01
Move from Solver to Sponsor
Stop absorbing every ambiguity yourself. Create the conditions where other people can think, decide, solve problems, and learn together.
Built to Think
Build a Company That Doesn't Wait for You.
You hired good people. Yet the hard decisions still find their way back to you. Built to Think shows you how to build teams that solve problems, make sound decisions, and adapt without waiting for permission.
Get the Book
Listen to a Preview
Hear the opening of Built to Think
Why hard problems keep coming back to you, how to build a team that solves them closer to the source, and how AI can accelerate what you build.
Companion Resource
Get the Free Built to Think Companion E-Workbook
Use the companion e-workbook to move from reading the ideas to applying them inside your own company. Enter your purchase details and we'll send you the free workbook. Scheduled to release in early October.
Inside the Book
What Built to Think Will Help You Do
Built to Think gives leaders a practical way to build stronger judgment, clearer ownership, and teams that can keep moving without every hard problem coming back to the top.
02
Clarify Who Can Decide
Give people real authority without sacrificing quality. Make it clear who owns the decision, who needs to be involved, and when action can begin.
03
Build Better Solutions
Use disciplined problem solving to get beyond discussion and reach decisions that reflect the real problem, the right voices, and the conditions for implementation.
04
Turn Decisions into Action
Prevent good ideas from being overturned, endlessly reworked, or quietly buried by thinking about implementation before the solution is launched.
05
Make Thinking the Default
Build an organization where problem solving, decision making, and learning become part of how work actually gets done.
06
Use AI Without Weakening Judgment
Help your people use AI to strengthen thinking rather than replace it. AI multiplies whatever structure it meets, so the foundation matters.
The Goal
Become less essential to every decision and
more valuable to the organization you're building.
Sharon Birkman
Chairman & CEO, Birkman International
Foreword by Sharon Birkman
Same facts, different readings.
Sharon Birkman has led Birkman International since 2002, when she succeeded her father, Dr. Roger Birkman, who created the Birkman Method. Organizations around the world use it to understand what drives people below the surface and why colleagues can look at the same situation and see it differently. Sharon has spent her career on that question, which is why her read on a book about teams carries weight.
In her foreword, Sharon goes straight to the problem every growing company runs into. When capable people misread each other and nobody says so, the friction goes underground and the leader ends up translating for everyone, so every decision starts waiting on one person. That's the bottleneck Built to Think was written to break, and Sharon explains why it matters even more now that AI can speed up a team's misunderstandings as easily as its thinking.
Read Sharon's Full Foreword →Featured Praise
Praise for Built to Think
Leaders, authors, and advisors read the book before it went to print. These nine perspectives capture what they saw in the work.
01“
“Leaders who want to build capability rather than dependency will find this book both challenging and immensely practical.”
The ultimate test of leadership is not how well people perform when the leader is in the room, but how capably they think and act when the leader is not. What I value most about Built to Think is Leanne Terrace’s powerful shift from Solver to Sponsor—and her clear-eyed understanding that AI can accelerate good thinking but cannot create the human conditions that make it possible. Leaders who want to build capability rather than dependency will find this book both challenging and immensely practical.
Jim Huling
Executive Coach and Co-Author of the #1 bestseller The 4 Disciplines of Execution
02
“
“If every important decision has to come through you, growth will always have a ceiling.”
The organizations that win in the future will not be the ones with the smartest tools, but the ones that have learned how to think. Leanne Terrace understands a challenge every growing leader eventually faces. Built to Think offers a practical way to build teams that can solve problems, make sound decisions, and adapt with confidence.
Dr. Marshall Goldsmith
Thinkers50 #1 Executive Coach and New York Times bestselling author of The Earned Life, Triggers, and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
03
“
“The book I wish I had when I was still trying to be the one with all the answers.”
During my leadership at WD-40 Company, I learned that people do their best thinking when they feel safe enough to do it without permission. Built to Think turns that belief into a real operating system with disciplines any leader can put to work tomorrow morning.
Garry Ridge
Chairman Emeritus, WD-40 Company & USA Today Bestselling Author of Any Dumb-Ass Can Do It
04
“
“Break free from the hero trap and unleash real decision-making power across your organization.”
