Welcome to Insights — my space for publishing ideas, research, and reflections on technical leadership and the human systems that make or break it.

Here you’ll find:

  • Publications — peer-reviewed papers and conference presentations that form the foundation of The Emotional Architect.

  • Fresh perspectives — monthly reflections that expand on themes from my mentoring, book development, and speaking work.

  • Event recaps and updates — highlights from IEEE Aerospace Conference, WE Local, Women in Manufacturing, and other conferences where I share this framework in action.

I publish here to do what I ask of technical leaders: make the invisible visible. Human-systems failures often hide beneath the surface until they derail the mission. My goal is to surface the patterns, name them, and show you how to engineer better ones.

Fresh Perspectives Lisa Akers Fresh Perspectives Lisa Akers

The Lizard on the Launchpad: What to do When the Call Goes the Other Way

You made your case, and the decision went the other way. The hard part is what happens the next morning, when committing to a call you disagreed with slides quietly into carrying its cost yourself. This is the story of a staffing argument that went against me early on Orion, and what it taught me about the difference between supporting a decision and disappearing into it.

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