In the early days of the internet, its prophets preached that it would bring freedom — a specific kind of freedom that they called disintermediation. In addition to being a very attractive buzzword, disintermediation describes the process of cutting out the middle man. Disintermediation, they promised, would get you the best prices on what you […]
If you’re lucky, then you probably spend a lot of your time as a leader or executive knowing, more or less, what you should be doing. But that surety of purpose doesn’t mean that things can’t go off the rails. That’s why it’s important to stay attentive and listen to what the world around you […]
In this column, I spend a lot of time talking about the things you should be doing. And I’ve gathered a lot of this advice by doing the wrong thing and learning the hard way over the course of the past 30 years. The crux of the issue is that I can give that kind […]
In my career, I’ve closely examined many different types of organizations working in different areas. But for all the many differences I see in business perspectives and how an organization is run, I find that businesses tend to fall into one of two categories: yesterday businesses or tomorrow businesses. A yesterday business falls back on […]
FOMO, or the fear of missing out, is a powerful thing. It’s so powerful, in fact, that learning to utilize it is the cornerstone of every Sales 101 course. And it works for one very simple reason—fear is an extremely potent motivator. As human beings, fear is a fact of existence and has been since […]
In many organizations, and certainly within organizations of size, a role tends to arise out of necessity: the fix-it guy. (Author’s note: For our purposes, “fix-it guy” is a gender-neutral term that can refer to an individual of any gender who is routinely called upon to save the day.) This person has a particular talent […]
Many moons ago, I was a salesman new to the media world, and I was young, hopeful, and indisputably did not know what I was doing. At another time we can get into the journey of how I got my position without being strictly qualified, but one way or another I was there, and I […]
No matter what industry you’re in, at least part of your organization’s core function is to communicate information to your target audience. Whether that’s telling them how to make good dietary decisions or providing information on your latest sale, you are usually seeking a reaction. Because if you don’t understand their perspective, you are going […]
Throughout literature, television, and nearly any other form of media, there’s a recurring trope of the jezebel: the homewrecker, the other woman, the person who steps in and ruins a happy relationship. Whether this threat is the eponymous Jolene from Dolly Parton’s hit song or Jacob Black of Twilight fame, you’ve certainly seen examples of […]
Isaac Newton’s first law of motion is fairly simple: An object at rest will stay at rest until acted upon by an outside force. Similarly, an object in motion will stay in motion until an outside force stops it or changes its direction. This is a foundational law for our understanding of how matter moves […]
