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ceo Tagged Articles
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Board, CEO and Organizational Alignment
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| Boards and management that are strategically aligned and clearly understand their roles and fulfill their responsibilities effectively can make a significant difference in the success of an organization. |
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What is CEO Time?
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| You're the Chief Executive of your small business. You're also the Chief Employee. CEOs make a lot of money. Employees do not. If you're not making a lot of money right now in your business, have a look at how much time you're spending as a "Chief Employee." |
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2009 Business Growth Strategy
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| This article shows you how to increase sales 26% in this economy. A must read for any business owner, sales manager, COO, CEO - anyone watching bottom line profits. |
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Team Building with Happiness
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| The number one CEO coaching piece of advice from Zappos.com CEO, Tony Hsieh, is to build a culture that allows happiness to thrive. This article explores this team building tip and explores what companies can do to enhance their culture and team building success. |
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Ideas and Actions of a CEO
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| CEOs are more than action oriented people. They must be reflective, come up with the lead example, determine the lead course and have great faith in the ideal they are promoting. Great leaders of the past are good examples to study for clues as to how to lead, beliefs to possess, action to take, people to care for and earth and land to entrust. The great are given much and from them much is expected. They must be worthy and act determinedly in the position they have been privileged to stand in |
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What Does a CEO Do?
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| When asked what a CEO do the answer might vary from individual to individual, even among CEO’s themselves. The short answer is an easy one; everything. The long answer is as complicated as business itself. I hate complications so- as is my wont, I will try to break it down as simply as possible.
The term CEO stands for Chief Executive Officer, and that’s a pretty broad term- but it is accurate in describing all of the duties of the CEO. From marketing to sales and fund raising, the CEO is responsible for all aspects of a business. This is a pretty big job and less than 5% of all CEOs perform all their duties with any efficiency. The reasons are as varied as the responsibilities that come with the job description.
Most CEOs have the feeling that their job is fund raising, and while that is one important aspect of a CEO’s work the job |
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My Give a Damn’s Busted!
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| Is it possible that your employees are singing “My Give a Damn is Busted”? A common complaint of many business owners is that their employees lack motivation. However, the real problem is that employees are under-engaged, and there is plenty of research to support this. |
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10 rules for writing an effective press release
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| How to write an effective press release. |
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The Three C's of Leadership --- Curiosity, Creativity, commitment
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| Most of us are not born leaders. However, a good percentage of us long to become leaders of men and make deep connections in our careers seeking that ultimate leadership position. It may be Sales Manager, Warehouse Supervisor, Vice President, CFO or even CEO. People who get results are high impact leaders. They are consistent, explicit and concise and they command a presence when they walk into a room. They have enough charisma to turn the dullest moment into a high-energy event. When they move on, others want to go with them. Their openness and honesty creates a legacy which people admire and look up to. They gain commitment and foster trust. |
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3 Leaders Who Follow the Signs
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| These companies trust their intuition, signs and the facts, evolving to intercept opportunities for growth! |
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The Management Consultant and CEO - Getting On The Same Wavelength is Critical to Consulting Success
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| Getting into the head of the CEO is critical for the consultant to be effective and successful. How to do it with success? Let's talk about it. |
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The Plan was a Success but the Business Died
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| Planning is a good thing. Don't think I'm saying it's not. We have to plan. The challenge is that human nature, and many of our reward systems, tend to reinforce the plan as the "be-all and end-all." We forget that the plan is a means to an end. The end is profitability, or however we define success. |
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Choose It and Use It: An Executive’s Guide to Selecting and Using Outstanding PR
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| This guide will instruct CEOs how to choose a PR firm and how to utilize that resource to its fullest. This information should be on the desk of every business leader interested in the reputation of his or her company, products and services. |
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LEADERHIP: IF NOT NOW ….THEN…WHEN……????
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| Time is the greatest resource available to mankind .Come to think of it, when our planet earth was formed millions of years ago and thereafter for many centuries, there was no concept of time. The reason probably was that there was no need for measuring the activities performed by the creatures then in terms of the results.. The sole motive of the living creatures was just that-Living. And to do any other activity connected to survival. |
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Getting Feedback from an External Coach
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| This article looks at the role/s an external coach can provide for a CEO to help him bring himself, the company and the business to greater heights. |
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Eight Steps to Goal Setting
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| If the CEO of an organization were to ask you how to set goals, what would you say? |
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Successful Business Plans
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| If you are the Chief Executive Officer, what must you have in place for business plans to work? |
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The Other Side of Fear
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| Yet once we face that fear - reach out for help - the relief is extraordinary. |
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Is Can't Limiting Your Growth?
