Early in my leadership career — particularly in tech-driven environments like the Clippers — I fell into what I now call the "fixer trap": stepping in to solve problems myself in ways that felt heroic but were actually undermining my team's growth. The moment that cracked it open for me was when a top engineer quietly told me she could have resolved the systems failure I'd rushed to fix myself. She wasn't frustrated — she was measured. And that measured tone hit harder than any complaint would have. I had communicated, without saying a word, that I didn't trust her. Over time I saw the same pattern play out at UTA, where I realized I'd made myself the bridge between teams rather than building one — creating a dependency that made the organization fragile every time I wasn't in the room.

The shift came when I stopped leading with answers and started leading with questions. A simple prompt — "What have you tried so far?" — returned ownership to the person facing the problem. From there I developed what I call the Three Asks Rule: before offering any solution, I ask three guiding questions to help someone find their own way forward. Most of the time, by the third question, they've already found it. And when people arrive at solutions themselves, they own the outcome in a way they never would if I'd just handed them the answer. That's the real work of leadership — not being the fastest problem solver in the room, but building a room full of people who don't need you to be.

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