Jeff Bezos 10-Minute Leadership Lesson

One of the most underrated habits of effective leaders is the discipline of checking in. Not checking in to monitor, micromanage, or meddle—checking in to stay connected to reality. Far too many leaders live in what I call “the PowerPoint version of the company,” where everything looks polished, measured, and reported in a way that feels accurate but isn’t always true. Real leadership happens when you step out of the boardroom and step into the real experience your people and customers are having.

Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, modeled this brilliantly. In a meeting with his team, he was told that customer support wait times were down to under one minute. Great news, right? Bezos didn’t just nod, smile, and move on to the next slide. Instead, he picked up the phone and called Amazon customer support himself. The result? He waited… and waited… and waited—over ten minutes on hold.

That moment became a powerful leadership lesson: Inspect what you expect. It’s not enough to hear the report. It’s not enough to trust the metric. A leader’s job is to verify, validate, and experience the truth firsthand.

Leaders often assume systems are working because the data says so. But data can be incomplete, outdated, or misinterpreted. Processes can look perfect on paper yet break down in practice. Teams may unintentionally present information in the best light possible, not to deceive, but because they genuinely believe things are better than they are.

That’s why checking in matters.

When leaders regularly check in, a few important things happen:

1. Leaders stay grounded in reality.
The further up you rise, the less you naturally see. Checking in helps leaders bypass filters and experience what customers, employees, and front-line teams experience every day.

2. It builds credibility.
When your team knows you’re willing to roll up your sleeves, test the processes, and understand their challenges firsthand, trust goes up. People follow leaders who are willing to do what they ask others to do.

3. It prevents blind spots.
Some of the biggest organizational failures happen because leaders assume everything is fine—right up until the moment it isn’t. Checking in exposes cracks early, when they’re still fixable.

4. It sparks continuous improvement.
When leaders directly observe a gap, the urgency to address it increases. It creates momentum and accountability. Bezos didn’t just discover a wait-time issue; his action signaled to the entire organization the importance of customer obsession.

So ask yourself: When was the last time you checked in?
Not in a formal meeting.
Not through a spreadsheet.
Not from a report or dashboard.
But through your own eyes, ears, and experiences.

Call your customer support line. Walk the floor. Sit in on onboarding. Experience the process your employees navigate. Listen to your team—not just for updates, but for understanding.

Great leaders don’t rely solely on what they’re told. They investigate, verify, and connect. They inspect what they expect.

And when leaders stay connected to reality, organizations stay connected to excellence.