First let’s talk about unemployment. As of July 2010, the most recent month for which statistics are available as I write this, the Bureau of Labor Statistics calculated the U.S. unemployment rate at 9.5%. That’s 14.6 million people who are unemployed. And many argue that the true unemployed number is much higher and that the 14.6 million counted by the BLS are only those who continue to actively look for work.

Those are some scary numbers, but someone shared this link with me, which shows the increase in unemployment county-by-county across the United States. It really made an impression. Things are bad all over.

So why is the unemployment rate hovering so close to double-digit territory? Like most things, there isn’t a single answer to that question, but here are some observations.

Companies have been hit hard by the recession. Consumers have cut spending, and  to continue to be profitable — or in some cases, just survive — businesses have had to do the same. That means employing fewer people — especially since this country’s economy is largely a service economy. We’ve let much of our manufacturing leave and go overseas. The companies that remain are predominantly service businesses. Those businesses need people to deliver their services. Times get tough and people purchase fewer services, so companies needed fewer people to deliver what is being bought.

We’ve seen about a 50% increase in the stock market since it bottomed out in 2009, but that doesn’t mean that companies are doing 50% better than they were last year. I would argue that the market was undervalued when it hit bottom and it may be overvalued today. I say that because much of the improvement in profits came from cutting expenses. Don’t get me wrong, cutting excess cost out of a business is a good and prudent thing to do. But you can’t cut your way to prosperity.

So companies make cuts, Wall Street applauds, and the stock price rises. But what happens when you can’t cut anymore? At some point, when you’ve cut all the costs you can, you need to increase revenue if you want profits to increase. I’m not convinced that revenue growth is driving the improvement in stock prices. How much longer can companies cut before they hit bone?

Companies have cut the excess expense — and then some — out of their operations. Now what? We don’t see consumers flooding back. In fact, the American consumer is spending less, so with no more cuts to make and no new revenue being generated companies are loath to hire.

Remember, it’s not fun to let people go. Once you’ve bitten that bullet, you’re not going to rush back in and face the prospect of having to do it again. So, in my estimation, companies won’t hire until they’re confident that revenue growth has returned.

Now it becomes a bit of a “chicken or the egg” dilemma. I won’t hire until I see sustained revenue growth, but consumers won’t spend until they get back to work or feel more secure about their current employment. We’re locked in a bit of stalemate, and I’m not sure what the resolution is.

What should be done next? A lot smarter people than me are trying to figure out that.

In our company, we’ll try to run the business as conservatively and leanly as possible. That means making sure that every employee is contributing, evaluating the return on investment expected if we were to hire for a position, and scrutinizing every candidate carefully to make sure we get the best person. One thing can be said about 9.5% unemployment: A lot of really good candidates are looking for work.

What would cause me to be bullish on hiring? I need to see revenues begin to grow again. And if you can help me do that, well, I just might be hiring.

For another businessperson’s perspective on why he’s not hiring, take a look at this Wall Street Journal piece from earlier this month.

You might recall that on August 6, Hurd resigned under pressure from HP’s board. According to a company statement, a woman who had romantic ties to Mr. Hurd, who is married, “received compensation and/or expense reimbursement where there was not a legitimate business purpose, as well as numerous instances where inaccurate expense reports were submitted by Mark or on his behalf that intended to or had the effect of concealing Mark’s personal relationship with the contractor.”

Furthermore, the woman, Jodie Fisher, accused Hurd of sexual harassment. An investigation by outside counsel found that this had not taken place.

What to do if you are on HP’s board? It seems pretty straightforward to me. The guy lied on his expense reports, effectively embezzling company money to pay his girlfriend. What’s more, his actions invited a sexual harassment lawsuit on the company. And even though counsel found that no harassment had occurred, he put the company in a position to defend the claim, costing it additional money. Finally, the negative publicity that came as a result of his actions was damaging to HP.

Oh yeah, HP has a standard of business conduct that tells employees, “Before I make a decision, I consider how it would look in a news story.”

Ouch! Do you think Hurd’s actions really lived up to that standard? Only if he thought his story was going to be on a daytime soap!

