Companies have been laying off workers left and right since the economy tanked several years ago, but Linda Oien, a Spokane native and longtime former Xerox Corp. executive, thinks it was a flurry of such activity in the early 1990s that still is wreaking havoc today.

Sweeping work-force reductions back then, as many American businesses focused more intently on bottom-line performance, "broke the loyalty bond between employers and employees, and we haven't recaptured that loyalty bond since," Oien asserts.

Coincidingly, as the economy has changed, "Unfortunately, we have thrown a lot of people in the deep end of the leadership pool to sink or swim," with little knowledge of how to create a focused, rowing crew-type work culture, she says.

To address what she sees as a continuing huge leadership void nationwide, and to share some of what she's learned in her several decades in the corporate world, Oien recently published a book, titled "'power10' Leadership: How to Engage People and Get Results." It provides what Oien claims are "10 powerful success factors necessary to building winning teams and organizations," and it's available at bookstores here and through various Internet sites.

Power 10 is a rowing term, referring to the command given by a coxswain%u2014the person who steers a racing shell and serves as the rowers' on-the-water coach-for rowers to perform 10 strokes at maximum power. The tactic is used to overtake or pull away from a competitor in a close race, typically at the finish line.

The term is woven throughout Oien's book, which also includes a photo collage of the Gonzaga University women's rowing team, and Oien says she interviewed the team's coaches to get their help in applying the rowing metaphor effectively.

Part of her focus, too, was on comparing the coxswain's overall responsibilities with those of a business owner or manager seeking to motivate and coordinate employees to be as productive and efficient as possible.

Since 1996, Oien has operated her own management-consulting firm here, called businessPATHS. Before that, though, the 1967 Shadle Park High School graduate spent nearly 25 years with Xerox, working her way up from an entry-level position here to district and regional management posts, including in Arizona and California.

She says she witnessed firsthand, as that Fortune 500 conglomerate transitioned from an autocratic to a more participative management culture several decades ago, how an inability by leadership to adapt to such changes can take a human toll.

"There were a lot of people, including quite a few who I worked for during those years, who couldn't make the transition," Oien recalls.

Though she's convinced her book can provide many businesses a much needed boost, she acknowledges that her publication of it this year might seem ill-timed.

After all, when the economy is suffering, "the first thing people scratch off their budgets is training and development," she says, so getting employers to look beyond base survival needs to how to fine-tune their operations through stronger leadership is a challenge.

Like many employment-industry professionals, however, she argues that the best time to focus on leadership-bolstering measures is when times are tough. That's because once the economy begins to rebound strongly, the organizations that have failed to engage and rally employees through such leadership will be the ones most vulnerable to losing their top performers. And, she adds, "It's always the best that are going to go first."

One of the challenges for many companies these days, unfortunately, is just making sure that enough rowers remain aboard to provide wake-generating forward motion when the coxswain calls.