Neal Kocurek

Leadership Chef

Neal Kocurek passed away on March 29, 2004. We miss you Neal! Thank you for sharing yourself and your energy with everyone that needed or asked for it.

Neal was passionate about building leaders within companies and the community. He believed this was the single most important thing one could do. He spoke about his Leadership Recipe to all who would listen. In fact, he said that it was this recipe which enabled him to do the many amazing things he did including founding Radian, bringing the Convention Center to reality, leading St. David's, starting Envison Central Texas and solving personal challenges he faced.

Here's Neal's Leadership Recipe - we hope you can use it towards achieving your own goals, be it starting a company or anything else:

Leadership is the activity of influencing people to cooperate toward some goal which they come to find desirable - over the long haul. by Orway Tead (Neal's addition in parens)

The Recipe

1. Use the miracle device (the calendar - schedule time w/ yourself!)
2. Know about your Scotomas (flaws/wrong ideas) let your ideas/problems incubate
3. Develop a vision of your leadership initiative
4. Use Tead's definition as a guide throughout the process
5. Establish the goals - make them SMART (specific, measurable, achievable,
6. Use all your resources (don't underestimate the power at your fingertips)
7. Listen to all parties who have interest (esp. those who are opposed to you)
8. Collect, analyze and present data - again and again
9. See that all parties involved/affected are educated
10. Create "our idea" - get people to add their thoughts\
11. Use your interpersonal skills - data sells
12. Remember Sir Winston: "never ever, ever ever ever...ever, ever give up!"