So Hurd should clearly be out. It’s an open-and-shut case.

Hold on one minute. Did I mention that under Hurd’s leadership, HP’s market capitalization had more than doubled? Just to put that into perspective, the company’s value increased by about $50 billion over the last five years.

So now put yourself in the shoes of an HP investor. This guy had doubled the value of your investment despite the worst economic downturn of your lifetime. How many investments do you have that have done that? So the guy fibbed about $20,000. He made investors $50 billion. That’s with a “b.”

Does your opinion of what should have happened to Hurd change?

Mine doesn’t and here’s why. The company had a code-of-conduct policy in place. And if the policy calls for termination if someone breaks it, then that is what must be done — regardless of who it is. If you’re going to have a rule, you must enforce it. If you’re not willing to enforce your rule in every instance, then don’t have the rule.

If HP’s board had made an exception for Mr. Hurd, then what good would the policy have been? We realize we have a policy against this type of behavior, but this guy is so good we’re going to ignore it. What about others who lost their jobs for violating the policy? How would they feel after discovering that the company really does make exceptions for the right person? My guess is they would be knocking on HP’s door with their lawyer in tow.

I commend HP’s board members for letting Mr. Hurd go. They put the policy in place, and when it was time to enforce it, they did. I’m sure the decision wasn’t easy. When you have a person who has been that successful in leading your company, you hate to see them go. But they did it anyway.

And if you’re feeling the least bit bad for Mr. Hurd, don’t. He’s reportedly walking away with about $40 million. That’s NOT with a “b” but it’s certainly more than enough to keep food on Mr. Hurd’s table. And it might give Mrs. Hurd food for thought.

But in many companies, titles bring with them status, and status often brings certain perks. Maybe it’s a reserved parking spot or, my personal favorite, a key to the executive washroom. Executive washroom? It’s a bathroom, folks. It has a toilet, a sink, some soap, and something to dry your hands with. Why would anyone care if they happen to urinate next to the CEO? It makes no sense to me, but I digress.

So titles are important to people for various reasons, but I suspect that one of the biggest reasons people get hung up on a title is because they equate it with compensation. See if this sounds familiar: An employee walks into your office with a handful of papers. The first words out of his mouth are, “I’ve been doing some research that I’d like to share with you.”

You know the rest of the story. The research he has is some salary data that he pulled off the Internet. Of course, the research will show that based on his title he should be making much more than what he is being paid. And, after sharing his data and making what he believes is an iron-clad argument, he asks for a raise.

Now the ball is back in your court. You can cave or you can consider the facts. In my experience, what the average person has not done is look at things like job duties, years of experience in the position, size of company, educational background, specialized training, geographic location, etc. He just finds an average salary or a salary range and assumes that’s what he should be paid. As long as the data shows that he should be making more, it’s solid information.

If you’re paying people fairly, you’ll usually find that there are some flaws in the data they’re providing and can demonstrate why their current compensation is representative of the job they do. Once in a while, you will discover that, indeed, someone is not being paid fairly for what they do. Then it’s your job to rectify the situation.

You might be thinking that if I were more judicious with the titles I hand out, I wouldn’t have to deal with this problem. That might be true in some cases, but I’d argue that I would still have to face the occasional employee who wants to make the case for higher pay based on a job description. And as long as I’m paying people fairly, I don’t mind having that conversation about compensation.

Bottom line is that I think about titles differently. I believe that a title can be a real motivator to some people. Maybe it’s because they can tell their moms that they have a really snazzy title. Or they can impress people at cocktail receptions with their fancy monikers. I really don’t know or care, but if it helps you feel better about what you do, I’m all for it.

If it makes you feel good to be called New Idea Genius instead of Product Development Manager, I’m good with that. If you like the ring of Building Engineer instead of Custodian, knock yourself out. You can be my Building Engineer. I’ve even run across the title Marketing Czar on a business card. Who cares? I’m much more concerned about what you do and how you do it than what your title is.