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| Replacing "We can't," with "What if?" is a big step toward releasing the status quo that's holding us back. Once we ditch that gravity, the sky can be our limit! |
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5S Applied to the CEO Role
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| We’ve taken the 5S concept and philosophy that is traditionally applied to workplaces, shop floors and operations and applied it to the role of the CEO and to the performance improvement of the enterprise. |
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Breaking New Ground: Trump’s Success Factors
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| “What separates the winners from the losers is how a person reacts to each new twist of fate,” says Trump. He has reacted to the twists and turns in his life with optimism, becoming CEO of the largest privately held company in New York, with over 22,000 employees and estimated revenues in excess of $10 billion. What did he use to get ahead? |
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Lesson #5: Keep It Simple To Start
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| “Success is never an overnight proposition,” says Vernon. “You must commit to long-term goals and tackle problems head-on.” |
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Computing Success: How Dell Came Out On Top
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| To become a success, Dell says, “You just need a framework and a dream.” |
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From Peddling to Profits: How Thomas Watson Achieved Success
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| When Watson decided to change the name of his company to International Business Machines, he knew that it was a big name for a small company. But, over the next few decades, Watson would build the company to live up to its name. From a traveling door-to-door salesman to CEO of one of the largest expanding companies in the U.S., Watson’s name has since become synonymous with not only the beginnings of the computer industry but with what it takes to become a successful entrepreneur. How did he do it? |
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Canada’s Billionaire Businessman: How Schwartz Made Onex a Success
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| Schwartz is 66 years old this year but has no plans of slowing down. As Chairman and CEO of one of Canada’s most successful companies, Schwartz’s goals for the future remain the same as they have for the past quarter century: “More people. More transactions. Larger amounts of capital. Identical philosophy,” he says. How did this son of an auto-parts dealer become one of the Top Ten Wealth Creators in all of Canada? |
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Lesson #5: You Need Balance To Maintain A Business
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| “Honestly I felt and still feel guilty all the time,” says Aigner-Clark. “Even now, I feel like I never give either my company or my kids enough attention. It’s really a battle when you have your office in your home.” |
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Lesson #4: Fight To Find Your Place In The Field
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| “A lot of the times when adult stars try to be a CEO of their own company nobody takes you seriously or thinks you know what you're talking about,” says Jameson. “They talk down to you and act like you don't have a clue.” |
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A Star Is Porn: How Jameson Rose From Rags To Riches
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| “When I started my career, my intention was to become the best. I had big plans and a lot of determination,” says Jameson, “but sometimes even I think this is beyond what I could have ever dreamed.” Jameson might not have been able to predict her success, but she was able to achieve it nevertheless. How did this woman who was the victim of abuse at the hands of others and drugs, become one of the most popular adult entertainment stars in history? |
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Lesson #4: Turn a Learning Disability into a Learning Opportunity
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| For the 30 years that Orfalea served as CEO of Kinko’s, his office would have been unrecognizable as such. He had no stacks of reports piling up in his desks. He had filing cabinets, but a quick peek inside would reveal no files. He had no computer and often times, not even a pen. Why? Because Orfalea suffered from both dyslexia and ADHD. He ran his company differently from most CEOs because he had no other choice. |
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Lesson #1: Work Hard and Plan for Your Dreams
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| When Johnson was a young boy, he would frequently visit his father at the General Motors plant where he worked. “I would sit in the chair behind the desk and dream I was the CEO,” he says. But it was Johnson’s father who told him that he had to do more than just dream about what he wanted; he had to work hard for it. |
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Magic Johnson Quotes
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| Magic Johnson Quotes |
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Lesson #2: “Getting out of the way is really important”
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| One of the reasons why Craigslist has become such a success story is because Newmark has understood the importance of getting out of the way where and when it mattered. From content to overall management of the site, he knew that it was not going to be him who always had the best answers. And, where it counted, he was willing to step back and hand over the reigns. |
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Lesson #2: Use Secrecy to Seduce Your Customers
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| Throughout Warner’s entire career, he has granted just three interviews with the media, this despite being one of the wealthiest men in the world. Does he really value his privacy that much? Or rather is it yet another weapon in Warner’s chest of arms that works to further lure in the unsuspecting customer and make his products irresistible? |
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Fear of Failure
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| Dick Costolo, the CEO of FeedBurner, has another awesome post up titled Too Many Companies?? |
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I’m back and feeling better!
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| When the Supreme Technician (that’s me) wanders around the world, speaking, shouting, screaming and whispering the mantra of extreme entrepreneurship and the Age of The Entrepreneur, exhorting everyone in sight to wake up and to see the roses (before smelling them), life takes its toll, oh yes it does, and my voice goes with it, grinding down to dust, to squeals, to scratchy itchings, and with it goes my imagination which says, oh, no, will I ever be able to speak again? |
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The Top Ten Lies of Corporate Partners
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| In a manner of speaking, I’m running out of lies to tell. So far I’ve taken care of entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, engineers, and marketers. The target of this posting is “corporate partners.” (You might find a previous posting, "The Art of Partnering" interesting.) |
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The Top Sixteen Lies of CEOs
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| At the suggestion of, and with the help of, Glenn Kelman, here are more lies. These are the lies of CEOs running a companies that are beyond the startup phase. Startup phase lies you’ve read here before. |
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PDF Your Board Package
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| Thankfully I no longer get fedexed binders of board packages from my portfolio companies in advance of a board meeting. Through the modern miracle of email, the board packages show up in my inbox – hopefully a few days (rather than a few hours – or even minutes) before the board meeting. The board packages tend to show up in three different formats – one that is easy to deal with, one that is ok, and one that sucks. |
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Do CEO\'s Overcompensate for Their Strengths?
