If you've never run a company before, it's likely that you don't fully appreciate how hard it is to navigate the seemingly endless collection of tensions and trade-offs that exist within any organization. These situations are difficult precisely because they rarely involve a choice between something that is clearly right and something that is clearly wrong. More often, leaders find themselves choosing between two priorities that are both important, both defensible, and both worthy of attention. But because time, capital, and focus are finite resources, investing more heavily in one priority inevitably means investing less heavily in the other. This reality creates a unique challenge for leaders: Not only must they determine where to allocate resources, but they must also manage the internal tensions that frequently emerge when different people, teams, or departments become closely aligned with one side of the trade-off or the other. This week, I present seven specific examples of leadership trade-offs that I faced as a CEO, and I do my best to explain why tensions like these are among the most difficult decisions that leaders are asked to make (after all, if the choices were obvious, they wouldn’t require leadership in the first place). The tensions that I explore are: (1) Needs of the “Current Business” vs. Needs of the “Future Business” (2) Existing Employees vs. New Hires (3) Customization vs. Scalability (4) Growth vs. Profitability (5) Delegation vs. Control (6) Speed vs. Scope vs. Quality (7) Persistence at-all-costs vs. Willingness to Pivot Link to article: redacted