If you’re feeling overwhelmed or stuck as your team grows, Built to Think will show you how to break free from the hero trap and unleash real decision-making power across your organization.
David Meerman Scott
Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Fanocracy
05
“
“Buyers pay for one thing above all: a company that does not depend on the founder.”
I have personally advised more than 20,000 companies on scaling toward a high-value exit. Built to Think is the system that builds it. If you ever intend to sell, or simply want the option, this is the work that has to happen first.
Kane Minkus
2X Inc. 5000 founder, Top 300 in America; 3X bestselling author
06
“
“Knowing when and how to ‘get out of the way’ is a core leadership skill — and this book shows how.”
There is a yin and yang about great leadership. The leader may be a team’s greatest asset, but he or she is often at the same time the greatest impediment to collective performance.
Prof. David Clutterbuck
Author or Co-Author of 77 books covering HR, Coaching and Mentoring (and arguably the world’s leading authority in Mentoring)
07“
“Most leaders fail … because they do not know how to build ‘We. Q.’ or collaborative intelligence.”
“Most leaders fail, not through lack of IQ or even EQ, but because they do not know how to build ‘We. Q.’ or collaborative intelligence, in their leadership team and across their organization." Having spent nearly 50 years helping leaders develop collaborative intelligence, it is a joy to see Leanne’s new book. Built to Think lays out practical steps organization and team leaders can take to lessen the dependency of the organization on themselves and build sustainable collaborative intelligence into their organization.”
Professor Peter Hawkins
Chairman of Renewal Associates. Global thought leaders in Systemic Team Coaching and Organizational Transformation. Co-Author of the recent best seller Team of Teams Coaching: Using teaming approaches to increase business impact and author of Leadership Team Coaching
08“
“This is an essential resource for navigating the intersection of human potential, leadership, and technological complexity.”
“Built to Think tackles a critical question facing businesses and educators alike: how can leaders maintain deep integrity and stay true to human intention while building for scale in the age of AI? Leanne offers a practical system for cultivating capable, adaptable teams rooted in care, trust, diversity, and sustainability—creating the ideal foundation to successfully integrate AI strategies. This is an essential resource for navigating the intersection of human potential, leadership, and technological complexity.”
Laura Kinderman, PhD PCC
Principal and VPA BC, Yorkville University; Vice Chair, North Vancouver Chamber of Commerce; QIESR Invited Scholar, Queen's University
09
“
“Deals slow down when something changes, and the question goes up the chain and sits there.”
Built to Think builds a team that knows what it can decide and how to solve the rest together. Get the book, work the framework, and you'll feel it in your pipeline.
Todd Hartley
Wall St. Journal Best Selling Author
About the Book
Your Company Can Grow Without Making You the Bottleneck
Your team may be capable. Your company may be growing. But if the hard decisions still queue behind you, the organization has not yet learned how to think without you.
Built to Think shows leaders how to change that. Instead of carrying every difficult problem to the finish line yourself, you build the structures, decision clarity, and problem-solving discipline that help other people make sound judgments and keep the work moving.
The Leadership Shift
Solver
→
Sponsor
The Solver absorbs ambiguity. The Sponsor defines the problem space, clarifies decision authority, and creates the conditions for the team to think together. That shift is how a company becomes less dependent on one person and more capable as a whole.
Clear Authority
Disciplined Thinking
Stronger Judgment
“You don’t need new people. You need the people you have, thinking like owners.”
The System Inside the Book
How Built to Think Works
Three practical levels help leaders move from solving the immediate problem to building an organization that can keep thinking without them.
01
Seven Disciplines
Solve the right problem.
A repeatable problem-solving process for moving from ambiguity to a sound solution without automatically escalating the work upward.
02
APEX
Set the work up to succeed.
Clarify decision authority and the right voices before solving begins, so good work is less likely to be overturned, reworked, or buried.
03
SIGNAL
Make thinking part of how the company runs.
Build the operating system that helps people see what matters, respond with judgment, and learn as the organization changes.
One System. Three Levels.
From solving the problem, to setting up the decision, to building an organization
that can keep thinking without you.