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| As I sit in the Seattle airport waiting to board my delayed flight to Anchorage (Dear Alaska Airlines: Since it’s a “mechanical delay”, please feel free to delay it as long as you want until you are absolutely sure the airplane works), I was pondering a conversation I had at the very end of Gnomedex with an entrepreneur that I’d met for the first time. |
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Getting Face Time
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| Put yourself in the right place at the right time to get in front of that elusive someone. |
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Coyote
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| Met a young man by the name of Coyote who works at the hotel in St. John's. He told us all the cool places to visit downtown. Coyote is interesting to me because he announced to me that he has no ambition, no desire to achieve anything other than climb rocks for the rest of his life. So he goes around from state park to state park and gets odds and ends jobs to give him just the means to work the rocks in the area. |
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Developing Leadership Effectiveness
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| What advice would you offer others who are trying to develop their leadership effectiveness? |
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Board Meeting Rules
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| Following are some board meeting rules that were recently presented to me and my fellow board members by a CEO at one of his first board meetings at a newly funded early stage company. I thought they were brilliant. Feel free to pass them out at your next board meeting. |
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About time we heard what the aging population can DO together
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| Seems like everyone's always talking about the market opportunities emerging because of America's aging population. It's about time someone stopped talking about their buying power and more about their DOING power! |
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Mark Cuban Hates Suits
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| Mark Cuban and I have something in common, other than our fondness for rants. Rants about suits! |
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Building the Perfect Board Package
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| Some companies do a great job of putting together package for board meetings -- it's empirical, concise, and focused on measures that matter and that can be influenced -- while other companies leave their boards more confused after the meeting than before. |
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The Art of the Layoff
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| We’re in a bubble again. It’s not as frothy as last time, but hallelujah, this time we know what to do, right? One good thing about the dotcom implosion in 2000 is that we got lots of practice laying people off, and I’m afraid that this valuable knowledge may get lost. |
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Don't Be Casual
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| Coming out of the Venture Capital in the Rockies conference, I was pleasantly surprised with how solid most of the presentations were. There was plenty of pre-conference preparation, practice, and iteration from the companies presenting – and it showed. |
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CEOs That Are Introverts
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| Often there’s a perception that to be a successful CEO, you need to be an extrovert. Media and pop culture reinforces this – we regularly see people that are comfortable in the spotlight and equate them with the model of success. |
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Communicating Sales Info To Your Board
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| My partner Chris Wand is finally blogging (even though he’ll deny it) over at AsktheVC – he’s writing a series on what should be in a “board reporting package.” |
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Fathers Day Insight
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| I want to share with you this bonus Usable Insight from Dr. Mark Goulston's blog. Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there! |
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Should You Force Your Investors To Use Your Product?
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| I had the following exchange with the CEO of one of my investments the other day.
Q (Brad): It’s strange to me that only a few of the investors / board members are using Product X. Any insights? |
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Advice du Jour: Do Whatever Gets You Tenure
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| I was recently talking to a CEO friend of mine who is having trouble with his board. He thinks there is a very good chance that he will soon be fired. |
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Tip of the week - It's never too early to start connecting
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| In the latest tip of the week, I shared some passages from young entrepreneur and connector (and Never Eat Alone fan) Ben Casnocha's new book |
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Post Acquisition Integration
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| My friends at FeedBurner surfaced today with a post titled Hello? Hellooooo? In it, they explain what they've been up to post-acquisition by Google. Two words - technical integration. |
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A CEOs Thoughts on Collaboration
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| I had breakfast with Matt Blumberg – the CEO of Return Path – yesterday. I’ve worked with Matt for at least six years and love the way his brain works. During my frustrating quest for the best chocolate croissant in Boulder (so far all of the ones I’ve found appear to be exactly the same – I’m guessing there is one chocolate croissant distributor in town) we talked some about “collaboration.” |
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Lighten Up / Tighten Up
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| As I was writing my previous post about The Constipation of Scale I got an email from a co-investor talking about a CEO / CTO conflict. It had an interesting phrase in it that I realized applies to many CEO / CTO relationships – “CEO needs to lighten up and CTO needs to tighten up.” |
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Privacy, Investing Alpha, and the CEO's Mother-in-Law
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| Much of investing is a search for hard-to-get data that can give you an edge, or alpha. That quest for alpha via better data is one of the themes of my Money:Tech 2008 conference, and it is the topic of an unusual and fascinating article in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal. |
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100 Ways to Succeed #85
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| R.O.C(I): "They" All Work For Me! |
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Use Math to Create Loyalty
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| This week's tip comes from my friend Chip Conley, author of the new book "Peak: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo from Maslow" and CEO of Joie de Vivre hotels. Many people have told me and Chip that we were separated at birth in terms of our approach to business and life. |
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Great Example of Blogging Changes to Your Product
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| I'm a small investor in Shelfari. I read a ton and thought it would be fun to play along with them at home and both a user and an investor. About a month ago I started noticing increasing chatter about Shelfari spam during the invite process in my RSS search feeds on "Shelfari." I regularly passed them on to Josh Hug, the CEO of Shelfari. |
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The Best Way to Market to Business
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| The Internet is the best way for advertisers to market to business decision-makers, according to a poll. A survey of nearly 1,000 people by Minnesota Opinion Research found 60% agreeing the Web was persuasive. Fifty percent said it influenced them to make a purchase.
