This book has quickly become a favorite as a gift to customers and clients from people in the business world. Because it is so well written and illustrated, those that receive it as a gift are sure to be mesmerized with it for great lengths of time. It is hard to put the book down once you begin reading through the passages and the sense of inspiration that comes from the quotes can spark great ideas and direction for those that read it.

Great Quotes from Great Leaders was written to inspire and it does a wonderful job at it. Peggy Anderson has included quotes from some of the world’s greatest leaders and most respected individuals over time. The quotes from Franklin Roosevelt give us the strength and desire to push forward in the face of adversity. He speaks of our desire to live as free people and our need to push through any doubts that may stop us from achieving the goals that we have set forth for ourselves.

Peggy Anderson has also included quotes from other presidents, like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and John F. Kennedy in this masterpiece. Each of these gentlemen played an important part in creating the society that we live in today. Their quotes are recorded so that they can pass on the words of hope and encouragement to all that have the pleasure of reading them.

Along with gifts for business associates, giving Great Quotes from Great Leaders to family and friends has proven to be a great idea. This book can capture your attention and hold it as you receive your inspiration from each and every one of the passages. When Peggy Anderson wrote compiled this collection of great quotes, she surely knew that these quotes will live on through time and will serve as inspiration to many people.

The four hundred quotes that are contained in Great Quotes from Great Leaders are nicely arranged in this stunning coffee table edition. You can leave this book lying around in any room and it will surely draw attention. The content grabs the attention of the reader because they are raw commentary from some of the greatest people in history.

When you see the beauty that is contained in this book and read the passages that were made famous by very influential people in your lifetime you are sure to be amazed and enthused. Give it as a gift to a loved one, friend, or business associate or purchase a copy for your own enjoyment. In either case, Great Quotes from Great Leaders is sure to be enjoyed by anyone that gets the pleasure to read it.

Please visit The Personal Development Company if you would like to learn more about Great Quotes from Great Leaders by Peggy Anderson

And what better authors are there to cover such material than Ken Blanchard and Don Shula? Ken Blanchard has long since established his talent as a business leadership guidance professional. Don Shula’s career of a NFL head coach also established his credentials a brilliant guiding light to personal and professional achievement. Now, the two have come together to produce a brilliant self-help audio series. Simply listening to a few minutes of the material on these CDs each and every day can lead to a significant improvement in understanding what is needed to attain success.

What makes Coaching from the Heart such an excellent series? There are quite a few positive benefits to this work. If the main benefit of positives were to be summed up into a single component, it would be the structure the work follows. Specifically, the system promotes the five great principles a leader can embody. You can’t be a great leader unless you have a proper and clear insight into what is needed to be such a leader. The five main traits you need to be a solid leader are explicitly spelled out in these CDs. This opens the door for being able to embody such traits and put them into practice.

Once you put them into practice, your lot in life will improve in many different ways. How could it not? Natural, effective, and learned leaders will certainly experience positive interactions from others. Why would they not? Those with the qualities of effective leadership are admired and treated with respect.

Other facets designed to develop outstanding leadership are discussed in this audio series. Areas of development include creating a vision for the future and maintaining the proper conviction needed to ensure the outcome is the desired one. The potential to adapt and excel in changing environments is also examined in detail. And, quite helpfully, the ability to help others become the best they can be is examined. Mastery of these many skills can certainly help you attain the talents of an effective leader.

Does mastery come overnight? No, of course not; mastery is always a work in progress. Those that do take the time out to follow the concepts offered in this series will discover mastery can be arrived at in a reasonable timeframe.

Coaching from the Heart by Ken Blanchard and Don Shula is certainly an innovative and groundbreaking work covering all the many varied talents needed to lead others and even yourself. Most assuredly, skills such as this will be a great benefit to all your endeavors in life.

Please visit The Personal Development Company if you would like to learn more about Coaching from the Heart by Ken Blanchard and Don Shula

In The 10 Qualities of Charismatic People, Dr. Tony Alessandra discusses ten qualities of the individual that can be developed by those who desire success in their lives, attraction from others, and want to experience more attention. Among these qualities and characteristics that The 10 Qualities of Charismatic People teaches, personal development plays a huge role.

