In today’s tough business climate, managers and executives are becoming obsolete and are being replaced by leaders. The new manager/executive must be an expeditor and leader rather than an order giver and manager of people.

In this article, I have documented what I have found to be the leadership skills and abilities that are valued in leaders today. If you are looking to build a high performance team or company, these are the leadership traits that you and your managers should be focused on to improve personal and business performance.

1. Vision

Leaders have the ability to see things as they should become. Defining the organization’s direction, the leader defines the organization’s future.

2. Communication

Leaders are able to get others to share in their vision. They communicate in a clear and powerful way. Whether in large meetings or personal discussions, they never miss an opportunity to pass along their message.

3. Flexibility

Leaders are willing to learn. Leaders will be committed to furthering their own knowledge as well as making sure others keep up with the demand for a better educated workforce.

4. Action Oriented

Leaders know that it is not enough just to gather up the good ideas of others. When new ways of doing things can be implemented, putting them into action will fall on the shoulders of the entire team.

5. Bottom Line Thinker

Leaders know the financial conditions and limitations of the organization. Once they have the same information as senior executives, it is expected that they will reach the same decisions.

6. Builds Rapport

Leaders let the person or group know they understand their viewpoint, whether they agree or not.

7.

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Do you find yourself struggling with how to deal with people problems at work? If so, Manager’s Desktop Consultant: Just-in-Time Solutions to the Top People Problems that Keep You Up at Night is a worthy addition to your library of business books. Written by organizational development experts Louellen N. Essex, Ph.D. and Mitchell E. Kusy, Ph.D., this book provides practical advice for helping managers effectively deal with people problems at work.

This book is designed to provide leaders at all levels within modern organizations with practical tips and suggestions for effectively handle people related issues. It touches on techniques for managing all types of people problems that arise in the business world, including tips for improving one’s ability to communicate effectively with peers and subordinates alike.

One of the biggest challenges faced by managers relates to effectively managing change within their organizations. Coping with employees who are resistant to change can be particularly challenging and difficult. This book provides guidance for creating a systematic process and plan for leading organizations through change in a manner that will include and engage employees in the process. Encouraging employee teamwork and collaboration is another important people issue of concern to managers. The authors do an excellent job of providing substantive tips for cultivating a culture of teamwork that go beyond the often “touchy-feely” suggestions. Their emphasis is on how to improve productivity and efficiency via team work.

In any environment where people have to work together, conflict is inevitable. Managing conflict in a constructive manner isn’t always easy, but it is something that today’s managers have to face.

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People often mistake by relating the term ‘Management’ with HR. Which I feel is not absolutely true. Management means managing, like how a HR Manager manages its employees, a Sales Manager manages its Sales, a finance manager manages flow of funds and an account manager manages its firm’s accounts. Management teaches the ways to manage things well, sometimes one thing at one time and sometimes requires multi-tasking, take an example. An employee is very disturbed due to some reasons and misbehaved with many of his seniors, its HR manager’s job to handle him. The better he handles the man, the better he has learnt the term ‘management’.

The other terms, management means the most senior staff of an organization i.e. Chairman, Director, C.E.O. or Board of Directors etc. In such a case, the managerial staff is treated as representative of the senior management.

In terms of HR, management study teaches how to know different human beings, how to recognize their needs, how to persuade them to perform better and also to understand what make them feel good and happy. Almost every company is turning its side to HR department, and expecting their HR professionals to prepare its employees to perform best and give the positive results. But, this is not possible unless the problems and issues of an employee are resolved. To understand what’s going in the employee’s mind, what he wants, and what is troubling him, HR Department should try its best skills. I feel if an employee has had a bad start of the day, his whole day will be ruined and in the same manner, if he is having a bad evening, his rest of the day will be not good. Thus, HR Department should help the employee to make balance in his personal and professional lives.

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You may have been selected by your executive to initiate and see through some change program in your organization. Or you may have decided that the time has come to make your mark by dusting off the cobwebs in your workplace. However your change role came about, you have a challenging task ahead of you.

