March 23, 2007
I'm In The Wrong Line of Work...
From the 19 March 2007 Wall Street Journal: "An Economist's Courtroom Bonanza: Whether It's Mötley Crüe or Antitrust Law, Berkeley's David Teece Is Ready to Testify" by George Anders
Meet David Teece, renowned expert on lots of things and pioneer of a lucrative consulting niche that has transformed business litigation. The University of California, Berkeley, business-school professor is one of America's busiest expert witnesses, billing corporate clients as much as $850 an hour for his insights. He has built a publicly traded 1,300-person research shop, LECG Inc., that does much of the legwork for him and other economists, so they can zoom through more assignments.Posted by PJ at 10:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
For high-profile economists like the 58-year-old Prof. Teece, expert testimony has become a way to earn $2 million or more a year. Their rise has its roots in the Reagan era of the 1980s, when a free-market view of the law inspired by University of Chicago scholars gained ground. Courts now rely far more on economic analysis, with its apparent precision, to reach decisions. As a result, big companies in legal disputes race to enlist top economists on their side, paying top dollar in an arms race for talent.
[...]
By 1988, Prof. Teece was being offered more expert-consulting work than he could handle, even though he works until 2 a.m. most nights. So was Berkeley law professor Tom Jorde. They decided to set up Law & Economics Consulting Group, an off-campus research shop in nearby Emeryville, Calif. There, they and some similarly busy Berkeley professors built a staff full of newly minted Ph.D.s to help pull together their testimony.
This arrangement not only saved time but also pumped up economic experts' incomes. Besides billing hundreds of dollars an hour for their own work, these experts also collected a markup on their aides' time, much as partners in a law firm do for associates' work. On big projects, with dozens of aides working round the clock, the markup could be worth $100,000 or more to the scholar in charge.
"I won't get many thank-you notes for this, but we've given economists the chance to earn investment bankers' incomes," Prof. Teece says. "If you're successful with us, it isn't hard to make half a million dollars a year." He estimates that 60 LECG experts topped the $500,000 mark last year.
January 17, 2007
What I've Learned...
What I've Learned: Al Green, Alex Trebek, Alyssa Milano, Andy Grove, Arianna Huffington, Arny Freytag, Arthur Miller, Bill O'Reilly, Billy Bob Thornton, Bobby Bowden, Burt Reynolds, Carroll Shelby, Charles Townes, Christie Brinkley, Christopher Reeve, Clive Davis, Conrad Dobler, Curt Gowdy, Dan Rather, David Bowie, David Brown, Don Rickles, Edward Teller, Even Knievel, Faye Dunaway, Forest Whitaker, Garry Shandling, Gene Simmons, Haley Joel Osment, Heather Locklear, Homer Simpson, Hugh Hefner, Hunter Clemons, J. Craig Venter, Jack Bauer, Jaime Pressly, James Caan, James Watson, Jeff Bezos, Jim Willett, Jimmy Dean, Joe Frazier, John Kenneth Galbraith, John McCain, JR Simplot, Julia Child, Katie Couric, Keith Richards, Kirk Douglas, Lou Reed, Lucinda Williams, Mark Burnett, Mia Farrow, Michael Wright, Muhammad Ali, Neil Young, Ozzy Osbourne, Pamela Anderson, Peter O'Toole, Phil Spector, Philip Johnson, Ray Charles, Red Auerbach, Richard Branson, Richard Petty, Rip Torn, Robert Altman, Robert DeNiro, Robert Evans, Rod Steiger, Rodney Dangerfield, Roseanne, Roy Jones Jr., Sarah Silverman and Jimmy Kimmel, Siegfried and Roy, Suge Knight, Tom Petty, Tommy Franks, Walter Cronkite.
Some personal favorite quotes:
Homer Simpson: "When someone tells you your butt is on fire, you should take them at their word."
Jack Bauer: "If I say "dammit," either something bad just happened, something bad is about to happen, or I'm going to do something drastic."
Dan Rather: "I saw a quote recently that I believe in: "News is what somebody somewhere doesn't want you to know. All the rest is advertising."
