High-Stakes Leader

The hardest calls in leadership are the ones you make alone - under pressure, before all the facts are in, with no one left to hand them to.

High Stakes is a field-tested system for making those calls well. Not theory from a calm room. Four disciplines, built where the cost of getting it wrong was measured in something real: careers, companies, cash, freedom, and at times, lives.

Get the Four Monday Moves

The book lands Fall 2026.

You already know the feeling

You are the one everyone turns to. You hold a steady face when you do not feel steady. The final call is yours, and the weight of it shows up at hours when no one else is awake.

That weight is not a flaw. It is the cost of carrying something that matters. The leaders who feel nothing are not stronger - they are holding nothing, risking nothing, responsible for no one.

You were never going to be the leader who feels no weight. You can become the leader who carries it well. That is what this work is for.

The four disciplines

Leadership under pressure is not nerve, and it is not instinct. It is a few disciplines you can build and rely on when it counts. Everything here - the book, the Labs, the advisory - is built on these four.

1. Confront
2. Decide
3. Uphold
4. Develop

The book

High Stakes: Four Field-Tested Disciplines That Define Real Leadership is the foundation - the stories, the frameworks, and the moves, drawn from twenty-five years of high-stakes decisions and tested where it was expensive to be wrong.

It is written for anyone who carries hard calls: founders, executives, and the leaders coming up behind them. If the call lands on your desk and the buck stops with you, this book is for you.

Releasing Fall 2026 in paperback and Kindle. Join the list below to know the day it goes live - and get the Four Monday Moves now.

Three ways to put it to work

However deep you want to go, there is a way in - from a little to a lot.

On your own. Read the book. Work the Monday moves. Take the newsletter. Move at your own pace.

On your schedule. Practice the disciplines against something that pushes back. The Skills Labs turn the book's frameworks into real reps - on demand, as many times as you need, until they are second nature. Learn more about the Skills Labs ...

At your side. When the call is live and the stakes are real, Founder's Ally puts a thinking partner next to you on the decisions you carry alone. Not practice - the real thing. Learn more about Founders Ally ...

The Four Monday Moves

You do not need a thirty-day program to start. You need one move this week.

Drop your email and I will send you the Four Monday Moves - one concrete first step for each discipline, small enough to do before Friday, drawn straight from the last chapter of the book. You will also be first to know when High Stakes goes live.

No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.

About Mike

Mike McKenna has spent more than twenty-five years in situations where the wrong call carried a real price. He built his career running white-collar-crime investigations for Fortune 500 companies and responding to federally declared disasters across the country, then turned what he learned into teaching - coaching thousands of students across thousands of hours of instruction.

He is the founder of TEAM Solutions, where he now advises founders, executives, and the leaders of growing organizations on the high-stakes decisions they carry alone.

Read the full story →

Frequently asked questions

What is High Stakes about?  It is a practical system for making hard leadership calls well - deciding under pressure, having the conversations people avoid, holding your standards when no one is watching, and building people who can carry the load with you. Four disciplines, built from real high-stakes experience rather than theory.

Who is it for?  Anyone who carries decisions that matter - founders, executives, and the leaders coming up behind them, across the private, public, and nonprofit sectors. If the buck stops with you, it is for you.

What are the four disciplines?  Decide, Confront, Uphold, and Develop. Each one is a buildable skill, and each maps to a Skills Lab where you can practice it.

What is Founder's Ally?  A premium advisory relationship for founders and leaders who want a trusted thinking partner on their real, high-stakes decisions - not practice, the live calls. Learn more about Founder's Ally here.

When is the book available?  High Stakes releases in Fall 2026 in paperback and Kindle. Join the list above to be notified the day it goes live.

Start with one move.