Recently, I was booked to give the closing keynote at an annual corporate meeting for an industry leader.  Their CEO had a vision for the meeting: Create A Mindset Where Winning Is the Only Acceptable Outcome.  She picked me because I’d worked at a company (Yahoo) that famously developed this outlook, then lost it over …

Often, we are told to dismiss or ignore fear.  Or, we are admonished to overcome it … whip it down! In reality, those tonics almost always fail to quell that worry that eats away at us. Fear is often cast as a bad thing, never to be fed or encouraged.  But that is an oversimplification.  …

Earlier this year, I was sitting around a table of successful entrepreneurs, listening to them talk about lessons learned in startup world.  One founder would soon sell his company for almost two hundred million dollars and the person sitting across from him had just successfully raised one hundred million bucks from Silicon Valley VCs.  These …

A few weeks ago, I retweeted this Mark Cuban Twitter update: Challenge conventional wisdom. There is almost always a better way — Mark Cuban (@mcuban) August 10, 2013 I connected with what he was saying, and how important it is for us to progress past “what’s been working so far.” Too many leaders (and their …

Show me a ball player who injured most of the time and I’ll show you someone either on the trading block or moving towards retirement.  When someone develops a reputation for being injury prone, their stock plummets…along with their playing time.   Why? After a few injuries, people begin to wonder whether you really want …

Last week, I had a chance to catch up with a friend who just moved to LA to work in the music production industry.  He’s read Love Is the Killer App several times, and put several of the ideas into practice.  He’s mentored several up and coming engineers as well as lending his network to …

Do you think you can be the next great innovator?  Are you gunning to be an inventor like James Dyson or Thomas Edison? Do you want to disrupt entire industries like Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos or You Tube’s Steve Chen, Chad Hurley and Jawed Karim?   It’s entirely possible for you to become a great …

We all know that giving attaboys or attgirls to our team is a good thing, right?  Not so fast, or should I say, not so general.  Research from Bersin indicates that certain types of accolades or recognition works better than others – especially when it comes to Gen Y employees.   What works?  Highly specific …

If you work long enough, you’ll be part of an epic failure that petrifies you.  You won’t know how to deal with it, and likely, you’ll respond by trying to hide it or deflect the blame to someone else.  That will not make you stronger, happier or healthier.   Many positive thinkers might tell you …