I came upon an epiphany this morning that almost lifted me from my seat. This isn't a political post, although I begin with a political premise to help me explain things.

I was thinking about a post on leadership, and how President Obama has some very tough decisions to make over the next couple of months. Not that he hasn't had tough decisions all along, but they keep getting more critical as time goes on.

I was also thinking that, when he was elected, he said he would reach across to the other side and work towards bipartisanship. This is actually one of the biggest fallacies in politics, for the most part, and my epiphany pretty much came to that in a bold way.

Here's the problem. Think about if two people decided they wanted to share a meal. They agree that they want pasta. However, one wants spaghetti, while the other wants noodles. Well, there's a minor impasse, but both parties at least have a starting point of agreement; they both want pasta.

This may be an oversimplification of things, but here it is plain and simple. You can't have any type of negotiation about anything if both sides don't even agree on the need for something. When we look at this big health care debate, the truth seems to be that one side wants health care and the other side doesn't. There is no middle ground here. If both sides really wanted health care, both sides would have put out a health care plan a long time ago; that didn't happen. One side put it out there, the other side said they didn't like it. Where do negotiations start?

Remember the topic of gun control? One side really wanted it, the other side didn't want it at all. Remember the topic of abortion? One side really wanted it, the other side didn't want it at all. Remember the topic of civil rights? One side really wanted it, the other side didn't want it at all.

This is a big problem with the concept of management sometimes. In this case, management wants one thing while the employees want another. Bad managers can't even communicate what the common goal is, so how can there be negotiating when no one ever has an idea of what they're negotiating for? Management has a lot of perceived power, but in the end, management can't get what it wants if it can't implore employees to work for them.

The agendas are different, though, and managers need to learn that, then figure out what to do about it. The same goes for presidents of businesses and countries. When it comes to politics, I think most presidents learn early that they might have to go it on their own, especially when the other side doesn't have a horse in the race. Companies can't afford to work that way. Sure, those leaders can force change, or force loyalties, but things will crumble without a true direction, a goal that everyone wants to aim for.

Until that happens, there is no negotiating; only dictating.