Tommy Franks: "My grandchildren call me Pooh."
Roy (of Siegried and Roy): "Wear the cape; never let the cape wear you."
Burt Reynolds: "I was number one five years in a row at the box office. But what's really stunning is that no one until me had ever gone from number one to number thirty-eight in one year."
Don't miss the Hunter Clemons one, it's great. He's just some random 11 year old from North Carolina. "Once a teacher tried to force me to do something I didn't want to do and then walked away. I got angry, and the teacher turned around just as I was doing a movement that showed I was angry. You never think they're gonna turn around just at that moment." So true...
January 14, 2007
If at first you don't succeed...
"I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that don’t work."
-Thomas Alva Edison
How not to rob a liquor store.
Posted by PJ at 08:06 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackDecember 01, 2006
Losing Touch...
We all do it. Sitting at our desks and a little short on work, we start Googling old friends and people we've lost touch with, wondering just what they're up to. On my lunch break today, I was doing just this and came across the website for Walker & Cantrell. I went to high school with Sarah Walker, and remember her as being one of those really great people--smart, funny, attractive, etc. It's great to see her doing well, and the duo sounds fantastic. If you're in the NYC area, you can find their show listing here.
Posted by PJ at 12:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackOctober 27, 2006
Black Humor
"Three dollars a minute for technical assistance for my computer? If I'm going to spend that kind of F--KING money, I'd just as soon have phone sex."
Lewis Black on customer service.
Posted by PJ at 07:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackSeptember 18, 2006
Want to be a CEO? Avoid Harvard.
Carol Hymowitz has a fascinating article in the Wall Street Journal called "Any College Will Do: Nation's Top Chief Executives Find Path to the Corner Office Usually Starts at State University." (The dead tree version of the WSJ has this on page B1.) Here's what she has to say:
Some 10% of CEOs currently heading the top 500 companies received undergraduate degrees from Ivy League colleges, according to a survey by executive recruiter Spencer Stuart. But more received their undergraduate degrees from the University of Wisconsin than from Harvard, the most represented Ivy school.
Harvard's nine current CEOs include United Technologies' George David and Microsoft's Steve Ballmer. Among Wisconsin's 10 current CEOs are Pitney Bowes's Michael Critelli, Kimberly-Clark's Thomas Falk and Halliburton's David Lesar. Carol Bartz, chairman and former CEO of Autodesk, majored in computer science at Wisconsin and used a scholarship she'd won for women gifted in math to help pay her tuition.
Some non-Ivy League schools have long been training grounds for particular industries. The University of Texas-Austin, the alma mater of Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson, has churned out numerous oil executives. Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, is known for its computer-science graduates. But some of today's most successful CEOs got their start on small, isolated campuses.
A.G. Lafley, Procter & Gamble's CEO, chose Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., because he wanted a solid liberal-arts education and to be assured a spot on the intercollegiate basketball team. A history major who graduated in 1969, he was elected president of his sophomore class, became a fraternity officer and spent his junior year studying in France.
"I learned to think, to communicate, to lead, to get things done," he says, adding that those qualities are what he seeks in job candidates at his company. "Any college will do."
No stunning insights there, although it is interesting. But Richard Tedlow at HBS added an interesting thought later on:
One reason more Ivy League alumni aren't CEOs may be that many have traditionally chosen careers in investment banks and at big law firms, where they could earn big sums quickly and wouldn't have to start in entry-level management jobs.Posted by PJ at 05:55 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
"A lot of people who earn degrees from tier-one universities and business schools aren't willing to start at the bottom of a huge company" and spend years scaling layers of management and hoping to reach the top, says Richard Tedlow, a business historian at Harvard Business School.
