Give people the opportunity just before they are ready for it.  In hospitality we either promote too soon or not soon enough.  The key is to give people the opportunity at a time when they are almost there.  This will push them out of their comfort zone so they are challenged, but just enough so that they achieve success.  

- Sarah Derry for HospitalityMagazine.com.au

Rule: You can get your time and your life under control only to the degree to which you discontinue lower value activities.  For you to do something new, you must complete or stop doing something old. Getting in requires getting out.  Picking up means putting down.

Creative procrastination is the act of thoughtfully and deliberately deciding upon the exact things you are not going to do right now, if ever.  Most people engage in unconscious procrastination. They procrastinate without thinking about it. As a result, they procrastinate on the big, hard, valuable, important tasks that can have significant long-term consequences in their lives and careers.  You must avoid this common tendency at all costs.  Your job is to deliberately procrastinate on tasks that are of low value so that you have more time for tasks that can really make a difference in your life and work.

-Brian Tracy, Eat that Frog

How many times have you been in a store, restaurant, or on the phone, and questioned the proper "fit" of the person's skills in relation to the job they were working?  The waiter who is unfriendly, or the person answering the phone who puts you on multiple holds, disconnects your call, or transfers incorrectly?  How about the person at a home improvement store working in "lawn and garden" who can't answer any of your lawn and garden questions?  One of my personal favorites is the person who works in a family fun vacation destination, such as a theme park or resort, who, based on the poor delivery of their service, alters your "fun" experience?  So who is to blame for this improper fit?  During that moment of frustration, it is easy to blame the service person at the restaurant, home improvement store, or on the phone, but as we peal back the layers of "why," there are many reasons for this bad fit and disconnect.

After you have identified for an employee both a range of goals and the mindset necessary to achieve them, the next logical step is to map out, in a pragmatic fashion and with employee input, different possible paths to success. The idea here is to describe actions, resources, and plans of action in terms as specific as possible...you want to provide your employee with a "nuts and bolts" repertoire of approaches that he or she can draw upon in the coming cycle.

- Beverly Ballaro, Dealing with Difficult People

Most people are not comfortable being judged themselves and therefore tend to err on the side of caution when they have to put their personal assessment of a colleague in writing.  What they don't realize is that an excess of diplomacy can actually produce consequences just as damaging as those created by an unduly harsh approach.  By squandering an opportunity to deliver meaningful criticism, they deprive both themselves and the employees they are evaluating of any practical benefits.  They turn the process into an exercise in futility, and a time-consuming one at that.

- Kelly Robertson, V.P. of Sales for Art Merchandising

-Brian Tracy, Eat that Frog