Francis Egbuson

I ran into the excerpt from a new book by former spiritual adviser to President Barack Obama, Joshua DuBois. It quotes lyrics from a song by Nina Simone titled “Feeling Good”; Birds flying high, you know how I feel Sun in the sky, you know how I feel Breeze drifting on by, you know how I feel It’s a new dawn! It’s a new day! It’s a new life for me And I’m feeling good. —Nina Simone, “Feeling Good” DuBois in making his point that no matter what is happening around us, we still have the choice on what to keep our focus on, also quotes Psalm 59 which narrates the Psalmist choices in the midst of crisis: See how they lie in wait for me! Fierce men conspire against me for no offense or sin of mine, Lord. . . . They return at evening, snarling like dogs, and prowl about the city. They wander about for food and howl if not satisfied. I will sing of your strength, in the morning I will sing of your love; for you are my fortress, ...

As we match towards 2014, it is important to remind ourselves about why we do what we do as business. Why do customers continue to rely on our content, delivery capability and follow-up. Why do we continue to get referrals and why do people who attend our workshops give us 9 or 10 in our post workshop assessments. To be sure, our plan is to run a profitable business, with solid margins and great pipeline of future business. But as I reflect, what keeps Julia Nansubuga  - a 6-7 month pregnant woman running through the parking lot of Uganda Revenue Authority to deliver a proposal ahead of time, is not the profitability of the business or the prospects of future options. And as the ex-Google Uganda employee opined “this is great and I know I am in the right place”. That “right place” is right because of our mission. As FranklinCovey Executive Vice President, Sean Covey put it in his December memo to owners, “ In the end, we do what we do because we care about our mission....

It took my family and I almost two hours to get to the airport at Entebbe on Saturday. Traffic crawled along and we thought there was an accident on the way. But we crawled along until we go to Entebbe, no accident, just lost of cars and trucks on the road. We arrived at the entrance and we were told that our favorite airline gate was closed. We pleaded with airport security and airline representative but we were told that we were late - gate closed an hour ago. So we called our travel agent who insisted that we could still board because aour seats were "available". She said "you be an African and put something in that man's hands". The "that man" was the supposed supervisor. I said "put something in his hands?", "yes!" was the response. So we ended up staying the night in Entebbe for the next flight where we did not have to "put something in that man's hands" and where I did not have to prove the authenticity of my...