Public hangings are teaching moments. Every company has to do it. A teaching moment is worth a thousand CEO speeches. CEOs can talk and blab each day about culture, but the employees all know who the jerks are. They could name the jerks for you. It's just cultural. People just don't want to do it.

Focus on a few key objectives ... I only have three things to do. I have to choose the right people, allocate the right number of dollars, and transmit ideas from one division to another with the speed of light. So I'm really in the business of being the gatekeeper and the transmitter of ideas.

Every great leader has a generosity gene.

If I had to run a company on three measures, those measures would be customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction and cash flow.

Common mission trap for companies: trying to be all things to all people at all times.

When it's time to let someone go, do it right. No surprises. No humiliation.

An overburdened, overstretched executive is the best executive, because he or she doesn't have the time to meddle, to deal in trivia, to bother people.