The contribution I make to a client is basically to be very stupid and very dense; ask simple, fundamental questions; demand that he be thoughtful with the answers; and demand that he make decisions on what is important.

--Peter F. Drucker

Establishing a group of executives to study stock-price improvement through my consulting practice had another helpful impact on me. The members asked that we have the work checked by an independent academic to be sure we weren't making mistakes that we didn't realize.

I was asked to pick the academic. Naturally, I chose Peter Drucker who kindly agreed to begin working with Carol and me in 1992 to improve the stock-price improvement research. That's when my business education really began because Peter was the only person who could help me see the full potential of what I was doing.

He had three messages for me that he repeatedly stressed over the years we worked together (through 1999, when he began to cut back on his consulting due to his failing health):

1. I had a general methodology that I used to solve all problems.

2. That approach could be used by anyone to solve 80 percent of all problems anyone ever has to face. Thus people could learn one way of solving problems rather than hundreds, creating the potential for lots of breakthrough progress as they became more talented in the new method.

3. If I didn't share that process with the world, it might not be rediscovered for centuries and that would be a terrible loss. I should publish a book that explained the process so others could use it.

Even on my most optimistic days, it had never occurred to me that I could contribute anything uniquely valuable. Peter had replaced my mother in helping me see the unlimited future we can all create when we follow the right steps.

Since then, I've been a new kind of optimist -- a practical, but unlimited, one. What's the difference between a practical, but limited, optimist and a practical, unlimited one? The practical, unlimited optimist in me creates and uses disciplined ways of asking questions and thinking that extend my vision of what can be done well past the best of what can be observed today.

By learning those questions and ways of thinking, your ability to see opportunity and grasp its benefits will be unlimited as well. That's my message for you, thanks to Peter Drucker.