Fun is a crucial part of business “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” —George Bernard Shaw I’m testing the theory that if I don’t act my age, I won’t grow old. When I look in the mirror, it appears that my theory is bunk, but damn […]
Get it on the calendar by Todd Ordal My wife is an artist and works primarily in clay. The pieces are very creative, many bordering on bizarre. (When our children were young, they thought they had the coolest mom ever when she had a piece depicting a hyena devouring a zebra removed from a show!) Her […]
Is the problem your strategy, execution or both? Todd Ordal A friend expressed frustration with his company the other day. When I queried him about his frustration, he summed it up by saying that they had started to focus on “metrics over mission.” In this particular example, concern for improving the lives of their customers […]
Where will you compete, and why will you win? Todd Ordal “Why will people buy from you versus your competition?” I asked a CEO. He recently went through a “strategic planning” process, so the question seemed reasonable. He couldn’t answer it. Some of you reading this can’t either. More often than not, CEOs believe they […]
A friend expressed frustration with his company the other day. When I queried him about his frustration, he summed it up by saying that they had started to focus on “metrics over mission.” In this particular example, concern for improving the lives of their customers is starting to take a back seat to short term […]
Top four language barriers Todd Ordal I recently read that only 6 percent of teenagers check email daily. For those of us who are middle age and in business, it’s still a primary communication tool. I always wondered why my kids (in their 20s and 30s) respond to texts immediately but rarely reply to email. […]
“Ordering a man to write a poem is like commanding a pregnant woman to give birth to a red-headed child.” —Carl Sandburg Former Veterans Affairs chief Eric Shinseki was the whipping boy for the public issue of veterans waiting too long for health care. I believe he’s a very honorable man and a great American […]
Prayer recommended Todd Ordal A recent Wall Street Journal article highlighted the challenge J. C. Penney, Target and American Eagle are having in recruiting new CEOs. They are all large, well-paying, prestigious jobs. Why is this a problem? All three are experiencing significant declines. J. C. Penney recently fired its CEO, who had previously built the Apple […]
Can collaboration in decision making go too far? Todd Ordal Most enlightened leaders understand that talented people won’t work in environments where their every move is choreographed and their decisions are second-guessed. They also know that with every pair of hands they hire, a brain usually comes along and they can leverage their team members’ […]
Keep the big picture in mind in business planning Just when you thought you had enough to worry about in your business, according to USA TODAY (April 23, 2014) it now looks like the chance for a “killer asteroid” is a bigger threat that we believed. I’ll bet you didn’t capture that as a possible threat in […]