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The Impact of Social Media on Sales, Support, Marketing, and Branding
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| Over at the Sun Microsystems small and medium business site, I published an interview with Josh Bernoff about his new book (co-authored with Charlene Li) called Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies. |
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Should you fire the voice mail guy?
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| Let's say the person in charge of your retail operations does the following every single day: |
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Your Built Environment
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| I've always been the architect of my own happiness. Whether that meant virtually ignoring my initial job description as a young consultant at Deloitte, or creating my own company culture as a CEO (a work that's always in progress), I've aligned my career and my environment - the people around me - to my own personality and values system. |
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Fantastic Post By Calacanis On How To Get PR
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| Anyone who has worked with me knows that one of my favorite lines is "marketing is stupid." And - if you really know me - you know that I don't actually mean "marketing is stupid", but I use it as a proxy for "most PR people suck, most marcom is done poorly, and most companies have no idea what they are trying to accomplish with all the money they waste on shitty marketing and PR." |
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How to Tell If Your CEO Is Clueless
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| Pontificating, theorizing, and terrorizing abounds these days in tech startups. Here is a simple test to help you figure out if the startup you work for is in trouble. All you have to do is listen to your CEO talk to people for a week and determine if she uses these lines. |
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Daily Data
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| I had a call this morning with a CEO of a young company I’m on the board of. They are well funded so they have plenty of urgency, but no panic, around what they are doing. During the conversation, he asked what he could do to increase the board member’s visibility of the progress they are making. |
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The Rhythms of My Life
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| I was in a board meeting yesterday with a company planning a major commercial release of their product “at the end of summer”. We managed to turn this into 8/31/09 at 11:59:59pm pacific time (since I don’t believe you can release something unless there is a time/date stamp associated with it.) As part of this discussion, we spent some time discussing the notion of a daily / weekly / monthly rhythm for both the CEO/CTO as well as the product team. |
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Reach High-Profile Targets Quickly: Five Steps to the Artfully Manage the Gatekeeper
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| Last week's tip about breezing past the gatekeeper at events brought out tons of interesting comments - you guys are using your street smarts to meet everyone from ZZ Top to Swedish choir directors to George W. Bush. |
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A Small Set of Simple Moves
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| I heard the phrase “a small set of simple moves†a few weeks ago from someone and it stuck in my head. Since then I’ve been thinking about it regularly as a fundamental operating principle. |
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How to Get Found
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| The reality is that people and technology is getting better and better a blocking out unwanted interruptions-aka, “marketing.”
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Superstar CEOs Suck
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| Compensation, status, and press coverage of managers in the United States follow a highly skewed distribution: a small number of “superstars” enjoy the bulk of the rewards. |
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Fred Wilson and the Venture Capital (Non-)Cartel
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| When a capitalist says that he is pleased to see profits increase as his competitors disappear and the remainder hold the line on price is that a cartel? How is it different from the CEO of, say, Honda, gloating about the elimination of other auto companies, and then asking the remaining companies to hold car prices? |
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Lead the way
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| Sales needs to be led from the top and it needs to be on the agenda of the ‘C’ suite, and this will mean from the CEO down, including the CFO, COO, and CIO. Even if the ‘C’ suite never has contact with an external customer (which I strongly advise against) they need to know how to lead, sell in, and support the sales effort.
Why?
Despite millions, if not billions, of dollars being invested in sales training, CRM systems and the like, many leaders are realising that their frontend processes, backend systems, culture (including those staff who have not traditionally seen themselves involved in sales), and sales methodologies are not aligned with their customers. |
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CEO Impact on Training and Consulting Projects
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| Often we are asked, "What are the factors that caused the difference between our successful and unsuccessful projects?" |
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Leadership Training for New Managers: How to Go From Peer to Manager
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| Leadership Training for New Managers - Leadership is a skill, and one that is important as it first turn, as it is for a Fortune 100 CEO. Tomorrow, you may talk about your boss. Today, they might talk about you. Leaders to make the leap from co-worker is not difficult, but it totally changes how you should be treated before |
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Why Make Investments in Culture
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| Most CEOs are so busy solving critical problems they have no time to invest in improving the culture of their organization. This is a big mistake. The attached article explains the paradox and offers three key benefits to inventing in culture improvement activities. |
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Zappos Zooms to the Top: Hsieh Becomes an Industry Leader
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| “Over time, it became clear that Zappos was the most promising and the most fun,” says Hsieh. “Eventually, I decided to join the company full time, and I became the CEO.”
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EVERY BUSINESS NEEDS A CEO!
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| The idea of the value of a title in business today is debated far and wide and I agree in most cases titles are important, however for successful businesses in today's rocky business environment are discovering the need for the changing meaning of certain titles or the addition of certain titles to the necessary line up of key employees in their organization. The new thoughts may surprise you! |
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Merger Miseries 6 Bean Counters and Bubbleheads
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| This article focuses on the lead people who work early in the merger process. They are usually the financial types. I believe this is a mistake. In this article I describe why. |
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What do CEOs and turtlenecks have in common?
