A company president had little tolerance for procrastination. In an effort to increase organization efficiency, she hung up signs throughout the building that read, “DO IT NOW.” Within 24 hours, her vice-president quit, her assistant got married and the custodian stole the company van.

This story is not entirely true, especially the part about the van. But I suspect the president found a more specific way to motivate staff to achieve their goals.

All kidding aside, procrastination is a thief. It robs you of the one commodity that you just can’t buy back: time. It throws off schedules. It replaces accomplishment with inaction. It turns dreams into nightmares. One of the worst things you can do when faced with a difficult decision in almost any endeavor in life is to procrastinate.

Let’s face it -- given a choice, most people will perform the least important task first, and the most important last -- if at all. That’s why one of these days becomes none of these days.

Here are some tips to stop procrastinating and join the TNT Club -- Today Not Tomorrow:

-- Deal with your fear. Fear of failure can be crippling, but fear of success can paralyze your efforts just as severely. Avoiding success may seem irrational, but success brings change, and change is often threatening.

-- Make a to-do list with specific deadlines. List what you want to accomplish with a detailed timeline you want to meet. Projects often take longer than expected to accomplish, so add in some extra time. I make my to-do list every morning by working backward: What do I need to accomplish by the end of the day? By the end of the week? The end of the month? That tells me where to focus.

-- Break your work into smaller steps. When you look at a big project, it can be overwhelming, so break it down into more manageable parts.

-- Don’t get frustrated. Seriously, has frustration ever improved a situation? Better to take a break, collect your thoughts and redirect your attention toward making a positive first step. Then go on from there.

-- Stop overcomplicating things. There is never a best time to accomplish a project. Perfection is a big reason for procrastination. You must dig in. Getting started is often the hardest part. Remember the old saying: Well-begun is half done. Once you are off to a good start, it’s much simpler to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

-- Eliminate distractions. Interruptions and distractions are productivity’s No. 1 enemy. I’ve even gone as far as hanging a “Do Not Disturb” sign on my office door. Set aside a period of time each day -- even if it’s only 10 minutes -- when you are unavailable for anything less than a four-alarm fire. That goes for office visitors, telephone calls, email and carrier pigeons.

-- Reward yourself. I’m a big believer in rewarding myself for completing a challenging task or a big project. I’ll go out to play golf or attend a sporting event or take some time off to relax. Rewards are good motivation. It also clears your mind for the next challenge.

-- Hang out with go-getters. I only hang out with positive people who inspire me to take action. Their spirit and drive rubs off on me. It’s like having motivation buddies. And I like to announce what I’m trying to accomplish, because they will check up on me and make sure I’m doing what I said I would do.

There is an anonymous poem called “Mr. Meant-To” that goes like this:

Mr. Meant-To has a comrade

And his name is Didn’t Do.

Have you ever chanced to meet them?

Have they ever called on you?

These two fellows live together

In the house of Never Win,

And I’m told that it is haunted

By the ghost of Might-Have-Been.

Mackay’s Moral: Never put off until tomorrow what you should have done yesterday.

One of the hottest words for leaders today is culture. Culture affects perception. It influences behavior and it shapes our personalities. Creating culture is a concentrated, conscious choice.

Tony Hsieh, the late former CEO of Zappos, said, “If you get the culture right, most of the other stuff will just take care of itself.”

Creating a positive, high-performing, people-focused, result-oriented environment does not just happen. It takes a tremendous amount of work and soul-searching and cannot occur without both. It is what separates the highest-performing organizations.

Every company has a culture, intentional or unintentional, desirable or undesirable. Managers and leaders influence culture by the attention they give it. Those who focus on culture tend to create a vibrant environment, while those who ignore culture end up with a struggling and confused workplace.

Hence, leaders must make creating a positive culture a priority. Employees recognize the difference between a workplace where they want to come to work, feel valued and know what the company stands for. Customers notice as well.

Leadership author Glenn Van Ekeren observes: “Culture is movable, fluctuating, shifting. It requires continual attention, nurturing, direction and adjustments. Culture doesn’t function well on automatic pilot. It flourishes when leadership is continually passionate about infusing culture with their influence.”

Van Ekeren said you have to be there for people and demonstrate that you have their back and best interests at heart. He mentioned the conversation between Winnie the Pooh and his dear friend Piglet. Piglet crept up to Pooh from behind and said, “Pooh?”

“Yes, Piglet?”

“Nothing,” Piglet replied. “I just wanted to be sure of you.”

In an organization with a healthy culture, employees should never have to ask to be sure. You cannot build a culture if you are disconnected from your people.