September 08, 2006
Dating and Mating Rituals
I always find it fascinating how people act without realizing what they are doing. Here's an interesting piece from MSN and Match on behavorial acts while courting:
When it comes to flirting in the hopes of finding The One, what works? The direct approach, “Hey, I couldn’t help but notice your beautiful eyes”? Subtle glances? Playing hard to get? These were among my questions as I headed out on a field trip with Dr. Helen Fisher, a professor of anthropology at Rutgers University, and the author of Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love. Dr. Fisher has devoted her career to understanding human mating rituals—and her knowledge applies perfectly, she added, to today’s pickup scene. “Even in this modern age, humans adhere to courtship strategies that are as old as the hills, and used throughout the animal kingdom,” says Dr. Fisher. And that’s why she and I headed out for a night of café- and bar-hopping, to observe what works (and what doesn’t) when it comes to mingling and the human mating call. Six hours, two coffee shops, and one — or was it two? — bars later, we had some interesting findings.Posted by PJ at 01:46 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 01, 2006
Buffet on..... everything
He's one of the richest men in the world. He's also one of the most unassuming. Warren Buffet has proven himself one of the most successful investors in history, and also one of the most quotable. Some of his most famous quotes can be found here. Two of mine:
"If class warfare is being waged in America, my class is clearly winning"
and
A story that was passed down from Ben Graham illustrates the lemminglike behavior of the crowd: "Let me tell you the story of the oil prospector who met St. Peter at the Pearly Gates. When told his occupation, St. Peter said, “Oh, I’m really sorry. You seem to meet all the tests to get into heaven. But we’ve got a terrible problem. See that pen over there? That’s where we keep the oil prospectors waiting to get into heaven. And it’s filled—we haven’t got room for even one more.” The oil prospector thought for a minute and said, “Would you mind if I just said four words to those folks?” “I can’t see any harm in that,” said St. Pete. So the old-timer cupped his hands and yelled out, “Oil discovered in hell!” Immediately, the oil prospectors wrenched the lock off the door of the pen and out they flew, flapping their wings as hard as they could for the lower regions. “You know, that’s a pretty good trick,” St. Pete said. “Move in. The place is yours. You’ve got plenty of room.” The old fellow scratched his head and said, “No. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll go along with the rest of ’em. There may be some truth to that rumor after all."Posted by PJ at 01:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 09, 2006
Career Advancement Without Experience
Career Advancement Without Experience
Executive Summary: Lacking experience, contract workers find it difficult to advance to a job with expanded responsibilities. But it can be done. Siobhan O'Mahony discusses research into the concept of "stretchwork" and the increasing complexity of career management. Key concepts include:Posted by PJ at 08:52 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
1. Lack of experience can be overcome when seeking a new job by using tactics such as taking a pay cut and framing prior performance in creative ways.
2. As employers turn to more "external" workers, career paths will become increasingly bumpy.
July 31, 2006
A Nation of Wimps
We knew them growing up. We knew who they were on the playground. We knew who they were in the classroom, and on the sports field, and during gym class.
And we absolutely know who they are in the workforce. The ones who don't understand that managers correct behavior not because you're a total failure, but because they are trying to help. The ones who you dread giving performance feedback to. And (as I read recently) the ones whose parents call when their little one doesn't get the promotion or the raise. Why do these people exist?
Because we're raising A Nation of Wimps:
No one doubts that there are significant economic forces pushing parents to invest so heavily in their children's outcome from an early age. But taking all the discomfort, disappointment and even the play out of development, especially while increasing pressure for success, turns out to be misguided by just about 180 degrees. With few challenges all their own, kids are unable to forge their creative adaptations to the normal vicissitudes of life. That not only makes them risk-averse, it makes them psychologically fragile, riddled with anxiety. In the process they're robbed of identity, meaning and a sense of accomplishment, to say nothing of a shot at real happiness. Forget, too, about perseverance, not simply a moral virtue but a necessary life skill. These turn out to be the spreading psychic fault lines of 21st-century youth. Whether we want to or not, we're on our way to creating a nation of wimps.Posted by PJ at 06:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
July 26, 2006
Apperception
"I see only one move ahead... but it is always the correct one."
A man walks along the inside of a circle of chess tables, glancing at each for two or three seconds before making his move. On the outer rim, dozens of amateurs sit pondering their replies until he completes the circuit. The year is 1909, the man is José Raúl Capablanca of Cuba, and the result is a whitewash: 28 wins in as many games. The exhibition was part of a tour in which Capablanca won 168 games in a row.Posted by PJ at 04:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
How did he play so well, so quickly? And how far ahead could he calculate under such constraints? "I see only one move ahead," Capablanca is said to have answered, "but it is always the correct one."
