Let’s say you’ve found the perfect mix of people to staff your new project. They get along great together. They’re all top performers in their respective fields. They’re all gung-ho to get going. But then something happens.

First, one starts showing up late to meetings. Then, someone else plans a vacation he absolutely must go on. Next, you have another who leaves the company altogether for warmer waters. You reflect on what went wrong and realize that, one by one, they lost their will, their zest, their joie de vivre for working on your project. One of them needed an upgrade to a special coding software, but you didn’t want to get it for her. Someone didn’t have the tool he needed to do his best work. Another needed to attend a training class for using the upgraded safety gear the company mandated—but you wouldn’t give her time off the project to attend. And another team member was great at graphic design, but because no one was willing to do the project accounting and he had some slack time, you assigned that job to him. Willing to be a good team player, he accepted, but he had no talent or aptitude for that.

You’ve suddenly become the leader of the project where good people come to die.

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