Communication Abilities

When reading what Alessandra has to say about developing charisma and attracting more people to you, one of the keys involves communication. Communication–no matter who you are–plays a big part in relating to others and the words you speak matter. You can be a diplomat, antagonist, or even appeaser and should realize the words you use dictate how others relate, listen and interact with you.

The 10 Qualities of Charismatic People discusses the secrets of communicating silent messages, the signals which people can detect from your entire state of being. In addition to silent messages, you need to learn practical communicative abilities, such as articulation, listening skills, and the art of persuasion–garnering support for your view.

Personal Insight

Throughout the book, Dr. Tony Alessandra presents a how-to guide that anyone can follow if they want to develop charisma, achieve strong personal relationships, attention and attraction with others. A major part includes self-realization and personal insight. Personal insight involves looking at your emotional, psychological, and intellectual self. You need to not only take responsibility for your own emotions, but also think about your current state of mind and how you approach problems and dilemmas. Factors like honesty, integrity, risk-taking, resourcefulness and healthy-skepticism come together to help you develop your personality, attitude and entire methodology of approaching others.

Not only do you need to have great personal insight into yourself, but you also need to have insight into others. The 10 Qualities of Charismatic People teaches about the steps you can take to be more cognizant of your surroundings, the environment and others’ behaviors. It also shows you how to tune into your intuition and “gut” feelings, something which is crucial to your overall development of charisma.

Dr. Tony Alessandra’s book can help you develop the self-confidence needed to relate to others and become a charismatic person. People with charisma seem to command respect from many people automatically, and this is a principle that the book discusses. By developing charisma with the help of The 10 Qualities of Charismatic People, you’ll easily get help from others and get what you want in the process while being adored by others. You’ll also help other people feel at ease around you, dramatically increase your self-esteem, self-confidence and turn others people into your friends.

Please visit The Personal Development Company if you would like to learn more about The 10 Qualities of Charismatic People by Dr. Tony Alessandra

There are a variety of drivers of engagement. One might argue that the largest driver of engagement has to do with the leaders of the company and how they interact and build relationships with coworkers. Employees that leave a company cite that a main reason of dissatisfaction is that they had a bad relationship with one of their leaders. Maybe the leader didn’t provide a good vision or direction, maybe the employee did not get meaningful feedback on their contributions, or maybe the leader was simply unapproachable and cold. Motivational and inspiring leaders are probably the most important driver of employe engagement. Employee relations training can give human resources the tools they need to help their leaders encourage engagement.

Another driver of employee engagement is more directly related to the human resources department, which is where a good human resource training program comes into play. This next driver relates to a solid rewards program – financial rewards, bonuses, raises – these all make employees feel more secure and are great incentives for employees to engage. Employees that have financial difficulties are much less likely to feel attached to their work, even if they enjoy it. Financial stress does not drive employee engagement. A company must provide a good rewards system to foster more engagement.

The third driver is the general sense of involvement and the quality of communication in an employee’s daily work. An employee should know how the company is doing and what the future might hold. Communication is key to making an employee feel like he or she is a valuable part of a company. If an employee knows that he or she is worth something within a company, he feels more attached and is more likely to engage. A company should ask employees for participation and ask them to get involved. Creating an emotional attachment to work improves engagement.

There are several ways for a company to evaluate its current level of engagement. Surveys may be helpful, as are focus groups and one-on-one discussions. The HR department can go out and interview people throughout the company to get valuable insights. Gathering data to understand current performance is key to learning what a company needs to do to improve. A human resource training program can introduce some of the tools needed to conduct interviews, and employee relations training can also be beneficial for an overall understanding of engagement and what employees need to get more involved. A comprehensive engagement strategy should first evaluate the current situation and then develop a plan to improve employee engagement through several channels.

David Shoemaker is Vice President of Learning Solutions and Innovation at eCornell. For more information on employee relations training, human resource training program, or eCornell, please visit http://www.eCornell.com

There are four major types of project uncertainty that a project manager might face. The first is variation – this type of uncertainty is compounded by the small uncertainties associated with each part of a project. If there are five main parts to a project and each has a timeline variation of two weeks around the completion date, that is actually a variation of 10 weeks total for the project. The project manager has to be aware of and deal with all of these uncertainties simultaneously to keep the project on track.