He thus put in a nutshell what a century of psychological research has subsequently established: much of the chess master's advantage over the novice derives from the first few seconds of thought. This rapid, knowledge-guided perception, sometimes called apperception, can be seen in experts in other fields as well. Just as a master can recall all the moves in a game he has played, so can an accomplished musician often reconstruct the score to a sonata heard just once. And just as the chess master often finds the best move in a flash, an expert physician can sometimes make an accurate diagnosis within moments of laying eyes on a patient.
But how do the experts in these various subjects acquire their extraordinary skills? How much can be credited to innate talent and how much to intensive training? Psychologists have sought answers in studies of chess masters. The collected results of a century of such research have led to new theories explaining how the mind organizes and retrieves information. What is more, this research may have important implications for educators. Perhaps the same techniques used by chess players to hone their skills could be applied in the classroom to teach reading, writing and arithmetic. [...]
June 07, 2006
Things Leaders Do
Jeff Immelt on the 10 Things Leaders Do:
1. Personal Responsibility.
"Enron and 9/11 marked the end of an era of individual freedom and the beginning of personal responsibility. You lead today by building teams and placing others first. It's not about you."
2. Simplify Constantly.
"I always use Jack [Welch] as my example here. Every leader needs to clearly explain the top three things the organization is working on. If you can't, then you're not leading well."
3. Understand Breadth, Depth, and Context.
"The most important thing I've learned since becoming CEO is context. It's how your company fits in with the world and how you respond to it."
4. The importance of alignment and time management.
"There is no real magic to being a good leader. But at the end of every week, you have to spend your time around the things that are really important: setting priorities, measuring outcomes, and rewarding them."
5. Leaders learn constantly and also have to learn how to teach.
"A leader's primary role is to teach. People who work with you don't have to agree with you, but they have to feel you're willing to share what you've learned."
6. Stay true to your own style.
"Leadership is an intense journey into yourself. You can use your own style to get anything done. It's about being self-aware. Every morning, I look in the mirror and say, 'I could have done three things better yesterday.' "
7. Manage by setting boundaries with freedom in the middle.
"The boundaries are commitment, passion, trust, and teamwork. Within those guidelines, there's plenty of freedom. But no one can cross those four boundaries."
8. Stay disciplined and detailed.
"Good leaders are never afraid to intervene personally on things that are important. Michael Dell can tell you how many computers were shipped from Singapore yesterday."
9. Leave a few things unsaid.
"I may know an answer, but I'll often let the team find its own way. Sometimes, being an active listener is much more effective than ending a meeting with me enumerating 17 actions."
10. Like people.
"Today, it's employment at will. Nobody's here who doesn't want to be here. So it's critical to understand people, to always be fair, and to want the best in them. And when it doesn't work, they need to know it's not personal."
June 05, 2006
Managing Great Groups
Warren Bennis has long been considered one of the experts on high-performing teams. In his book Organizing Genius, Bennis lays out an overview of some of the highest performing groups around the world, and finds their common traits. In this 1997 interview from the Leader to Leader Institute, Bennis lays out some of these common traits:
At the heart of every Great Group is a shared dream. All Great Groups believe that they are on a mission from God, that they could change the world, make a dent in the universe. They are obsessed with their work. It becomes not a job but a fervent quest. That belief is what brings the necessary cohesion and energy to their work.Posted by PJ at 11:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
They manage conflict by abandoning individual egos to the pursuit of the dream. At a critical point in the Manhattan Project, George Kistiakowsky, a great chemist who later served as Dwight Eisenhower's chief scientific advisor, threatened to quit because he couldn't get along with a colleague. Project leader Robert Oppenheimer simply said, "George, how can you leave this project? The free world hangs in the balance." So conflict, even with these diverse people, is resolved by reminding people of the mission.