Consider this sobering thought. In spite of the importance of successfully implementing workplace change for maintaining your business’s competitiveness, most change initiatives fail to deliver the expected organizational benefits. This failure occurs for a number of reasons:

• absence of a change champion or one who is too junior in the organization
• poor executive sponsorship or senior management support
• poor project management skills
• hope rested on a one-dimensional solution
• political infighting and turf wars
• poorly defined organizational objectives
• change team diverted to other projects

Do you recognize one or more of these in your organization from previous initiatives? You have probably experienced already one major cost of such failure. The cynical and burned out employees left behind only make the next change objective even more difficult to accomplish. It should come as no surprise that the fear of managing change and its impacts is a leading cause of anxiety in managers.

Your first step in becoming a successful change leader is fully understanding your organization and matching the initiative to your organization’s real needs. This means not just adopting the latest management fad. Recognize that bringing about useful and meaningful change is fundamentally about changing people’s behavior in certain desired ways. It is not primarily about installing a new system or rearranging the organizational structure. If people in the end do not behave and work differently, then the money and time spent in “doing stuff” is wasted.

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Values are the parents of your chosen or unconscious behaviour. If someone at a meeting or a party rubs you the wrong way, chances are that you have picked up something about them that doesn’t fit your set of core values.

On my website, you’ve had an opportunity to glimpse my core values: Love& Compassion, Authenticity, Honesty & Integrity, Health & Vitality, Passion & Creativity. Without even realizing it, the way I interact at work and at home reflect these values. It is the beginning of any self-development work to take a closer look at your own driving values and even at those of your colleagues or direct reports.

In the field of Neuro Linguistic Programming, the study of how language affects behaviour, there’s an exercise called ‘The Parts Integration’. Its main premise is that all humans operate from their values. I found it fascinating that you can identify a feeling or an action as coming from a ‘part’ of your body. Amazingly, when you ask people to identify anger at a co-worker or sadness at a lost job opportunity and ask them to point to it, they can visualize it coming from somewhere in their body. The rest of the exercise takes a leap of faith and involves isolating and speaking to the part about what “it” wants for the person to whom it belongs. And the question that’s repeatedly asked is “even more than that, what does it want?” until the “part” reveals a deep core value. This value can be anything such as ‘happiness’, ‘love’, ‘truth’ or ‘peace’.

I remember one American woman in class standing up angrily and fighting with the instructor when she gave Osama Bin Laden as an example of a man whose core value was ‘security’ which explained his acts of heinous crime against his fellow man. But I understood the instructor’s point.

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I think I was born a mid level manager.  With the exception of my cemetery property telemarketing gigs as a student, from my first job in a developing country all the way to my current job as a Brand Manager at BIC, I’ve always been a mid-level manager.

Being a mid-level manager is akin to being the new kid in school. You want your teachers to approve of you but you also need your peers to think you’re cool. And to get in with the cool kids, you’ve got to speak their language.

Greg was a show boat of a man – he dressed to the nines and cared exceedingly about appearances. He was the operations manager for 10 years running. Being cost-conscious came naturally to Greg, and he got a lot of  encouragement to exploit his instinctive tightfisted skills; senior management constantly rewarded him for pinching the pennies out of a project, even if it looked like a mad science project gone wrong.  Because of this, Greg was often at odds with the marketing department over the issue of packaging costs.

Ironically, Greg’s pride and joy was his luxury car, everyone knew how it made him feel like he’d finally arrived.  His silver cufflinks flashed and winked at me as we sat talking about how new packaging should look. I knew that our brand equity was hurting, largely in part to the sub-standard pack materials and cheaper design.

As we spoke, Greg started to extol the virtues of cheaper packaging emphasizing – the hefty sum he had saved the company over the years. I stopped him out of the blue and asked him what kind of car he drove.  Stunned at the change of topic, he stammered “Who? Me?” 

“Yeah,” I replied “do you have a nice car?” 

“A Porsche!” he said beaming with pride.

I feigned pleasant surprise, eyes wide open, – “Wow, do you think a cheap import could compete with your Porsche?”

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No matter what side you were on, here are a few observations, affirmations and truths, post-election, with respect to selling:

1. Strategy and tactics are equally important. The purpose of executing tactics in a sales campaign is to drive a well-founded strategy. Tactics without a strategy is like playing darts with your eyes closed.
2. Message! Not messages, messages, messages. Decide what you are going to count on to win based upon research – a focused, objective assessment of the sales opportunity.
3. You can successfully change the ground rules even if you temporarily lose ground.
4. The understanding and leverage of political influence is crucial.
5. Messages must be clear, concise and compelling and paint the vision of a better situation for the buyer. One fumbled message can dilute the impact of a hundred perfect ones.
6. Logic and the facts aren’t the only things buyers consider.
7. Discipline rules. Seat-of-the-pants doesn’t.
8. Knowledge of your opponent’s plan to win is vital for devising and refining your own plan.
9. Direct and blatant “bad-mouthing-the-competition” doesn’t generally work.
10. Never underestimate the underdog.
11. Want to win? Look the part.
12. Tell the truth before your opponent exaggerates it.
13. Choose the right team. The salesperson is CEO of their own virtual sales corporation. Whom they choose to stand next to them and to advise them can make a big difference.
14. Whomever has momentum at the time of close generally wins. Its very difficult to build momentum just at the right time without a plan.
15. Embrace technology. It permeates pretty much everything most of us do.
16. Go broad and deep into the customer’s organization as appropriate. (Ideally effective marketing will have blazed the trail in advance.

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Business is and always has been a man’s world. To some extent that is largely still true because more men are occupying Chief Executive roles within companies all over the world. This is not to say that there are not powerful women out there who could serve as a fantastic example for other women to follow. In fact, there are many powerful women running huge multinational companies and corporations.

The top 20 most powerful women in the world in 2008 are as follows:

1. Angela Merkel – The most powerful woman in the world in 2008 is the German Chancellor. Merkel has been at the helm of Germany since 2005. She is extremely well respected in her home country and is a key player in the European Union. As a result, her position as the most powerful woman in the world is well deserved.
2. Sheila C Blair – Blair is the highest ranked American on the list. The Chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. In simple terms, she runs the company that guarantees Americans a certain sum of money back should the bank they save with goes bust. As we are in a credit crunch at the moment, her ranking has increased.
3. Indra K Nooyi – The Chairman and Chief Executive of PepsiCo, which is the fourth largest food and drink company in the world. She is considered to be one of the best corporate leaders in the world and earns $14.7 million a year as a result.
4. Angela Braly – Braly is the Chief Executive and President of WellPoint and earns $14.9 million in salary.

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For me, the business term of the week is “big hairy audacious goal (BHAG),” coined originally by James Collins and Jerry Porras in their 1996 article entitled Building Your Company’s Vision. A BHAG is a form of vision statement “…an audacious 10-to-30-year goal to progress towards an envisioned future.”My stories (all true) all relate to alignment of the company BHAG to the individual employees’ BHAGs.

My first story is about a technology CEO who now heads a 55 person company with a full management team and complement of key staff. He’s bored. The product that he invented has been proven. His management team does all the work he does not like to do and more. Other key employees are smarter than he is so he lets them run the show. I affirm that this is all good and that he just needs a new BHAG – personally. “Can I do that (implying while not letting the company down)?” he asks. Yes. Go for it.

The next encounter is a middle manager in a construction company. She is sure that her company has no leadership and that failure is imminent. She has no response to my questions about what she is doing to build a leadership team, mentor leaders, manage her leader. I inquire, “what is your big hairy audacious goal – personally?” She responds, “none”..she accomplished her BHAG when she got this job.

Finally, I listened painfully to a manager describe an employee who only puts in 40 hours a week, cannot juggle more than one task at a time, never asks for more challenging work. I asked, “what is the employee’s big hairy audacious goal – personally?” The manager has never had that discussion.

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A major problem for business owners and employers today is getting the best employees and then keeping them. Sounds easy, but any employer will tell you that these activities take up the most time and have the biggest impact on business results. So how do you go about retaining the good people once you’ve found them?

Understanding what your employees want from a workplace sounds like a logical place to start. After all, if you know what your employees are after, you simply need to provide it and all will be well. This is a great theory, but research shows that employers are not that successful at identifying what their employees actually want. In fact there is a significant disconnect between the things that employees say are important to them, and how highly employers rank those same things.

This survey first came out in 1946 in Foreman Facts, from the Labor Relations Institute of NY and was produced again by Lawrence Lindahl in Personnel magazine, in 1949. This study has since been replicated with similar results by Ken Kovach (1980); Valerie Wilson, Achievers International (1988); Bob Nelson, Blanchard Training & Development (1991); and Sheryl & Don Grimme, GHR Training Solutions (1997-2001).

