Coming soon

You're Not Here to be Popular

Making decisions stick when there's no right answer

By Tom Foley. Publication date to be confirmed.

About the book

The decisions that define a leader have no clean right answer. They create losers, they attract noise, and they will never win the room.

Being right will not save them, and being liked will quietly destroy them.

Drawing on a career making irreversible calls in front of millions, and on the science of procedural justice, psychological safety and composure under pressure, this is a practical guide to making hard decisions stick, and earning the respect to make the next one.

THE HARD CALL

Occasional writing on decision-making, leadership and what it costs to lead well. No noise, no cadence obligation.

"The job is not to be liked. If you're aiming for popularity then you're probably not making the best decision. If you can get people to say 'I don't necessarily like it, but I understand it' then you're doing something right."

Recent dispatches

15 Jun 2026

The False Yes

Why your team nodded, and then quietly killed your decision

The false yes is one of those things that once you have seen it, you cannot unsee it. A team agrees, nobody objects, and two weeks later the decision is quietly dying in the corridor.

Read on Substack →

8 Jun 2026

Being Right Won't Save You

The best decision in the world still loses the room if people can't see it was fair

Being right is not the job. And on the hardest calls, "right" isn't even on offer. The target is something that sits between correctness and popularity, it's legitimacy.

Read on Substack →

5 Jun 2026