The American spirit strives to win whether it is in our personal or professional lives. In these trying times, companies will feel the need to step up initiatives to bring back jobs, production, and sales. Winning does not just pertain to coming out on top regardless of how our teams are treated.  

Mark Miller is one of my favorite authors. I have read every one of his books and he just published his fifth installment of books in his High-Performance series. His latest book Win Every Day – Proven Practices for Extraordinary Results focuses on execution to create a remarkable organization. Mark’s books are business parables where the reader becomes a part of the story and engages with teams every day as they identify and tackle organizational problems.

Our business parable focuses on CEO Blake Brown who learns how to consistently cheer his team on to excel at execution after identifying some internal customer service issues. Coincidently, he receives ideas and leadership from an unexpected source, his son’s new high school coach who is working with the team to bring up their performance and teaching them how to win every day in one form or another. The coach uses a variety of approaches and field trips to teach valuable lessons to the team that brings results where everyone wins. Blake takes these same strategies and applies them to his company to win every day in a variety of areas, not just increasing profits.

High performing organizations do four things that create excellence:

1. Bet on leadership

2. Act as one

3. Win the heart

4. Excel at execution

Obviously, every organization must agree that they aim to be great, excel, and unique. Moreover, leaders need to be sincere in doing their best, encourage others to be the best for families, customers, vendors, and ultimately the world. Teams need to sincerely buy-in. Teams should pursue mastery, own the numbers, and help others to win. On the other hand, leaders should coach for life, focus on processes, and communicate.

Mark offers some key takeaways from Blake’s journey. Most importantly, Black acknowledges that he is the root cause of how the company experienced some failures and he is the key to encouraging everyone to win.

1. The past does not determine the future

2. Communication is the oxygen of execution

3. Our competition is our own arrogance and complacency

4. When you win every day, you can live a life with no regrets

5. Execution is not one more thing – it is THE thing

6. We cannot win every day without everyone

7. If I do not make the right choices, my team never will

8. We want to measure activities that actually help us win more “games”

9. If we own the numbers, we can hold each other accountable. More importantly, we can hold ourselves accountable

10. Mastery is a level of skill in which three things are true: the desired behavior is consistent, execution is flawless, and the behavior is second nature.

I love nothing more than a good story and Mark Miller is a master parable writer. I learned lessons that “stuck” in my mind because I was learning from a story and the ideas flowed in order and made sense. In particular, I was fascinated by how Blake learned so much from his son and his son’s coach. They learned how to teach teams new ways of growing, supporting each other, and how everyone could win. So often we see how sports analogies and business strategies are the same, we just use different terms.

If you love easy reading stories that teach you lessons as you grow in your career and influence your teams then Win Every Day is a must-read. You will find yourself lost in the book eager to see how the lessons from a high school sports team and those of a successful company seeking a new status are entwined.

Leaders Are The Best Artists Around!

"I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free" - Michaelangelo

Photo courtesy of JD Hancock via Compfight

We gardeners are a quirky group. As soon as we can spring outside after a long cold winter we begin cleaning up everything dead and well, get distracted.  We start to trim garden beds and we pull a shrub or two out on a whim. We sprinkle wood chips and end up expanding garden areas. We begin to see what can be, not what is in front of us. We look for nonperforming plants to pull out and envision the new cultivars that can replace them. Everything is a blank slate in the spring, even after plants are bursting with lush, wild, growth. It's taken me years to admit it but, an obsessed gardener IS an artist!


I've never considered myself an artist. I can be fairly creative, yet I like order and am a planner. I don't understand a lot of the "art" out there and am fairly certain my kids can create incredible works compared to what I've seen in some art galleries.  Some people are born with artistic  talent, others have to work at it by practicing, learning techniques, and  practicing. The same is true with any hobby or skill. I was born with a love for gardening, yet I wasn't always a natural. It's taken years of practicing, learning new stuff, trial and error, and patience to become the gardener I am today. Any gift boils down to creating confidence in yourself, motivation, a willingness to step out of your comfort zone, and persistence. You too can be an "artist" of any hobby or skill that you love.

"All gardening is landscape painting" - Alexander Pope

Gardens really are blank canvases from which we can imagine, create, plant, grow and bask in the final picture. There are so many options and combinations out there to play with. There's cottage gardens, tropical, conceptual, cactus, modern, traditional, herb gardens - the list goes on and on. There are so many ways to go about bringing a vision to life. As a gardener, you unconsciously look at  the whole picture and see what can be. You think about how to reach your vision. What will it take? Who can help you reach your artistic vision? You work with what you have (resources) to create something that will benefit and wow others.
 If you still doubt that you are an "artist" Consider some of the top traits of a successful artist (below along with a few of my own): Top 10 qualities of a great artist

• Awareness of audience: Who are you reaching out to (other than yourself)?
• Eye for design
• Creativity
• Humility
• Knowledge of materials
• Passion
• Vision
• Inner motivation
• Have a plan
• Don't give up!

Do these traits sound a bit familiar? They should. No matter what your purpose in life or your current focus -

You are an artist. These traits are ingrained within you. Guess what? Is leadership any different? Are leaders not artists as well? Don't leaders look at a canvas and imagine what can be and how to get there? You bet!

"Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere" - Albert Einstein

Photo Courtesy of Moises Rivera via Compfight

Like gardeners and artists, leaders unwittingly use artistic skills every day. We should treat our role like a fragile work of art. We look at the "canvas" before us as a new venture. We imagine and plan how to make the canvas come to life. How to make all the "elements" work together to empower others and further team success. What are the best materials to use (our people) and how can we help them make a difference on our canvas?


 Leaders strive to bring out the best in our people. We can be instrumental in molding them into masterpieces that contribute to the "piece" of art (vision) that we have before us. Leaders bring out the passion in others, we are visionary, not afraid to try something new. We are alive, engaged, curious, and aware. We bring that to our "art" and include our people in the end result. We share our canvas and want everyone to be a successful part of our overall masterpiece - our team.



No matter what kind of leader you are, you ARE an artist! You CAN help create something vibrant with impact. You HAVE the ability to pick up a "canvas" and LEAD through your art. Get out there and lead today. Sculpt something that will make a difference in the lives of others.

YOU ARE AN ARTIST....What will you do starting  right now?