Kevin SuraceKevin Surace is an AI pioneer, inventor, author, and human effectiveness authority helping people thrive while AI reshapes work and life.

Love Your Team Before You Lead Them

25 May 2026 · 1 min

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In this monologue, Kevin Surace argues that authentic love and care for employees is the cornerstone of effective leadership. He emphasizes that leaders should genuinely care about their team members and their families, which builds deep loyalty that compels the team to follow the leader through difficult challenges. While acknowledging that some employees may underperform and need to be let go, he frames even that decision as an act of compassion—allowing the individual to find a better fit elsewhere. By consistently demonstrating love over years, a leader earns the trust and commitment of the entire team, enabling them to “march over the hill” together when faced with adversity.

Chapters

You love your employees. I love my employees. And yes, I know that there's always some employee and they're not cutting it, and there's always issues there, and you're working with them, and maybe you work them to stay. Maybe the joy is in letting them go so that they can find a better— Sharing them with someone else. Yes, we all have to do this. But I really, really love the people I work with, or else I wouldn't have hired them. And I care about them, and I care about their families. And you know what's important about that is when it's time to march over that hill into the enemy fire, they follow you. Because they see that you've loved them all the way through, that you really care about them, right? And so they'll march over the hill with you. And otherwise, they don't do it. So you want to be that leader where your entire team marches over the hill with you because you've earned that, because you've loved and cared for them for, you know, the last 5 years.