the only thing i know is history doesnt remember the cautious

Feeling easy around someone is an underrated form of leadership. For people already so self-driven they border on self-exploitation, high-pressure management doesn't motivate—it just accelerates burnout. That's why I've come to value my current leads: they stay optimistic, don't complain, move fast, and when something breaks, they simply fix it. The result is counterintuitive: discussing problems with them feels less stressful than carrying them alone. It's a relief, not a performance review. The self-driven don't lack motivation. They struggle with over-expectation, perfectionism, and the fear of disappointing others. A leader who adds pressure on top of that isn't raising the bar; they're amplifying anxiety. But a leader who signals "we iterate, not perfect" and "trying costs less than you think" creates the psychological space where good work actually happens. In high-knowledge, high-iteration, high-volatility industries, leadership doesn't have to mean being the smartest, the toughest, or the one who grinds the hardest. It can mean this: your presence makes people feel like everything is manageable, and even the craziest ideas are, at the very least, worth trying.

In male-heavy industries like crypto, I notice a pattern: women speak up on issues like harassment, but often feel the need to add, “I’m not a feminist, but…”. I understand where it comes from. The word “feminist” has been demonised to the point that openly owning it feels like a career risk. You want to protect your access to male networks, you want to keep your audience broad, so you rebrand very basic ideas as something SOFTER: “I’m not into labels, I just care about fairness.” The irony is that what they are describing is feminism in its most fundamental, reasonable form: women are human, we should not be harassed at work, incentives and power should not be abused. That is not radical. That is just human rights applied to half the population. Personally I’m less interested in policing labels and more interested in the psychology behind that disclaimer. When a woman has to say “I’m not a feminist” as a safety spell before she criticises harassment, it tells you more about the environment than about her. It shows how expensive it still is, reputationally, to say openly: “yes, I am a feminist, and no, that doesn’t mean I hate every male.”