ASK any group of entrepreneurs the question "What do effective leaders do?" and you will get various answers. Leaders define the strategy, motivate, create the company's mission, build its culture. Then ask: "What should leaders do?" If the group is experienced, you will likely hear only one answer: the sole job of the leader is to deliver results. But how? For many years, the actions that leaders can and must take to help their people perform at their best have remained a mystery. Recently, this mystery has created an entire "informal" industry: literally thousands of "leadership experts" have built careers in training and consulting business executives, aiming to create entrepreneurs who can achieve bold goals – whether strategic, financial, organizational, or all three.

However, effective leadership remains an enigma for many individuals and organizations. One reason is that until recently, almost no quantitative research has proven exactly which leadership behaviors yield positive results. Leadership experts provide advice based on conclusions, experience, and instinct. Sometimes this advice refers to specific leadership behaviors that produce positive outcomes. Leadership experts provide advice based on conclusions, experience, and instinct. Sometimes this advice achieves its goal, other times it does not.