By Bob Maksimchuk

You don’t have to ask many people.  Everyone is busy.  But as a leader, you don’t have that as an excuse.   It has been said that managers keep the business running, but leaders move the business forward.  If you don’t think you have the time to move the business forward, the business will stagnate.  Be stagnant for too long and the business will lose ground and be overtaken by its competitors.

As a leader, you must use your time and teams most effectively.  A simple first step is to leverage your team’s capabilities.  You must enable your teams to receive delegated work from you.  And here is where many leaders don’t leverage their teams.  The reason many leaders give: I “don’t have the time”.

That begins the “Downward Spiral of Leadership”.  If you don’t think you have the time you don’t delegate.  If you don’t delegate the...

By Bob Maksimchuk

Sometimes you can learn important lessons from unconventional sources.  If you are unaware, the classic 1976 movie western The Outlaw Josey Wales, set near the end of the U.S. Civil War, was directed by and starred Clint Eastwood, who played the main character Josey Wales.  The writers may not have intended it; however this movie is replete with leadership and communication lessons that are applicable to executives, project managers, team members, or any of us especially in difficult times on our projects.  You currently may not be in a leadership position but some day may need to lead.   All of us do need to effectively communicate with those that we work with.  You often hear the lament that technical people need to develop “soft skills”.  So let’s see what we can learn from Josey Wales and hopefully have some fun along the way.

[Spoiler alert: This series...