A lot of discussions lately are centered around teamwork and leadership. This is especially an issue after all leadership scandals that have been brought to light in corporate America this past year. Due to major layoffs, and loss of exceptional brainpower, there is a huge need for leaders who possess both a heart and a sound knowledge base at same time. The quest is on! Leadership books outsold all books this summer giving us great insight into challenges of companies around world.

So where do you start when creating a great leader? Everybody seems to start with teamwork. Teamwork will lead to excellence, which will eventually translate into better company results. But common approaches to teamwork are lacking. It’s time for a little innovation! Let’s focus on an approach that happens to shock a few people. An approach that is quite different than what management gurus have been preaching for past 15 years.

If we want people to be good at what they do, love their work, and be proud that they belong to something bigger than themselves, we need to change our traditional management thinking. We, as leaders, need to remind ourselves that people are people and individualism is by no means dead. People still crave individual praise.

I admit as a leader you are walking a fine line between honoring individualism and cultivating teamwork, yet bottom line is that it can be done. In fact, it MUST be done if you want to recharge your employee’s creative batteries. People’s morale, faith and most importantly loyalty are so low these days. As a leader, you need to use a variety of motivational, and inspirational tactics if you want them to feel self-confident. Without this, you can be sure that they will not leverage all their potential.

Contrary to some beliefs, individual attention will by no means jeopardize your work in building an effective team. Think of it as an opportunity to embrace and inspire individualism without sacrificing collective effort. Every one of your people is good at something. Find that “something” and allow them to shine through it.

How do you walk that fine line between teamwork and individual praise? Here are a few ideas that you can implement immediately.

Sound familiar? If it does, you're not alone. We've all been there. The difference is that some of us write letters that get results. Others write letters that get us ignored or ridiculed.

Written correctly, a letter of complaint can be very effective at getting you results you want. You might even get more than you expected. Some letter writers report receiving surprize gifts and merchandise in response to a well written complaint. Many businesses appreciate knowing when something is going wrong, and they will do what they can to create goodwill with a dissatisfied customer.

The following suggestions will help you write a letter of complaint that's likely to be read and acted upon.

Complain only when appropriate. Sending numerous, frivolous letters of complaint will get you nowhere. Send your letters only for genuine complaints, and only after initial communication with company representatives has failed. In other words, if widget you bought didn't work as expected, you would ask sales person or customer service department to correct problem before you fire off a letter of complaint to head office.

Address letter to correct person. You need to reach person who has authority to correct problem. Inevitably, this will be a supervisor, a manager or a company executive.

If your complaint is with a local business, address letter to owner or manager.

If you're dealing with a local branch of a large corporation, you'll need to find out whether your complaint lies with local branch or if problem was created by policies set by a corporate office. If it's with corporate office, you'll send letter there.

It might take some detective work to find out who should receive your letter. If you can't find out by asking, try company web site, annual reports, or business directories in your local library.

Be courteous and professional. Avoid sarcasm. No matter how angry you are, sending a rude, discourteous, inflammatory letter will not help you get problem corrected.

Keep it short. One page is all you need. The manager is more likely to read and act on your letter if you keep it brief, factual and to point. No one has time or patience to wade through a six-page tome.

Be factual. Identify problem and outline efforts you have made to correct problem. Remember five rules of journalism: Who, What, When, Where and How.