Being a team leader is tough. You must balance the needs of the organization with the needs of the team members. You coach, counsel and develop.You mediate conflicts of personality and performance.

In short, you’re either the solution or the problem.

Whether you inherited your team (most likely) or chose the members yourself, you as team leader are responsible for making the team work.

While it is tempting to blame the team (“they didn’t work together” or “she is the real problem”) you need to realize that YOU are responsible for getting them work together and for dealing with whoever is problematic.

Do as much correctly as you can and you’ll avoid many problems. Practice the basics of good team building. But When you see a problem, seek a solution and make sure the problem is addressed rather than ignored.

Team leadership is about taking responsibility. Once you get past blames and excuses, you can do the difficult but important work of a team leader.

Take responsibility for being the solution.

Feedback is useful if you act on it. I write books as honestly and as well as I can to help readers.

Someone wrote a less than nice review that one of my books was full of my pet peeves.  I write about my experiences to provide real life illustrations. I don’t need to make up stories–I just report on what I observe and experience.

In the example cited by the reviewer, I did not mention any of the bad service providers by name (most unhappy customers don’t extend that courtesy). Instead, I focused on what could have been done to avoid or fix the problem.

My so called pet peeves are the same kinds of things that literally hundreds of readers, clients and audience members have shared with me that bother them too.

Customers’ pet peeves–irritants, problems and dissatisfactions–are golden opportunities if you act upon them rather than simply grouse about them.

Customers let you know what’s wrong, and arguing rarely if ever helps your cause.

Find out what’s bugging your customers and fix it. Find out what your competition is doing that bothers customers and make sure you don’t do it too. Customers will notice, appreciate it and do more business with you.

The customer’s pet peeve is your golden opportunity.

Instead, thank them for being honest and do what you can to un-peeve them.

President Obama is understandably defensive about the criticism he is receiving about the Gulf oil disaster. News clips recently show him explaining that he was in the Gulf making “tough talk” and finding out whose ass needed to be kicked (really).

All leaders feel the heat whether the problems they face were caused by them or someone else. That is the nature of leadership. Bush took the heat for how his administration responded to Hurricane Katrina. Obama is taking the heat for the Gulf.

As much as tough talk is appreciated, people want results. Talking tough, placing blame or even taking responsibility mean little until the problem is solved or the situation is resolved.

The title of a book written by my friend Randy Pennington says it all: “Results Rule.”

There are many lessons for leaders here, but primary is this: don’t let the heat in the kitchen prevent you from cooking the meal. Deal with the heat. Ignore it if you can. If you can’t, address it. Just don’t let it distract you from bringing your compete attention and resources to bear on the goal.

There will be time for dealing with those who caused one of the greatest natural disasters of our time, but right now Americans want results and solutions. Not tough talk and ass kicking.

An effective leader has to get past ass kicking to problem fixing.

If you are cheered or encouraged by what you’re about to read, it will be in an odd sort of way.

Maybe you can relate so Steve. He’s the CEO of a mid-sized business that has seen revenues hammered by the recession. He and his team have done careful analysis, consulted with industry experts and taken dramatic measures. In short, they’re doing everything right.

And it isn’t working.

They haven’t seen revenues rebound like they’d expected. Their best efforts haven’t saved the accounts they’d hoped to save.

Steve and has team is discouraged and looking for answers.

The best answer I can offer: there are no guarantees.

Most managers and leads live with a positive optimism that if they just do everything “right,” things will work out. Often they do. Sometimes they don’t.

All of us can think of times in our lives when our best analysis and decision backfired. Just as we benefit from dumb luck, so can we suffer from what I’ve come to call “informed misfortune.” Informed misfortune reminds us that even when good information is acted on well there are no guarantees of the results.

Feeling encouraged? I didn’t think so, but perhaps you should reflect on what I’ve just shared. Deep down, you already knew it to be true, that there are times when your best efforts don’t create the results they should. Unless you are living in deep denial–or very young–you already know there are no guarantees.

That doesn’t mean we should quit trying to think and be and do our best. It does mean that we shouldn’t beat  up on ourselves when doing our best isn’t enough. The encouragement to be found is a realistic assessment of life, and the acceptance that there are forces bigger and more powerful than ourselves and our organizations that may in the end have the last say.

The belief that doing everything right will assure success is borderline delusional. Because doing things right often does create success, we want to extrapolate that into the belief that it will always create success. And there are times when it won’t.

Steve and his team aren’t giving up. They aren’t prospering as they thought they might, but they’re surviving. The good news is that they don’t waste too much time getting existential about why doing everything right didn’t work. Instead, they focus on what they should keep doing despite that.

This realization–this “no guarantees” reality–may be the only thing that will ultimately keep you sane during difficult times.

Spotting problems is easy. Almost everybody can do that.

Solving problems is much more difficult. Not everyone seems up to that task. Problematically, more people are content to spot a problem (also known as moaning, groaning and complaining) than they are contributing to the solution.

But even solving problems isn’t the highest art. Spotting and exploiting opportunities is a personal and organizational leadership skill.

(By the way, “exploiting” is the correct word for seizing and taking advantage of an opportunity or situation. Exploitation becomes negative when it is done to people. Because exploitation has a potential negative connotation it is important to understand the difference.)

Why are spotting opportunities hard?

First, it requires a conscious effort. Rarely do we stumble upon opportunities, and even if we do we won’t recognize them if we aren’t paying attention.

Second, it requires a contrary focus. Today most people are focused on their problems and not their opportunities. Our natural focus seems to be on what’s wrong rather than what’s right or what could be better.

Third, opportunities are often subtle rather than obvious. Furthermore, they often come disguised as a problem and then you have to look hard to find the opportunity hidden in the problem. (Most people just see a problem as a problem.)

Once you’re spotted an opportunity you must take action to exploit it. Opportunities not acted upon are nothing more than possibilities. Leaders are those who turn possibilities into reality. But that takes work, not wishful thinking.

Are you looking for and acting on opportunities?

Magic is mysterious…until you know how it works. Once you learn the technique behind the trick, you too can work magic.

Here are five words that can solve problems, defuse conflict, increase loyalty and build relationships with customers:

I’ll take care of you.

“I’ve been sent to three different people and none have been able to help me!”

I’ll take care of you.

“We get here right at six and it says the specials we wanted to order end at six.”

I’ll take care of you.

“I just found out we need to have the product delivered by noon tomorrow.”

I’ll take care of you.

“I can’t get anybody to listen.”

I’ll take care of you.

I’ve had any number of customer service reps and managers work their magic on me by offering those five simple words.

Look for opportunities to work your magic today.