The second type of uncertainty is foreseen uncertainty. Although these uncertainties are foreseeable in that they may happen, the project managers and workers don’t know if they actually will. These uncertainties are different from variation – these are more major and may need risk management. One example of foreseen uncertainty can be seen in the pharmaceutical industry. Maybe a drug in development turns out to have side effects; these are foreseen because they happen with most drugs, and a plan needs to be developed for how to deal with them. Training in project management can be helpful to learn how to develop contingency plans.

The third type of uncertainty is unforeseen uncertainty. These are uncertainties that cannot be anticipated in the initial project planning. Those in project management and leadership positions are unable to make contingency plans because they do not expect these uncertainties to occur. This uncertainty is particularly difficult to deal with and can make people become very stressed. It’s important for project managers to know how to deal with these situations.

Lastly, the fourth type of uncertainty is called chaos. This happens when the initial project plan is uncertain itself. Chaos is found more in research endeavors (rather than more specific development projects) where the participants don’t know exactly what their work will show or what they will do with it at the end of the project.

No single project will have just one type of uncertainty, which is why it is so important that project managers be able to anticipate and deal with all types – variation, foreseen uncertainty, unforeseen uncertainty, and chaos (sometimes called “unknown unknowns” or “unk-unks”). There are different uncertainty profiles that can describe the combinations of uncertainties explained above, such as low predictability (low variance and high chaos) and high predictability (high variance and low chaos). The more a project manager can understand about a project, the better he or she will be able to develop an effective management style. The main way to approach uncertainty is through planning/learning and response, tracking progress/assumptions/unkowns, and meeting target goals (or making new goals based on current findings).

A flexible leader is generally a good project manager. A flexible project manager understands the four uncertainties and knows how to bring a project to success and completion while facing those uncertainties. Training in project management prepares PMs for project management and leadership and can facilitate the development of effective management styles.

David Shoemaker is Vice President of Learning Solutions and Innovation at eCornell. For more information on project management and leadership, training in project management, or eCornell, please visit http://www.eCornell.com

Janis found in his research that most catastrophic decisions were the result of lack of conflict or opposing viewpoints within the team. When there is no conflict, there are no alternatives to analyze and teams have a tendency not to gather the necessary information to make an informed decision. According to Janis, groupthink usually happens when these conditions exist:

There is a strong, dominant, and persuasive team leader

There is a high level of cohesion within the team

The team is under a lot of pressure from the outside to make a good decision

As a senior executive, you need to be on the lookout for groupthink within your leadership team. Healthy conflict is not only good for the team, it is essential for making good decisions. However, there is a danger that conflict can become negative and disruptive if not handled in a proper manner.

Senior leaders need to create an environment where team members are encouraged to challenge ideas and decisions. Sometimes, it may be necessary to force the issue. At one point in my career, I was assigned to represent Manufacturing on several product strategy teams. When our team presented our recommendations to the company president, he would always challenge our recommendation by asking why we didn’t consider an alternative strategy. If we recommended a invest and grow strategy, he would ask why we didn’t divest and sell the business. Knowing that he was going to do this, we always have lively and open discussions in our team meetings about different alternatives. So, if you and your team are making a critical decision, make sure that you have explored alternatives.

Another technique that I use when facilitating a group of senior leaders in an organization, is to make sure that the top level person in the group does not speak first. Many times I found that once the top person has offered an idea or opinion, it biases the group tremendously. If you are not getting discussion or alternatives, avoid the temptation to fill the void of silence with your own ideas. Draw out others on the team by asking them what they think. Be attentive to non verbal clues that a person may disagree or have something to say. I see this in my client engagements all the time. I like to throw out statements or questions to get some reaction. Once I do this, I am observant of people’s expressions. As soon as I see something that indicates I struck a nerve, I will ask the person to respond.

Along this same line, it is important to allow each person on the team the opportunity to contribute and to avoid having one person dominate the discussion. One of the major reasons that people won’t speak up is that they are afraid of rejection or criticism for their idea. Here is a personal example to illustrate the point. When I was in seventh grade (over fifty years ago), the teacher asked a question and I raised my hand with the answer. My answer was wrong and the teacher made fun of my answer. Because of this, I was always afraid to raise my hand again.

It is best to separate the generation of ideas or alternatives from the evaluation of them. The brain has two sides. The left side of the brain is analytical and logical, while the right side of the brain is creative. We have difficulty moving back and forth between the two sides of the brain, and we usually have one dominant side. So as soon as we stop generating alternatives and starting to evaluate, we are shutting down the right side in favor of the left side. Therefore, it works best to get all of the ideas and alternatives on the table before beginning to evaluate them.

