Crystal Stapley

I Was Asked What My Superpower Was. Someone Else Answered Before I Could. And in that moment, I was reminded why one of the most powerful tools in leadership has absolutely nothing to do with authority, experience, or a title. Recently, I was sitting in on a roundtable discussion about biosolids and the impact they have on operations. You know how these conversations go. One minute we’re talking about material management and operational challenges, and the next we’ve somehow found ourselves...

High performers have a funny habit. We find each other. Not because we're walking around with some secret handshake or flashing a "Top 1%" badge. We recognize things that never make it onto a résumé, the person who asks one more question, volunteers before they're asked, notices a problem before it becomes everyone else's emergency, or quietly raises the standard without ever announcing they're doing it. For years, people have asked me whether high performers are born or built. My answer has...

This piece is part of a chapter from Allies and Egos, scheduled for publication in the coming months. But lately, too many things have reinforced exactly why this chapter needed to be written in the first place. So here we are. Operations has a way of teaching people the truth whether they want it or not. The equipment tells the truth. The slopes tell the truth. The turnover tells the truth. The condition of the working face tells the truth. And the exhausted operator doing the job of three...