In the end, isn’t that what it’s all about? What is the job that you’re performing and how well are you doing it? The title is just something that you put on your business card. I share a title with the most powerful man on the face of the earth, President Obama.  It doesn’t mean that we’re equals or that we even do remotely the same job. It’s just a title.

But self-discipline is the key to achieving success in whatever we endeavor. It was Teddy Roosevelt who said, “With self-discipline most anything is possible.” I believe that. Ultimately, there is only one thing you can control completely — what you do or don’t do.

Success in the workplace certainly takes self-discipline. I’m a big believer that it’s the little things done consistently that add up to success. Sure, every once in a while someone will catch “lightning in a bottle.” But the odds of that happening are pretty slim. Instead, you must put in many, many small efforts that often go unseen and unappreciated before you achieve your goal.

In his book Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell talks about the number of hours it takes to master any task. Any guess at the number Gladwell came up with from his research? How does 10,000 hours strike you? That’s eight hours a day, five days a week for nearly five years to become proficient at something. According to Gladwell, it doesn’t matter if it’s playing an instrument, programming computers, or planting crops — it takes 10,000 hours before you truly master it.

One of the points Gladwell makes in the book is that there is no such thing as an “overnight success.” Success takes hard work. There is no way around that fact, so you might as well get used to it.

Think about your own job now for a minute. Do you exhibit the self-discipline in your work required to be truly successful at what you do? We all know the little things that must be done every day to be successful. They’re routine tasks. They’re redundant tasks. But they must be done and done well to achieve success.

Consider the sales profession for a minute. I can tell you from experience who the most successful salesperson is likely to be. Is it the person with the most dynamic personality? No, but a great personality doesn’t hurt. Is it the person who is the most persuasive? No, again. But persuasiveness certainly isn’t a bad trait for a salesperson. The most successful salesperson in almost every organization is the one who makes the most sales calls.

In the end, sales is a numbers game. The more sales calls you make, the more prospective customers you speak with. The more prospects you speak with, the more opportunities you have to pitch your product. The more opportunities you have to pitch your product, the more chances you have to close a sale. So who makes the most successful salesperson? The one who does the most basic element of the sales process — knocking on the most doors or making the most dials. It ain’t fancy, but it sure is effective!

Our founder, M. Lee Smith, used to say, “The lifeblood of our business is …” What’s the lifeblood of your business? What is the one thing that must happen if you are to be successful? Now ask yourself, “What are the little tasks necessary to achieve success?” I’m sure you know what they are. The question is, “Do you have the self-discipline to do them?”

Like the salesperson who has to pick up the phone one more time to call one more prospect, you need to discipline yourself to do the little things every day and do them well to achieve the success you strive for. Don’t get distracted or bored with those tasks. Take pride in them, do them well, and the results will be there. There is no other way.

Think about the most successful people you know. Harry Truman said, “In reading the lives of great men, I found that the first victory they won was over themselves . . . self-discipline with all of them came first.” Do you find this to be true of the successful people you know? I certainly do.

I’m going to leave you with this quote from Henry Ward Beecher: “Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. Never pity yourself. Be a hard master to yourself — and be lenient to everybody else.” Do this and you’ll achieve success beyond your wildest imagination!

In the “It’s About Time” category, the board of BP negotiated the departure of Tony Hayward as CEO of the oil company and replaced him with Robert Dudley.  As I wrote last month, I was amazed and appalled by Hayward’s inability to handle the crisis with savvy.  Bravo to the BP board for taking action, I just wish they had done it months ago.  Good luck, Mr. Dudley!

In the “What the Heck” category, I read about Goldman Sachs’ recent ban on profanity in electronic messages. The company was embarrassed in April at a Senate hearing when an employee’s e-mail referred to a deal they had done as “shitty.” So now they have a new communications policy that is being enforced by screening software.  I understand that certain language can be offensive, but where do you draw the line? Everyone has a different gauge when it comes to what they find offensive. And like I told my mother when I was in the third grade, you can find the word “ass” in the Bible.

