It Shows Up Earlier Than You Think
I recently spent an hour helping my daughter get organized, planning her week, mapping out when she will do her homework, and figuring out how to study for an upcoming test. Then I started my workday and spent my first hour doing almost the same thing with an employee.
This Isn’t an Isolated Problem
This is a problem showing up everywhere right now, in schools, workplaces, and families. It often looks like overwhelm, missed deadlines, procrastination, burnout, and a constant feeling of falling behind. We tend to treat these as individual performance issues, but that misses what’s really happening: a widespread gap in executive function skills.
What Executive Function Actually Is
Executive function is the set of skills that helps people manage themselves and their responsibilities: planning ahead, organizing, estimating time, initiating tasks, prioritizing, managing distractions, and adjusting when plans change. These skills are what allow intelligence and effort to reliably turn into results. And yet, many people were never explicitly taught how to do them.
Same Skills, Different Context
Here is an example of a cheat sheet that we use for employees to teach them how to manage their week. Here is an example of the same cheat sheet, but modified for a high school student. Same skills, different context.
Where the Gap Begins
As a society, we often assume these skills will develop on their own. If they do, great. If they don’t, we assume something is wrong with the person. We label people disorganized, unmotivated, or unreliable instead of asking the more useful question: where and when were they supposed to learn this?
Schools Reinforce the Gap
Schools focus heavily on content. They teach what to learn, but not always how to manage the work that learning requires. If someone is naturally organized, school reinforces that strength. If they’re not, the school often penalizes them without teaching the missing skills. That pattern doesn’t stop at graduation. It follows people into adulthood.
Workplaces Continue It
Workplaces pick up right where school leaves off. We tell adults to manage their time better, stay organized, and improve follow-through as if those instructions are self-explanatory. We rarely define what “better” looks like. We rarely teach people how to plan a week, break down complex projects, prioritize competing demands, or recover when things fall apart. Instead, we frame these struggles as character or performance issues rather than a teachable skills gap.
Why It Persists
One reason this gap persists is that “executive function” can sound abstract. But when you translate it into simple behaviors, like time blocking, daily priorities, and a weekly reset, people improve quickly. They stop relying on willpower and start relying on a system.
The Cost of Ignoring It
The consequences of this skills gap aren’t small. Chronic overwhelm leads to burnout. Unclear priorities lead to wasted effort. Poor planning creates stress for individuals and teams. Capable, hardworking people end up doubting themselves, disengaging, or leaving roles they could have succeeded in with the right support.
The Signal We’re Missing
The most telling signal is how often people say things like: “I don’t know where to start,” “I worked all day, but I’m still behind,” or “I feel overwhelmed all the time.” Those aren’t motivation problems. They’re executive function problems, and they won’t be solved by telling people to try harder.
What Actually Works
When expectations are explicit, tasks are broken down, timelines are realistic, and routines are taught, performance improves quickly. Stress goes down. Confidence goes up. People stop feeling like they’re failing at life and start feeling capable again. This isn’t about lowering standards. It’s about giving people the skills required to meet them.
This Is a Skill, Not a Trait
We need to stop treating executive function as a personality trait that people either have or don’t have. It’s a skill set. Skills can be taught. Skills can be practiced. Skills can improve over time, but only if we acknowledge that teaching them matters.
Why This Matters Now
If we care about education, productivity, mental health, and workplace performance, we have to get serious about this. Teaching executive function skills can’t stop at childhood. Adults need this education too, perhaps now more than ever. Life is more complex, information is more overwhelming, and expectations are higher than they were a generation ago.
Final Thought
This isn’t about fixing people. It’s about equipping them. If you’re a leader, pay more attention to this gap.
By Joshua Lavine, Company Culture Expert and CEO, Capitol Benefits LLC
