When the “Rational” Manager Kills the Soul of the Team: A Monday in the Life of IPER

On the first Monday of March, the calendar looked ordinary.

But by the evening it felt like the same sharp knife had cut through three different places in the world at once: a startup team, a group of students, and a piece of land under shells.

To me, this was not random. It was one of those days when the wheel of time turns a bit louder, and you can clearly see which type of intelligence is trying to occupy the throne — and what it destroys when it does.

I call this map of four intelligences IPER. It did not come from a random theory in my head. It comes from years of watching real people, real teams and real crises, across history and cultures.

• I – Intuitivus (intuitive intelligence): vision, synthesis, pattern-sensing, future.

• P – Practicus (practical intelligence): execution, craft, operations, real-life constraints.

• E – Ethicus (ethical intelligence): relationships, values, trust, diplomacy.

• R – Rationalis (rational intelligence): analysis, control, structure, metrics.

A healthy team is like a dome of light with four sides: all four work together, with one of them a little brighter, depending on the phase. But on that Monday, Rationalis tried to occupy the whole dome.

Let me tell you what I saw.

Story 1: An AI startup that tried to jump straight into being a half-dead corporation

One startup I know is an AI platform: an aggregator of many models for text, images, video — a “buffet” of AI tools for different tasks and budgets.

For three years, the team did the hard invisible work:

• building the platform,

• writing guides on prompt engineering,

• publishing reviews of new models,

• showing real use cases.

By the time our Monday arrived, these texts and experiments were already bringing in up to €10,000 per month. The team was about 15 people: two founders, developers, marketers, content people.

Then people started leaving. One person left, then another. Founders hired replacements quickly. By early March, roughly half of the original team remained — and they were uncomfortable. They had lived through the early risky years.

They had pulled numbers from zero. But now it felt like their voices were fading.

Inside the team there was a different, more organic vision:

• Stop being just a “swedish table of AI models” where you pay at the door and use anything.

• Start building packages and agents for different audience segments.

• Understand who those segments actually are, instead of treating “everyone” the same.

• Map the real cohorts of users and create flows that fit them.

There were attempts to open this conversation. People proposed brainstorming, scenario design, even spiritual “calendar” moments to sync product, team and customers.

The founders hesitated. They weren’t sure which markets to scale to. They were tired. They wanted “system”.

And then “System” arrived.

The entrance of Rationalis: “Show me the numbers or you don’t exist”

They found a man from a large corporate environment — the kind of corporation that started long ago as email and search, and then grew into an entire ecosystem.

From the outside, he looked like exactly what they needed:

• “He knows what a system is.”

• “He will organize things.”

• “He understands growth and KPIs.”

The first thing he brought in was shitposting (his own word). He didn’t bother to understand in depth what a high-tech AI aggregator is, how fragile its trust is, or what kind of future it could have.

He didn’t do his own research.

Instead, he called the team and said something like:

“We will digitize everyone’s work. Each person’s salary will depend strictly on the numbers they bring. By the end of today, send me your ideas for taking this platform to €1M.”

Some ideas did come. But half the team shrank inside, because they knew:

• A large part of their real work does not show up directly in final numbers,

• Yet without it, those numbers would never appear.

• Nobody had mapped how to connect these hidden contributions to visible metrics.

In private chats people wrote things like:

“What about the work that keeps us compliant with international regulations?” “Who translates hard technical topics into human language for users?” “Who maintains the attention and trust of people who already use us?”

Then, the next wave of phrases arrived:

“Show me results and I’ll give you the salary you want.”

For people who had already created results over the first two years, this was offensive. They had already proven their value. They were thinking about how to raise the level without killing quality and meaning.

What happened next was predictable:

• resignations started with the most active people,

• brainstorming died,

• the inner fire went out almost overnight.

From the outside, it looked like chaos and ingratitude. From the inside, it felt like being told:

“Your expertise doesn’t matter, only numbers matter. And by the way, we haven’t thought carefully about which numbers or why.”

This is what it looks like when Rationalis takes power alone and tries to live without Intuitivus, Practicus and Ethicus.

Story 2: The professor with four impossible assignments

On that same Monday, somewhere else in the world, a professor of electrical engineering gave his students four assignments, each about twenty A4 pages.