In the “Holy Crap” category (and no, I’m not sure that would make it through the Goldman Sachs filter), a colleague sent me this link. If you’re brave enough to click on it you’ll find a graph that was published in a New York Times blog that shows the percentage of jobs lost in this recession compared to recent recessions. It’s frightening to see that nearly twice as many jobs have been lost in this recession than in any of the previous five recessions! And while we’ve seen a slight recovery in the jobs numbers, we have a long way to go to get back to the pre-recession employment levels.

In the “Good for Her” category, Agriculture Department employee Shirley Sherrod said she will “definitely” sue conservative blogger, Andrew Breitbart, who posted a video edited to make her appear racist. Whether or not she can win is yet to be seen, but maybe her suit will be a much needed wake-up call for bloggers and commentators to be more careful about what they write and post.

In the “Who Cares” category, President Obama took a lot of heat for appearing on the daytime talk show The View. People from both sides of the political spectrum criticized the President, saying that appearing on such a show was beneath him. Really? Politicians are going to do what is necessary to appeal to the voters. They’ve been kissing babies for generations. My guess is that the President helped himself immensely with a certain portion of the electorate, and who can blame him for that?

In the “How Ironic” category, while appearing on The View, President Obama said the Shirley Sherrod incident shows that racial tensions still exist in America. I thought the timing of this was interesting because the same day the President’s comments were taped, a piece appeared in the Opinion section of The Wall Street Journal titled, “Our Divisive President.” The article, written by two Democratic pollsters, one who served under President Carter and the other under President Clinton, said, “Rather than being a unifier, Mr. Obama has divided America on the basis of race, class and partisanship.” They went on to compare Mr. Obama’s approach to governance to that of Republicans Richard Nixon and George W. Bush. The President couldn’t have liked being lumped in with that duo!

In the “Think About It” category, I came across this the other day.  The author is unknown.

An American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked.  Inside the small boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them.

The Mexican replied, “only a little while.”

The American then asked why didn’t he stay out longer and catch more fish?

The Mexican said he had enough to support his family’s immediate needs.

The American then asked, “but what do you do with the rest of your time?”

The Mexican fisherman said, “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take siestas with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine, and play guitar with my amigos.  I have a full and busy life.”

The American scoffed, “I am a Harvard MBA and could help you.  You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds, buy a bigger boat.  With the proceeds from the bigger boat, you could buy several boats, eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats.  Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery.  You would control the product, processing, and distribution.  You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then LA and eventually New York City, where you will run your expanding enterprise.”

The Mexican fisherman asked, “But, how long will this all take?”

To which the American replied, “15-20 years.”

“But what then?” asked the Mexican.

The American laughed and said, “That’s the best part.  When the time is right you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich, you would make millions!”

“Millions — then what?”

The American said, “Then you would retire.  Move to a small coastal fishing village where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take siestas with your wife, stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos.”

Last week on Monday, conservative commentator Andrew Breitbart blogged about a speech given by Sherrod, a mid-level Department of Agriculture employee. He included video excerpts of a speech she had given in March to a local NAACP event.

The video showed Sherrod, the USDA’s director of rural development in Georgia, making comments about her reluctance to assist a white farmer because of his race. Sherrod, who is black, was quickly asked by Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, to resign her post and did so by Wednesday.

As the full story came to light, however, it became clear that Sherrod’s comments were taken out of context. In fact, the story she told during her speech was about her hesitation to help the farmer decades ago, long before she joined the USDA. In her speech Ms. Sherrod had shared that after her initial reluctance; she had recognized her own prejudice and come to realize that “there is no difference between us.” Ultimately, she had helped the white farmer save his land, as he and his wife attested when they came to Sherrod’s defense.

Vilsack had condemned Sherrod wrongly. What to do?

To his credit Vilsack acknowledged that he “could have and should have done a better job” and expressed “profound regret” to Sherrod before offering her a new position with the USDA.

Then after the apology, Mr. Vilsack was admonished by his boss, President Obama, when the President said that Vilsack had “jumped the gun” when he asked for Sherrod’s resignation.

There must be a few lessons in here for all of us in management. How about these:

1. Make sure you have a thorough command of the facts before you take action. I’m sure Secretary Vilsack wanted to take immediate and decisive action to put this fire out quickly. The problem is he didn’t know all the facts and, instead of putting the fire out, threw gasoline on it and got burned.