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| What do chief executive officers (CEOs) and turtlenecks have in common? The changing landscape in business is going to reveal some strange adaptations in the future of the American business enterprise. A more youthful workforce will most definitely have a significant impact on both the environment as well as the management that occupies the typical corporate boardroom.
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Tale of Two Clients - Sales Training! :) versus Saaaales Training (:
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| Here's an interesting comparison for you.
Two client companies are on the exact same sales development time line. (Same time line but separate from each other - they don't even know about each other)
Both of their sales forces went through sales force evaluations at the exact same time.
Both of their sales management teams were developed at the same time.
Both of their sales organizations received sales infrastructure help (sales process, sales pipeline, metrics, sales recruiting process, etc). |
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Tale of Two Clients - Sales Training :) vs. SAAAALES TRAINING :(
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| You've heard it before. It flows down hill. Your organization can only be as effective as the weakest leadership link. When it comes to a sales development initiative, you must start out committed and remain committed to drive the process until the change you demand has been accomplished. Anything short of that is a formula for failure. |
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How do CEOs think?
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| I travel regularly to meet our customers. Normally, we work with the VP Engineering and the CTO of product Companies. I meet them regularly and most of the time our meetings are technical discussions or discussions about specific projects we may be working on.
As the market was slow, most of our customers were not in a position to discuss specific projects. Most projects were on hold, and our customers were under pressure from their CEOs and Boards to reduce costs. This meant that they were pushing us for rate discounts. |
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10 CEO's and the Impact They Have on their Sales Forces
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| I don't mean to paint a picture that depicts CEO's as the problem, but in some companies, they are the problem. In 9 of the 10 examples I described above they were the problem but unlike this article, it happens in only about 50% of the cases, not 90%. So if you are a CEO or know one, what should you do when getting help for your sales organization? |
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10 Attributes of the CEO Who Drives Sales and More
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| My second conversation was with an effective CEO who is completely unlike those that I described in the other article. My good CEO has the following 10 qualities that have a positive impact on the sales force: |
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But I'm a Sales Guy - The Story of Motivation and Compensation
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| A Sales VP and his CEO were in the conference room and each time the CEO brought up a problem, we asked the Sales VP to elaborate. Each time he began with, "Well I'm a sales guy so I know this stuff..."
Yes and No.
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My Sales Force Won't Use CRM
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| I mentioned that the key rule to getting salespeople to change is rule #9, Consequences.
There are three primary ingredients to having Consequences. |
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Lesson #4: “We focus a lot on culture”
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| “Watching Ev really sink his teeth into the role of CEO, take it very seriously,” says Stone. “He very genuinely wants to innovate – not just from a product or technology standpoint, but from a company standpoint. For me, I’ve learned about what it means to focus on a culture, to build social responsibility and the idea of a company as a super-organism.” |
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Chiquita Fruit Juice Bars to debut in Dubai
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| Chiquita Brands International Inc. said Monday it has signed an international master franchise agreement to open Chiquita Fruit Juice Bars in the Middle East, beginning in Dubai. The agreement was signed with Fresh Fruits Co., a distributor of Chiquita products in the Middle East. They will be located at metro transit stations being constructed around the city, starting with three locations and expanding to 11. |
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The Great Secrets of a True Leader
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| To be most successful, leadership can not be treated simply as a role you play or as a program for middle management, but rather it must be viewed at all levels as a way of "being a leader." This "soft stuff" is hard work, but as a leader you already knew that. |
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Creating an effective sales performance management system
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| Following on from last week’s article about managing and measuring the right things in sales, I thought it would be worth looking at some of the key principles for effective sales performance management systems.
The first place to start is to align your sales performance management system and subsequent key measures to your organisation’s strategy and goals. It’s then the job of the CEO and the Sales Leader to ensure the organisation (that means everyone else who supports the sales effort) is aligned to the sales performance management system. When this dimension is in place the organisation is best placed to sustain high sales performance. |
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Four Business Partnering Ideas for Colossal Expansion
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| A partnership is a way to balance your strengths with someone else's in order to get more done - without losing your mind! Entrepreneurs as a whole tend to thrive in their creativity but don't enjoy managing their business. That's where a partner can come in handy. A partnership is often the leverage strategy a CEO chooses when its time to expand.
There are some real tricks to having a partnership that works. I've seen many situations blow up because the keys to having a profitable partnership aren't in place. |
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Quash Your “Employee” Mindset To Propel Business Growth
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| Is your employee mind restricting your business’ growth? Learn how to overthrow your employee mentality, step into your CEO shoes and enjoy a surge in your development!
Many small (and large) business owners find themselves in a difficult position when transitioning from seeing themselves as the craftsman or solopreneur to a owner of a business capable of generating more than six figures, and that is that you just can't seem to crush that "employee" mindset when approaching your business.
