A podcast about my work experience and history.

Key themes emerging from the recommendations include:

• Leadership and People Management: Evan is repeatedly described as an empathetic, humble, and supportive leader who prioritizes team growth, fosters psychological safety, encourages collaboration, and promotes professional development. Reviewers highlight his ability to rebuild teams during challenging periods, navigate interpersonal dynamics with emotional intelligence, and empower individuals to excel while maintaining calm under pressure.

• Project Management and Agile Expertise: He is praised for effectively implementing Agile methodologies, adapting processes to organizational needs, explaining complex technical concepts clearly to non-technical stakeholders, and ensuring timely, high-quality project delivery. Several note his success in shifting priorities smoothly and driving innovation.

• Technical and Strategic Acumen: Contributors emphasize his deep technical knowledge (particularly in web development, digital solutions, and marketing technology), strategic thinking, and ability to align IT initiatives with business objectives, resulting in improved performance metrics and organizational growth.

• Interpersonal Qualities: Evan is characterized as approachable, compassionate, collaborative, and professional, with a focus on building trust, valuing diverse perspectives, and creating positive work environments. Many express eagerness to work with him again and recommend him highly for senior or executive roles.

Overall, the recommendations reflect unanimous positive regard, underscoring Evan's reputation as a transformative leader, mentor, and technical expert who consistently delivers results while nurturing team success. The endorsements demonstrate sustained excellence across multiple roles and years.

I worked at a large organization some time back, and when I started, I asked what the existing issue resolution plans were. I got a lot of blank stares. “What do you mean?” said one employee. I explained, “What do you do when there is a problem or critical issue?” “Well, you mean other than leadership running around with their hair on fire?” “Yes, other than that.” “Oh well, then nothing.” This got a good chuckle out of the other team members around the conference table.

“Yikes. Okay, well, I think we can improve that.”

The first problem in issue management is not having a plan. And by a plan, I mean an actual thought-through, written-down, executable series of actions that are used to respond to any and all situations. You’d be amazed at how many organizations do not have one.

I’ve got another myth in mind today. Big Foot? Aliens? The Bermuda Triangle? And by the way, whatever happened to the Bermuda Triangle? When I was a kid, it seemed like every show had some kind of reference to it. Now, no one ever talks about it anymore.

I think some of you won’t agree with my characterization of this as a myth. You will say, “Oh, but Evan, it is very real.” Well, yes, it is real, in the sense that there are many leaders who believe in this; in fact, some might think it is the most important aspect of your work life. But I’m going to explain why it isn’t a real thing, and shouldn’t be a real thing.

The myth of “managing up”.

Let me explain. Have you heard this phrase before? Have you used this phrase before? First, let me say that this isn’t about judging, it’s about awareness and helping leaders improve…without, as the subtitle of my book says, losing your soul.

Most organizations are structured pretty similarly. There are the people who DO the work (in my world, that would be the programmers and developers). They DO 90% of the work. Then there are the managers and directors, those who, hopefully, help those who do the work remove roadblocks, care for their day-to-day needs, ensure they have the support and tools they need to do the work efficiently, etc….Then you have the VPs who hopefully take care of the managers and directors and see that they have good goals and support toward those goals, and the resources they need to accomplish those goals. Then you have executive leaders who should be setting strategy and high-level goals and overall roadmap for the organization.

Right? Isn’t that essentially how most companies are structured? So here is where things, in my opinion, go wrong. When anyone above the DOer group starts to believe the people under them exist to serve their own needs. If I, as a manager, believe that my team’s job is to serve me and do things to make me look good and appease me, we have a broken system. The same is true at each level. So if a VP demands of a director or manager that they “manage up” rather than manage down, it’s a sign of a broken system, a broken culture, one that is essentially driven by the concept that I’m more important than you are, and you must understand that and capitulate to my importance.