When I first became President of Thomas Nelson, I began hosting an event called “Pizza with the Prez.” Once a month I invited a different workgroup to have lunch with me—without their supervisor being present.

This event provided an opportunity for me to get unfiltered feedback. It was one of my favorite activities. It also proved to be one of the most productive.

Tell me if this scenario sounds familiar. You hear the alarm clock go off in the morning. You just need a couple more minutes of sleep, so you hit the snooze button.

Ten minutes later, the alarm clock goes off, but you’re already sound asleep. Thirty minutes later, you wake up in a panic. You just overslept and are going to be late.

You rush out of bed, throw on whatever you can find and head to the bathroom. You look at your toothbrush and tell yourself there’s no time. You gargle, grab whatever is in the fridge for lunch and you’re off.

At a recent conference I attended, I heard someone say that the higher leaders advance in an organization, the less truth they receive.

In the conversation that ensued, it was discussed how executives receive less feedback from their teams and organizations. This was attributed to positional authority, employee job security fears, and other organizational factors.

“The best thing about social media is that it’s free!” I heard this the other day, and cringed. While it’s true that we don’t need a credit card or PayPal account to use Facebook or Twitter, there is still a cost to social media. We pay daily with our time.

On an average day, I spend more than an hour engaging on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn. Throw in a Tweetchat, a newsletter, a YouTube video, and four blog posts each week, and I spend twenty hours a week, using social media to build my platform.

That’s a part-time job! Multiply seventy to eighty hours per month by any hourly rate, and we’re talking serious money.

I first met Dave Ramsey in the early 1990s. At the time, he was the co-host of a local radio show called, The Money Game. He had also self-published a book called Financial Peace, which was later picked up by Viking and became a New York Times bestseller.

I had the privilege of working with Dave on the launch of his book, The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness. It become a mega-bestseller, selling over four million copies since it first came out in 2003. In fact, month after month, it is still one of Thomas Nelson’s top ten bestsellers. It is the first book that I recommend to couple’s wanting to get control of their finances and improve their marriage.

I first encountered Marcus Buckingham when I bought the book, Now, Discover Your Strengths and took the StrengthsFinder test. I found the premise revolutionary: the most effective method for motivating people is to build on their strengths rather than correcting their weaknesses.

We began using this assessment in our leadership training and staff development at Thomas Nelson. It was a major paradigm shift. It is much more empowering to focus on building people’s strengths rather than trying to improve their weaknesses.

Education comes in odd ways. Most of us think you can only learn from a great leader. I’m here to tell you that you can learn just as much from a bad one—maybe more.

This is fortunate for me, because I’ve certainly had more bad bosses than good ones. You probably have, too. These lessons were certainly more painful, but they taught me what not to do, which is just as important as what to do.

Whenever I write or speak on the topic of delegation (as I did yesterday), I always get a question from someone who says, “But what if you don’t have a staff? How can you delegate?” This question typically comes from staff people, technicians, stand-alone professionals, or start-up entrepreneurs. It’s a great question.

For my first few years out of college I worked as a salesman in the publishing industry. I didn’t have anyone reporting to me. It was just me, a telephone, and an order pad. I didn’t even have a computer.

Many years ago, I had a boss that drove me crazy. He insisted on micro-managing me. He wanted to know every move I made. I had to furnish daily status reports with every call, every conversation, every project, etc. It really got to me. I tried to be patient, but I eventually quit. I just couldn’t succeed in that environment.

In this situation, I don’t think I gave him any reason to distrust me. This was just his management style. Everyone complained about it. He was simply a bad boss. Unfortunately, some are like that.