Once you have created an environment where your team feels comfortable contributing alternatives, questioning key decisions, and sharing their opinions, you need to be careful to keep the conflict that is bound to occur positive. The focus should always be on the idea or alternative, not the person. One sure way to turn conflict negative is to create winners and losers. Sometimes the best solutions or decisions involve a hybrid of several different alternatives.

It is important that the evaluation of alternatives happen in the team environment. Discourage the “hallway meetings” where people lobby for their own idea. Conflict will turn negative if people feel left out of the evaluation process.

There are two types of consensus. One is pure consensus where everyone on the team agrees fully with the decision. The other type of consensus is where everyone on the team agrees to support the decision. Pure consensus is difficult, if not possible to achieve. Also, it may not be the best decision. On the other hand, practical consensus is the goal. Once the alternatives have been considered and a decision has been made, you should get verbal acknowledgement from each person on the team that they support the decision and expect their behaviors and actions to be supportive. This is one last chance for people to speak up.

If groupthink is a problem within your senior leadership team, it may be time to generate a little positive conflict. As Winston Churchill said. “If two people agree on everything, one of them is unnecessary.”

Ryan Scholz works with leaders whose success is dependent on getting commitment and high performance from others. He is author of Turning Potential into Action: Eight Principles for Creating a Highly Engaged Work Place. For more information, visit his web site at www.lead-strat-assoc.com.

The theory behind the model is very simple. Effective managers adapt a leadership style that is appropriate to the situation rather than use the same style all of the time. A big “ah ha” for one of my clients recently was that the model applies to tasks not people. The same person will have to be managed differently depending on the task involved.

When determining which style to use, the manager assesses the situation from two dimensions. The first is the person’s level of competency for the task. Competence is the level of skills and knowledge that a person brings to the assigned task.

The second dimension is the level of commitment or motivation to do the task. Commitment involves the person’s confidence to perform the task, their interest in doing it, and their enthusiasm for it. While assessing commitment, it is important to realize that lack of confidence is treated the same as lack of motivation. In fact, what may appear to be an enthusiasm or motivation issue on the surface most likely stems from lack of self confidence.

In the Situational Leadership model, there are two types of management behavior. One is called directive behavior which focuses on how to do a task. It involves telling or showing people what to do, when to do it, and providing feedback on the results. Directive behaviors focus primarily on the competence dimension.

The other type of management behavior is called supportive behavior. It focuses on the confidence and motivation dimension. It involves such actions as listening, praising, encouraging, and involvement.

Applying the wrong style to a task or situation can have two negative impacts. The first is that performance will be less than expected. The second is that it can be demotivating. The theory is simple, yet the application can be difficult because we all tend to have a preferred style, and therefore may have a tendency to use it even when not appropriate.

The first rule of situational management is that the amount of directive style employed is inversely proportional to the competence of the individual to do the task. A common term for a highly directive style is micromanagement. While employees and staff may not appreciate micromanagement, it is an appropriate style when the person lacks the competence to perform the task.

I recently heard an employee express frustration because he spent a lot of time and effort doing an assignment for the boss only to have the boss say it was all wrong and no good. The employee’s competence level on this task was low because he had never done it before. The manager adapted a low directive approach and left the poor employee with the challenge to read the boss’s mind and figure out what to do. In this situation, a highly directive style would have been appropriate.

However, the biggest issue I see is that managers tend to use a highly directive style even with highly competent people. The manager feels a need to be involved in all of the details and requires much more reporting and follow up than is really necessary. Applying the micromanager style too much can be demotivating and ultimately effects the commitment dimension.

The second rule of situational management is that the amount of supportive behavior required in inversely proportional to the level of commitment of the person to perform the task. Think about a brand new person who you just hired. They are usually eager to get started and contribute. They don’t need a lot of supportive behavior; they just need be told what to do. This doesn’t mean that the manager ignores the person, but praise is given after the task is accomplished, not before, There is no need to “fire up” the person; they already have the motivation.

A common situation that managers face is the combination of moderate to high competence combined with low motivation. The person knows how to perform the task, yet they just don’t seem to show any enthusiasm for it. The problem can be lack of confidence. This person needs reassurance and a boss who is supportive. When faced with this situation, some managers may revert to micromanagement which is absolutely the wrong style for the situation. Telling the person how to do a task will actually make it worse. The focus should be on encouragement and motivation, not on the how and when of the task.

