20 years across Google, Maersk, and Diageo taught me that the biggest barrier to change isn’t ideas — it’s the gap between inside reality and outside expectations

After 20 years inside some of the world’s most iconic companies, the moment I stepped out, what both sides were missing became unmistakably clear. As an executive, pitches never stop. Everyone believes they’ve cracked your problem — they just need a moment of your time to prove it. Each conversation starts with the same confidence: that they’ve discovered a capability you were oblivious to, one that will unlock what your own organization somehow failed to see.

After two decades on the inside — 13 years at Moët Hennessy and Diageo, six at Maersk, and four at Google — I crossed the line for the first time. I went from the inside to the outside and it was a huge wake-up call.

On the inside, people are not blind to opportunity., but they are managing a dense web of commitments, history, habits, and risk. What looks like resistance or a gap from the outside often masks careful sequencing, resource constraints, and competing promises — all invisible unless…