Jeff
Vogelsang, Managing Partner of Promontory Point Partners, is a turnaround
specialist. We heard him speak to a
group of CEOs wherein he described the typical interaction between himself and
the CEO of a company that requires his turnaround help. Vogelsang said that the CEO will “whine” (his
word, not ours) to him that […] Continue Reading…
Who Moved My Cheese? ~title of a 1998 business fable by Dr. Spencer Johnson
To blog or not to blog. Blog suspended . . . for now.
We published our first blog on August 4, 2010 and have continuously posted two new blogs per month since then (we did miss one publication date during recovery from knee replacement surgery, but apart from that, our string has been uninterrupted). It appears Covid-19 is about to end that […] Continue Reading…
“The whole concept of negotiating is intimidating to many people.”
Chris
Voss is an author, speaker, and businessman.
But prior to that, he was an FBI agent for 24 years, most of that time
working as a hostage negotiator. While
doing that work, he noticed that the skills needed to negotiate with kidnappers
and terrorists weren’t all that different from the skills business people […] Continue Reading…
If I were a prospective new customer for your business, would your website pull me in or turn me off?
We claim no expertise in website design. But we did come across a video of a workshop
presentation featuring a guy who does claim some website design expertise, and
we thought it would be worth passing along to you. Don Miller is an American author, public
speaker, and business owner. His company, […] Continue Reading…
“I haven’t failed. I’ve discovered 10,000 things that don’t work.”
There
are scholars who study group dynamics . . . that is, they study the way people
behave and interact with one another in a group setting. These scholars sometimes talk about a thing
called “the Messiah Complex.” This is a
phenomenon that takes place when a group must confront a problem that […] Continue Reading…
“Your company’s culture is defined by what it tolerates.”
Every
organization has a culture. The only
question is, has the organization’s culture evolved on its own without any real
thought or guidance from the organization’s management? Or has it been carefully crafted and nurtured
as a guide for how the organization intends to conduct itself? Most organizations will claim to have a
strong […] Continue Reading…
7 Leadership Practices That Will Reduce Employee Turnover to a Minimum.
In
our previous posting, we talked about the key role you and your management team
play in retaining the best and brightest of your employees. We noted that the main reason, by far and
away, that people leave their jobs is because they can’t stand working for
whoever their boss is. That “boss” […] Continue Reading…
Employee turnover is not a human resources issue. It’s a management/leadership issue.
The
beginning of a new year is a time for reflection. It’s a time to consider what’s working and
what’s not . . . what needs to stay the same, what needs to change. If there is one thing we did last year that
we could do over again, what would that […] Continue Reading…
“You manage things. You lead people.” ~ Peter Drucker
Hamza
Kahn is an award-winning marketer, successful entrepreneur, and keynote
speaker. We watched a TED talk of his
wherein he talked about Theory X vs. Theory Y.
To be honest, we weren’t familiar with either one of these
theories. But Theory X, he explained,
holds that employees are lazy, can’t be trusted, and dislike work. […] Continue Reading…
“I’ve never seen a business fail that delights its customers.”
Obviously, a marketing plan must be in alignment with the customers it hopes to attract. But because marketing is equal parts skill and artform, achieving that alignment can be deceptively difficult. What do our customers really want? What are they really willing to pay for it? How do they […] Continue Reading…