Finally, being able to recognize situations where the person performing the task is both highly committed and high competent is essential to being an effective manager. Having people with this capability frees up the manager’s time to do other things. Managers needs to avoid the temptation to spend too much time either directing or supporting in these situations.

Think about a current situation you are facing with an employee or staff member. What is the person’s level of competence.? What is their commitment? Then, what is the appropriate style that I should use?

Ryan Scholz works with leaders whose success is dependent on getting commitment and high performance from others. He is author of Turning Potential into Action: Eight Principles for Creating a Highly Engaged Work Place. For more information, visit his web site at www.lead-strat-assoc.com.

A great deal can be learned about leadership from the recent history of the Blackhawks and their drive to become the best team in professional hockey. For those who follow the team closely, you probably know that they have recently traded and released a number of players who made key contributions to the championship season. Despite these trades, the leadership lessons still hold true.

The team’s turning point has been linked to the ascent of Rocky Wirtz to the chairman’s role. But it actually began with the drafting of Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane by Dale Tallon, the former general manager, prior to Rocky Wirtz’s taking over the team. These two players make up the core nucleus on which the team has been built.

Rocky Wirtz succeeded his father, William (Bill) Wirtz, who ran the team for 41 years. Bill was a very astute businessman but had been stuck in a 1990′s strategy of pay-per-view television and keeping player salaries under tight control. The financial situation was desperate at the time of Bill Wirtz’s death in September of 2007. Rocky Wirtz was in the unenviable position of having to quickly reverse almost every one of his father’s major decisions.

One of his first decisions was moving into his grandfather’s old office. Arthur Wirtz had been a major contributor to the growth of the original NHL. His office was left virtually untouched since his 1983 death. Bill Wirtz had refused to allow the office to be occupied by anyone else for almost 25 years. This move symbolized the forward movement of the team and emphasized the goal of returning the team to prominence.

Forbes magazine reported that under Bill Wirtz, the fans and other key stakeholders had grown estranged from the team. The Blackhawks had alienated its players, fans and key stakeholders. Think of the parallels to disengaged employees, unhappy customers and frustrated stakeholders.

Over the years, various disagreements had created a riff between management and its former Hall of Fame Players. This included famous names such as Bobby Hall, Stan Mikita and Tony Esposito. In fact, Bill Wirtz was blamed for allowing Bobby Hull to leave the team and join the World Hockey Association (WHA) in 1972.

These former star players were welcomed back by the new Blackhawks. Each was given their own recognition day and each became an important link to the past glory of the team. More importantly, they helped reinforced the winning culture that the new management had embraced.

The team also reached out to the fan base in other ways. By switching the radio broadcasts to mega-station WGN and broadcasting all home games on free television, they actually were able to increase attendance at the United Center. This was in direct conflict with Bill Wirtz’s philosophy that broadcasting home games was a disservice to season ticket holders.

Management also changed their philosophy toward the players. Like a typical sports team, they needed to spend more money to sign quality players. But they also focused on building esprit de corps (a sense of loyalty and belonging) amongst the players. By building strong relationships between management, players, player’s families and fans, they created a powerful force that enabled players to fully commit to the team and fans to embrace them.

In his book “Good to Great”, Jim Collins talks about “getting the right people on the bus”. I think this correctly describes the Blackhawk’s personnel moves. It initially started at the management level. Rocky Wirtz hired John McDonough as president very early in his tenure. McDonough, the Chicago Cub’s former president, was only hired when Wirtz was convinced that he had the fortitude to make equally tough decisions.

The team added former coaches Joel Quenneville and Scotty Bowman as senior advisors. Joel Quenneville was soon elevated to head coach. Stan Bowman, who is the son of Scotty Bowman eventually, took over the general manager position. These moves put experienced leaders and coaches in place that had previous experience in winning a Stanley Cup.

This thinking also applied to the players. They had the raw talent in Kane & Toews, but they lacked experience. They brought in veteran players like Cristobal Huet at goal & Brian Campbell at defense. But even after winning the Western Conference semi-finals in 2009, they continued to add talent like Marian Hossa, John Madden and Tomas Kopecky.

