When the ancients said a work well-begun was half done, they meant to impress the importance of always making a good beginning.
— Polybius

With three minutes remaining in the first half of a football game, my friend, Kevin, and I, young student athletic trainer assistants, left the playing field to prepare the locker room for the halftime team meeting. Our team, the University of Kentucky, was visiting the home stadium of Clemson University in South Carolina. Over 84,000 screaming Clemson fans were in attendance. The noise generated by the large partisan crowd was deafening and our team desperately needed to retreat to a quiet locker room to think and refocus before beginning the second half.

Our first task was to move a table from inside the locker room to just outside the door, so we could place water and sports drinks on it. But right after we moved the table through the door, we felt a strong gust of wind and heard the door slam shut behind us. "Do you have the key,?" asked Kevin. "No," I answered. Kevin had left our team's only key inside the room. We had locked ourselves and the team out! If we didn't find another way to get back in right away the team would not have a quiet locker room in which to meet during halftime.

Luckily for us, in his ensuing frantic search for help, Kevin met a security guard who had an extra key to the door. He let us into the locker room, just as the horn sounded signaling the end of the first half and seconds before the team ran off the field. For me, that was one of the most stressful moments of my life. I knew how important it was for the coach to gather team members in a quiet place to focus before they went back to the field to compete. Making team members think and reflect one last time before they go forth into an environment full of emotion, hard work and multiple distractions is critical for any coach.

In my roles outside sports, as a lawyer, university professor, and leader of a 200,000-member worldwide organization, I have learned that people who want to be successful in any endeavor should prepare for their work week much like sports teams prepare to enter the stadium for a big game. For many people, their big game begins each week on Monday morning. After a weekend of rest, relaxation and reenergizing they prepare to re-enter their office, sales territory or workplace to make their dreams come true.

Effective leaders and successful people need to be inspired to enter the work week with the same focus and attention to strategy as the members of a team in the locker room. My e-mail messages, books, and live presentations help people who want to be more competitive in life and more productive each week, regardless of whether their goals are social, economic, political or spiritual.

My Monday Morning Messages have been tested and proven to be effective. For over seven years they have been refined in response to feedback and conversations with leaders from around the world. I began writing these Monday Morning Messages in 1997, as part of a strategy to teach, inspire and motivate a team of seven young leaders and entrepreneurs in Europe. They were so moved by the messages that they soon began sharing them with others. Today the mailing list for the electronic version of Monday Morning Messages has grown to become a community of thousands of business, government and community leaders in more than 100 countries.

After writing these messages and working with thousands of leaders around the globe, I am convinced that no half-day period of the work week is more important than Monday morning. The events on Monday morning and how we react to them can either destroy our energy, enthusiasm and productivity for the entire week or provide an uplifting foundation for great accomplishments. It is important that we enter our respective "stadium" each Monday morning focused and ready to perform at the highest level possible. These messages will help you to do just that.

My weekly messages have impacted people around the world in a way that I never imagined. I have been amazed at the strong reactions from readers. They have told me that the messages have given them more confidence as they enter the work week, more courage to deal with difficult problems and more hope to make their lifelong dreams come true.

Perhaps the strong positive reaction I have received to the messages is due, at least in part, to the speed and volume with which information now moves and the new challenges that increased flow places on individuals. Although people today may not work longer than a decade ago, technology now allows us to process and do more within a shorter amount of time. This increased technology pressure can leave us feeling more overwhelmed and emotionally "burned-out" than ever before.

The speed at which things move today also means that Monday mornings have often become more stressful and intense. Problems can develop faster over the weekend and the challenges hitting an individual on Monday morning seem to be getting greater and greater. When I ask an audience, "What is your favorite day of the week?" Monday rarely gets any votes. Monday is so seldom selected that I once asked a seminar participant in Barcelona, Spain why he had voted for Monday. He responded that he worked Tuesday through Sunday and Monday was his only "off" day!

Each of my messages describes a specific strategy. If remembered and applied in your daily life, each strategy will increase your chance of success. I have developed these strategies through my personal experience of leading an international organization and exchanging ideas with thousands of other successful leaders around the world.

The ideas expressed in these messages are simple but, if read carefully and thoughtfully, can be very effective and powerful. Read the selected message at the beginning of each week, and then write down and place the quote for the week somewhere where you will see it often each day (on your bathroom mirror, by your telephone, on the dashboard of your car). You will experience better Monday mornings, more productive work weeks, and a more successful year.

One of my favorite quotations is the following by James M. Barrie: "The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another, and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is written with what he vowed to make it." It is simply not enough to have great goals, high objectives, and exciting dreams. You must have a clear strategy and be effective and focused on that strategy every week. It is important that you dream big dreams for your life and your business, but unless you stay focused on your strategy, despite all the distractions during the competition, the river of life will carry you far down stream. You will realize you have missed your target only when it is too late to do anything to change the outcome.

If you read these messages thoughtfully and consider them carefully, they will prepare you each week to enter your "stadium". They will help you grow, achieve greater success, live a more fulfilling life and become a more effective leader.

To discuss the possibility of Bruce Rector presenting a speech or training session to your team or organization CLICK HERE or call 1-859-271-0505.