Founder of the Maslow Research Center and Strategy Inc., with a Ph.D. in Leadership Education, Dr. Timothy Tiryaki moved with his family to Leaside last summer. His son currently attends Bessborough Middle School and will continue to Leaside High School. Timothy wants to deepen his connection with his new community, and, given his multiple talents and insights, he certainly has much to offer.
A globally recognized expert in the area of study where strategy, culture, and leadership intersect, Timothy is the author of Leading with Culture (2024) and Leading with Strategy: Using Your North Star to Guide Decision-Making (2026). Trained as an industrial engineer, he began his career at Procter & Gamble and worked at Intel, where he gained invaluable experience working in complex, high-performance environments. Over the past 25 years, he has led transformation projects for various Fortune 500 companies and assembled a diverse portfolio of clients.
Timothy’s first book, Leading with Culture, presents the Maslow Research Center’s findings concerning employee experience in the 21st century and focuses on building people-centred organizations. Drawing inspiration from the fourth and fifth levels of humanist psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the book addresses three crucial questions: How do employees fulfill their needs for esteem, respect, self-confidence, achievement, and recognition? How do they achieve their potential and move towards self-actualization? What do they need and expect from their organizations, peers, and leaders? By exploring real-world stories and illustrative case studies, the book offers a groundbreaking perspective on organizational culture and a comprehensive understanding of workplace needs.
Leading with Strategy
Timothy’s second book, Leading with Strategy, delivers a transformative yet flexible paradigm that clarifies the complex trade-offs in today’s AI-enabled business environment and provides unique perspectives on strategic thinking and leadership. He explores the contemporary maze of leadership dilemmas that have emerged in the wake of the latest generative AI technologies. The strategies Timothy propounds are dynamic tools that transcend staid, one-size-fits-all approaches to common business problems. Strategy, he maintains, is one of the most overused and misunderstood words in business. True strategy, for him, encompasses three propositions:
Value creation – creating something valuable and sustainable, not just short-term wins for management but long-term benefits for all stakeholders.
A philosophy of being – not a rigid plan but a flexible way of thinking. It involves asking the right questions and continuously exploring possibilities. It is about framing our actions within the big picture and guiding our choices with purpose.
Learning – testing ideas, adapting, and learning in real time. It embraces trial and error, recognizing that missteps are essential to refining the right approach. It is not a detailed plan meant to be executed without change. Nor is it a quick fix or a checklist of tasks. What Leading with Strategy unfolds is not a solo self-oriented endeavour but a collaborative dialectical process of unlearning, rethinking, discovering, designing, deepening, executing, and evolving.
Broadly speaking, strategy is equipment for living in an age of flux. And that equipment is spiritual as well as practical, a philosophy of being as well as a pragmatics of doing. To help others in their quest for meaningful work, self-actualization, and communal belonging, Tim is launching a non-profit initiative called Strategic Canada, a national movement designed to elevate the strategic capacity of our country – one person, one leader, one organization at a time.
Shared strategy
“In a world defined by complexity, transformation, and accelerating change, strategy can no longer remain the domain of executives. It must become a shared capability, something that empowers individuals, strengthens teams, and drives national competitiveness. Strategic Canada aims to explore and define a uniquely Canadian approach to strategic thinking that integrates innovation, productivity, wellbeing, and cultural diversity.” Visit strategiccanada.org to see how you can participate.
In my experience, many discussions of strategy, culture, and leadership offer reductive formulae and banal bromides, the all-too-familiar staples of the self-help genre. What’s refreshing about Timothy’s approach to the topic is his articulation of what he calls the Paradox Mindset.
“The paradox mindset is the ability to hold conflicting ideas, opinions, and insights at the same time, without rushing to judge, choose, or resolve…. It’s the move from either/or to both/and. Instead of reacting fast, we stay in the tension….We don’t just pick a side. We reach a synthesis on a higher plane of awareness. This is where wise leadership decisions come from. Not speed. Not certainty. But depth. Growth matters. Learning matters.”
And, Timothy concludes, amid a noisy, messy, ambiguous, and complex world, “paradox is where wisdom lives.”
This post was guest contributed by Greig Henderson.
