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Welcome back - it's nice to have you here!

Before we dive in...

About four years ago, someone suggested I should start charging people for the introductions I make.

Not coaching. Not consulting. Introductions. And I remember thinking that it felt completely wrong.

I love connecting people. I love finding the overlap between two people who might never have crossed paths and seeing what happens when they do. I call those collisions.

Sometimes a conversation turns into a partnership. Sometimes it creates an opportunity. Sometimes two interesting people just have a really good conversation. That's enough for me.

So the idea of putting a price tag on every introduction felt like turning something I genuinely enjoy into a transaction. I still feel that way. But I've been reconsidering something else.

What happens when you're so comfortable creating opportunities for other people that you become uncomfortable asking them to create one for you?

And what happens when a strength you've spent years developing becomes something everyone, including you, simply expects you to keep providing?

🎯 THE MOMENT

Over the past couple of weeks, I've had several conversations that have stayed with me. People with impressive careers. Strong LinkedIn profiles. Established networks. Accomplishments that look great from the outside. The kind of people you might assume have things pretty well figured out.

Then the conversation moves past the usual professional introductions. And something different comes out.

Business isn't where they expected it to be. Revenue isn't where they'd hoped. Finding leads is harder than it looks. Closing clients is taking longer than they anticipated.

These aren't people who suddenly forgot how to do their jobs. They're capable people navigating real challenges.

And the contrast between the polished public story and the private conversation is fascinating. Not because anyone is necessarily pretending. Because both versions can be true.

You can be accomplished and uncertain. Well-connected and in need of an introduction. Successful by one measure and struggling by another.

I recognize some of that in myself. I've spent years building relationships, connecting people, and helping opportunities find their way to the right places. That comes naturally to me.

Asking someone to help me find my next client? Historically, not nearly as naturally. Which raises an uncomfortable question.

When did being good at helping become a reason to hesitate before asking for help?

⚡ QUICK SPIN

A strength becomes a trap when you stop choosing when to use it.

Competence creates value. Value creates expectations. Expectations become habits. And habits can quietly become obligations.

The problem isn't that you're no longer good at something.

It's that being good at it may have become part of a deal you never consciously agreed to.

🛠️ MY TURN

For much of my corporate marketing career, I brought my personality into the work.

I wasn't always the most technical marketer in the room. I wasn't always the person with the deepest command of every data set. But I could connect with people.

Clients weren't just accounts. Colleagues in other departments weren't just functions on an organizational chart. They were people. And understanding people helped me do better work.

That carried through agency pitches, client relationships, and eventually into the work I do today.

But something else happened as my career evolved. I started to see that a capability could remain valuable even when the environment around it changed.

At Microsoft, for example, I could build strong relationships with clients and still feel a disconnect between the work I was doing, the product I was representing, and what I believed mattered.

The strength hadn't disappeared. The fit had changed. That's an important distinction.

We often talk about growth as though we're supposed to keep sharpening our existing strengths. Become an even better communicator. An even more decisive leader. An even more reliable problem solver.

But what if the next stage doesn't need more of the same strength? What if it needs a different application of it?

I think about that now when I look at my own tendency to give before I ask. Making introductions genuinely energizes me. I don't want to lose that.

But building a coaching business has required me to get more comfortable saying things like:

Sometimes the most useful thing I can do isn't make another connection. It's letting someone make one for me.

That doesn't make the relationship transactional. It makes the relationship more reciprocal.

And for someone who naturally gravitates toward being useful, that can be a surprisingly meaningful shift.

📚 THE BACKUP

This pattern extends well beyond networking.

Consider a founder who builds a business by being exceptionally good at solving problems. Early on, their competence is a competitive advantage. A client needs an answer? They have it. A process breaks? They fix it. Someone on the team gets stuck? They step in.

And because they're genuinely good at those things, the immediate results often reinforce the behavior. The customer is happy. The deadline is met. The team gets unstuck. Everybody moves on.

