When faced with catching a fly ball, Lucy missed again. "The past got in my eyes," she told Charlie Brown, "I thought I had it, but suddenly I remembered all the others I'd missed."In two decades in management, I've known hundreds of workplace Lucys. People who let their past get in the way of their future; who self-determine what they're going to do, can do, or might be able to do by what they didn't do, haven't done, or e...

Personable and enthusiastic about her work, it took me months to uncover the problem. Calling Cheryl to my office for a quick question, I inquired why the information I needed wasn't in the file. "Oh," responded Cheryl, "I haven't done the filing yet." Thinking she misunderstood what I needed, I explained that what I was looking for was from four months ago. "Yeah, that filing's not done yet," she said matter-of-factly.It t...

"Treat everybody else as if they were you." These words gave me pause. I wonder what it would be like if we each did what this "unknown author" is advocating?Would she still have abandoned her station at the airport fast food restaurant to get a fork and share a pastry with her friend while her customers waited if she followed this adage? Would he still have sat by the window of the plane with his feet on the seat and knees...

How would you respond to this question: "Are you one of the top 10% of performers in your company?" This question posed in a Business Week survey found that overall 90% of surveyed executives, middle managers, and employees from both large and small companies thought they were, indeed, in the top 10% of performers.I'm not a math major, but how does that work exactly? In my twenty years in management that wasn't my experienc...

A paperweight sits on my desk, etched in silver with the message: Life isn't always black and white. It serves as a reminder there are few absolutes at work (or in life). Yet, it would be easier if there were; if good ideas from bad, trustworthy people from non-trustworthy, and right paths from the wrong ones could easily be discerned.I've learned in twenty years in management that increasing one's perspective increases the...

Like huge anchors on cruise ships, other people can hold you down. Not intentionally, but their negativity impacts you. It's hard to be winning at working when you're anchored in place; hard to see the next great idea and enthusiastically embrace it when you're feeling a sticky heaviness; and hard to think creativity when you're feeling empty.Like a balloon with air pouring out, deflated and flat at the end, I hung up the p...

Once there was a young woman who didn't like her job. Everyday when she came home from work, she told her husband how terrible her day had been, how tiring the work and how unreasonable her boss. "Leave that job," her husband told her."Oh I will" she said. "But not yet. I have too many friends there for me to leave just yet." And so she complained until the days became years and her family grew to five. "Leave that job," he...

Since she'd been referred by a good client, I rearranged my schedule to accommodate a phone meeting for what she described as a "pressing decision" about a potential business endeavor I had experience with. The day before our appointment, the call was confirmed and it was verified that she would call my office at the arranged time.When the time arrived and no call came, I was surprised. Fifteen minutes later, still no call....

I still have the email. It's been years since a highly placed corporate boss, who had the reputation and approach that things were never quite good enough, sent it to me. He was long on critique and revisions while short on acknowledgement and appreciation.Anyone else reading his message would deem it ordinary. No flowery words, no glowing adjectives, no verbose flattery or deliberate feel-good rhetoric. It was written in a...

It was a dimly lit restaurant. Still she was dressed in pink, and while I admit it's hard to tell the gender babies, clothing color is a reliable clue. So, it surprised me when the waitress began playing with my granddaughter, asking "How old is he?"Twenty minutes later, that same waitress served our dinners into my daughter-in-law's lap, spilling the contents of her tray as she approached the table. We made light of the oc...