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Funding for Small Businesses
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| While big banks refuse to loosen their grip on credit, one business consulting firm wants small businesses to know the news is not all bad. In fact, by working with smaller business banks, may provide funding for new and established small businesses in spite of the deepening recession. |
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The Board's Role in Fundraising
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| “Should my board help me raise funds?” The obvious answer is yes, of course they should! Now comes the hard part. Getting the board to actually raise money is a lot tougher than simply saying they should. Many nonprofits, of all sizes and types of mission, overlook the basic steps necessary to engage the board in effective fundraising. |
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Ice Water Test of Starbucks Strategy, Implementation, and Tactical
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| A simple test sometimes verifies and validates what thousands of pages of strategy documents cannot. A simple request at a Starbucks, and the response in superior service, convinced me of the strategy excellence at Starbucks. |
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Tips to create and administer successful 360° performance appraisal assessments
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| The 360° performance appraisal is the buzz word and many multinational organisation is adopting this mechanisam to make vibrant work culture and to satisfy their employees.. As 360° feedback has evolved, the range of people who give feedback has diversified. Many 360s now include feedback from suppliers and customers, in addition to the traditional sources from within the organization (direct reports, peers, managers, team members). By using our seven steps , you can make the process of designing, administering and analyzing 360° assessments a positive one. Each stages are described in details in this article.Therefore, making 360° assessments a process in your organization can help you keep your leaders on track, enable you to measure the gains in employee performance and leadership, and therefore improve your overall performance. |
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Stupid Choices in the Selection of Sales Assessments
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| When you use an assessment in the sales recruiting process, it must be customizable so that criteria unique to your business, like I described above, can be factored in. That way, in addition to whether the candidate meets our criteria of a successful salesperson, we must be able to determine whether the candidate will be able to succeed in the face of the company's unique challenges.
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Inflection Points Bring New Retail Strategies
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| Might your retail segment be facing an inflection point, and if so, are you really prepared for it? Almost every company faces ongoing changes of one type or another in its industry, and retail is no exception. An inflection point occurs when an industry or segment faces lasting changes so large and significant that it calls for companies to adapt with a new strategy or ability to compete, or face what becomes an irreversible decline and failure. Such an inflection point may bring even greater opportunity than before for organizations who do figure out how to take advantage of it.
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Motivation or Sales Process?
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| Many people are looking for a quick fix when it comes to..... |
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The power of a CEO 360 Review
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| I recently sat through an annual CEO 360 review at a company that has been very serious about executive development since inception. It reminded me how powerful this is when it’s done correctly. |
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Bench Strength and a Hard Driving Sales Force
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| He also spoke at length about the right way for companies to use value to decommoditize their products and services. Bill elaborated about the difference between real selling and demonstrating and presenting.
His 5 tips for owners, presidents, and CEO's? He said that things really aren't terribly different other than money being tighter. So he said: |
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1st of the 10 Kurlan Sales Competencies that are Key to Building a Sales Culture
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| #1 - IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU!
Believe it or not, there are a lot of people in sales who mistakenly believe that the world revolves around them. If my previous sentence said "show business" instead of "sales" it would make sense but this isn't show business. |
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Leadership Is What People Buy Into
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| Free advice and guidance on what it is people are looking for when researching online business opportunities. |
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Why Do Kids Sell Better Than Adults?
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| How come as a kid you could sell your parents on almost anything? Now you are having trouble selling potential customers (a.k.a. prospects) on your products and services even though you know they need them. So what gives? |
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Phone Systems Can Save Big Money!
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| “But the answer to this much lower cost for space lies in their new phone system. It’s not just that the phone system was purchased at a good price.” |
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C-Level Selling - A Sales Person's Best Resource
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| Sales managers and sales people are sympathetic to other salespeople. Learn how they will help you get to the C-Level and make your sale to their companies.
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Survey: Hiring expectations improved in emerging markets
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| The global job market may not have returned to its pre-recessionary levels, but prospective workers in many countries should see improved opportunities for new positions in the coming months, according to a new report. |
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A Compass for Your Vision
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| What's your companies vision? |
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Make your SELF Indispensable! Build a Bigger Network and Increase Your Market Value.
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| Every sales leader needs to consider their market value. Not only should sales leaders regularly evaluate and determine areas for growth for their staff, but also for themselves. When I talk about market value, I am referring to the two critical areas that will help you increase your value to your organization and as well as up your personal value. Your market value appreciates as you become a better leader and have a large professional network |
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Overcoming the Dysfunction in Sales Organizations
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| These days, many companies have questions about compensation for salespeople and sales leaders and as a result they make a lot of mistakes too. Why would a company want to squash a top producer because he/she is making a lot of money? It happened to Rocky once and he weighed in - with a strong opinion - on the subject. |
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Why Customer Service Destroys Salespeople
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| Customer service alone is not going to help a company achieve its growth targets. It is essential for salespeople to be focused on selling as their first priority...
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Pre Call Planner
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| It's a great idea to plan your sales call well in advance of making the call. Those that tend to "wing it" don't usually end up flying very far... |
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Three Strategies to Keep Your Clients Even in a Bad Economy
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| One of the CEO Rule for small business owners is: “The Transaction is the Result of the Relationship.” Every business owner wants to build great customer relationships but what happens when the customer calls with a money problem? If the relationship is first in your mind, your options are endless. Find a way to keep the customer today and you are well on your way to keeping that customer for life. |
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Smooth Sailing
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| A cash flow crunch could cause a wave of problems for your business. Making finances a top priority will help to ensure that you don’t capsize. |
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The Future of Business Intelligence: Did Gartner Get It Right?