Except something else may be happening underneath. The founder is teaching the organization where answers come from. The team learns when to escalate. The founder learns that stepping in works. And the business gradually builds its routines around one person's competence.

Nobody necessarily designed it that way. The system simply adapted to what kept working.

Until the organization reached a stage where the same pattern started limiting growth.

Now the founder needs people who can exercise judgment without waiting for approval. But the system has spent years rewarding the opposite behavior. That's the hidden cost.

A strength can solve today's problem while preventing tomorrow's capability from developing.

And this doesn't only happen in companies. Think about the person in a family who remembers every appointment. The colleague who always organizes the meeting. The executive who never seems rattled. The friend who makes every plan. The manager who can rescue almost any struggling project.

When someone repeatedly demonstrates a capability, the people around them may begin organizing their own behavior around its availability.

Eventually, the question shifts from Can this person help? to Why wouldn't this person handle it?

That's a very different expectation. And the person providing the capability can start internalizing it.

What began as a description of a strength becomes a rule about how you're supposed to behave. There are at least three costs hiding in that shift.

1. The capacity cost. You keep absorbing work because you're efficient at it, even when your time and energy would create more value elsewhere.
2. The development cost. Other people get fewer chances to build judgment, confidence, and ownership because you're so effective at stepping in.
3. The identity cost. You become reluctant to act outside the role you've established, especially when that means admitting uncertainty or asking for support.

None of these costs requires bad intentions.

In fact, they often emerge from genuinely good qualities. Reliability. Generosity. Resourcefulness. Commitment.

That's what makes the trap difficult to see.

🛠️ THE SYSTEM

So how do we interrupt it without telling people to stop being generous, reliable, or excellent at their work?

I think we have to separate three things that often get bundled together.

Capability. Expectation. Obligation.

Capability is what you're able to contribute. Expectation is what other people have learned to anticipate. Obligation is what you believe you must continue providing.

Those aren't the same thing. But when we operate on autopilot, they can feel identical.

Here's a small exercise I'd use this week.

The Competence Check

Pick one thing you're known for. Not something you're struggling to learn. Something you're already good at.

Maybe you're the person who solves difficult problems. Maybe you connect people. Maybe you keep everyone organized. Maybe you're the one who always stays calm.

Now ask four questions.

1. Where does this strength create real value?

Start here because we aren't trying to turn a gift into a flaw.

Name what the capability makes possible. Who benefits? Why does it matter to you? What would genuinely be lost if you stopped using it altogether?

2. Where has that capability become the default expectation?

Look for the places where people no longer ask whether you're available or interested. They simply assume you'll handle it.

Also look for the expectations you've created for yourself. Sometimes nobody is demanding that you keep doing something. You're the one who can't imagine not doing it.

3. What's the cost of continuing exactly as you are?

Don't stop at your own time. Ask what the pattern might be preventing.

Is someone else missing an opportunity to learn? Are you avoiding work that requires a different capability? Are you preserving an identity that no longer fits your circumstances? Are you making it harder for others to know when you need support?

4. What would intentional use of this strength look like now?

This is the important one.

The answer might be to delegate. Or teach. Or set a boundary. Or keep doing the thing, but on different terms. Or ask someone else to do for you what you've so often done for them.

The goal isn't to become less capable. It's to regain a choice you may not have realized you'd lost.

Try this before lunch

Find one moment today when your competence triggers an automatic response.

Someone asks for help. A problem appears. An opportunity to step in presents itself.

Before doing what you usually do, ask:

Then decide.

You might still say yes. But you'll know why.

💡 THE SHIFT

We tend to imagine that growth means adding capabilities.

Another skill. Another credential. Another tool. More experience.

And sometimes that's exactly what growth requires. But there are transitions where adding more competence doesn't solve the problem. Because the problem isn't what you're capable of doing. It's what you've become accustomed to being responsible for.

The founder doesn't necessarily need to become a better problem solver. They may need to become better at developing problem solvers.

