What A Jerk? What A Star!
“The perfection preached in the Gospels never yet built an empire. Every man of action has a strong dose of egotism, pride, hardness, and cunning.” – Charles de Gaulle (quoted in The New York Times Magazine, May 12, 1968) A recent issue of the Harvard Business Review featured a case…
READ MOREFour Things to Do Today From Goethe
Today’s Action Plan: Do these four things today. Enjoy some good music. Read an inspiring poem. Look at something beautiful. And have a good conversation.
READ MORESlacking Off At Work? Here’s Someone Who Thinks You Should
“If you want work well done, select a busy man: the other kind has no time.” – Elbert Hubbard (The Note Book, 1927) Tom Demarco, a high-tech consultant and author of “Slack: Getting Past Burnout, Busywork, and the Myth of Total Efficiency,” believes that productivity is overrated. He says that…
READ MORESwarm Intelligence And Free Enterprise
“Is there a polity better ordered, the offices better distributed, and more inviolably observed and maintained, than that of bees?” – Montaigne There is an article in a recent issue of the Harvard Business Review (HBR) about something scientists call “swarm intelligence.” It suggests an interesting insight into the value…
READ MORECheating Yourself In Your Spare Time
“When a finger points at the moon, the imbecile looks at the finger.” – Chinese proverb Theres a young man I know — someone Im mentoring — who has great potential but no obvious advantages. He doesnt have a good education, has no money to speak of, and has only…
READ MOREYour Secret Fantasy: Just Do It!
“Every morning when I wake up, I experience an exquisite joy — the joy of being Salvador Dali — and I ask myself in rapture, ‘What wonderful things is this Salvador Dali going to accomplish today?’” – Salvador Dali Do you have a secret ambition? Is there something you’ve always…
READ MOREGet Away From The Day-To-Day And Find The Answers That Elude You
“We think we learn from teachers, and we sometimes do. But the teachers are not always to be found in school or in great laboratories. Sometimes what we learn depends upon our own powers of insight.” – Loren Eisely (The Star Thrower, 1978 The other day, RW said to me,…
READ MOREBe Careful Writing Negative Thoughts
“A word carries far — very far — deals destruction through time as the bullets go flying through space.” – Joseph Conrad (Lord Jim, 1900) It’s a tried-and-true business rule that you should always deliver bad news in person. But now that we are fully entrenched in the world of…
READ MOREYou Don’t Need To Be A Creative Genius
“There are three ingredients in the good life — learning, earning, and yearning.” – Christopher Morley I had lunch with JS today. JS owns and runs a very successful business in South Florida. He sells medium- and discount-priced jewelry directly to customers and through the catalogs of some very large…
READ MOREChampion Your Heroes And Create Loyalty
“Nothing comes from nothing.” – Lucretius (On the Nature of Things, 1st century B.C.) As we said in yesterday’s message (“In Times Like This, Resist the Invitation to Gripe”), your boss needs a positive-minded, hard-working team to see his business through these tough times. That’s why, if it becomes necessary…
READ MOREPrepare For A Long, Bad Time Of It
“Morning comes whether you set the alarm or not.” – Ursula K. Le Guin (Dancing at the Edge of the World, 1989) Almost every business I know is struggling. Most are in decline. Retail stores are closing in record number. Bankruptcies are up. Banks are being forced to refinance loans.…
READ MOREDon’t Give Up Money And/Or Time That Is Your Due
“In every work a reward added makes the pleasure twice as great.” – Euripides (Rhesus, circa 455-441 B.C.) A guy I know just got fired after seven years on the job. There were different theories about why he was let go — insubordination, sub-par performance, his attitude, a suspicion of…
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