Leaders are not modest, and more importantly, the extensive social science research on narcissism, self-promotion, and similar constructs shows that these qualities and behaviors are useful for getting hired, achieving promotions, keeping one's job, and obtaining a higher salary.

The single most significant change has been the globalization of labor markets. Product markets - trade in goods - have been globalizing for years. But now, with the reduction in communication expenses and the building of all sorts of IT infrastructure, essentially any job can be done almost anywhere.

We need economic policies in the U.S. that produce jobs, first of all, but good jobs, second of all. Believe it or not, Germany, a country characterized by high wages, strong unions, a social safety net, and so forth is the second largest exporter (after China) in the world. The idea that the only way to succeed is by eliminating vacations, sick days, worker protections, and so forth is simply belied by the competitiveness rankings produced by the Economist magazine's intelligence unit and by the World Economic Forum.

People will envy you to the extent that you start out with a group of people and you rise up the organization faster than them. Get over what your peers are thinking about you because your peers are also your competitors.

Part of strategy is figuring out what you're good at, figuring out what you're not good at, and then getting yourself in position to succeed by doing mostly what you have a competitive advantage doing.

I don't think eliminating the knowing-doing gap depends on the amount of knowledge around. It depends much more on people's attitudes and intentions - do they actually want to turn knowledge into action, or just go through the motions of acting as if they are busy or are accomplishing something.

While it is almost certainly true that leaders ought to eat last, the evidence on the ever-widening difference between CEO and average employee pay and the enormous severance packages leaders obtain even as front-line workers see their economic well-being eviscerated makes a mockery of the idea that leaders do anything other than take care of themselves.