Speed. Age. Glocal. Uncertainty. Innovation. I hear business leaders actively talking about these trends as separate entities. But it is clear to me that they are interrelated and must be taken as a whole to sustain profitable growth in this new age.

The traditional marketing communications function is riding an elevator plummeting toward the basement. It has already been passed by the elevator headed up, full of constituents influencing each other.

What's clear from the last year in business is that companies that achieve high, or even healthy growth, have the ability to focus, perceive all the options, choose one or several realities with great market appeal, innovate around them and continue to do so persistently.

Elements of past success in previous organizations can be incredibly helpful in shaping strategy in a new position, but the default mindset needs to be 'what's new and different here that requires new and different solutions?', not 'what can I copy wholesale from my last job?'.

Taken together -- innovation and the approach of looking at the cost competitiveness through the eyes of a private equity company -- thought leaders at our recent conference gave CEOs an important new perspective to achieve sustainable profit growth.

I recently read that to do any job, you'll need the physical ability, the right skills including the knowledge and experience and the right behavior. To succeed, those ingredients can't be emphasized enough when it comes to your portfolio of relationships as well.

Waiting for the crisis is rarely the best answer. Wisdom foresees danger and opportunity in equal measure. It stops. It digs. And then it acts.

The flood of evidence continues building the case for a paradigm shift in communication from mass marketing to personal marketing, from traditional media outlets to social media communication strategies.

It is hard to do -- especially since most think of innovation as seismic change brought about by all those much-heralded, mass-market disruptions dreamed up by boy geniuses and biotech scientists.

On a corporate level, it's a near death experience. Who wouldn't love to have snazzy office space and a generous dental plan? But it all blows up if you can't make payroll.

For any individual, team or organization to grow, they have to depend on not just coming up with a lot of good ideas but the ability to implement them as well.

PR is day in, day out. It has to operate at the media's pace (worldwide, 24/7). A particular position or message has to be tweaked to suit the situation, while remaining in line with the longer term strategy.

Cooperating is a much lower level activity than collaborating. Knowing the difference can make all the difference in the results you get with your business partners.

Is change coming at you from the outside in, or the inside out? My experience in working with top leaders from business, government and education on five different continents is that the majority of change comes to us from the outside in.

In the last two decades, it seems everything in our world has undergone some sort of change -- from the way we watch our entertainment, make purchases, or even communicate. But some things don't change.

In the long history of poor management decisions made at major American companies, only a few proved to be fatal. It is hard to ruin a company with a ...

Only you can be the steward of your business's future. No one else can shoulder the overarching responsibility of setting its course and seeing the journey through.