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| On Friday's segment "Beyond Business Intelligence Technology: The Importance of Domain Expertise" I will be welcoming Oco's CEO William (Bill) Copacino who has authored 3 books and more than 150 articles on supply chain management, to discuss the transformational changes that are redefining our understanding of Business Intelligence. |
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Unleash Attention-Getting Power in Your Bio
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| How to make your bio stand out for the media |
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Use your skills and work for yourself in a franchised business
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| You have worked your whole life developing skills to use in the workplace. It started in college and has continued through every job you have had. I offer advice here about how you should use the specialized skills you have acquired through the years to own a franchise you are familiar with. |
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Put your livelihood in the hands of the person you trust most- YOU!
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| When you work for yourself, growth in your business is based on everything you do to market yourself and create a customer base. This helps you to put the livelihood of you and your family in the hands of the person you most trust- you! A franchise is built on how hard you work and my article discusses why you should consider this subject. |
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Why Is the Chief People Officer Missing from the C-Suite?
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| The CEO, CFO, CIO and the list continues are recognized acronyms for executives in the C (Chief) suites. Yet what makes companies successful is people. So where is the Chief People Officer? |
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3 Reason’s to Invest In Sales Management Training
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| If you want to thrive in difficult times here are 3 reasons why you should invest in sales management training. Your sales force is your company’s most expensive promotional resource. Yet too many sales organizations operate well below their potential. Your front line sales managers are the people who can unlock the potential in your sales organization |
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The Creative Executive
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| The ability to be creative is one of the most powerful tools a leader can have. How does one develop more creativity on a daily basis. Here are some tips. |
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TAKE, SHAKE OR BREAK
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| Business is simple, all you have to do is TAKE, SHAKE OR BREAK. But, good Take, Shake and Break decisions and practices are essential to the continuing success of any enterprise. |
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C-Level Sell to Develop Large Accounts
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| Learn how to develop large accounts by getting-to the C-Level executives and attaining preferred status. |
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Costing cutting at the expense of sales? Bad move
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| I don't know about you, but when markets start to tighten or when things feel a bit uncertain, instead of cost cutting and bunkering down, I have found that you need to do precisely the opposite. You need to invest in your sales efforts with good strategy, sales training, good sales management and good sales coaching. |
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How By Answering These Three Questions Can Dramatically Improve Sales Training
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| If you only had 3 questions to answer to improve sales training. what would they be? |
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Don't Let Your Group Drink Dirty Water-Be a Leader
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| There is an Akamba, Kenya, proverb that says, "Syaasya ndongoi, inyusaa muuluu." This wise saying means when a herd of cattle lacks a leader, it ends up drinking dirty water. This saying is based on an observation in which the last herd to get to the water source finds the water has been made dirty by the ones that arrived before it.
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7 Key Simple Points to Turn Ineffective Sales Scripts to Effective Ones to Increase Sales
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| In the rush to increase sales, some organizations are returning to the old tried and true sales scripts. Yet, these well intended business owners to sales managers have forgotten several key points and one very critical key aspect when using a sales script.
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Sales Training Is Much More About Great Attitudes than Superior Sales Skills
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| Do you believe great sales is about having the best sales skills or sales attitudes? Read why Attitudes are the foundation for great sales. |
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Sales are Probably Down if You Are Doing These Three Things...
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| "When your market isn't growing, it is not business as usual and holding your breath and hoping is not the right strategy." This according to Casey Coffman, my guest on... |
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Recession Resistant Franchises
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| If you want to open your own franchise, you need to choose a franchise that will continue to thrive in a down economy. That is why choosing a recession-resistant business is so important. In this article, I offer my thoughts on types of franchises that will have to continue to thrive because everyone will have to continue to use them no matter what happens in the economy. |
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Employee engagement -How do great leaders do it?
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| Great leaders set worthwhile goals and champion exciting ideas. They create 'meaningful' work for their people. These are the hallmarks of great leaders. Such leaders keep their people engaged. |
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How to Create a 20/20 Business Vision and Why it Matters
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| The turning point for a vision is when everyone sees it, gets it, and buys into participating to make it happen…built your vision…make that dream a reality.
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Audi Franchise to further expand in India; eyes 30% of luxury car market, through franchising
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| Buoyed by overwhelming response, German luxury car maker Audi would increase its car dealership franchise network in the country and aims to grab 30 per cent share of the luxury car market by 2011, a company official said. |
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Why Managers and Supervisors ARE NOT the Best Communicators During Times of Change
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| Most of the programs fail to manage change within organizations...Here’s why managers & supervisors are not the best face to face communicators during times of change.
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How To Cascade Messages via Managers To Employees
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| Communication skills are rarely one of the key competencies taught or measured by organizations... here are some easy ways to ensure that Team Briefings work.
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Put on Your Helmet - 3 Tips for Selling in this Economy
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| What a great interview I had with Bill Murray, Founder and CEO of Winning Incorporated, Friday on my Meet the Sales Experts Radio Show! He was awesome.
Here are some of the highlights from my conversation with Bill: |
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Differentiating Pricing Strategy From Selling Strategy
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| Let's differentiate between this very sound pricing strategy yet unsound selling strategy. From a pricing perspective, this strategy allows you to effectively position your company, brand, products and services wherever you need them to be, based on markets, competition, reputation, quality and business strategy.
