The Thinker – The Very Good

Almost every Monday, Peter Mazzola (our manager) would announce that while out riding his bike hundreds of miles that weekend, he was ‘thinking.’ Everyone would tremble because we all knew what that meant … something new was coming. However, the good news was that with Mazzola, it was always a well thought out concept or idea, not a knee jerk reaction to something he read on the internet or a sales excuse for not selling.

A leader’s job is to look into the future and see the organization not as it is, but as it should be. – Jack Welch

As we would listen to his new idea, he would share the thought process which lead him to it. He would also share the different paths that he went down and dismissed. By doing so, our manager was not only directing us, but also educating us on proper thought processes.

Little did we know, but he was training us in the art of creative or critical thinking.

Over the years working for Mazzola, we all became better thinkers and leaders ourselves. The impact that this manager had on all of his subordinates was very impressive and led us to places, which we could have never reached without his mentoring. In fact, many times I have looked at a problem and asked myself …

“What would Peter have done?”