We all mess up at one time or another—or many times, rather. Whether the mess up was avoidable, or not, what’s important is being willing to stand up and accept responsibility when you made a mistake. That’s the mark of a confident leader.

Our new president gave a splendid example when he picked Tom Daschle for the cabinet without thoroughly vetting him. After Daschle withdrew, Obama readily admitted, “I screwed up.” By this simple statement, he cleared the air to move forward in a new direction. He also sent the message that well-meaning people are going to make mistakes along the way, but if they are committed to doing the best they can and operate in good faith, it’s going to happen and its okay.

By accepting responsibility early, he also defused his harshest critics. Note also the language. “I screwed up” carries a move powerful visceral element than. “I made a mistake”.

Whether you are President of the U.S. or President of your own life, when you do mess up, it is a chance to learn from what went wrong, readjust your strategy and take new action.

Some questions ponder…

• What are some of your most impressive recent mess ups?
• What did you learn from each? How have you (or how will you) make adjustments to “clean it up”?
• What should you say or do to acknowledge responsibility? (If it’s too far in the past the moment of opportunity is gone)

By reframing how you interpret mistakes as a natural part of the action learning cycle,— you can recognize their value in pointing out a better way to success!

Around Valentine’s Day, people experience a spectrum of emotions from tingly to depressed. Some may be in a great relationship, others want to be in a great relationship, or perhaps feel stuck in a not-so-great relationship. Whatever the case may be for you, being aware and focused on your own Self-Mastery journey is a key success factor in your own personal growth which positively impacts your relationships overall.

While we think of relationships in terms of partnerships with others, the most important relationship you can have is with yourself. When is the last time you clarified your Values? Goals? Purposes?—particularly in how they fit with those of other people in your life. Becoming aware of who you are and who you want to become first requires some soul-searching, and it needn’t occur all in one session. A strong relationship with yourself is the key success factor because your thoughts, feelings and behaviors affect how you are towards others, particularly those who are close to you.

A strong relationship with yourself also means you can be aware of and honor who you are now—your strengths, weaknesses, talents and interests—and who you want to become. Along the journey, being willing to allow yourself to go through the cycles and challenges of change with a winning attitude will help you be and stay a champion. Whatever relationship phase you are in right now, by accepting the challenges of Self-Mastery as you seek to become the most you can be—and encourage others to do the same—you attract other key success factors that can magnetize your life!

It’s tough to make a buck when you are running an airline, but when Robert Crandall was president of American Airlines, he did something we can all emulate in times when saving money is essential.

Crandall looked for every potential cost-saving by scrutinizing each expenditure and asking if there is a better way. While reviewing the budget of one of AA’s facilities, he noticed that a night watchman was on duty every night. Crandall asked “why don’t we hire a watchman for three random nights a week, potential thieves won’t know which night he is there?” They did and next year, after no thefts and money saved, he said “why don’t we replace the watchman with a vicious German Shepard?”. This they did, then reduced the dog’s duty to three nights a week. Still, no thefts. Money saved.

Then Crandall made the ultimate innovative move. They hired a professional handler – wearing protective gear — to anger and wrestle with the dog, while recording the frightening growls and barks of this savage beast. They then replaced the on-duty dog with an electronic recording that would randomly play a few angry barks loud enough to scare the most determined thief. More money saved!

What time and money consuming functions are you performing in your life and work? How innovative can you be in serving that same function in a cheaper and easier way?

Scrutinize your core processes and daily routines, and discover some creative ways to save resources with your own version of barking beasts!

This era of accelerating change calls us to constantly grow our skill set so we can perform well on a variety of levels and difficult settings.

How aware are you of the best skills you currently possess? Have you identified those you need to acquire? Brushing up your skills may mean you need to buff and polish vigorously to remove the rust, or it may mean you just need to lightly dust them off. Recognizing what you still need now, and will need in the future, can help you develop and improve your game plan.

Take some time to identify what you need now, and anticipate your future needs. Begin by identifying where you want to be in the future (say, in 5 years). Get as specific as possible. Then identify the competencies required to be effective in that situation, and rate yourself against them.

Regularly assessing and upgrading your inventory of skills will help you stay competitive in today’s market.

Each day our thoughts can range from highly focused topics to distracted and fragmented ideas about the past, present and/or future. Being able to direct our mental processes strategically requires following a format or system of thought. The best way to begin is to ask what I consider to be most critical question: What Am I Trying to Accomplish? and Why?

This question scales up and down the time continuum. You can ask it regarding your long term life goals, as well as regarding what you need to accomplish in the next hour.

This sharpens your outcomes (the “what”) and connects them to a higher purpose (the “why”). Invest sufficient time here to get a clear answer before rushing to solution.

Sometimes it’s easy to get lost in the storm, especially when emotions are high. That’s why well-structured questions and logical processes are essential thought-connectors to ensure the amount of strategic thinking and planning being done is sufficient enough to get us from where we are to where we want to go.

This question is the first of Four Critical Strategic Questions in our Logical Framework approach, which some call “revolutionary”. The Logical Framework approach helps you pull together divergent resources required to discover and implement a complete solution. To learn all Four Questions, see our free special report Turn Strategy Into Action available at www.ManagementPro.com. Strategic Thinking is more powerful – and easy to do – than some might initially think!

