Read This First

What is a Culture of Responsibility? How is it different from holding people accountable? How could answering these questions affect the success of yourbusiness?

A few years ago, Mike had the opportunity to hear a talk at a charity dinner that had a profound clarifying effect upon his outlook on success as a business leader, a parent, a grandparent and a member of society. The speaker was a man that Mike had never heard of before, and you probably haven’t either: Robert Dale Maxwell. He lives in Bend, Oregon. As of this writing, he holds the honor of being America’s oldest living Medal of Honorrecipient.

The following citation describes what Maxwell did to earn the medal, but what Mike was more impressed with waswhy he did it … and the effect thatwhy had on how we define the word “success.”

On September 7, 1944, near Besancon, France, Maxwell and three other soldiers, armed only with .45 caliber automatic pistols, defended their battalion observation post against an overwhelming onslaught of flak and machine gun fire from a platoon of German infantrymen. The Germans had infiltrated the battalion’s forward companies and were attacking the observation post with machine gun, machine