They are protected from the "suits." All Great Groups seem to have disdain for their corporate overseers and all are protected from them by a leader -- not necessarily the leader who defines the dream. In the Manhattan Project, for instance, General Leslie Grove kept the Pentagon brass happy and away, while Oppenheimer kept the group focused on its mission. At Xerox PARC, Bob Taylor kept the honchos in Connecticut (referred to by the group as "toner heads") at bay and kept the group focused. Kelly Johnson got himself appointed to the board of Lockheed to help protect his Skunk Works. In all cases, physical distance from headquarters helped.
They have a real or invented enemy. Even the most noble mission can be helped by an onerous opponent. That was literally true with the Manhattan Project, which had real enemies -- the Japanese and the Nazis. Yet most organizations have an implicit mission to destroy an adversary, and that is often more motivating than their explicit mission. During their greatest years, for instance, Apple Computer's implicit mission was, Bury IBM. (The famous 1984 Macintosh TV commercial included the line, "Don't buy a computer you can't lift.") The decline of Apple follows the subsequent softening of their mission.
They view themselves as winning underdogs. World-changing groups are usually populated by mavericks, people at the periphery of their disciplines. These groups do not regard the mainstream as the sacred Ganges. The sense of operating on the fringes gives them a don't-count-me-out scrappiness that feeds their obsession.
Members pay a personal price. Membership in a Great Group isn't a day job; it is a night and day job. Divorces, affairs, and other severe emotional fallout are typical, especially when a project ends. At the Skunk Works, for example, people couldn't even tell their families what they were working on. They were located in a cheerless, rundown building in Burbank, of all places, far from Lockheed's corporate headquarters and main plants. So groups strike a Faustian bargain for the intensity and energy that they generate.
Great Groups make strong leaders. On one hand, they're all nonhierarchical, open, and very egalitarian. Yet they all have strong leaders. That's the paradox of group leadership. You cannot have a great leader without a Great Group -- and vice versa. In an important way, these groups made the leaders great. The leaders I studied were seldom the brightest or best in the group, but neither were they passive players. They were connoisseurs of talent, more like curators than creators.
Great Groups are the product of meticulous recruiting. It took Oppenheimer to get a Kistiakowsky and a Niels Bohr to come to his godforsaken outpost in the desert. Cherry-picking the right talent for a group means knowing what you need and being able to spot it in others. It also means understanding the chemistry of a group. Candidates are often grilled, almost hazed, by other members of the group and its leader. You see the same thing in great coaches. They can place the right people in the right role. And get the right constellations and configurations within the group.
Great Groups are usually young. The average age of the physicists at Los Alamos was about 25. Oppenheimer -- "the old man" -- was in his 30s. Youth provides the physical stamina demanded by these groups. But Great Groups are also young in their spirit, ethos, and culture. Most important, because they're young and naive, group members don't know what's supposed to be impossible, which gives them the ability to do the impossible. As Berlioz said about Saint-Saens, "He knows everything; all he lacks is inexperience." Great Groups don't lack the experience of possibilities.
Real artists ship. Steve Jobs constantly reminded his band of Apple renegades that their work meant nothing unless they brought a great product to market. In the end, Great Groups have to produce a tangible outcome external to themselves. Most dissolve after the product is delivered; but without something to show for their efforts, the most talented assemblage becomes little more than a social club or a therapy group.
May 16, 2006
How We Work
We're interested in the habits, rituals and small (and occasionally big) methods people and teams use to get their work done. And in the specific anecdotes and the way people describe their own relationship to their own work. Here's a list of some stories and habits. Not sure it is actually useful for anything. Do any patterns emerge across stories, other than the obvious stories of super-focus, super-dedication?
These examples are mostly "names" because the list so far is mostly from published sources, but everyone's stories and habits are interesting, so go ahead and add yours in the comments.
He's up to almost 100 people on his list of how people work. It's fascinating reading. Check it out here.