Even when the case against a subordinate seems cut and dried, you must take the time to examine the situation thoroughly before you act. Had Vilsack or one of his people in the Department of Agriculture actually listened to Ms. Sherrod’s side of the story, this whole embarrassing episode could have been avoided. You cannot terminate (or ask for a resignation) from employees without giving them the opportunity to explain the situation from their perspective.

2. Quick and decisive action is a good thing — if you have all the facts. An immediate message from Vilsack saying that the matter was being looked at and appropriate action would be taken once all the facts were known would have been the prudent thing to do. He could have made it clear that he and the USDA were not ignoring the situation and that they would act once they had the full story. It’s public relations 101!

But instead, he obviously was feeling the heat and moved too quickly. No one would fault him for taking his time as long as he ultimately made the right decision. But you’ll pay the price for reacting in haste and making the wrong decision — as he found out.

3. If you screw up, apologize. Vilsack had the sense and decency to apologize publicly to Ms. Sherrod. For that, he should be commended. He made a big mistake and owned up to it when he said he “could have and should have done a better job” and expressed “profound regret” to Sherrod. He can’t undo the embarrassment he caused Ms. Sherrod, but at least he was willing to admit he’d made a mistake and offer an apology.

4. If you’re the boss, you don’t need to publicly embarrass a subordinate. I’m not talking about Vilsack here, but our President. Vilsack screwed up, recognized his mistake, and apologized for it. Still, his boss decided to publicly criticize him when he stated that Vilsack “jumped the gun” and that “[w]e have to take our time and think these issues through.”

Of course, the President was right. Vilsack did jump the gun and should have taken his time to think it through before he acted. I just don’t think the President needed to say so publicly, after the fact. Vilsack had already admitted as much and apologized for it. So making the statement about it publicly only served to embarrass Vilsack further because, obviously, he had already learned his lesson.

I must admit that the rules are different in Washington than they are for the rest of us. The media scrutiny they received is 1,000 times what it would be for the typical manager. Yet, had Mr. Vilsack reacted as all of us know we should when faced with a similar situation, he could have saved himself a lot of embarrassment and Ms. Sherrod the public humiliation she experienced before she was vindicated.

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

I must say that I found the video to be very enlightening.

I know you’re dying to find out what really motivates us. According to the studies on which Pink based his work, when it comes to knowledge workers it’s NOT financial rewards. He makes the case that people are not as easily manipulated or predictable as many people think.

Much of the talk that serves as the basis for this video centers on two studies that call into question the theory that if you reward something you’ll get more of that behavior and if you punish something you’ll get less of that behavior.

The first study, funded by the Federal Reserve Bank and conducted by economists at MIT, the University of Chicago, and Carnegie Mellon, found that as long as the tasks required only mechanical skill, the financial rewards worked as expected — the higher the reward the better the performance. But if the task required cognitive skill, the larger reward led to poorer performance.

According to Pink, the Federal Reserve Bank was so surprised by the results of the study that they decided to test it again. They replicated the study in India. And the results were the same. In fact, study after study has replicated these results.

For simple, straight-forward tasks, financial rewards work. As Pink puts it, financial incentives work if you can say, “If you do this, you will get that.” But when a task becomes more complicated and requires conceptual, creative thinking, financial rewards don’t work.

So what does Pink say about money as a motivator at work when it comes to knowledge workers? He admits that money can be a motivator, but only in this way. “If you don’t pay people enough, they won’t be motivated. Pay people enough to take the issue of money off the table. Pay people enough that they’re not thinking about the money and they are thinking about the work.”

Now you’re thinking, “Is this really true?”

So what is it that does really motivate us? Pink says, according to all the behavioral studies, there are three factors that the science shows leads to better performance and personal satisfaction at work:

Autonomy. The first factor is autonomy — our desire to be self-directed. Pink admits that this goes against traditional management theory. In his talk, he says, “Management is great if you want compliance. But if you want engagement . . . self-directed is better.” Now that one rings true.

