“Appraisals are where you get together with your team leader and agree what an outstanding member of the team you are, how much your contribution has been valued, what massive potential you have, and in recognition of this, would you mind having your salary halved?” – Theodore Roosevelt One thing I hear from leaders without … Read more
“Far and away the best prize that life offers is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.” – Theodore Roosevelt The past few posts in this space (here and here) have spent some time on the idea of priorities and making sure we’re focused on stuff that’s really important. Our time and energy … Read more
“The truth is, hardly any of us have ethical energy enough for more than one really inflexible point of honor.” – George Bernard Shaw Whether you’re talking about honor or your business, it’s extremely easy in today’s world to let yourself get stretched thin. There are so many things flying at us that if we … Read more
“As you start to walk out on the way, the way appears.” – Rumi The world is full of business leaders who feel completely overwhelmed. They have almost literally a hundred things to do every day, and that doesn’t count the things that will come up that are completely unexpected. A lot of them started … Read more
“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs, ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go do that. Because what the world needs are people who have come alive.” – Howard Thurman In each of our businesses, we spend time talking about customers and markets and buying habits and all kinds of things centered … Read more
“The talk you hear…about adapting to change is not only stupid, it’s dangerous. The only way you can manage change is to create it. By the time you catch up to change, the competition is ahead of you.” – Peter Drucker I saw this quote for the first time recently and it made me a … Read more
“You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks.” – Winston Churchill I recently attended a conference where I had the opportunity to interact with a number of high-performing people from across the country. By the end of the two days, my head was spinning with ideas … Read more
“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” – Sun Tzu I recently attended a workshop that included some team decision-making exercises. The scenario was this: you’re stranded in the desert, 80 miles from civilization, and you have a list of 15 things you could have … Read more
“If your vision is for a year, plant wheat. If your vision is for ten years, plant trees. If your vision is for a lifetime, plant people.” – Chinese Proverb These days in business a fair amount of attention is given to setting a vision for the organization. Not everyone does a good job, not … Read more
“If you surround yourself with the smartest people you can find, people will think you’re a lot smarter than you are. Only insecure people think this works the other way.” – Noah Callahan-Bever I don’t think it’s an outrageous statement to say that your business will go as far as your people will take it. … Read more
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