The People, Process, & Progress Podcast - Episode 430: New Year. New Intent.

Episode Date: July 13, 2026

Welcome to Episode 430 of People, Process, Progress.For many organizations, July marks the beginning of a new fiscal year. Budgets reset, priorities shift, and new initiatives begin. It's an exciting time, but it's also the perfect opportunity to pause before rushing into more work.In this episode, Kevin Pannell shares why every successful year should begin with leadership intent rather than simply launching new projects. Drawing from more than three decades of experience in the military, emergency management, healthcare, public safety, information technology, and higher education, Kevin explores how clear intent helps leaders align teams, improve governance, prioritize meaningful work, and create better outcomes.In this episode, you'll learn:Why a new fiscal year should be part portfolio reset and part previous year re-evaluationWhat leadership intent is, and what it isn'tWhy people-centered problems require people-centered leadershipHow listening during your first 90 days builds trust and improves decisionsWhy governance should improve decision quality instead of creating bureaucracyHow portfolio management is really about investing in better human outcomesWhy lessons learned without improvement plans rarely lead to meaningful changeWhether you're leading a project, a PMO, a department, or an entire organization, this episode will help you begin the fiscal year with greater clarity, stronger alignment, and practical leadership principles you can put into practice immediately.Resources???? The People, Process, & Progress of Project Management???? The Stability Equation???? https://peopleprocessprogress.com???? X & Instagram: @thekevinpannell???? Interested in leadership development, project management, PMO transformation, or keynote speaking? Connect through the website.Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who is committed to leading people, improving processes, and making meaningful progress.

Welcome to People Process Progress. I'm Kevin Pinell. One of the things I've enjoyed most over the last 30 years or so is realizing that while the environments I've served in have been very different, the leadership challenges have been remarkably similar. I've worn different uniforms. I've worked in the military, emergency medical services, the fire service, emergency management, healthcare, information technology. Now I'm in higher education. The buildings have changed. The technologies have changed. Even the language that I use and my teammates use has changed. but the people haven't. If we've been, leaders have wrestled with the same questions. How do we decide what matters most? How do we bring people together around a common purpose? How do we build processes that help instead of getting in the way? And maybe the biggest question of all, how do we know we're actually making progress

instead of simply staying busy? Those questions aren't unique to project management. They're leadership questions. Whether you're leading a trauma center through a major implementation, coordinating resources during a hurricane, helping deliver technology to a university, or leading a small team inside your own organization. You're trying to accomplish the same thing. You're trying to help good people do meaningful work that improve the lives of other people.

Great ideas don't build themselves. It takes the right people aligning the right process for the team to drive real progress. Welcome to the People Process Progress podcast, where I break down the execution behind evolution. I'm your host Kevin Pennell, veteran public safety leader and PMO director who has spent decades leading teams through high stakes operations and complex change. If you want to stop spinning your wheels and start executing, you're in the right place. For more, head over to people processprogress.com. Now let's get into it. I enjoy the beginning of a fiscal year. For many of us, July doesn't just mean hotter weather and a new page on the calendar. It represents a natural

pause. It's an opportunity to look back honestly before looking for. forward, hopefully. I think that's important because one of the biggest mistakes organizations make is believing a new fiscal year means starting over. I don't think it does. I think a new fiscal year is a portfolio reset and part previous year reevaluation. Those are two very different things. Starting ever suggests the past no longer matters. Re-evaluating says the past has something to teach us. Before we approve another project, let's understand the ones already underway. Before we ask for additional funding, let's make sure we've invested wisely with the resources we've already been given. Before we build another roadmap, let's make sure we're still headed

toward the right destination. The longer I lead, the less I believe in starting new things, simply so we can say we started something. The more I believe in listening to our people and building leadership processes and guardrails around what they need to succeed. So that's where leadership intent begins. When I talk about intent, I'm not talking about intent. I'm not talking about a mission statement framed in a hallway or a vision statement that goes updated every few years, those absolutely have value, but they're usually too broad, right, to help someone decide what to do when priorities collide on a Tuesday afternoon. Leadership intent is different. Leadership intent is the practical guidance that helps people make good decisions when you're not in the room.

I've heard intent express in very simple ways. Quote, as we begin this fiscal year, I want us to take an objective and transparent look at what we're doing today, what we should continue doing tomorrow, and where we need to change, I expect leaders to provide direction, then trust their teams to lead and execute, end quote. I don't know I did quotes because that's me. Think about how much clarity exists in just two sentences. No methodology, no organization chart, no software, no project list, just principles. Right, but there's principles become the filter for every decision that follows. They hope people decide not only what to do, but just as importantly, what not to do. One of the reasons this resonates with me is because I've watched organizations spend

enormous amounts of time trying to perfect processes before they've established intent. They redesign governance. They buy new software. They create dashboards. They hold more meetings. None of those things are inherently bad, but they don't answer the most important question. What are we actually trying to accomplish? The Project Management Institute talks about aligning portfolios with organizational strategy.

