Fail Faster, Grow Stronger: Deb Dixson’s Playbook for Teams that Thrive Without You

On this episode of The Leadership Vision Podcast, I sit down with Deb Dixson—pioneering tech leader, advisor to Leadership Vision, and author of the foreword to Unfolded: Lessons in Transformation from an Origami Crane. Over a 30+ year career that includes serving as Best Buy’s first Chief Information Security Officer, later as global CISO and CIO for Delhaize America, and now coaching leaders worldwide, Deb has learned how to move teams from dependence on a single leader to interdependence across the team.

This conversation is a masterclass in practical leadership: empower people, name the mission, build trust on purpose, invite safe failure, and continually refold as the world changes.

“People work for people, they don’t work for companies.” —Deb Dixson

From individual heroics to interdependent teams

Like many leaders, Deb began her career as the “doer”—rising through the ranks by delivering results herself. The turning point came when she realized her talented “stable of thoroughbreds” weren’t yet a team; they ran fast individually but not in unison. When she eventually left that organization, several team members soon departed, too. The lesson landed hard: if the team only thrives when you’re in the room, you haven’t built a team—you’ve built a dependency.

Back for a “third tour” at Best Buy, Deb set a new intention: work herself out of a job. Partnering with Leadership Vision and Dr. Linda and Brian Schubring, she adopted a shared language of Strengths to help people understand themselves and one another, communicate clearly, and navigate conflict and change. The result? A team that kept thriving after she stepped away.

“The faster you can fail and then figure it out and move forward, the faster you can grow.” —Deb Dixson

Strengths, reframed: what energizes you scales the Team

Deb’s shift was accelerated by two catalysts: Dale Carnegie training and the Strengths philosophy. Instead of obsessing over weaknesses, she began asking: How is each person wired? What gives them energy? Where can they shine? That reframing helped her place people in roles where natural motivation met real business needs, which, in turn, built trust and initiative.

A favorite practice: make the mission painfully clear. At Delhaize America, a grocery retailer, she told her IT and security teams, “We sell lettuce.” That simple phrase forced engineers to connect daily choices to the end customer and the business outcome—speed, freshness, safety. Suddenly, colleagues could articulate how their work served the mission, not just their tasks.

Make failure safe, find the gaps, and let others LEAD

Deb encourages leaders to look for gaps—important work no one owns yet—and to permit people to try, even if it isn’t perfect on day one. That’s how she pitched and built Best Buy’s first CISO function: she noticed a looming risk, gathered smarter people around her, and made the case before it was urgent. Timing (and a headline-making breach in the industry) turned preparation into progress.

She also learned to soften the sharp edges of Maximizer by borrowing perspective from Learner and Relator—asking better questions, listening differently, and guiding the room to its own conclusions.

The paradox?

When you push others forward and create room for safe experimentation, your leadership reputation grows—even though you’re less center stage.

Timeless advice for any career stage

• Name the mission. If people can’t see how their role serves the end goal, expect misalignment and frustration.
• Invest in relationships. People leave managers more than companies.
• Build with Strengths. Put people where their wiring creates energy and excellence.
• Normalize “fast learning.” Celebrate responsible failure, shorten the feedback loop, and move.
• Keep growing. Don’t let being “good at something” shackle you to work that drains you.

“The world needs people and leaders with the courage to dream new dreams—big enough to reach the world and bright enough to heal it.” —from Unfolded, quoted by Deb

Listen, reflect, and act

As Deb puts it, many of us are afraid to fail, so we don’t try. This episode invites you to name the mission, trust your people, and give the team permission to dream, play, try, and fly—together.

Listen to the whole conversation and then ask yourself:

• Where am I the bottleneck—and how will I work myself out of the middle?
• Which gaps does my team see that we haven’t yet owned?
• What would change if we rewarded learning speed as much as outcomes?