Let’s correlate this to teambuilding. Each team members was chosen for their ability to contribute to the team’s goals. The team included acquired veterans, players who moved up through the minor league, recent draftees and former Stanley Cup winners. There was one common denominator and that was the team’s goal to win the Stanley Cup. Katzenbach and Smith cited in their book “The Wisdom of Teams” that “a common, meaningful purpose sets the tone and aspiration” for team success.

When an organization gets focused on its strategic goals, then great things can happen. There were good decisions made by the team’s chairman, president, general manager and head coach. The team played exceptionally well with everyone contributing to the playoff victories. Jonathan Toews won the most valuable player award. There was outstanding goal tending, great defense and timely offensive scoring. The Blackhawks successfully demonstrated how to build a team and teamwork itself.

But would we be writing this article if they had not won the championship? Typically, no one sings the praises of the general who lost the war or the coach who lost the big game. No one usually remembers the team that came in second.

There is no questioning the results. Attendance has grown from 522,000 (second lowest in the NHL) to almost one million (highest in the NHL). Season ticket holders have grown from a low of 3,400 to over 14,000. There are also more than 4,000 on the waiting list. The franchise has achieved financial success after almost not being able to make the payroll in late 2007. And most importantly, they have achieved the ultimate reward – the 2010 Championship of the NHL.

Now the question is “Can they repeat in 2011?”

Tony Rea is managing principal of 20/20 HR LLC based in suburban Chicago, IL. For more information visit http://www.2020hr.com

When putting something new together, do you:

A.Read the instructions

B.Ask for an explanation

C.Go ahead on your own

When contacting a person for the first time, do you prefer:

A. Meeting face-to-face

B. Talking on the phone

C. Doing an activity together

When you have a complaint about something you bought, do you:

A. Write a letter

B. Call on the phone

C. Take it back to the store

When shopping, do you prefer:

A. Having a written brochure to read about the product

B. Having a salesperson tell you about the product.

C. Being able to touch and try the product.

Your answers to these questions give an idea of your preferred learning style. The answers indicated by “A” are indicative of someone who is a visual learner, the “B” answers are indicative of a auditory learner, and the “C” answers are indicative of a kinesthetic learner.

This is a shortened version of an assessment that examines learning preferences, so the results are just for discussion purposes rather than a totally accurate assessment of your style. If all of your answers, were the same letter, it is an indication of a very strong preference. Most people tend to be a mixture of styles, depending on the situation. I know I am about 50% visual and 50% kinesthetic, with very little auditory. I have a very difficult time remembering people’s names if I only hear it. However, if someone gives me a list of names prior to meeting people, I am pretty good at associating names with faces. This is why I always try to get a roster of people attending a workshop ahead of time.

When developing employees, knowing their learning preferences is important. For example, imagine you delegate tasks to a person just by telling him what to do-auditory-and he is primarily a visual learner. He will have difficulty executing because it is inconsistent with this style. He needs to see for himself what it is that you are talking about.

Unless you give each subordinate an assessment to determine his or her learning style, or you are exceptionally perceptive at evaluating a person’s style through observation, the best approach to development is to employ all three styles in development activities.

I recommend a three step approach. The first step is auditory which means telling the person what you need them to know or do. When communicating to someone with a strong auditory preference, not only the words are important, but also the tone and volume. Auditory learners also respond to sounds and music.

The next step is to provide visual support for what you have told the person. This can mean written instructions, handouts, pictures, demonstrations, or anything else that conveys what you want a person to learn or do in a visual manner. I have found myself guilty of ignoring this visual need when I do speaking engagements. My worry was that people would be reading the handouts instead of listening to the wonderful message that I was bringing. But I recognized that this personal bias was ignoring the need of those who are visual. I had to stop worrying about me, but rather how do I effectively get the message across to everyone.

The third step addresses the kinesthetic preference. After you have told people what you want, and shown them visually what you want, then they need to experience it in some way. Confucius wisely said, “What I hear I forget, what I hear I remember, and what I do I understand.” So the third step is to let the person do what you want them to do or learn, observe them, and then give positive feedback.

The next time that you have a task to delegate to one of your subordinates, remember the three learning preferences. Avoid the temptation just to tell them what you want them to do. Take time to show them or give them something in writing. Then , let them perform the task while you observe and give feedback. If you follow this process, you will me much more effective in delegation and ultimately spend less time with people following up to make sure that they perform the task correctly.

Ryan Scholz works with leaders whose success is dependent on getting commitment and high performance from others. He is author of Turning Potential into Action: Eight Principles for Creating a Highly Engaged Work Place. For more information, visit his web site at www.lead-strat-assoc.com.

The business world could use more “players managers”. I am a baseball fan and watch a lot of the Braves games. Throughout the season, I have heard different people interviewed and make comments about Bobby Cox. As I listen to the different comments, I believe there are some things about him and his approach that would make managers in the business world better at getting results through people.

Even though Bobby Cox is a players manager, he is a tough disciplinarian. He runs a tight ship. He expects everyone to show up every day and give their best effort. In most cases he handles discipline in private. He doesn’t do it publicly in front of other players or in the press. On rare occasions he has pulled a player from the game for lack of effort to make a point.

He understands the difference between physical mistakes and mental or attitudinal mistakes. Even great players will make errors in the field or strikeout in crucial situations. He accepts this as part of the game. He never criticizes a player for making a physical mistake if the player is trying to do his best.

Another trait that I’ve heard players use to describe Bobby Cox is consistent. His behavior is the same whether the team has a five game winning streak or a five game losing streak. He isn’t two different people depending on how things are going at the time. He keeps everything in perspective and focuses on those immediate things he can influence and control. Most people respect predictability in their manager.

Bobby Cox has been thrown out of more games than any other manager in baseball history. Most of the time, he gets thrown out because he is standing up for his players. The players say “he always has our back”. People will respond and go out of their way to support a manager who will look out for them. He is willing to take one for the team. I remember a game last year where the umpire heard a comment from the dugout and called Bobby over to say he was going to throw someone out of the game. He asked Bobby who was going to go and Bobby said “me” even when he didn’t make the comment. He was ejected and paid the fine associated with it.

A favorite Bear Bryant quote is “if we fail, I did it and if we succeed, they did it.” Unfortunately, I see too many leaders and managers take the opposite approach and then wonder why they don’t have the respect and support of their people.

One of things that Bobby Cox has a habit of doing is putting a new player into a game as soon as they join the team. This can either be a rookie just called up from the minors or a player acquired from another team. The message is that everyone has a role on this team. He shows confidence in the player by giving him immediate responsibility and an opportunity to contribute.

Over the years, the Braves seem to have players that fit in with the culture of the team. Whether they are players developed through their minor league system or players acquired from other teams, Atlanta has managed to avoid having disruptive or controversial players on the team. The Braves and Bobby Cox put character and attitude above physical talent in their selection of players.

Bobby Cox has the respect of other managers as well. Recently, Tony LaRussa, manager of the St. Louis Cardinals, and third on the all time win list, was asked to describe Cox. His words were “class and integrity”. As an opponent, he knew that Cox’s players would play hard, but not dirty. Earlier this season there was an incident with the Milwaukee Brewers where one of their stars, Prince Fielder, was hit by a hit by a pitch and thought it was intentional. Bobby Cox went out his way the next day to meet with the manager of the other team and assure him that it wasn’t intentional even though it looked that way. The other manager accepted Cox’s assurance because of trust and respect.

In summary, to become a “players manager”, managers in the business world need to:

1. Be a disciplinarian, but handle discipline situations such the it shows respect for the employee. The purpose of discipline is to change behavior, not to punish or embarrass.

2. Expect people to work hard and recognize them for the effort even if sometimes the results aren’t as they should be. Your best employees will make mistakes. Accept this and move on.

3. Show stable and consistent behavior regardless of how things are going. Emotional ups and downs create confusion and instability in the organization.

4. Support and encourage your employees. Look out for them and protect them. Be willing to get thrown out of the game to support them, even if they were wrong.

5. Make sure that everyone has an opportunity to contribute and be part of the team. Show confidence in people by giving them responsibility right away.

6. Expect employees to fit in with culture. Do not tolerate disruptive or negative behavior.

7. Build trust and credibility with peers and colleagues by showing integrity and class. Show respect for other departments. Be above board in your dealings with other managers and play fair.

Ryan Scholz works with leaders whose success is dependent on getting commitment and high performance from others. He is author of Turning Potential into Action: Eight Principles for Creating a Highly Engaged Work Place. For more information, visit his web site at www.lead-strat-assoc.com.