Lean encourage us to focus on value and eliminate work that doesn't contribute to it. Change management reminds us that successful transformation happens one person at a time. Whether you call it strategy, value, or change, I think they're all pointing toward the same idea. People make better decisions when they understand where they're going and why it matters. That's why I believe the first 90 days of leadership should be spent listening as much as leading. That doesn't mean leaders avoid making decisions. It means they earn the right decisions by first understanding the environment they're stepping into. Every process exists because it solved a problem at some point.

Some still do. Some don't. The way to know the difference is to listen before you prescribe. I've learned that lesson more than once. A few years ago, I was asked to help with a large website migration involving more than 7,000 pages of content. The project was already underway, talented people working incredibly hard, And like many complex initiatives, it wasn't where anyone wanted it to be. My initial role was simple.

Help strengthen relationships, improve collaboration, help people work together more effectively. So I listened. I met with people individually. I paid attention to where communication broke down. I watched where processes created friction instead of clarity. For a while, I stayed in that supporting role because that's what I thought the team needed. Then the project leader pulled me aside and said something I'll never forget. I need you to step in more.

I need you to help lead this with me. That conversation changed everything. Not because my title change, not because my authority change, because the intent became unmistakably clear. I knew what she expected from me. I knew where she wanted me to challenge the team. I knew where she wanted me to simplify. I knew where she wanted me to lead.

Once that happened, something interesting followed. The conversations changed. People became more open. Meetings became shorter. Processes became simpler. Not because we were trying to simplify things. because we finally understood what we were trying to accomplish together. And that's a lesson I've carried with me ever since.

That lesson has stayed with me because it applies far beyond one project. The longer I lead, the more I believe leadership isn't about having the best answers. It's about creating an environment where good people can consistently make good decisions. That's why intent comes before process. Without intent, process becomes bureaucracy. Without intent, governance becomes another meeting, without intent, projects become lists of tasks instead of investments in meaningful outcomes. What's intent is clear, though, everything else starts falling into place. Governance is a great

example. I'll be honest, governance has earned a bad reputation in many organizations. We've all sat through meetings that seem to exist simply because they were on the calendar. We've all completed templates that nobody read and provided status updates that never influenced the decision. That's not governance, that's administration. Good governance. exists for one reason to improve the quality of decisions. Sometimes that means approving work. Sometimes it means redirecting work. Sometimes it means asking a question nobody else has asked yet. And sometimes it means slowing everyone down just enough to say, let's think about this for a minute. I always think about an old Arsenio Hall bit where he'd pause and simply say, hmm, good governance

should create some of those moments, not because we're trying to make work harder, because we're trying to make sure we're doing the right work. I found a few simple questions can change an entire conversation. Is this work required? Is there a safety, compliance, or regulatory reason? We have to do it. If we don't do it, what actually happens? Who benefits from this? Does it improve the experience for many people? Or are we responding to the loudest voice in the room? Those aren't project management questions. Those are leadership questions. And when leaders consistently ask them, something interesting begins to happen. Teams become more thoughtful. Departments begin collaborating instead of competing. People stop defending their projects and

start talking about organizational priorities. That's where portfolios begin to mature. The Project Management Institute defines portfolio management as aligning investments with organizational strategy, and I think that's right. I just tend to describe it in language that's a little more personal. To me, a portfolio is a collection of investments focused on improving human outcomes enabled by technology. Every one of those words matters, investment, human outcomes, enabled, technology. When I review a portfolio, I don't immediately ask how many projects we have. Ask what outcomes we're investing in. That's a very different conversation. Technology is important. I love technology. I've built a career around it. But technology is rarely the reason we exist.

patients don't come to a hospital because they want better software, students don't come to a university because they want another application, citizens don't care what project methodology we use. They care about the outcome. Technology enables that outcome. People create it. That's why I've become convinced that many organizations try to solve people-centered problems with technology. It's understandable. Technology is way easier. Buying software is easier than rebuilding trust, creating another dashboard is easier than having an honest conversation. Adding another meeting is easier than deciding one meeting should probably disappear. But those are leadership decisions, not technology decisions.