Posted by PJ at 09:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackApril 28, 2006
Private Equity Lawyers: The New Rock Stars
From the Dealbook blog on the NY Times, Private Equity Lawyers in Demand:
The boom in private equity investing is carrying over to the legal profession, with many law firms expanding practices in that field. As a result, lawyers with a background in private equity may have their pick of jobs. The pay scale can range from $150,000 for junior associates to “very comfortable seven figures” for some partners and general counsels, one legal recruiter tells The New York Times. “Private equity lawyers have become the new rock stars,” another recruiter says.Posted by PJ at 09:26 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 19, 2006
Negotiation Tips From The LAPD SWAT Team
Your average day probably doesn't involve dealing with hostages (although, some people stuck in your meetings might disagree). But the negotiation tips that Lieutenant Michael Albanese, OIC of the LAPD SWAT team and crisis negotiation cadre leader shared with MSN might help you anway:
Keep it informal. "I never get on the negotiating phone and say, 'This is Lieutenant Michael Albanese, special agent in charge of LAPD SWAT, cadre leader, do you have hostages?' and all that. Instead, it's just, 'I'm Mike from the LAPD. Is this Jim? What's going on inside there?' "
Speak at Steven Wright's speed. "If the other person is increasingly anxious, don't try to keep up with his or her fast pace and heightened delivery. Keep your voice monotone and flat, but still be reflective and caring."
Ask open-ended questions. "Try to get more than just yes or no answers. I don't say, 'Will you come out?' I say, 'Tell me why you don't feel comfortable coming out.' "
Repeat after them. "A main part of negotiating is being able to capture the other person's thoughts and mirroring their words back to them so they know you're listening."
No doesn't mean no. "Don't accept a no answer. If they give a firm no, I say, 'I can understand it, but maybe in a while, when you're ready to, you'll come out.' "
If you really want to say it, don't. "You can be sure that if right before you say something you're thinking about how good it'll feel, then two minutes later you'll be saying, 'Why did I open my mouth?' Avoid zingers. If you return a product, don't say, 'It's broken. Typical, huh?' Say, 'I understand you're having some problems with this particular model.' "
Negotiation might not be the most tempting SWAT-type technique you'd like to use on your boss or coworkers, but it's the one most likely to go over well in the workplace...
Posted by PJ at 07:16 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackApril 17, 2006
Managing The Generations
HBS' Working Knowledge on Managing Different Generations:
Workers Under 35:
Younger workers feel much less loyalty to institutions than do older workers. They also want responsibility and expect to have input right away, whereas older workers expect people to earn their way up. Younger workers aren't afraid to make decisions, and if you can create a strong social fabric at work, you can leverage their network-centric attitudes.
Workers 35 to 54:
This middle cohort tends to be antiauthoritarian and idealistic. They are ambitious, flexible, productive, self-sufficient, and people-oriented. On the other hand, they distrust leadership, are juggling busy lives, and demand merit-based systems and participative management. Make their work fulfilling to them, and they will move mountains; if they fail to believe in the mission, they will disengage—as 71 percent of this age group have done, according to Concours research, and become unproductive.
Workers 55 and Over:
Workers who are 55 and over bring an entirely different perspective, according to Concours research. They trust authority, respect rules, and are loyal to institutions. They expect people to "pay their dues" before being given authority. They place great value on financial security and may be uncomfortable with the ambiguity that is common in contemporary business. They also tend to have stronger social skills than their younger counterparts. This can, for example, make older workers ideally suited for call centers and other roles with significant customer contact.Posted by PJ at 11:57 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 08, 2006
NYTimes on... um.... tax payers.
This raises some questions about deductions, doesn't it?
Posted by PJ at 08:35 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackApril 05, 2006
Fail Smart
Fast Company has an interesting article on Kamran Elahian, a serial entrepreneur who started one too many companies, and fell flat on his face with the failure of Momenta. His journey after the failure is remarkable, as is the sum of what he has accomplished in those years. The article is here. FC had a sidebar that's worth reading: Five Ways To Start Fresh:
How do you better the odds that you'll succeed at a new start? Serial entrepreneur Kamran Elahian has made a life out of starting over. Here are his hard-won lessons for starting fresh -- and starting smart.Posted by PJ at 07:26 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Write a mission statement. You'll never do work that matters unless you define what matters. Elahian gave himself a sense of purpose by writing a mission statement for his life. He succinctly outlined his big-picture goals. Then he mapped out how he would get there.
