It’s April 18th and I’m flying to Florida to enjoy a holiday. I typically take time off in late December as we shut down between Xmas and New Year’s anyway. This is something new… Turning the ship over to your co-pilots is a necessary evolution in developing your company’s management team. They may stumble or even fall but life and business does go on without you. I tried it a week last fall during our busiest season and now 2 weeks during an equally busy spring. My goal in the not too distant future is to try two months. I will be plugged in with e-mail and I’ll probably work on some of the writing projects we have on the go but that’s it. Everyone is pretty much self managed now. Over the last 5 years, we did the “Good to Great” exercise successfully. My team will be flying solo on a couple of RFP’s for the first time, moving a half dozen websites to completion…and enjoying every minute of it. I also had to broker out my position as front man for my band TreeoH. We are just 4 weeks into a new house gig and I hated subbing out in the infancy stages. The trick is having the right people around you regardless of the enterprise. It’s the greatest lesson I’ve learned and have discussed it on previous blogs. Having the right people with the right tools to do the job is critical. We make so many concessions in this area out of fear of one kind or another. It’s a big mistake for business of any size.

Lee’s quote for the day “If you’re only as good as your weakest link, try replacing that link and see your business flourish.”

I’m looking out my window at a snowy day in Mississauga. It would have been a reasonably good weather day for March in small town New Brunswick where I grew up. But here and now, a little snow can shut this city down. Twenty minute drives can end up being 2 hours.

Hard to believe I had my motorcycle out for a spin on the first day of spring just two days ago. Life is like that, you can never predict what will come your way. Just two weeks ago, on a similar day as today, I had my SUV stolen right in front our business condo. I had just finished loading it up, went upstairs to send an e-mail…came back and it was gone. Yep, keys were in the car and engine was running…an east coast thing I’ve never been able to shake.

I waited two hours for the police to show. No CSI stuff. No pictures, fingerprints or measuring tire impressions. No pretty gals with low cut sweaters either. I answered a few questions, finished the police report and was about to leave when I realized the key to the office is with the thief who took my truck. So another 2 hours to wait for the locksmith. He had quoted $60 on the phone but somehow managed to justify a $220 bill on completing the 10 minute project. Oh yes, and the music gear I assembled, customized and perfected over the last 6 months was in the truck too.

Like many people, I like to think things happen for a reason. What goes around comes around and all that. Over the years I’ve learned to duck and weave and think on my feet. This kind of thing doesn’t really faze me at all. I’m pretty good at keeping my perspective.

My best friend from small town New Brunswick teaches English in Japan… just found out last night that he’s safe and sound. I’ll trade tsunamis and earthquakes for snow storms, stolen cars and unethical vendors (the key guy) any day.

Lee’s quote for the day

“Like my Uncle Fred used to say, everything is relative…just don’t marry one.”

Every department, company and democracy has a leader for a good reason. The one thing most of us would agree on, is that with any given issue there are as many opinions as there are stars in the sky… and someone needs to make the final call. I like the sayings “a camel was a horse designed by committee” and “too many cooks spoil the broth”, and of course to counter that “two heads are better than one”.

So how do you decide how much buy-in to get from the troops? When to listen and who to listen too? Who knows best? When and where does “the buck stop here”? Let’s sidetrack for a minute to the fundamental principals of executive decision making at the highest level… business innovation. In simple terms, at the front end of the process every idea is a good idea. After every goofy and insightful suggestion is exhausted, the process of elimination occurs to get the best idea in place that can solve the problem or create the new product.

I believe most leaders (be it of a department, a company, or a country) are both effective problem solvers and delegators. The best ones know when to call in specialists to assist and trust them to do the job at hand. The worst ones revert to “If I want your opinion I’ll give it to you”. Like most things it’s a matter of balance and from my viewpoint it’s a hard balance to achieve.

As an observer of leaders within the transportation sector for the last twenty years, I’ve seen all kinds. Some who are close minded to any new thinking, some that can’t decide, some that decide to quick, some that flip flop, some that run decisions by everybody (including close relatives), others that don’t let anyone in on what they’re thinking, a few that are extremely decisive, some surprisingly approachable, and those that are for the most part unapproachable by design. The commonality is they all run successful companies, have team members that complement there strengths and weaknesses and somehow find a way to keep all the balls bouncing in more or less the right direction.

In an ideal world I believe a good leader gets buy-in at the senior management level and that their senior managers are in touch with the needs and thinking of the troops. Decisions are not a democracy or a dictatorship. And a good leader knows when and how to bring the troops together, is decisive, cares about the people that make up their team and doesn’t keep that fact a secret.

I continue to learn about the decision making process and the responsibility of being a leader:

• You can’t touch everything and if you are attempting to, you are not building an effective team around you or giving your people the opportunities they deserve
• You have to let people fail to learn and grow, and many people have more capabilities then you or they are aware of. It is our job as leaders to understand their strengths and steer them to the right seat on the bus within or outside our organizations
• When your level of confidence is based on what you know and not a tactic to cover up what you don’t know, it is a powerful tool in business and in life

Lee’s Quote for the day

“Forget process, bonuses and perks of all kind. Honest and frequent communication is the most powerful tool we have to build the teams, the relationships and the success we deserve… we have the skills, we just need to remind ourselves to use them on a regular basis!”