There are bookshelves full of treatises on better leadership, personal effectiveness and motivating and inspiring employees, but one of the most effective ways to make your team more efficient is to make faster decisions.

Some of the most effective clients I have worked with have the best decision making process. They have a clearly defined group of people who can make a decision, and a defined time frame in which to make it. Opinions can be aired by anyone, but the actual decision is made by a group of people well-known in advance.

Two of the biggest stumbling blocks to making crisp, rapid decisions is the feeling that the decision makers do not know all the facts available, and that making the wrong decision will result in a corporate "public flogging." The first difficulty is relatively easy to surmount. Document what you know and do not know, and any changes to the business environment that would invalidate your decision. Not only are you making the best decision possible based on current information, but you are also recording the circumstances that might cause that decision to be revisited in the future.

The second stumbling block is more difficult to change, and requires a shift in organizational culture to one where careers are not jeopardized by one wrong decision. Like individuals, organizations that avoid difficult decisions and take no risks will never be leaders or innovators, and your organizational culture should encourage prudent risk taking, and decisions that are thoughtful, and made in the interest of moving the organization forward rather than avoided at all costs.

While enjoying work and play over in Paris, our dishwasher was up to more nefarious acts. The person watching our house called and said there "might be a problem with the floor," with little additional detail. We called a trusted neighbor who quickly emailed and confirmed our fears. The wood floor was bucking and warped, and it appears that there was obvious water damage.

Already on our way home for a few days to take care of our long-stay visas, this added another item to our expanding list of things to do, and our worst fears were confirmed when we came home to a floor that looked like it was developing speed bumps.

Like most people, it pains me to write the annual check for various types of insurance, but in this case it was comforting to call our local agent who arrived at our home within the hour. We quickly received a call from an insurance inspector who came out to the house, assessed the damage and opened the floodgates to a small army of contractors who are engaging in all manner of earsplitting activities to restore our floor.

While insurance may seem like the ultimate exercise in throwing money out the window, invest in solid policies from companies that will be there when you need them. I usually advocate spending a few bucks if it will give you more free time to peruse more valuable activities, and with less than 10 days home having an insurance company that handled arrangements for wrangling contractors and billing has been a true timesaver.

I have been lucky with getting travel visas in the past. My clients will generally make the arrangements and, other than the inconvenience of completing a couple of forms and waiting for the FedEx man, I had long considered the visa process relatively painless. That was until I met my match with the French visa process.

Since I have a long-term client project in France, I decided to rent an apartment there, and bring my wife and son over for the duration. I quickly discovered US citizens are allowed 90 days before they must acquire a visa, and I sent a few emails to various visa lawyers. None responded, so I decided to acquire the visa myself, mentally uttering those famous last words: "How hard can it be?"

Four months later, after hundreds of pages of documents, various stamps and authorizations, and a threat of immediate deportation, I am finally seeing some light at the end of what has amounted to an international scavenger hunt. The saga started with a five hour drive to Atlanta, and then continued on the ground in Paris, where I was sent to four different government offices, each providing a clue that led me one step closer to victory.

My favorite visit was to an office where behind the main entry door was a man behind thick glass with an assortment of small, multi-colored cards in front of him. I walked tothe window, a thick wad of documents in hand, and began explaining my situation in French. A few sentences into my rambling story he stopped me with a wave of the hand and asked "Foreigner?" I nodded yes, at which point he calmly picked one of the myriad cards and slid it under the glass. It politely told me to go to another government office (which of course was on the opposite side of Paris), and the man turned his eyes towards the next victim considering the matter closed.