When asked to rank a list of ten criteria, the employees and managers/owners ranked them very differently: 

What Employees Want

1
Full appreciation for work done

2
Feeling “part” of things

3
Sympathetic help on personal issues

4
Job Security

5
Good wages

6
Interesting work

7
Promotion/growth opportunities

8
Personal loyalty to workers

9
Good working conditions

10
Tactful discipline

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Have you ever wondered why the people in your team don’t seem as motivated as you do? Or why some people do their jobs with enthusiasm and vigor, and others barely get through the day without taking the frown off their faces?

You are not alone. The topic of human motivation has been studied for hundreds of years. So it’s a topic we know a lot about. Unfortunately it’s not often taught to managers as part of their training.

There are things you can do to influence how much energy people are willing to put into their jobs. Below are 5 critical things to know about motivation.

1. We can’t motivate other people

Motivation is not something we ‘do’ to others. It has to come from within. All we can do is create an environment which encourages motivation. So to some extent we are let off the hook. Our responsibility as managers only goes so far –after that, it’s up to the individual to get on board.

2. Some people just won’t ever be motivated

I think we all know the truth of this. Some people are just in the wrong space, and have no interest in being part of a team, or working any harder than they absolutely have to. It can be very difficult to manage the performance of these individuals, particularly if they are doing just enough to get by. Usually the solution is to include behaviors and attitudes as part of required performance. Then their attitude becomes a tangible performance issue which can be coached and managed through the performance review system.

3. One size definitely does not fit all

The fun thing about motivation is that we are all different, so you need to employ multiple strategies and approaches. Different generations, different stages of life, different needs from a career – these are all things that will influence what people desire as a motivator during their lives.

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The success of your business is directly related to the commitment and productivity of the people who work in your business. And yet it is generally recognized that 60% of employees, or more, are underutilized in their roles at work.

So what are the factors that contribute to low performance standards and expectations?

Communication, or mis-communication, is one of the major sources of low productivity. The messages that move between the owner, employees, managers and even customers are not understood in the same way. One classic example is that business owners tend to assume that employees and managers see things the same way they do.

Managers tend to lower their expectations (unconsciously) so that they will not have to confront employees. Most people dislike discussing declining performance with their employees, and so actively avoid having to do so by reducing heir expectations of what’s required.

Employees have a tendency to protect themselves from possible failure by pushing back on what is expected. They will often negotiate/bargain the job down to a more comfortable level.

Business owners often have difficulty separating what they want done from how they want it done. Telling employees exactly how to achieve a certain goal leaves no room for the employee to think or use their own initiative. Consequently they often stop trying to contribute and become ‘sheep” – just doing what they are told. In this catch-22 situation, the owner is forced into a position where they must constantly be telling everyone exactly what to do.

Some owners may not understand the concept of person/job matching, and so have the wrong people in the wrong positions. This situation can be extremely demotivating for the employee.

So how do you go about setting performance standards and expectations?

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When you ask employees about their impressions of Performance Management processes, the answer is invariably negative or neutral. It’s not often that the process is positively endorsed by those who use it. So where are we going wrong?

As managers, we know we need a management system of some kind for all the components of performance:

•  getting people to work on things that will help the business achieve it’s goals
•  identifying and overcoming obstacles that might prevent success
•  understand and checking our progress regularly
•  giving people a forum for talking about what they are doing and how it’s going
•  providing the appropriate checks and balances
•  recognising and rewarding performance

I believe there are 5 fundamental reasons why Performance Management is not viewed positively.

1. Reviewers don’t have the skills or confidence to give feedback appropriately

Giving feedback constructively is a learned skill. Unfortunately for their team members, many managers haven’t had any training or support in learning this critical skill. So when it comes to review time, feedback is either:

•  blunt and delivered with no thought for the impact or consequence,
•  not provided at all because the manager wants to avoid disagreement or conflict, or
•   is given in such a wishy washy way that the reviewee actually misses the fact they are being given feedback!

This is one of the most critical capabilities a manager can have, with far-reaching positive or negative consequences. Providing ongoing coaching and support should be part of the approach to managing performance.

2. Employees don’t see Performance Management (PM) as a 2 way street

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In it’s simplest form, performance management is a common sense set of discussions that make sure people are clear about what they need to do, have the support to do it and get open and honest feedback on their performance.