Don't look back. Once you embark on a new venture, put all of your focus on the future. Second-guessing only slows you down.
Be your own biggest critic. Relentlessly (and ruthlessly) evaluate your performance, paying special attention to your weaknesses. Only then can you shift your course of action so it plays to your strengths.
Celebrate your setbacks. Or at the very least, learn from them. If you don't analyze what went wrong and what you'd do differently, then you'll repeat the same mistake.
Lose like a winner. Failing doesn't mean that you're a failure. Pete Sampras is one of the greatest tennis players of all time, but he has lost many times. In business as well as in life, the only unforgivable sin is never trying in the first place.
March 27, 2006
Guy Kawasaki on Sucking Down
Guy Kawasaki has a great blog post up about The Art of Sucking Down. He looks at how people treat those "beneath" them, and how they could get better service by treating people better. He breaks it down into nine rules: (1) Understand The Dynamic; (2) Understand Their Needs; (3) Be Important; (4) Make Them Smile; (5) Don't Try To Buy Your Way In; (6) But Do Express Gratitude On The Way Out; (7) Never Complain; (8) Rack Up The Karmic Points. His ninth point, Accept What Cannot Be Changed, is worth quoting here in its entirety:
9. Accept what cannot be changed. Sometimes things are just not meant to be: there are no more aisle seats, all the outside tables are taken, and the boss doesn't want to talk to any sales reps. If that's the case, shut up, and go on with life. Don't flatter yourself and believe that the airline is out to get you by assigning all the aisle seats to others. Life is too short to get upset by things like this.Posted by PJ at 08:08 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 10, 2006
Entrepreneurial Proverbs
Marc Hedlund over at O'Reilly Radar as posted a fantastic set of "entrepreneurial proverbs" based around five areas: Starting ("Losing sucks"), The Idea ("If you keep your secrets from the market, the market will keep its secrets from you"), People ("Great things are made by people who share a passion, not by those who have been talked into one"), Product ("Cool ideas are useless without great needs"), and Money ("No means maybe and yes means maybe").
Posted by PJ at 05:34 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackFebruary 15, 2006
Adjusting to the Multi-Gen Workforce
An interesting piece from Fast Company this month called Scenes From the Culture Clash, looking at multi-generational workplaces and how companies are adjusting to the influx of youg workers:
A handful of other companies are making profound changes to harness the talents of the new workforce. Deloitte & Touche USA, the accounting and consulting firm with 32,000 U.S. employees, heard from its gen-Y workers that brutal audit schedules, in which teams had to camp out at client companies for weeks or months at a time, seemed superfluous in an age when client records are digitized. They felt they could get the same work done remotely. Deloitte's clients told the firm that they didn't care whether auditors were on-site or not, as long as the quality of the work didn't suffer. After a successful test in its New York office in which employees had the choice to work off-site, Deloitte is rolling the program out nationally over the next 18 months.
It's always fascinating to look at how companies adjust to changes like this. This is especially true now given the impact that technology is having on us, and in how we think about work and play and where those two have to take place.
February 07, 2006
10Q's with James Hackett
You're going to think I'm a really weird dude, but I'm envious of the guy who works the check-in desk at a fine hotel. Every once in a while there's a mix-up in somebody's reservation, but they know exactly what needs to be done. They have all the tools to do it. They work in a lovely setting, and their days begin and end on schedule. Have you ever looked at the faces of the people who check you in? Very few look like they're having sleepless nights.
An interesting 10 questions with James Hackett, CEO of Steelcase, Inc.
Posted by PJ at 07:45 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBackSeptember 13, 2005
What Makes Someone Great?
Ask Metafilter had a great anonymous question posted today: "What makes someone a great person?"
It's really interested to think of this in a work context, and realize how much of it carries over. Your great coworkers are probably the ones who are always willing to muck in and help on projects. They'll offer you support or a shoulder to cry on when things aren't going well. They're not just in it when the going is great.
One user, driveler, posted the poem "If" by Rudyard Kipling, which I love. The text is after the jump.
If by Rudyard KiplingPosted by PJ at 02:01 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBackIf you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!
