Stop Promoting the Wrong People (Ep 99)

Promotion mistakes rarely look like mistakes at first.

They look like a thoughtful reward. A fair decision. A leader giving someone a chance.

And then weeks or months later, feedback slows down, decisions feel heavier, and the people you most want to keep start under performing and pulling away. Or worse, quit all together.

This episode breaks down what is actually happening when the wrong person gets promoted and ends up in leadership; why smart, well-intentioned business owners keep falling into this trap; and how to recognize leadership readiness before the cost bits you in the bum...

In this episode, we dive into:
Why performance, tenure, and loyalty are often unreliable indicators of leadership and promotion readiness

The promotion profiles that tend to struggle most once people management enters the picture

How misaligned promotions create micromanagement, frustration, and quiet turnover

What leadership DNA actually looks like before someone takes on a team

The questions that surface whether someone can develop people, not just manage tasks

How to reset a promotion that is not working without damaging trust or momentum

⏱️ KEY MOMENTS:
02:19 Why smart leaders still make misaligned promotion calls
04:43 The difference between doing the work and owning outcomes
07:09 The leadership gap that pushes strong people out
09:32 Common promotion patterns that create hidden damage
11:55 What leadership readiness looks like before the title
16:28 A cleaner way to undo a promotion that is not working
21:10 How resentment builds, and how to interrupt it early

MEET THE BIZ DOCTOR®:
Lauren Goldstein is an award winning business advisor and consultant who 7- and 8-figure business owners call when they're stuck in the weeds of success and need their business to truly run without them.

As the founder of Golden Key Partnership, a boutique business consulting firm, she has spent the last decade behind the scenes of high-growth small businesses, fixing broken team dynamics, untangling operational chaos, and helping leaders reclaim their time and sanity.

Nicknamed The Biz Doctor® (how this podcast got its name), Lauren doesn't do surface-level advice. She diagnoses what is actually holding the business back, then builds custom strategies that create clarity, capacity, and a culture that scales.

Her work has helped some of the most respected small business owners build companies they actually enjoy running again.

She's been featured in Thrive Global, HuffPost, Authority Magazine and is a trusted expert to small business owners and Fortune 500 companies alike, such as Apple, Nike, and AT&T, among others.

READY TO GET CLARITY ON WHAT'S NEXT FOR YOUR BUSINESS?
📅 Book a free consultation: https://www.goldenkeypartnership.com
🌐 Website: https://www.goldenkeypartnership.com
📸 Instagram: @itslaurengoldstein
🎧 Listen on your favorite podcast platform

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#BusinessGrowth #Leadership #TeamBuilding #promotion #teams #scaling