Any performance management process should answer 4 important questions for your employees:

•  What do I need to do and how well? (Direction)
•  How am I doing? (Feedback)
•  What happens when I do well? (Reward/Recognition)
•  What happens when I need/want help? (Support/Development)

Lets look more closely at each of these:

Direction

Employees are not mind readers. Just because it is clear to the manager exactly what is expected, doesn’t mean the employee has the same understanding. Having a detailed discussion about exactly what the job requires and any specific priorities is the first step in good performance management. Key points to cover include:

•  what needs to be achieved throughout the year
•  what data or information (evidence) will be used to measure performance
•  the key actions needed to achieve the desired outcomes

Both parties should have a written record of this discussion either in the form of a job description or a set of specific objectives for the next 6 or 12 months. Written documentation leaves little room for misunderstandings or confusion between manager and employee about the expectations of the job.

Feedback

Observing the performance of your employees and providing feedback about it should be a routine part of the performance management process. Feedback is most effective in making a difference in work performance when the employee has confidence in the basis of that feedback. And you as the manager will be more confident if your feedback is based on information that you can support.

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There is not a single management skill more critical to your personal and professional success as an entrepreneur than learning to delegate. But delegating successfully is much more than simply handing out assignments. It is more an exercise in understanding and accepting our own strengths and limitations.

In this fast paced world, we must choose what activities it makes sense for us to do ourselves, and what it makes sense to let go of. None of us can be an expert in everything – not because of any lack of intellectual ability, but more because we lack specific exposure or experience. We must learn to accept this fact and be OK with it.

How do you fill the gaps in your expertise?
Let’s consider a real life example. My own areas of expertise lie in business and operational management, understanding people and coaching. This is my business. When I wanted to create a single web-page to market a workshop I was developing I had to make a decision. I have (very) rudimentary skills in web page creation. While all of the software I need is at my fingertips, the question is “Do I really have time to learn it?”

I ask myself: “Should I spend several hours – probably a whole day if I’m being honest – learning to grasp the software and design my own web-page” Or should I spend some money and hire somebody who already knows the software?” Then all I need to do is supply the content.

I am tempted to go it alone – after all, I love technology and knowing how to use it (that’s my ego talking!). But at the end of the day, my time is better spent working on other aspects of the business. So I outsourced the job.

In making your own decisions, the key is in determining what you need to know, want to know, must know, and already know. And how your time would best be spent.

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Although workplaces and management styles have come a long way in the last decade, the command and control style of management behaviour remains common practice in many companies. This management approach basically means that employees are told exactly what to do, when to do it and even how it should be done. The manager is in charge, has all the answers, and fixes all the problems.

It’s no surprise that plenty of people find this approach demotivating, and that workplaces with a command-control style are rated as pretty unsatisfying. When it comes down to it, none of us really enjoys being told exactly what to do, and neither do our employees. When people feel as though they have no say and are given no opportunity to contribute outside of their work tasks, then they switch off and become “disengaged”.

The command and control approach is being phased out for a more collaborative and engaging style – a “Coach” approach or being a “manager-coach”. This is a positive shift – as long as we support our managers in understanding what on earth is meant by a “coach approach”, and how expectations of them are changing.

Coaching – What does it really mean?

The coaching profession has exploded in recent years, diversifying across many different fields and industries. All of these people are dedicated to helping others achieve their goals, improve aspects of themselves or their business, or move forwards from where they are today.

In a work environment, the role of a manager-coach can be described as :

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CEO’s have not been using a service that can provide them with great value. Historically CEO’s have relied on mentors and consultants for guidance and help learning the ropes of the lifestyle that is a CEO. After the ropes are understood there is no need for mentors or consultants, CEO’s are hired because they are resourceful, intelligent and adaptable people.

CEO’s need is a professional coach. They need a coach that relies on experience and process. It is very important for CEO’s and those in the board room to realize that they have the answers to most issues that are presented to them to solve. A highly trained coach who focuses on a process of pulling that information from the CEO is the most effective way for support in a job that feels quite unsupported.

Many coaching firms and individuals will tout that they have the experience to coach you, which is only half the equation. Experience and empathic understanding is important but can put that coach into a position of becoming that mentor or consultant CEO’s do not need.

“It is not necessary, for example, for the executive coach to have all the knowledge required to solve a particular problem. Instead the coach should have the objectivity necessary to stand outside of the problem, and the agility to assist the executive in recognizing what is missing and what needs to be done” (Altier, 1989).