Built to Think
Build a Company That Doesn't Wait for You.
You hired good people. Yet the hard decisions still find their way back to you. Built to Think shows you how to build teams that solve problems, make sound decisions, and adapt without waiting for permission.
Get the Book
Listen to a Preview
Hear the Opening of Built to Think
Why hard problems keep coming back to you, how to build a team that solves them closer to the source, and how AI can accelerate what you build.
Companion Resource
Get the Free Built to Think Companion e-Workbook
Use the companion e-workbook to move from reading the ideas to applying them inside your own company. Enter your purchase details and we'll send you the free e-workbook. Scheduled to release in early October.
Inside the Book
What Built to Think Will Help You Do
Built to Think gives leaders a practical way to build stronger judgment, clearer ownership, and teams that can keep moving without every hard problem coming back to the top.
01
Move from Solver to Sponsor
Stop absorbing every ambiguity yourself. Create the conditions where other people can think, decide, solve problems, and learn together.
02
Clarify Who Can Decide
Give people real authority without sacrificing quality. Make it clear who owns the decision, who needs to be involved, and when action can begin.
03
Build Better Solutions
Use disciplined problem solving to get beyond discussion and reach decisions that reflect the real problem, the right voices, and the conditions for implementation.
04
Turn Decisions into Action
Prevent good ideas from being overturned, endlessly reworked, or quietly buried by thinking about implementation before the solution is launched.
05
Make Thinking the Default
Build an organization where problem solving, decision making, and learning become part of how work actually gets done.
06
Use AI Without Weakening Judgment
Help your people use AI to strengthen thinking rather than replace it. AI multiplies whatever structure it meets, so the foundation matters.
The Goal
Become less essential to every decision and
more valuable to the organization you're building.
FOREWORD BY SHARON BIRKMAN Chairman & CEO, Birkman International
Same Facts, Different Readings.
Sharon Birkman has led Birkman International since 2002, when she succeeded her father, Dr. Roger Birkman, who created the Birkman Method. Organizations around the world use it to understand what drives people below the surface and why colleagues can look at the same situation and see it differently. Sharon has spent her career on that question, which is why her read on a book about teams carries weight.
In her foreword, Sharon goes straight to the problem every growing company runs into. When capable people misread each other and nobody says so, the friction goes underground and the leader ends up translating for everyone, so every decision starts waiting on one person. That's the bottleneck Built to Think was written to break, and Sharon explains why it matters even more now that AI can speed up a team's misunderstandings as easily as its thinking.
Read Sharon's Full Foreword →Featured Praise
Praise for Built to Think
Leaders, authors, and advisors read the book before it went to print. These nine perspectives capture what they saw in the work.
01“
“Leaders who want to build capability rather than dependency will find this book both challenging and immensely practical.”
The ultimate test of leadership is not how well people perform when the leader is in the room, but how capably they think and act when the leader is not. What I value most about Built to Think is Leanne Terrace’s powerful shift from Solver to Sponsor—and her clear-eyed understanding that AI can accelerate good thinking but cannot create the human conditions that make it possible. Leaders who want to build capability rather than dependency will find this book both challenging and immensely practical.
Jim Huling
Executive Coach and Co-Author of the #1 bestseller The 4 Disciplines of Execution
02
“
“If every important decision has to come through you, growth will always have a ceiling.”
The organizations that win in the future will not be the ones with the smartest tools, but the ones that have learned how to think. Leanne Terrace understands a challenge every growing leader eventually faces. Built to Think offers a practical way to build teams that can solve problems, make sound decisions, and adapt with confidence.
Dr. Marshall Goldsmith
Thinkers50 #1 Executive Coach and New York Times bestselling author of The Earned Life, Triggers, and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
03
“
“The book I wish I had when I was still trying to be the one with all the answers.”
During my leadership at WD-40 Company, I learned that people do their best thinking when they feel safe enough to do it without permission. Built to Think turns that belief into a real operating system with disciplines any leader can put to work tomorrow morning.
Garry Ridge
Chairman Emeritus, WD-40 Company & USA Today Bestselling Author of Any Dumb-Ass Can Do It
04
“
“Break free from the hero trap and unleash real decision-making power across your organization.”
