Forget loyalty. Or at least loyalty to one's corporation. Try loyalty to your Rolodex-your network-instead.

For me, reading is reading.

Vision is dandy, but sustainable company excellence comes from a huge stable of able managers.

Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.

Take someone NEW AND WEIRD to lunch today

Community. A friend started a real estate brokerage a few years ago. By the time she'd added her second employee, she was a pillar of her 35,000-person community. No rule says that only the local banker or car dealer can organize the program to raise supplemental funds for the public library or send the high school band on a well-earned special trip. Participating in community affairs, with time more than dollars, is good business from day one. It gets your name around, adds to your distinctiveness, and, best of all, makes you an attractive employer (which is the key to sustained success).

Management is about arranging and telling. Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing.