Hi, I’m Jack Dunigan of thepractialleader.com, and today’s leadership lesson, lessons in superlative leaderships, I’m going to you about the power of leverage. Standby. You’ve probably seen the tagline on our website, which says reach further, accomplish more, and work less. Well, that’s an important tagline because it’s not just words, it’s not just this...

Whenever I hire a new employee, as part of their orientation I am always careful to emphasize that it would be a wrong to mistake my forbearance for indifference, that while I am long-suffering and will give them time to learn the ropes, there are standards to be reached and maintained. One of the most...

This week’s entry just happens to coincide with the American holiday of Thanksgiving, a once-a-year day set aside to be thankful for the bounty we have enjoyed. Originally it signaled the end of the harvest season when crops were gathered from the fields. Most Americans no longer farm but the day has remained one of...

We recently fired an employee and did so reluctantly. She was a hard worker, had a very low absentee rate, and clients liked her. But in the end there was one attitude and its corresponding action that tipped the scales away from retention and towards outplacement as termination is euphemistically termed these days. She patently...

“He was a very hard worker but not a good delegator,” said the consultant. Sitting across the table from the president and vice-president of the company he was advising, that consultant had been hired every year for the past five years to update the business plan for the year. Under new leadership, the company was...

It happens easily enough and usually innocently enough. You start a business or organization then endure what is often a long and expensive learning curve. Along the way you learn…you learn a lot. You discover the competencies and incompetencies of those working with you. You learn how to manage cash flow challenges. You learn the...

Our tag line reads “Reach Further, Accomplish More, Work Less.” That is, after all, the objective of developing capable people - to expand your influence, get more done, and do less of the grunt work yourself. It would seem to logically follow that the best way to do this would be to raise up a cadre...

“Good luck on your new position,” said the outgoing chairman. “You’ll start heading towards your objectives, look behind you, and find no one there.” “I don’t know why no one will help,” complained another leader. “Surely they can see I am overloaded. I can’t understand why they don’t step up and pitch in.” If there...

Rachel was a relatively new employee at a retail outlet. She was given the requisite week’s training in the training room and sent to the sales floor. Part of her job was to restock merchandise that had been returned. She had been on the job but a few days when an item was returned that...

It’s time to become small minded. Visionaries are big thinkers. Planners may make big plans but they think small. They take the grand scheme of things and turn it into smaller steps. Planners are comprehensive thinkers whose skillset includes the ability to break things up into increments and whose experience has shown them the necessity...