Leadership and the Power of Regret: Turning Emotions into Action
summary
Argues regret is a learning signal tied to upward counterfactuals and soothed by downward counterfactuals, not moralizing shame. Gives concrete examples: a buggy "report groups" drag‑and‑drop UX that eats two sprints, an eslint standardization finished across all projects in two days, and an extreme real‑world fuel example where people dig a 110 m long, 7.7 m deep channel by hand over 22 years. Recommends a practical three‑step loop regret reflect reform and when to use retros, postmortems, or satisficing.
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chapters (13)
- 0:00Leadership and regret intro
- 1:07Personal regret story
- 4:00What regret is
- 8:59Counterfactuals with Olympics
- 13:40Rumination and emotional regret
- 22:16Reflect reform framework
- 29:47Regret undone vs done
- 35:44Maximizing vs satisficing
- 40:58Regret in team leadership
- 46:19Regret in retrospectives
- 47:22Communicating regret
- 50:33Helpful vs harmful regret
- 53:25Summary for leaders
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