Leading is Hard, But Not Complicated!

You will never hear me say that leadership, especially the kind of leadership that’s necessary to effectively run a large organization, is easy. What you will hear me say from time to time is that it’s actually damn hard! In fact, I’ve often heard John Maxwell joke about the...

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Can You See the Big Picture?

Even when we begin to recognize what’s killing our profitability, start to dial in on the right prescription for addressing it, and come up with some simple solutions that can have a strong impact, we’ll miss capturing a significant amount of our best potential results if we allow our...

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Education or Application?

In March of 2000, as a 23 year old 250 ton stamping press operator (and carpenter on the side), I applied for and was somehow offered a position implementing the latest and greatest Lean manufacturing initiative the company I was working for was pushing down from the corporate office. I had been...

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They See You When You’re Sleeping…?

Whether Santa Claus comes to town or not, we can rest assured that from the moment we accept responsibility for leading our teams someone will ALWAYS be watching the example we set. Hopefully they won’t be watching when we actually are sleeping (because that’s creepy, even for Santa)...

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Quiet Firing: Childish and Unacceptable!

Let me emphasize it again just in case we’re not on the same page… Quiet quitting may be a relatively new term but it ain’t a new thing! And while I’ll never suggest I’m OK with someone giving less than satisfactory effort expecting a world-class reward, I’m...

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Burnout: Are They Tired or Just Not Inspired?

Since looking at Who’s to Blame last time, my mom shared something she had just seen on Dr. Phil where he suggested that quiet quitting was a societal issue largely caused by lack of initiative on the employees’ part. I usually attempt to be fairly mild and respectful with my language...

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Employees Quiet Quitting - Who’s to Blame?

There’s certainly a lot of hype around it currently, but I maintain that quiet quitting is no new issue - even though I’ve never seen anyone seem to care the least bit about it until just recently! With hopes that you’re tracking with me on the importance of EARNING engagement...

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Everyone is Influenced by Someone…

There’s not a day that goes by where I’m not incredibly thankful for the people who have mentored me over the last two decades. Quite a few of those have been very close, one-on-one relationships where I’ve been given direct input on areas I can grow in but even more have been...

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No Off Days...

Last time I briefly referenced a few of the less than positive things about Jordan that were given some media attention; gambling and how he was accused of treating teammates at times… Let’s consider those, but let’s do it with a clear perspective…

It truly doesn’t...

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“Winning Has a Price; Leadership Has a Price”

In one short segment pulled from The Last Dance, Michael Jordan shares these powerful statements:

  • “Winning has a price, and leadership has a price. I pulled people along when they didn’t want to be pulled. I challenged people when they didn’t want to be challenged. And I earned...
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Not Many Like Mike…

I can’t remember which commercial it was that coined the phrase “Be like Mike” but I do remember Detective Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) quoting it to chide his partner, Mike Lowrey (Will Smith), in one of the Bad Boys movies… Michael Jordan’s incredible work...

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Something You Just Can’t Buy

In addition to showing humility to every individual on the teams we lead in a way that exemplifies just how much we truly value them as individuals, we need to do everything in our power to earn something from them that can never be bought…

For more than twenty years now, I’ve heard...

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