Monday Morning Leadership

Dave Cottrell

Things weren’t going well for Jeff.  For several years, he had been a relatively successful manager for a Fortune 500 company, but now he was in a slump. He was working harder than he ever had, but he was going nowhere. He was struggling in every part of his life.  At work, Jeff’s team was also feeling the effects of his slump. People were upset. Business was slow – real slow – and the pressure on them to improve performance was rapidly hitting the ‘unbearable' level.  Jeff was ready to give up.  He was at the point where he needed to talk to someone who would listen and offer suggestions without judging him.

Tony was the type of person Jeff aspired to be – wise, respected, confident and a highly sought speaker and mentor. But Jeff was a long way from becoming the person he wanted to be and finally decided to call his friend.  Tony agreed to work with Jeff only if he would commit to two things:

• commit to meeting with Tony every Monday for eight weeks and

• commit to teaching others the lessons and experiences that he would be sharing with Jeff.