The executive doesn't necessarily need more answers. They may need to create an environment where other people can challenge theirs.

The person who makes connections doesn't need to become less generous. They may need to become more willing to participate in the reciprocity that makes relationships meaningful.

The next version of your leadership may require less proof of what you can do and more judgment about what you should do.

That's a different kind of growth. And it can be difficult precisely because it asks you to question something that has served you well.

🧭 THE CAPABILITY-EXPECTATION-OBLIGATION FILTER

Here's the distinction I want you to keep:

Capability: I can do this.

Expectation: People assume I'll do this.

Obligation: I feel I have to do this.

Those statements may describe the same activity. But they don't carry the same meaning. When all three are aligned with your priorities, your energy, and the needs of the people around you, wonderful. When they're not, you may be operating from an old agreement nobody has revisited.

And unlike a formal contract, these agreements rarely come with a renewal date. You have to notice when it's time to renegotiate.

🤗 YOUR TURN

What's one thing you're so good at that people rarely stop to ask whether you should still be the one doing it?

And here's the Monday challenge:

Change one response.

Ask for help instead of offering it. Invite someone else to make the decision. Say, “I can help you think it through,” instead of taking over. Or keep doing the thing you love, but make sure it's still a choice.

One small interruption can reveal a surprisingly large pattern.

👊 LET'S TALK

This is one of the tensions I see frequently in Transition Leadership. The way you earned your current responsibilities isn't always the way you'll succeed with the next ones.

And the challenge isn't necessarily developing a completely new personality or abandoning what makes you effective. It's learning which parts of your operating system still serve you, which parts need to evolve, and which expectations you may have outgrown.

That's where EnergyOS becomes more than a conversation about having enough energy. It's also about whether you're directing that energy toward the work, relationships, and responsibilities that actually deserve it.

If this issue brought a particular strength to mind, hit reply. I'd be curious to hear what you're exceptionally good at that you're learning to use differently.

👉 adamwbarney.com​

Cheers, Adam

P.S. I'm still not charging for introductions. 😂 Connecting good people remains one of my favorite things to do. But I'm getting better at remembering that the network I've spent years helping build can help me, too. And sometimes the most useful introduction is the one you finally ask someone else to make.

🔌 STAY PLUGGED IN

What happens when being capable means admitting what you don't know?

That's a question running through this week's Is Anything Real? conversation with Toni Will, general manager of the Kalamazoo Wings, women's leadership coach, and author of Rebellious Success.

Toni entered professional hockey after a career in banking and economic development. She knew how to build culture, develop people, and sell. What she didn't know was how to run the business side of a hockey franchise. And she didn't pretend otherwise.

She visited other teams, asked questions, and learned from people who had experience she didn't. Rather than treating that knowledge gap as a threat to her credibility, she made curiosity part of how she led. That connects directly to this week's Competence Trap.

Sometimes the pressure to appear competent becomes the very thing that prevents us from growing. We get attached to being the person with the answers, even when the next chapter requires different questions, different perspectives, or help from someone else.

Toni also brought something valuable precisely because she hadn't spent her career inside hockey. While others were deeply focused on the sport itself, she could see the broader opportunity to connect with the community and create experiences for people who weren't necessarily hockey fans.

We discuss the outsider advantage, women leading in traditionally male-dominated industries, the difference between expertise and gatekeeping, and what happens when leaders create access for others instead of simply celebrating their own place in the room.

The connection to this week's newsletter?

Your competence should expand what's possible, not limit you to what you've already proven you can do.

🎙️ Lead the Room: Women in Sports, Outsider Advantage, and Real Leadership | Ep. 84 with Toni Will​

Sometimes the most capable thing a leader can say is, “I don't know yet.”

IS ANYTHING REAL? • EPISODE 84 Lead the Room: Women in Sports, Outsider Advantage, and Real Leadership | Ep. 84 w/ Toni Will 24:32 MORE INFO

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