And Pink gives the example of an Australian software company, Atlassian. Once each quarter, Atlassian allows its developers to work on whatever they want for 24 hours. They can work on what they want, with whom they want, in any way they want. All they have to do is share the results of what they did to the company at the end of the day in a fun meeting with food, etc. This one day of autonomy per quarter has led to a whole host of software fixes and new product ideas that otherwise would have never emerged. According to Pink, the company is in essence saying, “You probably want to do something interesting, let me just get out of your way.”

Trusting your employees and letting them exercise their creative muscle — an interesting concept.

Mastery. The second thing that motivates knowledge workers is mastery. In the end, people just want to get better at what they do. People like to be good at their job and get better at it because it’s satisfying to get better at things.

Here Pink uses the example of open-source software such as Linux and Apache. Imagine that you can get a bunch of people willing to work for free to create something to give away. You have technically sophisticated people who are highly skilled and have jobs, but they’re willing to work for free on these projects because it offers them a challenge, a chance at mastery, and the opportunity to make a contribution. Our desire to get better at things!

Purpose. The third motivator for knowledge workers is purpose. According to Pink, more and more companies are looking to have a “transcendent purpose” because it makes coming to work better and helps recruit better talent. He says, “When you separate the ‘profit motive’ from the ‘purpose motive,’ bad things happen like crappy products and bad service.”

If you only focus on profit and forget about purpose, it doesn’t work. To really engage your workers, you need to show them the higher purpose of their work and the company’s. Let them know how they are helping people and making the world a better place, and they’ll do great things.

Pink’s bottom line: “If we start treating people like people — if we get past this ideology of carrots and sticks — we can actually build organizations and work lives that make us better off and make the world a little bit better.” Not a bad idea.

See the video

Just as a reminder, what started all of this was an April 20 explosion and fire on a BP drilling rig that resulted in the death of 11 workers. The rig sank two days later about 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. Since then, BP has made one misstep after another, and it starts at the top.

I’ve been amazed and appalled by BP CEO Tony Hayward’s inability to handle the crisis with savvy. It raises the question in my mind, “If this guy is smart enough to run a company with more than $200 billion in revenue and 80,000 employees, why isn’t he smart enough to do or say the right thing about the disaster his company caused?” Just for the record, Mr. Hayward has a Ph.D. and has worked at BP for 28 years.

The boneheaded moves started less than two weeks after the spill occurred when Hayward, speaking to a group of fellow executives in London on May 2, said, “What the hell did we do to deserve this?”  Really? You think it’s the right move to play the victim? Instead of taking responsibility for the spill, he’s looking for sympathy. What about the 11 people who died on the rig and the families they left behind? What did they do to deserve this? Playing the victim is the wrong thing to do, but that wasn’t apparent to Mr. Hayward.

Mr. Hayward’s next move was to downplay the impact the spill would have on the environment. “I think the environmental impact of this disaster is likely to have been very, very modest,” he said in a May 18 interview with Sky News television. We’re nearly a month into the spill with no apparent end in sight, yet BP’s CEO is downplaying the impact it will have on the environment. First, how about getting the thing stopped before you begin to predict the effect it’s going to have? Second, describing it as “very, very modest” when fisherman have lost their livelihoods and wildlife is being decimated is stupid and insensitive.

But why stop there? Mr. Hayward is on a roll! So 13 days later, he apologizes. Good move? You might think so, except he didn’t stop with the apology. Read what he said for yourself:  “We’re sorry for the massive disruption it’s caused their lives. There’s no one who wants this over more than I do. I would like my life back.” If he would have stopped after the first sentence he would have been on the right track, but he couldn’t help himself. He makes it about himself. Poor Tony wants this over more than everyone because it’s become a huge inconvenience and disrupted his life.

And it’s not just what Mr. Hayward is saying that defies logic. Two days after testifying before Congress in Washington, D.C., on June 17, he left to participate in a weekend yacht race. Now I’d be the first to argue that he doesn’t need to spend every minute at the Gulf, and I’d even argue that he deserves a weekend off. I’m sure he’s working long hours, and this situation has had to have been very stressful for him. But to choose to participate in a yacht race comes across as incredibly arrogant. No wonder he’s been dubbed “Tone-Deaf Tony.” Sometimes appearances do matter.

