The new top leader of a business, a for-service-not-for-profit or a government has an early task to create and then carefully cultivate a small Inner Circle of intelligent, experienced, diverse, trusted individuals from inside and outside the organization, who can and will provide insights that the leader needs.  The Inner Circle must take its responsibilities seriously since any leader is unlikely to possess or gain all the necessary insights for every situation.

This Inner Circle team should have all the following types, some of which are usually found combined in different individuals, including the leader:

• The Visionary Who Sees Ahead What Few Others Can Imagine
• The Entrepreneurial, Risk Taking, Free Wheeling Optimist
• The Practical, Factual, Financial Pessimist
• The Common Sense Balance Wheel
• The Compassionate People Person With An Understanding Of All The Stakeholders And Their Positions
• The Reader Of What's Happening Out There
• The Ethicist Who Raises The Hard and Right Questions
• The Historian Who Can Explain What Has Come Before
• The Politico Who Senses The Possible, When And How to Move Others To Want It
• The Teller of Truths The Top Leader Really Doesn’t Want To Hear.

The leader must listen carefully to all these voices, weigh their opinions and options, consider all the pros and cons, think through possible unintended consequences, then decide and vigorously implement — or kill — or postpone — his or her latest policy or strategic initiative.

If the top leader does this, the probabilities are increased significantly of great success — and of not creating and thereby avoiding being mired in the leader’s very own Vietnam, Watergate or Waterloo, with the suffering which results on all sides.