A new CEO was hired to take over a struggling company. The CEO who was stepping down met with him privately and presented him with three numbered envelopes. “Open these if you run into serious trouble,” he said.
Well, three months later sales and profits were still way down and the …
“No one wants to be average. But everyone wants to be normal.”– Roy Williams, The Wizard of Ads
One morning I ran into a colleague in the cafeteria as we were both getting our first cup of coffee. “Morning, Kevin. How’s it going,” Saskia asked.
“Great! In fact, it might be the best day of my life,” I replied.
“Really?! Why?” She seemed surprised.
“Oh, I didn’t say it is the …
Warren Buffet wrote in his annual shareholder letter:
In good years and bad, Charlie and I simply focus on four goals:(1) Maintaining Berkshire’s Gibraltar-like financial position, which features huge amounts of excess liquidity, near-term obligations that are modest, and dozens of sources of earnings and …
I obsess over time. Time is our most valuable resource. Nothing else even comes close; money is easy. This fact explains the popularity of Getting Things Done (GTD) and 4-Hour Work Week. Everybody wants to expand time.Reminding myself of these keys has been critical …
I think one of the secrets to my success in the past has been to primarily focus on the numbers. I would have clear financial targets, practiced open book management, rewarded generously the business unit and sales leaders based on financial performance. It works, but it can also be …
Great performers are always looking for ways to get better. But you need an effective way to discover areas to target for improvement.The problem is that people don’t tell you the truth when you ask for feedback, for a variety of reasons. They might be …
James Bond movies always start with an action-packed mini-adventure before they even cut to the famous theme song and movie title. Indiana Jones movies were modeled after the Bond formula and also immediately start with a fedora’d Harrison Ford grabbing treasure and escaping from bad guys. These movies literally …
“To gain a friend, let him do you a favor.” — Ben Franklin
During these rough economic times it’s helpful to remember Tom Hanks’ encouragement to Geena Davis in the movie “A League of Their Own.” It’s supposed to be hard. If it wasn’t hard everybody would do it.The “hard” is what makes it great. …
“The bottleneck is always at the top of the bottle.” – Peter Drucker
Every company should have one key metric. One number to focus on and measure and to drill into everyone’s head. No it’s not profit or sales. It’s the number behind the numbers. …
After FedEx acquired Kinko’s, from CEO Fred Smith:“Operate independently. Manage collaboratively. Compete collectively.”
“80 percent of success is just showing up.” — Woody AllenIt’s amazing how much I’ve been hearing about how the recession is hurting everyone these days. But is it really the recession? In the last week alone:
- …