So why does Mr. Hayward still have a job? Well, it might be that his bosses on BP’s board are cut from the same cloth. Here’s what  Mr. Hayward’s boss, BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg, said to reporters in Washington on June 16: “I hear comments sometimes that large oil companies are greedy companies or don’t care, but that is not the case with BP. We care about the small people.” “The small people.”  Are you kidding me?  I’m so glad that the “big” people at BP are good enough to care about the “small people.” How insensitive can you be? Obviously as insensitive as your CEO!

Most of us will never be involved in a disaster as large or public as this one, but there are plenty of lessons from Mr. Hayward and his colleagues at BP of what not to do the next time we find ourselves in the middle of a tough situation. Mr. Hayward would be much better off if he would choose his words more carefully, consider how his actions will be perceived, and, most important, act with compassion. It just isn’t that hard.  Too bad Mr. Hayward doesn’t seem capable of any of them.

It’s amazing to watch people come together to perform selfless acts that benefit others who are in need. Ever since the Nashville community rose up to help its own in the days and weeks following the flood that devastated many parts of our city, I’ve been thinking about how wonderful people can be in times of need — and how the people who do the volunteering often are the ones who benefit the most.

At our company we have a charitable activities committee that drives the volunteerism of the organization. Here’s how it works in a nutshell.

At the beginning of each year, we send an e-mail asking for volunteers to serve on the committee. The committee takes suggestions from its members as well as the other employees about the charitable activities we might participate in. We also add to that list any group that comes to us asking the company to make a charitable donation.

The committee discusses each suggestion or request, then votes, and from there sets a calendar for the year with monthly activities. Each person serving on the committee chooses one activity to “chair” — they coordinate, organize, and work with the contact from the organization.

In order for us to work with a charity, it must meet three criteria we’ve established:

1. The charity must be a local organization thoroughly checked out and approved by the committee before we consider working with them. We have limited resources so we want to make sure that we not only work with reputable organizations, but that we can make an impact where our employees live and work.
2. The charitable organization must provide a volunteer opportunity. We want our employees to get involved with the organization so we look for opportunities to volunteer. We will disregard any request for financial support that does not include a volunteer aspect. We will provide paid time off for any company-sponsored charitable activities.
3. In order for the event to be sponsored by the company, it must be voted on and approved by the committee. This helps us focus our efforts on activities that meet the criteria and where we believe we can do the most good.

Our people have benefited from the opportunity to work together for some tremendous causes. Each year we adopt a family for Christmas. The employees purchase the gifts, wrap them, and deliver them to the family. Last year, we had the family attend our company holiday luncheon so that our people could meet them.

We’ve worked with the Make a Wish Foundation here in Nashville helping make the dreams of a number of young people come true. We’ve sent a couple of kids to Disney World in the past. We typically hold a company event to which we invite the entire family of the recipient of our donation. Our employees purchase some gifts for the child, things he can take to Disney with him, and we celebrate together.

Already this year in addition to today’s work with Ronald McDonald House, our employees have volunteered with a non-profit that’s focused on mentoring, leadership development, and healthy recreational opportunities for inner-city children and youth. We also delivered 174 pounds of food to Second Harvest, a local food bank, and had volunteers donate their time to sort 17 pallets of food (equal to 35,000 pounds). And we have something planned for just about every remaining month of 2010.

If the people at your company are volunteering and making a difference, thank you! If you’re not doing it yet, be the one to get it started. It’s a great thing to do for the community in which you work and live. And it’s an even better thing to do for yourself and your coworkers. I promise you’ll never regret doing it!

More than a half century ago John Wooden created his Pyramid of Success. The Pyramid contains 15 building blocks of success, including industriousness, loyalty, initiative, skill, enthusiasm, and self-control. In creating the Pyramid, Wooden chose for his two cornerstones industriousness and enthusiasm, and the capstone on the Pyramid is competitive greatness.

So why did he choose industriousness as one of his cornerstones? Because Wooden knew the value of hard work. “Success travels in the company of very hard work. There is no trick, no easy way.” And the choice of enthusiasm for his second cornerstone? “Your energy and enjoyment, drive and dedication will stimulate and greatly inspire others.” And finally, about competitive greatness as his capstone, he said, “Perform at your best when your best is required. Your best is required each day.”

All of this also applies to those of us in business. If you want to be successful in your job, it requires hard work. If you want to be an effective leader, show your enthusiasm for your work. It will inspire those around you. And if you want to achieve competitive greatness, give your job your all each and every day. Nothing fancy here, but Wooden was never fancy, just effective.

Wooden also had a list of 12 Lessons in Leadership. And even though a couple of the lessons sound like they’re specific to the sport he coached, they’re not.

Lesson #1. Good values attract good people. As a manager, part of your responsibility is to build a strong team. To do so you must be able to attract good people. Wooden’s first lesson reminds us that if your value system is strong, you’ll be able to hire the type of people you need on your team.

Lesson #2. Love is the most powerful four-letter word. Talking about love in the workplace can be a slippery slope, but the thought here is that being caring and supportive of the people you lead will ultimately be more effective than screaming expletives.

Lesson #3. Call yourself a teacher. If you want to be a leader, be a teacher. Show people how you want things done. Teach them how to do their jobs better. Invest your time and energy in improving them, and they’ll make the team better.

Lesson #4. Emotion is your enemy. See Lesson #2. Losing control of your emotions, at work as much as anywhere, is a losing proposition. As a leader, it’s important that you manage your emotions instead of letting them manage you.

Lesson #5. It takes 10 hands to make a basket. OK, this one is specific to basketball, but the lesson is important at work. You need everyone to contribute if you’re going to be successful as a team. I had a coach who liked to say, “Like a chain, the team is only as strong as its  weakest link.” Same thing goes at work. If you want to really be successful, you need everyone working toward the same goals.

Lesson #6. Little things make big things happen. I’ve never been a big believer in finding a “silver bullet” that’s going to be the answer to all my problems at work. It’s doing the little things right and doing them consistently that is going to lead to the big successes. Wooden said it this way: “It’s the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen.”

Lesson #7. Make each day your masterpiece. This is a great reminder that we need to give our best day in and day out. Things don’t necessarily go the way we plan every day, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make the best of it. You control how you deal with the challenges you face each and every day.

Lesson #8. The carrot is mightier than the stick. You might be seeing a theme with Wooden’s advice. He believed in encouragement, not punishment. He believed in caring, not scaring. Incentives and praise are more likely to earn you respect and loyalty than anything else.

Lesson #9. Make greatness attainable by all. On a sports team and at work, it takes the contributions of many to be successful. If the team is only as good as that weakest link, then you want every team member to be strong. People want to succeed — they want to be great. Make sure you give them an opportunity.

Lesson #10. Seek significant change. When Wooden included this in his list of leadership lessons, he was a young teacher and coach. Yet even then, he understood that if you want to make something better, including yourself, you needed to set the goal high so that the change was obvious to all. And as he so aptly put it, “Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.”

Lesson #11. Don’t look at the scoreboard. Again, this sounds like it applies only to sports, but that’s just not true. In a world that looks for instant gratification, people often get caught up in monitoring and managing short-term results. Make sure you prepare well, work hard, and set your goals high — the long-term results will be there.

Lesson #12. Adversity is your asset. Coach Wooden said, “Adversity is the state in which man easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially free of admirers then.” That quote makes me smile because it’s so true. We’ve all faced adversity and know how lonely it can be.  But often the greatest opportunities present themselves when the circumstances seem most dire. Make sure you’re prepared for adversity and you’ll be ready to take advantage of the opportunities it presents.

John Wooden was a teacher and a coach, yet the life lessons he taught his students and players apply to each and every one of us as we perform our jobs daily. Take the things he taught to heart and it will make you a better manager and, ultimately, a better person. And what’s more important than that?