Why Leaders Can't See What the Room Already Knows | Kristine Frost on Leadership Blind Spots

Why do leaders miss what everyone else sees? Kristine Frost explores how leadership blind spots keep teams from effective decision making. Identifying your own leadership blind spots is the first step toward better inclusion and more accurate decision-making. By learning to recognize the signals your team is sending, you can move from performing as a static authority to becoming a responsive partner. We discuss why this shift is critical for high-level organizational health and personal professional growth. If you're not at the table, you're on the menu. Kristine Frost spent years in the C-suite and now advises it, and her argument is about who never gets a seat. The room goes quiet, the chief executive answers their own questions, and the real conversation happens in the hallway afterward. She offers a way back in: walk the plant floor, take the input without giving up the decision, and stop treating the people most affected as an afterthought. Key Takeaways • Most C-suite teams do not struggle because they lack diverse perspectives. They struggle because the room is not ready to hear them. • If you are different, it is lonely. Being the only woman, the only disabled voice, or the only LGBTQ voice in the room has a real cost, and masking it is exhausting. • Walking the shop floor and dressing like the people doing the work earns kinship, not just compliance, and it makes the decision land better once it is made. • When a leader disciplines their ego in the room, the team starts behaving like a team instead of seven individuals competing for the decision. Questions This Episode Answers Q: How do you get diverse perspectives to actually speak up in a C-suite? A: You need a CEO and a board that genuinely want multiple voices and are willing to sit with the discomfort of real debate. Then you have to make the room safe enough that people say the unsaid thing instead of saving it for the hallway. Q: What is the cost of being the only woman in the C-suite? A: It is lonely. Being consistently different from everyone else in the room means you carry the burden of breaking the mold, and it wears on you until you decide you will not wear the mask anymore. Q: How do you become comfortable with discomfort as a leader? A: You expand your comfort zone deliberately, in small steps. Pick something that scares you, do it, and let the sequence of small steps lead to bigger ones. Q: What does bringing humanity into business decisions actually mean? A: It means understanding people deeply enough that you can see how a decision will land on them. Business decisions are business decisions, but businesses do not run without people. Q: Why is it lonely at the top, and what helps? A: Everyone in the C-suite is isolated, not just the person who is different, because power dynamics make real connection risky. What helps is vulnerability, leaving the ego at the door, and one trusted peer or thought partner outside the room. Chapters 0:00 If You're Not at the Table, You're on the Menu 1:51 From the C-Suite to Advising It 4:27 Why Healthy Debate Doesn't Happen 5:47 If You're Different, It's Lonely 7:36 What Can You Teach Me? 8:27 Walking the Plant Floor 14:20 Getting Comfortable in the Discomfort 16:47 The Cost of Wearing a Mask 21:38 The Grandmother Who Shaped My Superpower 23:54 Fascinated by People 26:20 Every Leader Is Lonely 29:50 Clarity on Decision Rights 34:36 "You're Just HR" 37:06 Questioning Your Own Truths 42:15 Trust, but Verify 44:23 Where to Find Kristine Full transcript: https://whatdoyouknowtobetrue.com/vid... Watch next: • The Real Reason Your Team Avoids Difficult Conversations | DeDe Halfhill:    • The Real Reason Your Team Avoids Difficult...   Resources mentioned in the episode: Kristine’s company: https://shatteredglassadvisory.com/ Music in this episode by Sosin. What Do You Know To Be True? is a personal development and leadership podcast capturing insights and experiences with people who’ve navigated their own reinvention, to be more aligned with their purpose and possibilities. Each conversation offers new perspectives and inspiration for your next move. Wherever you are on the reinvent yourself path, these conversations are for you. ➡️ For insights into each conversation, subscribe to the newsletter: https://rogerkastner.substack.com/ ➡️ To be in more conversations:    / @wdyktbt   We're hosted by Roger Kastner and produced by Three Blue Pens. We’re recorded on the ancestral lands of the Duwamish and Suquamish people. To discover more about the land you are on, go to https://native-land.ca Keywords #leadershipblindspots #decisionmaking #perspective #executiveleadership #reinventyourself #Leadership #personaldevelopment #RogerKastner