Leading peers can be tricky since you’re simultaneously cooperating with and competing against them. For example, athletes on the same team contend for a limited number of positions in the starting lineup, yet compete together on game day. Musicians within an orchestra vie for the first chair, but then harmonize their talents to delight audiences…

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“This is a great, great country that had gotten a little soft and…we didn’t have that same competitive edge that we needed over the last couple of decades. We need to get back on track.”~ President Barack Obama Has America gotten soft? Lost its edge? Wandered off track? In many ways, society has indeed gotten…

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Ernest Kent Coulter walked away from a promising career as a newspaperman to serve as clerk in the New York Children’s Court. He was disturbed by the procession of juveniles streaming through the state’s penal system. Time and again, he witnessed the same pattern: a youth got into trouble, was branded as a “bad” kid,…

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The phrase “spending time” isn’t a metaphor. Each of us is allotted 24 hours per day, which we have no choice but to expend. We can neither stockpile time, nor buy back hours already spent. In his book, What To Do Between Birth and Death, author Charles Spezzano offers the following observation about time: You…

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As Americans, we love to roll up our sleeves and do it ourselves. We have an entire television channel, the DIY Network, dedicating to helping us tackle projects on our own—without relying on professional help. Rightfully, we feel a sense of pride after mastering new skills and empowering ourselves to build or fix something around…

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“All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time.”~ John Kenneth Galbraith Americans are anxious about their financial future. Their government, like a spendthrift shopper, has piled up debt and maxed out its available credit limit. As…

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On July 8th, NASA will launch a space shuttle for the final time when Atlantis lifts off for the International Space Station. The flight of Atlantis marks the last of 135 manned missions conducted over the past thirty years by NASA’s space shuttle program. The program has done much to advance scientific knowledge of the…

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Practical Tools for Leaders: Breaking the Patterns of Worry Anxiety is one of the top nemesis to a leader (and all humans for that matter). This issue can paralyze the progress of any organization. After years of working with CEO’s and business owners I have noticed that we all have a pattern for dealing with…

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Comfort lulls us into complacency. We get accustomed to routine or familiar with a role, so we settle in. As leaders, we must relentlessly challenge ourselves not to let ease and security dissuade us from making the changes necessary to fulfill our vision. Perhaps the most difficult transition I chose to make as a leader…

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