Culture at a company is everyone’s responsibility, but leadership is heavily responsible for its development. Employees and middle managers will learn what their bosses permit and reward, and will enforce it on each other. And if management fails at any point, it requires immediate proactive effort to mitigate the damage.

So how does an organization develop a desirable culture? I can tell you what I did when I started my company, and we continue to do six decades later.

Know why you are in business. What is your purpose? Set goals, and make them known throughout the company, so your employees understand what’s important to your business.

Hire thoughtfully and carefully. Ask questions during interviews and make your position regarding expectations crystal clear. I believe in being completely upfront about what we need, because I don’t want to waste my time or theirs training someone who isn’t a team player. And I don’t hesitate to fire an employee who won’t comply.

Lead by example. Staff should look forward to coming to work and doing a stellar job. Recognize and reward people for their efforts. Give credit where it is due. And absolutely be the first to admit when you’ve messed up. Then let folks know how you are going to fix it.

Love what you do. I know I may sound like a broken record, but if you don’t love what you do, you will have a hard time doing it well. Your attitude will show whether you are just in it for the money or if you really want to make a difference.

Mackay’s Moral: A team culture is a living organism. Feed it and watch it grow.

A small boy was auditioning with his classmates for a school play. His mother knew that he'd set his heart on being in the play -- just like all the other children hoped -- and she feared how he would react if he was not chosen. On the day the parts were awarded, the little boy's mother went to the school gates to collect her son. The boy rushed up to her, eyes shining with pride and excitement.

“Guess what, Mom?” he shouted, and then said some words that provide a lesson to us all: “I've been chosen to clap and cheer.”

Not everyone gets to play the part they want, but a positive attitude like this little boy’s goes a long way.

I am an eternal optimist. I firmly believe that there is hardly anything we can’t do if we set our minds to it. It helps to be realistic -- I know I am never going to pitch in the World Series, but I can be a player/manager of a top-notch company. I took a big gamble getting my company off the ground, but I’ve never looked back.

All the technology in the world will never replace a positive attitude. It’s good to know that a positive attitude can be booted up anywhere, anytime, by anyone.

In these uncertain times, we are bombarded by bad news and human misery, criticism and pessimism, so it’s understandable that we all get a little down from time to time. Fight it. I have never met a successful pessimist.

The mind can convince competent people that they are incompetent, or conversely that merely adequate performers are highly talented. Unfortunately, self-doubt and negative attitudes seem to have a more powerful influence on the mind than positive attitudes.

So, concentrate on developing a positive attitude. Here are some ideas.

-- Savor pleasure. We are good about experiencing pleasure at special events like parties, but try and focus your attention on pleasant daily things as they occur. Celebrate the little things.

-- Practice gratitude. It takes only two words to say, “Thank you.” It takes only one word to say, “Please.” It’s so easy to say thank you, and it can have such a powerful impact. Gratitude should be a continuous attitude. Have you told the people around you how grateful you are for their roles in your life? You might be surprised at how they respond -- perhaps because no one has ever told them they’ve made a difference.

-- Emphasize the positive. Attitudes are contagious, and you will be a welcome carrier of this condition! A Harvard Special Health Report published in Positive Psychology found that older people tend to minimize the negative, accept their limitations and use their experience to compensate. The earlier in life that people adopt these practices, the better they sustain a positive attitude.

-- Surround yourself with positive people. Negativity makes a person look at the land of milk and honey and see only calories and cholesterol.

-- Try to make other people happy. Consider how you would like to be treated and try to put yourself in their place. Look for win-win situations where everyone can have a positive outcome.

-- Listen to other ideas and give others credit. There is no “i” in team, but there are two i’s in positive. It means that “I” must be positive to help my team be positive, and to perform our best.

-- Focus on what you get to do. As the song says, “You can’t always get what you want,” but usually you can get some satisfaction. Focus on small victories as well as major ones.

-- Practice handling rejection. If there is anything that can get you down, it’s being constantly rejected. Rejection is a fact of life. It’s going to happen. Don’t take it personally. Learn from it, but don’t wallow in it. Rejection doesn’t have to be permanent.

It’s like the old farmer who was celebrating his 90th birthday. He'd seen it all -- the Dust Bowl, years of flooding rains and scorching heat, banks taking back mortgages on every farm in the county. But through it all, he'd remained positive and determined, even downright cheerful. His family and friends pressed him for his secret to maintain his optimism.

“It ain't so hard,” he said with a twinkle in his eye. “I just learned early on to cooperate with the inevitable.”