Why You're Always Firefighting Instead of Leading

In 2023, I walked into the year knowing I had to let go of 60% of my staff. My company had just lost $60,000 in monthly recurring revenue. My youngest daughter was learning to walk.

Between late 2022 and the end of 2023, the hits kept coming. My mother-in-law was diagnosed with three cancers. My brother-in-law was diagnosed with colon cancer. My wife was diagnosed with a rare skin cancer. In July 2023, my aunt died suddenly from a brain aneurysm.

Then in January 2024, my cousin was in a near-fatal head-on collision.

In early 2024, I was traveling back and forth to Florida to support my family, trying to run an operation built for over $1 million on half the revenue, managing two active projects with a new one about to kick off.

I was relying on my COO—with me for over three years—to help me stabilize the ship. "I'm in this with you," he said. "We're going to rebuild."

Then the ground gave way.

The Phone Call That Collapsed Everything

I was sitting at a kitchen table with my cousin, whose jaw had just been unwired from the accident, when my COO called.

"Our lead developer had a family emergency. He's leaving for Holland for at least a week." Our only developer. The one scheduled to start the new project.

And then: "And I'm taking an offer from one of our clients. You have me for four more weeks."

He was walking away with a client—and their revenue.

I took a breath. "Walk me through the other projects so I can pick them up."

"The new one? We're doing it in six weeks. I have three sprints planned."

I opened JIRA. That was not a six-week project. It was 24 weeks, minimum.

"Did you push back on this timeline?"

Silence.

The Reality Snapshot

The COO was leaving and taking a client with him.
The only developer was gone indefinitely.
A 24-week project had been promised in six weeks without pushback.
I had four active commitments and no team to execute them.

I was running the business while living out of a suitcase supporting my family through crisis.

Betrayal vs Abdication

This is where the story about betrayal usually begins. "Why is this happening to me? I've been stabbed in the back."

But sitting at that kitchen table, watching my cousin relearn how to eat, I realized something:

I wasn't betrayed. I abdicated.

I had given my COO liberty without accountability. I trusted him to "handle it" so I could deal with my grief. But trust is not a system.

Delegation minus accountability equals abdication.

When you abdicate, you don't get betrayal—you get volatility. He didn't hide the timeline because he was malicious. He hid it because I removed the governance that required him to show it.

What Trust Without Governance Creates

I stayed involved, but I stopped verifying. I stayed connected, but I stopped inspecting. I called that "trust."

In reality, I'd removed the governance layer that kept volatility in check.

I stopped verifying that we were aligned before promises were made. I assumed that "I'm in this with you" meant we were operating from the same map.

I gave liberty without accountability and called it delegation. I allowed him to make commitments without oversight or validation.

Reasserting Governance Under Pressure

I brought in a senior PM I trusted. I called the client with the poisoned timeline: "The previous timeline was unrealistic. I'm fixing it. You'll have a real plan in 48 hours."

Within that same 48-hour window, while repairing the project and delivering two others, I had to attend an eight-hour on-site meeting for a six-figure discovery. Next to the COO who had just walked away.

Every part of me wanted to flip the table. But I focused entirely on what was mine to handle.

We closed the discovery. We saved the project. I rebuilt the team.