Most organizations never reach their full potential, because most managers lack enough honesty and courage to help under-performing or misplaced employees move on to a better place, which we discussed in Firing 101.

Yet even if an organization is able to reorganize in a way that eases...

Most organizations have many reasons for underachieving: managers can't agree on a strategy, managers can't agree on priorities or managers are unready for twists along the economic landscape. But the most glaring reason for underperformance is that most managers stink at the art of firing people.

The economic and...

In a few short weeks, tens of thousands of college students will undertake the ritual of fraternity and sorority recruitment at America's colleges and universities. This will provoke hand-wringing and eye-rolling among many jaded faculty, cynical social activists and concerned parents.

Yet how we see fraternities and sororities may say...

Shame is the force that has guided most traditional Asian societies, from the northern tip of Japan to the southern beaches of the subcontinent. Shame is what keeps a child from shunning community obligations, or an adult from taking more than he or she deserves. Shame may, in our psychologically...

Is Pakistan an unambiguous and unambivalent friend of America? No. But that does not mean it should be turned into an enemy.

Pakistan is a house divided, experiencing a civil war in politics, culture and religion. Many frustrated Americans and Indians feel the most cathartic option...

An art exhibit at Pastor Rob Bell's church explored aspects of peacemaking, that vocation that was blessed so memorably by Jesus. One woman wove into her piece a quote from Gandhi, the peacemaker whose thinking and actions were so influenced by Jesus' teachings in the Sermon on the Mount.

Kay Hymowitz has a problem with today's young men, and she's willing to say so in the bluntest terms. But because she blames solely men for the dating difficulties of young women, I'd like to propose a better and fairer remedy for the plight of the unmarried Average American Woman....

Juan Williams has become a victim of the crossfire of a war within Islam, a war among extremists and moderates that is not going well right now for the latter group.

NPR's sudden dismissal of Williams, for his daring to confess to some jitteriness around Muslims who seem foreign,...

Will America remain a global leader while huge numbers of Chinese and Indians work harder for less money? Will we pass along a bankrupt nation to our children? These are tough questions which increasingly make us feel impotent. Admit it: we miss the romance and the glamor of the Crusades,...

Right-wing demagogues are attempting to lasso Christians as they head to the polls this fall, using Islamophobia as a powerful rope.

But what would Jesus do, if He dropped in to discuss the upcoming elections? Specifically, what would He say about and to our growing Muslim-American population? Let me...

Consider the recent events of the Summer of Islamophobia:

• The Anti-Defamation League casts its lot with forces opposing a relatively pluralistic Islamic center a few blocks from Ground Zero.
• Bigots come out in opposition to mosques far removed from the symbolism of Ground Zero.
• Newt Gingrich declares sharia...

Jenelle and Dan took the day off Friday to be able to adequately celebrate their son Nathan's graduation. It's understandable to want to hail their son's accomplishment. Or it would have been. But Nathan is just turning five; it was his preschool graduation.

It brought to mind the scene...

Let me kick Boston Celtics fans now that they're down.

All sports fans are arrogant and hypocritical, perhaps because all human beings are arrogant hypocritical, never more so than when they break themselves up in groups. But Boston Celtics fans and watchers offer a unique kind of hubris.

As...

How are immigrants from a Hindu nation putting the Protestant work ethic to shame, even within the most American of contests?

An overlooked lesson from last weekend's national spelling bee is that religion affects us far less than we might imagine. That should be good news for...

Since the heyday of segregation, a University of Texas dormitory has proudly been named for an influential member of the Ku Klux Klan. In 2010, officials have only begun to get around to considering correcting the matter.

It's yet another reminder that we can't keep forcing Southerners...

They say Karma's a bitch. They're too unkind. Recent floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes reveal her as a coolly indifferent, altogether inscrutable customer.

One wag noted a few years ago that the map of the Confederate slave states is pretty much the same as the map of today's...

Marry me, Bristol Palin. Your defenders have ripped me and the Huffington Post for daring to insult your reputation and for daring to insult their notions of Christian purity.

But I'm actually willing to make you an honorable woman, by Palin standards. I'll marry you,...

As the author of a new, independently published book, I'll share with aspiring authors some lessons I've learned so far in the two months my book has been out.

1. Get Three Books Out. Fast.
We're nearing a tipping point in the publishing industry, which...

As part of Bristol Palin's role as a born-again champion of abstinence, she recently wrapped up filming an episode of ABC's The Secret Life of the American Teenager, in which she plays the friend of another young single mother. Look for the episode to air this summer, but...

It's one thing to turn an atheist into a Christian. But sometimes it takes a miracle to turn a die-hard Christian into a real Christian. Yet that's the work that Gregory A. Boyd (himself a former atheist) is about. And I increasingly find myself cheering him on.

Pastor Boyd...