Despair sells speed. Ownership builds capability.

Have you ever reflected on the different behavioural levers used by many business and leadership programmes?

Some begin with despair.

Not overtly. Not dramatically. But subtly enough to be effective.

The message usually sounds like this: you’re working hard, the odds are stacked, the system is broken, and if you’re not where you thought you’d be by now, something isn’t right.

That framing works. Despair is a potent activator because it creates urgency, focus, and a readiness to act. It also makes us more willing to hand over agency and cash in exchange for relief.

Frameworks like Action Coach, EOS, and newer wealth-oriented communities all pull on this thread in different ways. They use different language and different aesthetics, but they all play at the same emotional doorway. They don’t invent the despair. They surface something many leaders already feel, and that is powerful.

But despair-led systems carry a structural trade-off: when despair is the entry point, dependency is never far behind. This results from the programme becoming the antidote. All progress is measured inside someone else’s model; therefore, leaving can feel like slipping back into the chaos you were promised escape from.

In contrast, the Thinking in Fields position deliberately begins elsewhere - with ownership rather than escape.

• Not with “you are behind”
• But with “you are already in something complex - let’s find clarity and a pathway through it together.”

It’s an ownership-led starting point.

Yes, it’s slower, certainly less dramatic, and, unfortunately, much harder to sell.
But it works for those willing to stay with it, as it builds capability rather than just compliance.

Once ownership is established, it doesn’t need to be renewed via a subscription.

That is the true difference.

Despair sells speed.

Ownership builds capability.

In the long term, capability accumulates. Orchestration is what turns accumulation into compounding.

What conditions have sustained effort once initial momentum fades in your organisation?