The Psychological Recession is the cluster of feelings that the present is really scary and the future will likely be worse. It comes from the sense you have no control over what's happening to you and you don't see a way to get your life back under control. It's the feeling that life is unfair; you paid your dues, you worked hard, and you ended up naked and vulnerable. There is no comfort to be found in the dismissal of the Psychological Recession as being just an idea; it is a real phenomenon with real consequences, all of them bad.

The need for challenge, the need to burst through the constrictions of tasks and situations already seen and mastered, can affect anyone, even those enjoying the greatest gains from success.

Nothing motivates like success. While academics, consultants and gurus are preoccupied with coming up with great insights and seminal ideas, usually they don't realize that making things happen, achieving operational excellence, moving the organization from uncertainty to clarity, from red ink to black, is what really creates hope for a better future. Therefore, great leadership always involves great ideas and real actions that reinforce a strong belief in the excellence of the decision makers and in the viability of the organization itself.

Self is a construct, a feeling, an identity that is internal and can neither be given nor taken away by others. We develop and nurture that identity by embracing inter-dependence.

Nothing creates more self-respect among employees than being included in the process of making decisions.

With air travel there is no distance, there is only time.

motivation is highest when the probability of success is 50 percent: We don't get involved if the task is too easy or too hard.