Tag Archives: leadership

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Your Success is Determined by Your Leadership Ability

The effectiveness of your leadership determines your level of success in all of your endeavors. It doesn’t matter how much money you have, who your parents are, what your education is, or who you know. You will only go as far as your leadership ability is capable of taking you!

If you don’t believe this, just ask the litany of leaders who have failed publicly over the last number of years. People like Martin Shkreli (Turing Pharmaceuticals), Elizabeth Holmes (Theranos), Martin Winterkorn (VW), or Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini (FIFA).

Your Leadership Ability is the Lid on Your Success

Leadership ability is the lid on your success. If you increase your leadership ability, you effectively raise the level of your success!

Back in the late 1990’s when I started to actively lead large teams I realized that I needed as much leadership help as possible. Fortunately, I met many great leaders who actively mentored me as my career developed.

I also discovered other leaders like John C. Maxwell who provides amazing leadership resources like his book “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership.”

Although I first read this book in the late 90’s, this collection of profound leadership wisdom continues to provide me great insight and guidance to this day! I have never met Mr. Maxwell but I consider him to be an important mentor who has made a huge impact on my life!

Following his 21 irrefutable leadership laws will profoundly impact your leadership abilities! I have outlined each of these laws below.

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How to Plug the Gaps and Stop Bleeding Money!

Most organizations are bleeding away profit through holes they don’t even know they have!

That’s right! If you are not periodically and systematically looking for inefficiencies, gaps, old processes, or broken systems, chances are, your business is bleeding profitability.

These holes that are bleeding profits from your organization are generally not a result of a deliberate or malicious act. They just form slowly as the marketplace shifts and as technology changes. These shifts and changes create holes that must be “fixed” in the same way a pothole in a road must be fixed!

$156,000 Timesheet

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“Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”

Adventures of a Curious Character

My book review this week is Surely You’re Joking Mr. Feynman by Richard P. Feynman.

Besides winning the Nobel Prize in physics in 1965, Feynman was an eccentric, larger than life character with a list of achievements and accolades that are hard to fathom. He actively worked on the development of the atomic bomb, traded ideas with Einstein, Bohr, and Nick the Greek, cracked safes guarding highly sensitive atomic secrets, played bongo drums for a ballet, along with a host of other eclectic activities and accomplishments. This is a highly entertaining book full of funny stories, technical theory, and valuable life principles.

My takeaways from this book are the principles that Feynman discovered and exemplified throughout his life. I have listed a few of them below:

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Acres of Diamonds

Think Big Things and Then Do Them

This week’s book review is Acres of Diamonds by Russell Conwell.


Conwell was a war hero, lawyer, businessman, educator, orator, minister, and visionary who is probably most famous for founding Temple University and for his trademark lecture “Acres of Diamonds.” This book is a transcript of the lecture along with a biography of his life and a commentary of the impact he has made on the world before his death in 1925.

The central point of the Acres of Diamonds lecture is that we do not need to look in exotic places to find business opportunity. Business opportunities are all around us. All we need to do is change our focus to looking at the needs of society and the people around us . . . If we strive to serve their needs, business opportunity will present itself!

My takeaway from this book are these three statements from Conwell’s lecture:

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How to Use Combat Lessons From Iraq To Improve Your Business

Many business leaders overlook leadership lessons from the military because we don’t think they cross the chasm between the harsh realities of war and the world of business.

I would argue that, regardless of the differences in operating environments, the same leadership principles do apply. In fact, the leadership principles tried and tested in the most extreme combat conditions must be applied in the world of business! If business leaders are not leveraging leadership lessons from the military then we are doing ourselves and our organizations a great disservice.

For example, how many times have we seen a power struggle between two mid-level business unit managers while the leader of these managers is too scared or preoccupied to take action to resolve the situation. When the lack of action by the leader allows the squabbling to continue, inevitably the whole business suffers. Morale drops, production and sales fall, customer relations are hurt and eventually the bottom line of the business feels the impact. The inability of a leader to take decisive action to resolve internal strife will damage your business.

This inaction and lack of decisiveness is not tolerated in military leadership. Lack of decisiveness costs lives in combat. Plain and simple.

It seems pretty easy to transfer this lesson from the military arena to the world of business but what about other leadership lessons?