That brings me to something I've believed for a long time. Bad behaviors exist because they're tolerated. I know that's direct, but believe me, it's true. When we hear someone say, that's just how they are, or that's not our purview, What we're often hearing is permission to avoid leadership. Leadership isn't about controlling people. Leadership is having the courage to address what everyone else has learned to ignore. Sometimes, that's a difficult conversation. Sometimes it's resetting expectations. Sometimes it's simply asking a question that nobody else has been willing to ask. I've learned that ignoring problems

rarely makes them smaller. Addressing them respectfully, usually does. Same philosophy. The same philosophy. applies to prioritization. Every organization has more ideas than it has capacity. That's totally normal. Every leader has someone asking for one more project, one more enhancement, one more report, one more meeting. If we aren't careful, we slowly convince ourselves that everything is urgent. The reality is everything can't be the highest priority. One of the hardest things to say is not yet. Notice I didn't say no. Sometimes not yet is exactly the right answer. Not because the idea like value because another investment currently delivers greater value. But leadership isn't about making everyone happy. Leadership is about creating conditions where people can succeed. I've never believed

leaders should be people pleasers. I believe leaders should be people enablers. If you listen to this podcast before, you know I trained Brazilian jiu-jitsu. One of the things I appreciate most about good instructors is that they don't solve every problem for you. They let you work. They let you struggle. Then, when you truly need it, they stop you, show you something you couldn't see, and send you right back into the role. The developing leaders on the mat, not followers waiting for instructions. I've tried to carry that philosophy into every leadership role I've had. Let leaders lead.

Support them when they need help. If they need to tap for a moment, step in, teach them. Then help them get back out there stronger than before. That's how organizations become resilient. Before we close, there's one more lesson I'd encourage every leader to think about as this fiscal year begins. Lessons learned. Most organizations are actually pretty good at conducting them. We document what well.

We identify what didn't. We capture opportunities for improvement. Then something strange happens. The meeting ends. The document gets saved. Everyone moves on. Nothing changes. I've seen lessons learned documents without standing observations that were never.

turned into improvement plans. Knowing what's wrong is an improvement. Talking about what's wrong is an improvement. Improvement happens when we summarize those opportunities. Group them into meaningful focus areas, assign owners, establish realistic due dates, and come back later to ask a simple question. Did we actually get better? If the answer is no, that we didn't really conduct lessons learned. We simply documented history. This is one of the reasons you'll hear me return to the same leadership principles throughout this year. Different organizations, different missions, the same fundamentals, clear intent, knowing what done looks like, simple, smart objectives, functional organization, requesting resources we actually need instead of the kitchen sink,

communication that adapts to the situation instead of following a rigid schedule, and finally, making sure the people who inherit our work are truly ready before we walk away. I've seeing those ideas that work in the military. I've seen them work during disasters and hospitals, technology, and now in higher education. Different environments, the same principles. So as you begin this fiscal year, I'd like to leave you with two questions. If you're a leader, have you provided clear intent for your team? Not just for the next project, but for how you expect people to think, collaborate, prioritize, and make decisions throughout the year. And if you're part of a team, have been given that intent. If priorities suddenly change tomorrow, would you know how to respond without

waiting for someone else to tell you exactly what to do? Those questions matter because leadership isn't measured by how many projects we start. It's measured by the outcomes we create and the leaders we develop along the way. Next month, we're going to build on this conversation by talking about priorities. Every organization has more opportunities that it has capacity. The challenge isn't finding worthwhile work. The challenge is choosing to choose. the work that matters most. Until then, remember this. Begin with intent. Build trust. Strengthen your people, improve your process, measure your progress. Because at the end of the day, every project, every portfolio, every governance meeting, and every technology investment

should make life better for the people we're here to serve. That's people, process, progress. Before we wrap up, thank you for spending part of your day with me. I know there are a lot of podcasts and leadership resources out there, and I appreciate you choosing People Process Progress. For today's conversation resonated with you. I'd love to hear your thoughts. You can find me on X and Instagram at the Kevin Pannell or visit the People Processprogress.com where you'll find episodes, additional leadership resources, and articles that continue these conversations. If you're interested in diving deeper in my books, The People Process and Progress of Project Management and the Stability Equation, expand on many of the leadership principles we've discussed today

and provide practical frameworks you can apply with your own teams. If your organization, conference, or leadership teams looking for a speaker on leadership, project and portfolio management, organizational change, or building high-performing teams, I'd be honored to be part of that conversation. You could reach me through my website. If you enjoy this episode, please consider subscribing, leaving a review,

and sharing it with a colleague or friend. That's still the best way to help others discover the show and continue building a community of leaders committed to serving people, improving processes, and making meaningful progress together. Until next time, I'm Kevin Pannell. Keep leading with purpose. Keep learning and keep moving forward. I'll see you in episode 431. Godspeed, go.