Many of our problems we bring on ourselves, usually by failing to think carefully at some critical point. We go so fast that we don’t see the looming pothole until we hit it. We dig the hole before falling into it. Success generally hinges on avoiding such unforced errors. Next time, before jumping in to anything, slow down and ask yourself these five questions. They’ll save your credibility — and your ass — nearly every time.

If we want a civilized and ethical way of living and working, we must accept the responsibilities and perils that come from being authentic as individuals. We cannot hide behind the norms and notions of the herd. Humans collectively have a lot of bad beliefs and assumptions in their heads, placed there by cultural and tribal forces and ancient survival instincts. Seeking the safety of the herd comes with a heavy price: all herd thinking is ultimately a loss of human freedom, authenticity and creativity. Besides, you can hardly call yourself a leader if all you do is follow the herd.

Instead of standing back and making long-term decisions based on seeking sustainable differences, businesses have mechanically worked to do the same as everyone else, only bigger and more efficiently. ‘Making the numbers’ has overtaken making sound judgments. Conventional management thinking and analysis aren’t the answer, they’re the problems that got us into this mess. The only true answer is to think deeply about the full nature and extent of the problems we face, free from any preconceptions. Analysis won’t save us, but creativity just might.

Gresham’s Law explains why the ‘good coinage’ of ethical business is constantly under threat from sharp practice and dishonesty. We want to believe that corporations and executives are honest, just as we want to believe in the value of the currency. So long as we take both on trust, forgers and cheats will seek to exploit our gullibility.

Power in the workplace exists in many forms and can be used in all kinds of ways. That’s why the question of the correct use of power is at the heart of leadership. Can ‘might’ also be made ‘right’? Do we use whatever power we have ethically? Since ethics come from what is within us, not from externals, exploring how power is being used or abused is a facet of all civilized approaches to leadership.

Leadership isn’t even close to being a science, although it draws heavily on ideas from the social sciences. Today, there are continual attempts to derive ‘laws’ for leaders to follow, whether these come from statistical analysis, anecdotal evidence, or the erroneous belief that following what the ‘great men’ of the past did can produce success today. This is nonsense. Leadership is an art and depends mostly on sensitivity to circumstances, courage to face reality and a continual willingness to do whatever it takes to bring others along.

Many people with good ideas fail to get their boss to listen to them because they don’t listen themselves. They jump in with the details of what they want to say, only it’s the wrong time, the wrong context, the wrong approach and they use the wrong words. You need to listen to the boss, so you can adjust your approach to make it register as important and useful. Here are some principles that can make a big difference to getting all the elements of communication with your boss right more often than not.