What is required to get a business running?

[Lee Iacocca: Talking Straight]

Start with good people, lay out the rules, communicate with your employees, motivate them and reward them if they perform. If you do all these things effectively, you can't miss.

My thoughts

I think if you get good people, then most of the other things follow because Good People are Good :)

Why are rules important?

They make the game predictable and help you to understand where you are moving as a team.

Why is communication important?

My Ex-Manager used to say: Change the circumstances and the same people will behave differently. Communication is important to keep things in motion, to let the team know where its moving.

Why is motivation required?

Because I have seen N number of times that people refuse to work (directly or indirectly) because there is no motivation for them to do a thing. Motivation is required to make the positives clear to the team. Whats amazing about human nature is that sometimes even a negative thing is motivating if the general belief is that it helps the team? For ex. I have seen many people do a thing very efficiently (even though they may not like it) if they believe that they are doing it for a good cause (which in a team means for the betterment of the team).

Why is reward required?

Have you ever heard about a free lunch :)? I never have.