You have a new customer with potential for more business. She wants a custom application. Engineering insists this is an opportunity to build a really "cool" product with all sorts of wonderful features. Marketing keeps saying the customer will not pay for those features and does not want them. It is now 90 days later and the delivery deadline is in serious jeopardy.

You have identified a unique acquisition that will grow your company and give you position in an important new market. Your board is divided and cannot make a decision. Your planning is stymied.

You have a creative or IT team facing a deadline that is stuck or overwhelmed. You know the people on this team are capable but the project isn't progressing. There may be conflict with the situation or circumstances.

You have a wonderful new product, and after some investigation you found a terrific outsource partner to do the manufacturing. Now, a year later, your partner's deliveries are consistently late and their quality is not what you expected. You are blaming each other for the problems.

You have an employee who works hard and was given a great review. She received only a token raise and you know she is looking for another job. You have found that 90% of all the reviews in the company are excellent, almost without criticism. There is no honest feedback on performance, so your employees don't have opportunity to develop.

Your company has had a force reduction. The employees remaining are backbiting (slandering others), and have become destructively competitive. They are nervous about who will go next.

A V.P. gives his director a large assignment and tells him he wants it in a week. The director tells him that if they try to meet the deadline the V.P. will only get 30% of what he wants. The V.P. insists on the deadline. This work is important for the company.

Your company needs a V.P of Marketing to lead expansion. You have a hiring committee, and each person on that committee has veto power. The committee has many reasons, but this important position has remained unfilled for six months.

Excellence. You strive for excellence and want to inspire excellence in everyone around you.

Vision. Vision fuels passion, solidifies commitment, and gives direction to rally the troops.

Purpose. You understand that your employees and partners want revenue, productivity and growth for themselves, just as you want those things for your organization – and you are committed to honoring that.

Commitment. Your dedication to the success of your business is so strong it overcomes any natural resistance to instituting new ideas that can make it better.