative, a key financial update, a founder finally saying the unsaid- and it looks very different.

Same org chart. Same people. Different gray.

Logic and rationale are the black and white. Necessary, but not enough. They’re the base, not the true picture.

A senior leader told me that an ownership stake would finally make him feel empowered to make critical decisions. To be able to speak for the firm.

It made sense. Ownership creates authority.

Except when we looked at what would really change. Very little.

The current owner would retain all the formal control. The paperwork wouldn’t materially change his permission. It would change how legitimate he felt using it.

Ownership wasn’t the real constraint. It was who he believed he would become once he had it.

What actually tints the work, what turns a logical decision into a murky gray, is emotion and ego. Things that are invisible on paper but unmistakable in practice.

My job is to find what's been normalized until no one sees it anymore.

That’s what I love about it.

Not the gray itself.

What’s causing it.