I am a member of my local chapter of Rotary International, the organization of business professionals that is likely best known for the yellow gear symbol that appears as you enter towns and cities around the world. In addition to holding weekly meetings on topics of interest to the membership, one amazing thing that many don't know about Rotary is that several decades ago, the organization committed itself to eliminating the disease Polio. Polio primarily affects children, and once infected there is no cure. However a simple oral vaccine can spare a child from the disease. In my opinion, far too quietly, Rotary as an organization committed itself to eradicating a disease from the world, and is now within sight of its goal.

As organizations and individuals consider their plans for the New Year, I am often struck by incidences of small thinking. Budgets are too small, the economy too fragile, clients and customers in too short a supply. Excuses abound for why we cannot embark on various tasks that, compared to eradicating a disease from the face of the Earth, seem like small potatoes.

I am not generally known among friends and family for my impeccable organizational skills, but I have improved by leaps and bounds over the course of my life. My wife is far more organized than I, and I am lucky to have a partner that keeps the house functioning so well; otherwise the dog, baby, and I would likely descend into Lord of the Flies-like chaos after a few days (with me likely ending up as Piggy).

Oddly, I do have a few spaces that I try to keep clean, the most obvious being my office and the garage. Everything has a place, and I feel what borders on physical discomfort when one of these spaces falls into disarray. I'll be the first to admit that I frequently lack care when leaving a suitcase or coat unattended in an improper place in the rest of the house, but get troubled when something is out of place in "my" space.

I've realized that occasionally this attitude spills into other aspects of life as well, where one might focus on a particular space, striving for perfect order, yet glibly scatter bits and bobs in other "compartments" of their life with little regard for the consequence. While I'll likely be guilty of leaving something out of place in the near future, in the physical and mental domains, it seems an awareness of this is the first step towards overcoming the practice.

A relatively recent addition to the boardroom babble I encounter is the admonishment to "move the needle". Presumably the person who utters this phrase is thinking of a speedometer or other gauge, moving in a more preferable direction, rather than my least favorite part of the annual physical, where the needle on the scale always seems to be moving in the wrong direction.

While most of these expressions are frustrating as they eliminate clarity in an effort to sound intelligent, this one seems a bit more dangerous since it represents one of the most harmful practices to any organizational effort: not defining success.

When I work with clients, one of the most important discussions is determining what the results of our work together will be, and how we will measure what we have accomplished with detailed metrics for success. Platitudes like "moving the needle" do little to concretely define success. At best this leaves your colleagues and subordinates guessing as to the intent of your initiative and likely to arrive at their own conclusion of what success looks like, and at worst serves as a means to dodge responsibility for the success or failure of a project. We know and can measure if revenue increases 8% for a particular division, but how do we know if we "moved the needle?"

Despite the evocative imagery of "moving the needle," leave this task to the nurses and doctors, and move the needle towards clarity around how you envision and measure success.

In case you missed them, my regular column on CBS' Tech Republic contained the following articles in the month of January:

Taking the Policy out of IT
The CIO Litmus Test
Fear and loathing in shadow IT
What do furniture and IT organizations have in common?

Perhaps the most dangerous lingering effect of my year in Europe, and thus far the most difficult to shake, is my Italian-inspired aggressive driving style. While China remains home to the craziest drivers I have ever witnessed, Italy is certainly ranks among the top, and unlike China, I spent nearly every day behind the wheel on the roads of Italy.

Rules of the road are generally disregarded, seemingly with more blatant violations the further south one goes in Italy. In Sicily, red lights are mere suggestions, and dual-sport motorcycles hop the curb and tear down the sidewalk to dodge a moment of traffic.

Nearly everywhere, what would be an orderly intersection in most countries descends into chaos, as a merging lane designed for a single car is flooded with three to five cars jockeying for position, and blindly pulling into traffic should an opening appear. Perhaps my favorite move is the "four lane shout out", whereby an Italian driver, almost always male, will pull across several lanes of traffic with nary a signal or check of his mirrors to shout a greeting to a buddy, or attempt to woo an attractive lady. The latter provided endless conversation for my wife and I as we debated whether this technique had ever, in the history of mankind, been successful.

I did greatly enjoy cruising Italy's autostradas, where the posted speed limit was 130 km (approximately 85 mph) and the acceptable speed was somewhere just shy of Mach 1. To merely survive in this environment required aggressive maneuvering, frequent gesticulating, and of course, a frequent flash of one's high beams to encourage a slower vehicle to get out of your way.

These techniques have not transitioned well to the genteel southern United States where I live. Several times I have found myself with my left hand poised on the high beam lever and my right gyrating in true Italian style, only to look down and realize my speed was approaching triple digits, and the vehicle a few cars ahead was a police cruiser. I have managed to resist the temptation to skid across lanes while blowing through a red light in order to wave to a friend, although my turn signals are getting far less use than they did prior to my Italian indoctrination.