I recently counseled a client through a difficult human resources issue. Like most human issues, it was not cut and dry. I spent weeks evaluating, assessing and analyzing expectations, responsibilities, processes and performances. What I discovered is that while there were very clear issues, the exact cause of them was unclear. Hearts were in the right place, but there was still an insurmountable disconnect. To help me get to the root of the issue – to uncover the exact poi

I’ve often told people who work for me, “I don’t expect you to be perfect. We all make mistakes. It’s about how you respond to a mistake that matters.” I had a Project Coordinator named Melissa who was my eyes and ears at the main office of an ad agency in Louisville while I ran a satellite office in Cincinnati. She was fresh out of college and made her fair share of mistakes. But she learned quickly how to respond to mistakes. She would call me and say, “OK, I really messed

On a walk one morning, my husband and I came across a deer that had been struck by a vehicle and lay on the side of the road. It was mortally wounded but still alive, terrified and suffering greatly. Having no control over its back legs, it thrashed with the front of its body, trying desperately to get up. It was within a foot or two of the side of Northshore Drive, at a bend in the road, where cars could not see it until they were upon it. We approached a stopped car on the

“Put on your own oxygen mask before assisting others.” It’s such a counter-intuitive statement, especially when I look over to my daughter seated next to me on the plane. As if I could bear to see her gasp even one time as I put my interests ahead of hers! And yet I know that if I reached first to her mask, in my fear and panic, my own breathing would increase as I scrambled to help her and keep her calm. And, of course, if I fall unconscious, I cannot help her at all. If y