With the rate of change these days, it’s challenging to keep up–especially in the realm of technology. Some of us are naturally more tech savvy than others; but if we miss a wave of upgrades, we may be missing out on breakthroughs that could simplify our lives and leverage our effectiveness. How often do you have a technology update? Are you a bleeding-edge early adapter who rushes out to upgrade when the latest hits the shelves? Or do you wait until the risks are totally gone and lose the early-adopters advantage? Perhaps somewhere in-between is a happy medium, with incremental improvements on a regular basis.

Here’s one way to do the check up: Identify 3 of your most effective colleagues, and trade ideas with them on their use of technology. What works for them? What do they consider most useful? What daily and weekly processes do they use to manage their performance? What new technologies do they see on the horizon that may be useful?

However you choose to do it, having a regular check-up for your personal and professional tech needs will help keep you online and in line for success!

Sometimes our wildest dreams do come true. That’s what happened for the now-famous opera singer Paul Potts when he flipped a coin to see if he should try out for the talent contest–and it was “heads”! So, even though it had been four years since he even sang opera, he applied and got accepted to compete last year.

Can you imagine the courage it took to perform? It was just one of the steps along the way where he could have turned back, but didn’t.

Paul Potts went on to surprise the judges and inspire everyone with his opera performance, which you can view on You Tube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxOytYLlhiQ

Ever since, he has been inspiring people with his voice as he travels around the world performing.

So, what do you and Paul Potts have in common? Maybe it is that you dream of becoming a famous singer someday, too. Or, maybe it’s that you have another dream of your own that you hope will someday come true. Whether it’s a big or small dream, don’t flip a coin necessarily, but ask yourself what small steps you can take today to move your wishful thinking of someday closer to becoming a reality today–and then start taking those steps one by one.

Have you ever wondered how you’ve managed to get where you are now? In some ways, you may like where you are; and in some ways, you probably have dreams and desires to be somewhere else in your life and career. Part of getting where you want to be is managing your life and your career in such a way that you achieve the results you want. We’re all managers in some way or another. It’s important to first determine what you’re responsible for in each area. Then, decide how you will approach it—determine what’s already working and what you want to work on improving. To get more specific about your management abilities, visit www.ManagementPro.com. Once you start thinking, planning, and acting using the tools you’ll find there, you won’t need to wonder anymore about whether or not your planning can get you where you want to go because you’ll know with certainty how to design a plan that will get you there.

Strategic living is smart living, not someday but starting today. Sometimes we feel numb about living the life we want because we don’t feel we have the time to stop and plan what we really want; and maybe aren’t sure to create a successful execution plan. But know coach who wants to go to the championship fails to create a game plan and help the team practice to sharpen their skills play by play and game by game. Taking three smart steps today can get your strategic living game-plan up and running.

Step One—Think about your life. Break it down by areas—you, your family, your work, your world. It almost sounds cliché because we hear all the time that we should put in writing how you want your life to look, but we seldom actually do it. So, decide now what you do want as well as what you don’t want. Turn the list of what you want into goals that you can visualize and emotionally relate to.

Step Two—Write out your plan for how to get there. Get other people involved who also have an interest in the desired outcome. The LogFrame planning I use myself as well as for my clients is a powerful tool in designing strategic living action plans because it helps you bring together the big picture why with the details that can make it happen.

Step Three—Finally, act upon your plan. You may not be able to start implementing all of it at once (which would probably set you up for failure anyway); but by following the steps you’ve laid out, you can move strategically towards the results you want.

Once you have your plan created, you will need to assess where you are and make adjustments as new factors come into play. The www.ManagementPro.com website is full of strategies and tools that give you the strategic edge to get the results you desire in business and in life.

Did you hear about Ken Couch, who rode a green lawn chair supported by a rainbow array of more than 150 helium-filled party balloons from Oregon all the way to Idaho?

Cheered on by spectators wearing fluorescent green “Dream Big” t-shirtsand clutching a mug of coffee, , Couch rose out of the parking lot of his gas station into the bright blue morning sky and roseride the prevailing wind about 230 miles east.

Each balloon gives four pounds of lift. The chair weighed400 pounds, Couch and his parachute added 200 more.

For altitude control, he carried a BB gun and a blow gun equipped with steel darts to puncture a balloon periodically so he didn’t go too high. He also had a pole with a hook for pulling in balloons, Global Positioning System tracking devices, an altimeter and a satellite phone.

While copying his feat isn’t on my to-do list, I have to admire the quirky cajones of a man willing to “Dream Big” and just go for it. And I would bet that his willingness to think beyond the lawn chair translates into creativity in other spheres of his life as well.

How quirky are you willing to let yourself be? What is the most outrageous unfulfilled dream you can imagine? And if you were to actually go for it, how would that shift your image of who you are? What is stopping you?

I invite posts on the topic “honoring my inner quirk”.

Couch, a veteran of hang gliding and sky diving, estimated the rig cost about $6,000, mostly for helium. Costs were defrayed by corporate sponsors.