You’re watching a professional golf tournament, and a player sinks a seemingly impossible shot.  The announcer might attribute it to luck, but I beg to differ.  That golfer has probably worked thousands of hours to perfect that shot. Having been…

With the job market gradually coming back after a difficult pandemic, smart hiring is at the forefront.  As a manager, you can’t do everything yourself, and you shouldn’t try.  Managers must be able to depend on their teams. Most companies…

Phil Mickelson recently became the oldest golfer to win one of the four major professional golf championships by taking it one mental stroke at a time. Confidence and the physical part of golf has never been an issue for Mickelson,…

Perhaps the most stressful part of any deal is the negotiation process that leads to a signature on the dotted line.  Whether you are the buyer or seller, skillful negotiating is an art that must be mastered to assure fairness…

Novelist Kurt Vonnegut Jr. learned a valuable lesson at age 15 that shaped his life and may shape yours. According to a story in “Bits & Pieces,” he spent a month working on an archaeological dig.  At lunch one day…

American novelist James Lane Allen had long been impressed by the ancient philosophy that a man becomes what he thinks, that a man’s character is the outward expression of his inward thoughts. He had traced it back to the Upanishads,…

The Titanic was state-of-the art.  No expense had been spared to make sure that it would be unsinkable.  The officers were unconcerned by their inability to get accurate information on possible hazards which might lie in its course. The ship…

In a research experiment, a marine biologist placed a shark into a large holding tank and then released several small bait fish into the tank.  The shark quickly swam around the tank, attacked and ate the smaller fish. The marine…

I wrote a chapter in my recent book – “You Haven’t Hit Your Peak Yet!” – on “The Seven Cs of Success.”  They included:  clarity, competence, constraints, concentration, creativity, courage and continuous learning. A reader sent me a very fitting quote from…

A newspaper reporter secured an exclusive interview with the devil and was especially interested in the deceptive techniques the devil used to build his reputation. He asked, “What is the most useful tool you use on people?  Is it dishonesty? …