Assumptions are one of the most dangerous things on a business leadership team. Why? Because no one knows what you’re thinking. At the beginning of the session, I tell teams that my expectations of them for the day are to be open and honest in the moment. Doing this “in the moment” is crucial to building team health.

EOS^® is all about focus, discipline and accountability and appropriately so. Successful organizations have all three. Lacking any one, the organizational results suffer.

A few years ago, one of my clients was planning to step down as CEO within a couple of years and wanted to appoint his successor from inside the company. What made this tricky was that there wasn't a single, obvious candidate. Recognizing that whomever he chose would need some time to grow into the role, he wanted to get an early start. The first step was finding out who was interested and how the rest of the team felt about them.

Rather than bury this issue in a series of secretive one-on-one conversations, he asked his team a simple question: “Who among you is interested in becoming our next CEO?” Three hands went up. What happened next was remarkable.

"Spreading true rumors" is a phrase I picked up when reading Patrick Lencioni’s book, The Advantage – Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business. Lencioni says that the rumor mill is the most pervasive means of communication in most companies – spreading misinformation and causing confusion in the company.

Instead of trying to stop the spread of information by word of mouth, Lencioni suggests that leaders should take advantage of this medium and spread true rumors.

The overall safety record in commercial aviation remains strong, despite occasional high-profile incidents. In fact, the chances of fatality in an aviation accident are 1 in 9,821, while in an automobile they're 1 in 114! There is a simple formula for the high success rate in aviation: great processes plus solid training/certification plus an obsession with clear responsibilities.