Holding the Line and Building the Path

Anxious energy is contagious. So is calm.

Handling panic was not learned in leadership seminars. It was learned from my dogs, Scout and Luna.

With a reactive dog like Scout, shouting and frantic gestures do not fix the problem. They accelerate it. If the handler shows panic, the animal mirrors it. Scout taught me that chaos collapses when you give it nothing to push against: physical stillness and zero internal noise. Centre of gravity down, breathing slow, ground held.

Luna refined the lesson out on rough mountain ground. Animals do not listen to mission statements. They read posture, tension and intent.

Frantic management is an anxious handler yelling at a stressed dog. When a system is ambiguous, people make mistakes and cut corners. Some managers shout louder and pile on threats, spending their energy policing people after the failure has happened.

Broken systems are fixed at the path. When the correct step is the easiest step, compliance turns automatic. Single-choice gates in the workflow, so the wrong turn is not there to take.

A small solicitors' firm showed me what that looks like. They emailed me on the 9th of October 2024: they were working towards Cyber Essentials accreditation, and the brief was to go round each computer, bring everything up to date, advise on antivirus options and price, and set up a standard user account on each machine because everyone currently logged in as an administrator.

Everyone as admin. Every user holding the master key.

The usual answer is an expensive subscription tool. Native Windows controls hardened. Strict local group policy set. Endpoint baseline locked down with tools the operating system already ships with. A standard account for daily work and a separate admin account for admin. The wrong step stopped being the easy one.

Every control people can walk round faces one question: what does a person have to do to get round it? A control that makes the safe step the default beats a reminder every time.