There’s a term to describe tempting opportunities outside of an organization’s core competencies: “Shiny Things.” 

Like sparkling diamonds or the flashing lights of fame, these opportunities beckon. Shiny things lure even the most rational leadership teams into poor strategic choices with real implications. When confronted with a new opportunity -- a shiny thing -- you’ll need to ask if it is a “core” or is it a “lure”? 

My son didn’t like what he heard from me, so he went to his mom and got the answer he wanted. We call this “the end-run,” -- it also happens in business. 

For example, have you ever experienced dissension in your organization where employees sided with one leader over the other? It’s like a reality show where alliances are created to overtake the other party.

I often remind my clients that an issue is just that… an issue. 

In other words, there is nothing they can’t solve. It’s simply that some issues are bigger and more emotionally charged than others.

People issues usually top the list as the toughest to take on. Many leaders delay addressing these problems because they fear they will be painful and result in unpleasant outcomes. Good problem solving is like reaching the eye of a hurricane.

In the past several years, I have been regularly impressed by leadership teams that have achieved “big” things. 

At the front end looking forward, it was logical for each team, based upon their history, to conclude, "There's no way we’ll do this."

So what made the difference? How did these teams of ordinary people succeed?

Two workers in the Operations Department of a company were working one Friday evening to push out a late delivery. One saw a problem about to happen and said to the other, “Look at that!  We can’t ship this out. This order is not correct.”

“You’re right,” said the other, “But neither one of us can fix it. Nobody can fix it until Monday. The boss told us to get this shipment out tonight, and we’ll get yelled at if we don’t. Remember what he did the last time something like this happened?”

So out the order went, and in came an angry customer complaint two days later when the order was delivered. And then out went a chunk of the profits from the order because it cost the company three times as much to fix the error than it would have to get it right the first time.