The coaching process is the number one way a CEO can arrive at answers that will empower and support their natural leadership and problem solving abilities. A good process coach is like a good telescope; you have to purchase the telescope, learn to use it as the tool it is, then the coach will use the process to bring those things that seem blurry or far away closer so that the CEO can arrive at the decision that needs to be made. Coaches do not make decisions for their clients, they help them see the problem clearer not the answer.

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Have you ever heard someone say, “Actually, I have to admit that I think I am really bad at managing other people. My staff all hate me and I’m incapable of doing my job”.

The answer is no, of course. No one says this either because they don’t believe it, or because they don’t want to appear incompetent. Unfortunately research tells us that from the employees’ perspective, there aren’t that many terrific managers out there.

What should we take out of this dichotomy? Perhaps at the least, we could all admit to ourselves that there is room for some improvement in the way we lead others. After all, it’s not the sort of skill that is easy to get 100% right all of the time. It might just be that we don’t specifically know what improvements to make, so here’s 10 ways to start:

1. Get a reality check

Finding out what others think of our leadership style can be real eye-opener, and is often the most powerful driver for change. Using a 360 survey where you receive feedback from your staff, peers and manager, gives you some concrete information on a sometimes intangible subject. Use an existing tool (and there are some highly regarded ones out there) or else simply let your staff know that you are seeking feedback from them in order to improve your style.

A word of caution though, your staff may not feel safe in giving feedback if they believe you are going to use it against them, or become defensive about what they say. It’s up to you to create a safe environment so they feel comfortable in being open and honest with you.

2. Don’t use the power of your position to get things done

If people are questioning why certain things are done, or the logic of decisions, never pull rank in response. A critical component of effective leadership is getting the buy-in from your team and colleagues.

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How many of us have been in a position where we have more to do than can realistically fit into one day, or week. So we spend all of our time feeling rushed, being rushed, and wondering how on earth we are going to manage. If you are having that feeling of overwhelm in your business, it’s time to take stock of what’s going on.

How well you manage yourself and the time you have, is crucial to your success. Wasted time equals lost opportunities. Lost opportunities equal lost business and profits.

Time can’t be “saved” – it’s an impossibility. You can’t find more of it – it’s a fixed commodity. You can only manage your activities as time passes. So how are you spending the 60 seconds in each minute – the 60 minutes in each hour – the 1,440 minutes in each day?

What you need is to achieve is working on your top priorities in the most effective way. Here are 10 great strategies for doing just that.

Lesson 1: Prioritize

Aside from just listing what needs to be done, rank them from most important to least important. And then complete them in that order. Too often we start with the easy stuff or the quick stuff, regardless of how important it is. Look at the list of things that need to be done. Hi-light the activities that you could put on hold if you had to. How much time could you free up if you put some of those activities on hold?

Be realistic about the number of priorities you have. Most of the activities we are involved in are things we want to do. The problem with overwhelm is that there are many more things we want to do, than we physically have time for. So create some space by telling yourself that you are just putting some activities on hold for now. You are not giving them up forever, but you are giving yourself permission to put some activities on hold – so you can focus on the most important priorities.

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Each year at the start of football practice, Vince Lombardi, the coach of the Green Bay Packers started his season the same way. His opening statement to his players was, “This is a football.” Every year, John Wooden, the legendary basketball coach of the UCLA Bruins started his first practice of the season by demonstrating to his players how to properly put on their socks to prevent blisters. Pretty basic stuff, huh?

Notice the similarities between Wooden and Lombardi in the educational formats. Whether it’s athletics or business, you must start with the fundamentals first. Just as if you built a mansion on a weak foundation, a business built on a weak foundation will crumble. Bill Walton the former star basketball player for UCLA was interviewed about John Wooden and he recounted his first practice with Wooden and how the coach talked about putting on socks properly. Bill Walton remarked that he expected incredible wisdom to come from his legendary coach in the first practice and was disappointed that the practice started with how to put on his socks. When Bill Walton questioned Wooden about the first meeting, Wooden’s reply was simple. If he were to teach Mr. Walton everything he knew about basketball but he could not do any of those things because he was sitting on the bench unable to play because of blisters, then all those teachings would not matter.

How many times have you experienced or witnessed yourself, sales people, managers and owners looking for miracle cures without taking care of the fundamental basics? Massive advertising campaigns, computers, software, business development centers, new facilities or cure-all sales approaches won’t matter if you don’t have the right foundation in place. What are the components of a solid foundation? First, you must have the right team members. Everything starts with people.

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