Cut'n - I'm a Detroit fan as well - today's loss was pretty painful.
I learned some important lessons this year, as I do every year. I think the most important and most painful lesson I learned this year is to not relax any quality or quantity standards in the name of employee training. I was more of a hard guy 5 years ago when directing employees, and thought that last year and this, I would ease off, to allow employees some time to learn and grow. I think that in doing that I got soft over the last couple years, and that softness has trickled down.
The result of that softness is slow work, allowing the guys to take 30 minutes to make a decision on a 25 minute task, etc, and the bottom line was hurt because of it. I realize I need to take more of a Bill Parcels (NFL football coach for those not in the USA) approach of "win now", no matter what you have for a team.
I also learned that my weaknesses tend to be in the book keeping end of things, and that I need to spend more time getting a firmer handle on that this off-season. That analysis has already begun.
When I started this site I thought there were about 2 dozen people on the web in our industry that were really sharp people that I could learn from. I've learned that there are quite a few more, and I feel pretty lucky to have them as members here.
