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Years ago my wife volunteered me as an umpire for my daughter’s softball league. “What possessed you to volunteer me?” I asked. “I don’t know the first thing about being an umpire”. “Not to worry”, was her quick reply, “The league is desperate for umpires and besides, I signed you up for umpire class.” Yes, there’s a class for umpires who call the games played by 9 year-old girls. I was somewhat reassured. “After all”, I thought, “how hard can it be to make the call?”

Last month I spent 8 days cycling in Alabama at a training camp run by Aldo Sfalcin, a retired pro from Windsor, Canada. Think of the camp as “spring training for cyclists”. His words of wisdom for a successful cycling season is that “you must go slow to go fast”. He encourages adult cyclists to put in at least 800 miles of cycling early in the year spinning easy gears at a high cadence to get the heart pumping and to regain muscle memory.

A few years ago, Gino Wickman shared his Ten Commandments of Good Decision Making in his EBook, “Decide! The One Common Denominator of All Great Leaders.” Each commandment is a gem but the one that resonates with me most is: “Thou Shalt Not Rule by Consensus”.

Are you satisfied that your customers consistently receive great products and services from your company? Is value dependent on who is delivering it or how it’s being delivered? Both are important, but without a written process that is followed by all, people will deliver value their way which is often not your way nor the best way.

“Standing in the middle of the road is very dangerous; you get knocked down by the traffic from both sides.” – Margaret Thatcher

Business owners “give up the gold” when they fail to resolve two issues that prevent them from having truly great people in their organizations. In fact, there are only two people issues in the wonderful world of business. They come in many disguises but they all boil down to two root causes: