"The surest way for an executive to kill himself is to refuse to learn how, and when, and to whom to delegate work," said James Cash Penney, founder of J.C. Penney Co.

When you grow, you have to know when to let go. You have to know when to delegate so you can rise up. The inability to delegate properly is the main reason that executives fail. I've learned people will seldom let you down if they understand that your destiny is in their hands, and vice versa.

Delegating is a key management skill, but managers often mistake delegation for passing off work. Failing to effectively delegate wastes your time as well as the company's time and resources.

Personal experience starting and running Mackay Envelope Co., now MackayMitchell Envelope Co., taught me this. There came a day when we had grown to the point where I had to hire a person below me to run the company day to day, while I scanned the horizon, studying our industry and the company's future direction.

The reason? You don't want to be micromanaging and end up macromangling. The captain's place is on the bridge and not knee-deep in the bilge. As the person steering an enterprise, you keep your head high and your vision unobstructed so you can study the big responsibilities, while maintaining authority and control. Many aspects of this art can't be taught. Pulling it off successfully can't be analyzed or quantified, but it can be qualified. If you don't get quality people, you're doomed.

In his book, "Further Up the Organization," Robert Townsend wrote: "Leaders delegate whole important jobs. Non-leaders make all final decisions themselves."

Learning to delegate often requires a detour outside your comfort zone. How do you start delegating successfully?

-- Don't look for perfection. Your objective is to get the job done, not create a masterpiece. Establish a standard of quality and a fair time frame for reaching it. Once you establish the expectations, let your staff decide how to carry out the project.

-- Provide complete job instructions. Make sure your employee has all the information needed to complete the job. Confirm that he or she understands -- and accepts -- the requirements.

-- Stop believing you're the only one who can do the job properly. Just because an employee does things differently, doesn't mean they won't do the job right. If you establish expectations of the end goal and the standards to follow, then methodology shouldn't be an issue. An important and often overlooked part of delegation is that it helps develop employees for advancement and creates a better work environment.

-- Focus on teaching skills. Delegating doesn't mean passing off work you don't enjoy, but letting your employees stretch their skills and judgment. As you hand over greater responsibility, it's important to understand that learning new skills sometimes includes making mistakes. Don't punish employees who make a good-faith effort to do things right.

-- Check on progress. Let the employee do the work, but check in periodically. Don't look over employees' shoulders or watch their every move. When you outline the expectations in the beginning, make sure you build in checkpoints for follow-up.

-- Thank the people who have accepted the responsibility. Make sure employees know their efforts are recognized and appreciated.

A new hotel employee was asked to clean the elevators and report back to the supervisor when the task was completed. When the employee failed to appear at the end of the day, the supervisor assumed that like many others, the employee had not liked the job and left. However, after four days the supervisor bumped into the new employee. He was cleaning in one of the elevators.

"You surely haven't been cleaning these elevators for four days, have you?" asked the supervisor, accusingly.

"Yes, sir," said the employee. "This is a big job, and I've not finished yet. Do you realize there are more than 40 of them, two on each floor, and sometimes they are not even there."

Mackay's Moral: The most successful managers aim at making themselves unnecessary to their staff.

OK, all you golfers -- ever played a skins game? In simple terms: Players during a round of golf wager on the best score for a single hole. If there's a tie, the "pot" rolls over to the next hole. One result of a skins game can be to up the ante on each hole. The backlash is taking your eyes off the long haul. In a skins game, you play for short-term stakes. As a result, strategy goes out the window.

Unfortunately, some people run their businesses that way. They muddle along in a never-ending skins game. This doesn't happen just in tiny companies. An insider at a famous blue-chip giant once quipped: "Our idea of long-term planning here is deciding what we'll do after lunch."

Anyone who has participated in a skins game on a golf course knows the painstaking attention paid to the line of every putt. It's a lot like what Peter Drucker describes as "the last of the deadly sins" of business, which he defines as "feeding problems and starving opportunities."

Drucker has long been considered the definitive authority on business planning. His principles are still widely used decades after his revolutionary writing on the concept of "management by objectives." Drucker sorted out a baffling world.

Planning boils down to two fundamental processes: goals and objectives. It is important to distinguish between the two. Goals are considered the purely quantitative and mostly financial targets. Objectives are more qualitative and elusive.1

Make your goals, and you stay in business. Advance your objectives, and you build a business worth having. The distinction between goals and objectives is hardly pure. Often objectives have quantitative measures attached to them as well, but they are rarely just numerical yardsticks.

At the age of 85, Drucker wrote "Managing in a Time of Great Change." A key premise: "Uncertainty -- in the economy, society, politics -- has become so great as to render futile, if not counterproductive, the kind of planning most companies still practice: forecasting based on probabilities."

Translation: Things no longer rest on a predictable base. How would I describe this sort of uncertainty? We live in a world where: "Computers make very fast, very accurate mistakes." And, "Artificial intelligence usually beats real stupidity."

Companies spend days, if not weeks, agonizing over their mission statements and business plans. How much precious, misspent time goes into the process? Get the business model right, and then accessorize it with the details. You may not need more than a few action plans focused on very restricted areas.

