Why are you in the business you’re in?
My sister Catherine loves fishing and, to be honest, she’s much better at it than I am. Catherine could catch 10 fish to my one because she knows what she’s doing. Before you even go fishing, you need to know why you’re going. Typically, people go fishing because they love fish and like spending time…
Setting goals gives us something to motivate and rally our team around
If you’re burned out at the thought of another daunting year and trying to plan, you’re not alone. Trying to figure out what will happen and how it will affect your organization seems like a crapshoot. Yet many leaders who recognize that they need to change still fail to understand how to make the necessary…
Could improve your performance by 10 per cent and double your profits
Imagine slaving away for years in your own business only to find out that it isn’t worth anything. I regularly meet with business owners who ask me how much their business is worth and I have to tell them the disappointing news that it’s actually worth very little. The reason their business isn’t worth anything…
To quote a noted sage: “Do or do not. There is no try”
In modern society, we’ve wandered away from the thought of winning. It has become taboo. All focus has been put on ensuring that those who don’t place feel just as special for having contributed. However, this flattening of drive seems to have had some unintended consequences – diminishing confidence and persistence. And if you want…
Are you a dominant or conscientious or steady leader, or an influencer?
Thanks to the women’s suffrage movement and their demands for equal work for women, I was at home last week while Margaret was slaving away at the university. Because she’s only in her 11th year at the university, she has to work until Christmas Eve. To make matters worse, Margaret was worried – as she…
But there is no proven path to preparing for it
Thousands of books have been published about leadership because millions of people have fantasies of being top dog. Former presidents, prominent military leaders, CEOs, academics and consultants of every stripe have written books about what it takes to be an exceptional leader. It's worth finding out. While theories abound about what makes a great leader,…
You need to increase profitability, get the business to run without you, start planning and be creative
Forty-one per cent of businesses in North America are owned by baby boomers between 55 and 75 years old. These people are actively thinking about retirement and how they will get their money out of the business. Research shows that, in many cases, up to 90 per cent of a business owners’ equity is tied…
Given Biden’s age and niggling concerns therein, there’s a non-trivial chance he won’t see full term
Just a year after giving Donald Trump his electoral walking papers, the Democrats are in some degree of disarray in the United States. It’s still early days and things may turn around before the 2024 election, perhaps even in time for the 2022 midterm elections in the U.S. But the Democrats’ jubilant triumph of 2020…
Having a framework for making decisions leads to a better chance of success
It’s becoming apparent vaccine mandates aren’t working: the number of variants of COVID-19 strains is increasing with the regularity of flu strains of the past. This is despite the fact that the majority of the population in the western world has been vaccinated – myself included, for those of you who might want to blow…
Change leaders need to ask themselves some difficult questions before they set out to "shake things up"
A few years ago I read a news story about an executive who had been hired to turn around the fortunes of a business that was on the rocks. The product was bad. Morale was awful. Management appeared to be confused about what to do. And customers were staying away in droves. Clearly, this fellow…