The solutions were not in his lectures. They were not in the usual textbooks.

One student asked gently:

“Can we solve these in our own way?”

The answer was a clear:

“No.”

Her body reacted before her mind could process it: panic, shortness of breath, almost no air.

Later it turned out that the professor had “forgotten” to say they could submit “a bit later.” But that did not solve the core problem:

• The task was not to learn, explore or create.

• The task was to fit exactly into his mental model under time pressure.

• There was no place for students’ Intuitivus, Practicus or Ethicus — only pure Rationalis, in his version.

Again, Rationalis alone on the throne.

Story 3: Shells in the sky

And on another part of the planet, shells were flying that day.

When Rationalis rules without limits at the level of systems and geopolitics, we call it by another name: “strategy,” “security,” “interests.”

But often it’s the same pattern:

• a narrow logic

• disconnected from living people,

• convinced that everything can be reduced to calculations and force.

The human cost is paid by those whose lives and bodies are not on the spreadsheet.

IPER: four intelligences that must sit at the same table

I watched these three stories and felt the same inner question:

“Why are founders trying to jump straight into the stage of a half-dead corporation, skipping the joyful phases of growth — the informal brainstorms, conferences, and real human learning?” “What is actually the goal of the professor? To teach independent thinking, or to break it?”

In the IPER language, the answer is simple:

• Rationalis is necessary. We need clear structures, metrics, legal compliance, precise engineering.

• But Rationalis alone kills the very sources of value.

When Rationalis forgets the other three, this is what happens:

• Without Intuitivus, there is no new vision, no pattern-sensing, no real future. Only copying and over-optimization.

• Without Practicus, there is no grounded execution, no respect for constraints, no craft — just PowerPoint plans.

• Without Ethicus, there is no trust, no loyalty, no healthy culture — only fear, comparison and silent sabotage.

This is why, in so many companies and institutions, you see:

“Rational came to power and killed the others.”

The calendar behind the chaos

I don’t believe this is random.

There are days in the year where the “light” falls more sharply on one side of the dome of life. Some Mondays are like that: they expose Rationalis at its point of dying.

You can see rational people, in high positions, using their own hands to kill:

• the product that gave them their job,

• the team that created their metrics,

• the trust that keeps their position relevant.

And at the same time, you see others who have been growing honestly, step by step, with all four intelligences involved. They are tired but alive. They do not need to pretend.

On such days, the wheel of time turns a little, and:

• those who chose only shitposting instead of depth stay with their shitposting,

• those who chose real development go further with real development.

The spotlight moves. Some faces fade into shadow, some new faces appear under the dome.

What this means for you (founder, manager, student)

If you recognize yourself in any of these stories, here is my gentle suggestion: do not rush to blame yourself. Instead, try to see which type of intelligence is sitting on the throne in your situation.

Ask yourself:

• Where is Intuitivus in this project? Who is allowed to see the whole picture and talk about patterns and future?

• Where is Practicus? Who actually knows how things work on the ground — and is their voice heard in decisions?

• Where is Ethicus? Who protects trust, values, the human side — and is that seen as “real work”?

• Where is Rationalis? Are metrics serving life, or are they used as a weapon?

IPER is not “spiritual decoration” or a fantasy theory. It is a practical map that I built from real data, real tests and real people — and then tested again against stories like these.

When you look at your own Monday through this lens, you may suddenly see:

• which part of your team is silently suffocating,

• which “rational” decision is actually suicidal for the system,

• where the next honest step of development is — even if it looks less “optimised” on a spreadsheet.

A small invitation

If, as you read this, you feel that:

• your startup is being sliced into numbers with no respect for its living core,

• your role is reduced to “bring me figures or you don’t exist,”

• or your learning is measured only by your ability to copy someone else’s method —

then you are exactly the person I am writing for.

In the coming months, I’ll be sharing more short “calendar notes” like this: real stories where the four intelligences of IPER — Intuitivus, Practicus, Ethicus, Rationalis — clash, cooperate and re-balance the dome of life.

Not as abstract theory, but as field notes from our shared time.

You’re welcome to stay and read them — and, if you wish, to share your own Monday where Rationalis tried to rule alone and what happened next.