The true genius of a great manager is his or her ability to individualize. A great manager is one who understands how to trip each person's trigger.

You should know that what wakes me up at night, what gets me running fast in the morning, and, frankly, what prompts me to lose any semblance of my habitual reserve is the conviction that work doesn't have to be this grim. We can do better.

Remember, what you focus on expands; results follow focus.

Obviously, you have to know what you need now and what you will soon need, then hire or promote from within to meet those needs.

What do we know to be important but are unable to measure?

Forcing your employees to follow required steps only prevents customer dissatisfaction. If your goal is truly to satisfy, to create advocates, then the step-by-step approach alone cannot get you there. Instead, you must select employees who have the talent to listen and to teach, and then you must focus them toward simple emotional outcomes like partnership and advice....Identify a person's strenths. Define outcomes that play to those strengths. Find a way to count, rate or rank those outcomes. And then let the person run.

To get the best coaching outcomes, always have your 1-on-1's on your employee's turf not yours. In your office the truth hides.