Knowing When To Navigate Around the Live Wire
A Leadership Skill I Learned by Watching Someone Brilliant
Some leadership lessons arrive through training or mentorship. Some arrive through experience. And some arrive quietly, in the middle of an ordinary workday, when you happen to witness someone do something so skillful that it changes the way you lead forever. This is one of those lessons.
Many years ago, I worked with a colleague who had a remarkable ability to navigate emotionally charged situations. For anonymity, I will call her Susie Q. She was steady. She was intuitive. She understood people in a way that felt almost effortless. But her greatest skill was something I had never seen before. She knew exactly how to navigate around a live wire. Not a literal one. A metaphorical one. The kind of situation that is buzzing with emotion and tension. The kind that pulls people in even when it is not theirs to carry. The kind that shocks anyone who touches it.
Most leaders walk straight into those moments. They try to fix them. They try to mediate them. They try to absorb the emotion. I was one of those leaders. I thought stepping in was what good leaders did. Until the day I watched Susie Q do something different.
The Moment I Saw the Skill in Action
I remember the moment clearly. An emotionally charged situation erupted in the office. Voices were tight. Feelings were high. People were looking around for someone to intervene. It was the kind of moment where you could feel the electricity in the air. I watched Susie Q walk toward the situation. She saw it. She assessed it. And then she did something remarkable. She navigated around it. Verbally. Emotionally. Physically.
She did not get pulled in. She did not take ownership of something that was not hers. She did not absorb the charge. She did not try to fix it. She simply moved around the entire moment with clarity and calm, as if she could see the live wire sparking on the floor and knew exactly how to avoid it. She walked out of the situation untouched. And the people involved handled it themselves, as they should have.
I stood there stunned. I had never seen someone do that. I had never even considered that navigating around a situation could be a leadership skill. But it was. And it was brilliant. In that moment, her name became a verb. Years later, I still say it. “I totally Susie Q’d that situation.”
The Skill Behind the Magic
What she did was not avoidance. It was discernment. She knew the difference between a situation that required her leadership and a situation that simply wanted her attention. She knew when stepping in would help and when stepping in would escalate. She knew when something belonged to her and when it belonged to someone else.
Most importantly, she knew that leadership is not about absorbing every problem. It is about knowing which problems are yours to carry. Navigating around the live wire is not disengagement. It is wisdom. It is emotional maturity. It is the ability to stay focused on what matters without being pulled into every charged moment that passes by. It is a skill every leader needs. And very few leaders talk about.
Learning When To Navigate Around
After that day, I watched her closely. I studied her. I learned not only how she did it, but when she did it.
She navigated around the live wire when:
the situation was fueled by emotion rather than fact
the people involved were capable of resolving it themselves
stepping in would intensify the charge
the issue was not aligned with her role or responsibility
the moment required space, not intervention
She stepped in when:
safety was at risk
clarity was needed
accountability mattered
the work itself was impacted
her leadership would actually change the outcome
It was not magic. It was mastery, the kind that comes from deep emotional intelligence and years of paying attention. Once I saw it, I began practicing it myself, slowly at first and with a kind of careful curiosity, then with more confidence as I learned when to engage and when to navigate around the live wire. Over time it became part of how I lead, part of how I stay grounded, and part of how I protect my energy and focus. Even now, many years later, I still say it with a quiet sense of gratitude for the lesson she taught me. I navigated around that live wire. I Susie Q’d it.
The Leadership Lesson That Stays
Leadership is not stepping into every situation. Leadership is knowing which situations require you and which ones do not. It is knowing when to engage and when to navigate around. It is knowing when your presence will help and when your presence will complicate things. Navigating around the live wire is not avoidance. It is clarity. It is boundaries. It is respect for the people involved. It is trust in their ability to resolve their own conflict. It is the understanding that not every moment needs your leadership.
Some moments need your restraint. And sometimes the most powerful thing you can do as a leader is simply navigate around the live wire and keep walking.