No brown M&Ms. The rock band’s concert contract stipulated that a bowl of M&Ms be available backstage with a key provision: no brown M&Ms.
Lead singer David Lee Roth of Van Halen had a method behind his madness.

The no Brown M&Ms served as a bellwether for the rock band to determine how thoroughly the venue fulfilled the critical requirements in the contract such as the height of ceilings and the weight tolerance of the stage. David Lee Roth grabbed the tiger of success by “detail.”

So did Bo Schembechler. The University of Michigan legendary football coach carried a yardstick on the practice football field to make sure his linemen aligned themselves 24 inches from each other. Not an inch more.

Schembechler led Michigan to 13 Big Ten Conference Championships and a ranking among the top 10 teams in the nation 16 seasons. Bo Schembechler grabbed the tiger of success “by detail”

So did actor Ray Bolger. The Scarecrow in the The Wizard of Oz, Bolger would not appear on the movie set until someone counted the pieces of straw sticking out of his arms. The straw count had to be consistent with the previous day’s straw count. Ray Bolger grabbed the tiger of success “by detail.”

Indeed, no detail is too small for the most effective leaders who embrace the message in this  proverb on the woes of a lack of attention to detail :

“For want of a nail, the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe, the horse was lost.
For want of a horse, the rider was lost.
For want of a rider, the battle was lost.
         For want of a battle, the kingdom was lost.”

The 3-books
in The Leadership Mints Series
available on Amazon.com
in print and e-book

Consumed like a breath mint — quick and on-the-go — a Leadership Mint is a short story that energizes leadership behaviors and personalizes leadership principles so they are more easily remembered, more readily acted upon and more fully applied.