Wal-Mart's success strategies and tactics are easy to understand yet hard to duplicate.

Sam Walton instilled ownership of the products in the stores into the collective consciousness of every associate regardless of what job they did for the company.

Wal-Mart hires average people but squeezes above average performance and results out of them.

The key to competing and surviving against Wal-Mart is to focus your business into a niche or pocket where you can leverage your strengths in the local marketplace.

People will give you the responsibility, even the authority, to go after the big things, the visionary things, the reaching for incredible opportunities, if they trust that you're running a city well. And if you don't run a city well, conversely, you can't do the big things.

Now, I'm back to my old ways: Needing to be the leader, needing to score.

Our leaders must get to grips with the huge risk that carbon dioxide emissions pose to the economy and the environment. As we know, carbon dioxide is a long-lived gas. It hangs around.

Average leaders inspire people to punch a time clock. Great leaders inspire industry and passion.