Gratitude
I am a big fan of gratitude. To be grateful is perhaps my favorite feeling: when I experience gratitude, it opens me up to taking in beauty and love in a unique and complete way. Here's a great quote about gratitude:I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.  ~G.K. ChestertonToday I celebrate everything for which I'm thankful.  Life, he

Some Good News
EXCLUSIVE: Smallest U.S. businesses borrowing again: PayNet | Small Business | Reuters.Here's a great little article.  The main point: that very small businesses (those with less than $100,000 in outstanding debt) began borrowing again, cautiously, to invest in their businesses last spring, and have continued to do so ever since.It goes on to note that "In past downturns, microbusinesses have led their larger counterparts in and out of the slumps."

Leading - Now and Always
I’ve been thinking about leaders lately, and how important good leaders are going to be over the next couple of years. As we start to come out of this recession, and to right our ship of state on a variety of levels, I’m noticing more than ever before how important it is for organizations to have strong and flexible leaders.  I watch as those organizations whose leaders are too inflexible, too cautious, too short-sighted or too fear-based continue to founder, while those whose leaders are far-sighted, passionate, courageous, wise, generous and trustworthy seem to be finding their way much more quickly and easil

Kind and Clear
Office-Politics.My extremely prolific and smart friend Franke James, of Dear Office-Politics and Bothered by My Green Conscience fame, has just done me the honor of writing a wonderful review of Being Strategic on office-politics.com.As usual, she is both very kind and very clear - I love what she says about the book.

Sibling Revelry II
A few weeks ago, I posted a dialogue my brother Kurt and I had about this "reset" time in our nation's history.  A number of people said they enjoyed it, but thought it was too long for a single post.  So I've split it in half: here's the second part.Continued from October 12...KA: You say, “In my experience, it’s even better if you have a whole senior team who come to that vision together (often with the visionary leader as catalyst).” Well, sure -- but my hands-on experience (in magazines, TV, the web and radio) is all startups, so it starts with the founder(s) who need(s) to pos