In real estate, it's location, location, location. In management, it's preparation, preparation, preparation. But, be very, very careful. It's not the sheer magnitude of the preparation that matters. It's the relevance of what you do. Is it clear? Will it change behavior? Does it sizzle?

Business can take some lessons on preparation from world-class athletes. For a recent seminar on goals and planning, I invited Peter Vidmar to be my guest. Vidmar is the highest scoring American gymnast in Olympic history and was the star of the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. He captained the USA men's gymnastics team to its first Olympic gold. He is now chairman of the USA Gymnastics Board of Directors and a broadcast commentator.

Vidmar understands goal setting in a very tangible way. Preparing for the Olympics is a life quest for these athletes.

He offered this advice: "Goals have to be realistic. I really take issue with any of those people who say you can be anything you want to be, because that's really not true. I'm 5 feet 5 inches and 130 pounds. There is no way I'm going to end up in the NFL. I think goals need to be measured and clearly defined. They also need to be time sensitive. You should give yourself deadlines.

"I think a goal should answer some questions," he continued. "In other words, be specific. It should answer 'what' -- what is it that you want to accomplish? It should answer 'why' -- why is it important to you? It should answer 'when' -- when are you going to get this done by? It should certainly answer 'how' -- how are you going to do it? Make sure your goals are meaningful for you."

And finally, Vidmar said: "When you work with a team, and when this goal is going to take a team effort, you've got to figure out a way to get each member of the team to take ownership of the goal themselves."

Mackay's Moral: You'll never reach your goal if you don't have one.

As we enter the long hot summer of politics and read stories daily about corporate strategies, one common theme emerges: leadership. And there is seldom agreement about what real leadership looks like or who is best to provide it.

Why? My theory is that too often, people in leadership positions fail to realize that every decision affects real people, not just the bottom line. Every good leader I have known has understood that he or she is leading people, not just an organization.

A couple additions to your reading list might improve your leadership potential. Authored by my friend, Marilyn Carlson Nelson, "How We Lead Matters" is a collection of "remembrances of people and times in my life from which I've learned lessons that may provide some insight or guidance to others."

When Marilyn became CEO of Carlson -- with brands like Carlson Wagonlit Travel, the world's largest corporate travel company, Radisson Hotels, Country Inn & Suites and TGI Friday's -- she admits she had doubts that she could fill the role her father had bestowed on her. Her book is a treasure trove of how she handled situations from Sunday school to meeting global leaders. Among the terrific leadership lessons in the 70 stories are gems like these:

-- On a trip to India, Marilyn asked a businesswoman how she was able to address social issues in a country with such immense problems. The woman shared the story of Gandhi. His five possessions consisted of "a cloth garment, a walking staff, a broken pair of eyeglasses, a pair of wooden sandals and a pocket watch. Yet he transformed the world with his commitment and compassion."

-- "It's been said that the mark of a true leader is thinking well beyond his or her years, that is, establishing a leadership culture in an organization that becomes the organization's hallmark."

-- "When you are making a difficult decision, ask yourself if the decision you're about to make would show integrity, leadership, caring. And if you make that particular decision, will you be giving up on something you should continue fighting for? ... Never forget that your role as a leader is to be a steward for future generations."

Marilyn continues as chairman of Carlson, and Carlson continues to prosper. See a connection here?

A brand-new book, "Love Works: Seven Timeless Principles for Effective Leaders," also emphasizes the critical relationship between leadership and a passionate, motivated workforce. Author Joel Manby is president and CEO of Herschend Family Entertainment, the company with more than 10,000 employees that entertains more than 16 million guests at Silver Dollar City in Branson, Mo., and 25 other properties across America. Manby's experience on the television program "Undercover Boss" reinforced his confidence in HFE's workforce, but what followed was truly enlightening. He received thousands of responses from viewers who had watched the show, many from people who wished that their workplaces were more like what they had seen on TV -- "more respectful, cooperative, joyful and well, more loving."

Loving? How many of us can call our workplaces loving?

"The simple truth is this: There is a crisis of confidence in leadership. The level of dissatisfaction and even resentment present in the thousands of letters and email messages shocked me," Manby writes. "People felt as if they couldn't trust their leaders and bosses."

In a panel discussion by the Society of Human Resource Managers, he explained what sets his company apart. "We actually use love to define our leadership culture at HFE. Not love the emotion, but love the verb. We train our leaders to love each other, knowing that if they create enthusiasm with their employees, the employees will in turn create an enthusiastic guest experience. I think most organizations avoid discussions about how people should treat each other, and I think that's what is wrong with a lot of organizations. Why are we so afraid to talk about love?"

The seven principles sound basic enough: to be patient, kind, trusting, unselfish, truthful, forgiving and dedicated. However, that's where the simplicity ends. The examples and stories are both inspirational and challenging. The chapter summaries are succinct checklists to keep you on track.

These two books define leadership in terms we aren't accustomed to -- but maybe they lead us to a better way to work.

Mackay's Moral: If how you lead matters, remember: love works.