If you’re feeling overwhelmed or stuck as your team grows, Built to Think will show you how to break free from the hero trap and unleash real decision-making power across your organization.
David Meerman Scott
Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Fanocracy
05
“
“Buyers pay for one thing above all: a company that does not depend on the founder.”
I have personally advised more than 20,000 companies on scaling toward a high-value exit. Built to Think is the system that builds it. If you ever intend to sell, or simply want the option, this is the work that has to happen first.
Kane Minkus
2X Inc. 5000 founder, Top 300 in America; 3X bestselling author
06
“
“Knowing when and how to ‘get out of the way’ is a core leadership skill — and this book shows how.”
There is a yin and yang about great leadership. The leader may be a team’s greatest asset, but he or she is often at the same time the greatest impediment to collective performance.
Prof. David Clutterbuck
Author or Co-Author of 77 books covering HR, Coaching and Mentoring (and arguably the world’s leading authority in Mentoring)
07“
“Most leaders fail … because they do not know how to build ‘We. Q.’ or collaborative intelligence.”
“Most leaders fail, not through lack of IQ or even EQ, but because they do not know how to build ‘We. Q.’ or collaborative intelligence, in their leadership team and across their organization." Having spent nearly 50 years helping leaders develop collaborative intelligence, it is a joy to see Leanne’s new book. Built to Think lays out practical steps organization and team leaders can take to lessen the dependency of the organization on themselves and build sustainable collaborative intelligence into their organization.”
Professor Peter Hawkins
Chairman of Renewal Associates. Global thought leaders in Systemic Team Coaching and Organizational Transformation. Co-Author of the recent best seller Team of Teams Coaching: Using teaming approaches to increase business impact and author of Leadership Team Coaching
08“
“This is an essential resource for navigating the intersection of human potential, leadership, and technological complexity.”
“Built to Think tackles a critical question facing businesses and educators alike: how can leaders maintain deep integrity and stay true to human intention while building for scale in the age of AI? Leanne offers a practical system for cultivating capable, adaptable teams rooted in care, trust, diversity, and sustainability—creating the ideal foundation to successfully integrate AI strategies. This is an essential resource for navigating the intersection of human potential, leadership, and technological complexity.”
Laura Kinderman, PhD PCC
Principal and VPA BC, Yorkville University; Vice Chair, North Vancouver Chamber of Commerce; QIESR Invited Scholar, Queen's University
09
“
“Deals slow down when something changes, and the question goes up the chain and sits there.”
Built to Think builds a team that knows what it can decide and how to solve the rest together. Get the book, work the framework, and you'll feel it in your pipeline.
Todd Hartley
Wall St. Journal Best Selling Author
About the Book
Your Company Can Grow Without Making You the Bottleneck
Your team may be capable. Your company may be growing. But if the hard decisions still queue behind you, the organization has not yet learned how to think without you.
Built to Think shows leaders how to change that. Instead of carrying every difficult problem to the finish line yourself, you build the structures, decision clarity, and problem-solving discipline that help other people make sound judgments and keep the work moving.
The Leadership Shift
Solver
→
Sponsor
The Solver absorbs ambiguity. The Sponsor defines the problem space, clarifies decision authority, and creates the conditions for the team to think together. That shift is how a company becomes less dependent on one person and more capable as a whole.
Clear Authority
Disciplined Thinking
Stronger Judgment
“You don’t need new people. You need the people you have, thinking like owners.”
The System Inside the Book
How Built to Think Works
Three practical levels help leaders move from solving the immediate problem to building an organization that can keep thinking without them.
01
Seven Disciplines
Solve the right problem.
A repeatable problem-solving process for moving from ambiguity to a sound solution without automatically escalating the work upward.
02
APEX
Set the work up to succeed.
Clarify decision authority and the right voices before solving begins, so good work is less likely to be overturned, reworked, or buried.
03
SIGNAL
Make thinking part of how the company runs.
Build the operating system that helps people see what matters, respond with judgment, and learn as the organization changes.
One System. Three Levels.
From solving the problem, to setting up the decision, to building an organization
that can keep thinking without you.