Unlike top management at Enron, exemplary leaders reward dissent. They encourage it. They understand that, whatever momentary discomfort they experience as a result of being told they might be wrong, it is more than offset by the fact that the information will help them make better decisions.

Make sure you have someone in your life from whom you can get reflective feedback.

Just as no great painting has ever been created by a committee, no great vision has ever emerged from the herd.

One of the worst mistakes is to do nothing.

Think of successful creative collaborations are dreams with deadlines.

I'd always rather err on the side of openness. But there's a difference between optimum and maximum openness, and fixing that boundary is a judgment call. The art of leadership is knowing how much information you're going to pass on - to keep people motivated and to be as honest, as upfront, as you can. But, boy, there really are limits to that.

A leader is someone whose actions have the most profound consequences on other people's lives, for better or worse, sometime forever and ever.