However, from a selling perspective, never provide your prospect with even two, let alone three options. It's difficult enough to close business in a timely manner today and you certainly don't want to be the cause of a decision making delay. |
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The Difference Between Provocative Selling and Baseline Selling
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| In the wake of a recent article by the authors of Provocative Selling in the Harvard Business Review an attendee challenged me to defend Baseline Selling. Since it was in the HBR, this attendee believed it had to be the better way to sell... |
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Ten Characteristics of Leadership
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| These are quotes taken from an article by Bill George former chairman and CEO of Medtronic.
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No Time To Plan
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| Planning is key to long-term success. Some say there is no time to plan, but I beg to differ. |
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Apple, regarding AT&T exclusivity—just say no
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| As reported yesterday, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is allegedly involved in discussions with Apple to extend the carrier’s exclusive iPhone contract into 2011. I hope that doesn’t happen. |
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Getting New Managers to Deliver Quickly
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| As companies start transforming their businesses in response to changing market conditions, they need their people to deliver. Every CEO faces two main people challenges. The CEO's first challenge is to develop current high performers into good leaders who can put in place a multiplier effect on their talents. The CEO's second challenge is to induct new talented people and get them off the block quickly. Organizations that have a strong process culture can get their new manager's off the block quickly and with less pain. |
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Managers & Leaders -Why CEOs Need a Leadership Pipeline
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| Often, the words manager and leader are used interchangeably. When CEOs aim to transform their organizations and improve long term sustainability of their businesses, they need to be clear about what kind of key people they would like to have -managers or leaders? They need to plan for developing their leadership pipeline if the transformation has to run deep and wide. This article differentiates leadership and managership. |
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Five Keys for Getting Along With People
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| Author, Judson Edwards, identified several universal principles for getting along with people. While these keys are important and relevant philosophies to relationships, I have made some modifications to his list. In addition, I’ve also contributed several of my own thoughts in order to speak more clearly about the personal relationship difficulties you may face on an every day basis. I am convinced that if you consistently apply these principles you will improve your relationships at work and home.
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When Your Business Grows Up, You Became A Manager
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| Jennifer Thompson tells her story on the difference between between an entrepreneur and being a manager of a business. |
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Building Self Assurance
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| How Ellen Thompson built self assurance and maintained confident when it mattered. |
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Evaluating the ‘Steve Jobs effect’
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| In a recent ChangeWave research firm survey, they inquired about the Steve Jobs “effect”? With his recent health disclosure and taking a leave of absence—amid speculation on whether Apple will stumble without him—ChangeWave asked consumers what effect it would have on their likelihood of buying Apple products if Jobs were to permanently step down as CEO |
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The 3 most common reasons why marketing fails
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| As the CEO of a marketing firm and a marketing copywriter, I see horrible marketing every day. Here are the 3 most common mistakes I see businesses make with their marketing which causes their marketing to fail... |
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Overcoming Your Boardroom Presentation Fears
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| I have gone through a good number of Boardroom presentation with all the funny and awkward incidents that characterise this kind of presentations. I is a stress situation that requires preparation and wit. Here are some tips that may help. |
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TEN TIPS FOR TELEPHONE QUALIFYING SUCCESS
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| Using the phone successfully to market your products and services to potential new clients often requires you to navigate through a labyrinth of people to find the correct individual(s) who can provide the information you seek. Whether for pre-sales research or to determine who has the ability to acquire your products and services, here is a quick summary of proven techniques for achieving these objectives from Ron S. La Vine – CEO of Accelerated Sales Training, Inc. a Live Cold Calling Sales Training and Telesales Training Company.
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Driving With The Handbrake On! The Texas Smoothie.
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| Entrepreneurs get trapped - one of those traps is what Michael Gerber calls "Doin' it, doin' it, doin' it!" where the tyranny of the urgent prevents us from doing the big-picture things that made us entreprpeneurs in the first place.
Jerry from Texas found a unique and idiosyncratic path out of that trap. |
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The Sales Force with Over Achievers Who Don't
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| I think that many CEO's are in denial.
Despite the struggles of their sales force, they continue to look at the pipeline and say to themselves, we'll be okay as soon as these deals close. But the deals aren't closing and with each passing day companies are less okay then they were the day before. |
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The Secret to Getting Press
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| Public relations enables you to build sales and get third-party credibility you simply can't purchase. But how do you get mentioned in the press? Find out as the secret is revealed! |
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TIPS OF WRITING EFFECTIVE MISSION STATEMENT THAT FITS WITH YOUR ENTIRE MARKETING STRATEGY
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| Many times you get into a company and the first thing that greets you is the receptionist and the companies' mission statement. The mission statement is either hanged in a huge board for all to see. It will also be on the top page of the brochure, which will be on top of the table at the waiting room.
To hang a mission statement for all to see is a great thing; however I have been reading many mission statements in my visits in many offices not in one country but in many and one thing come out clearly. |
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Nothing Happens until someone Sells something!
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| What does it really mean to sell something? An idea, a dream, our values, an opinion, or ones self interests? Selling is simply: a transfer of enthusiasm and trust in someone or something. With this trust is born a responsibility and commitment to honor that trust, and do so willingly, no matter how challenging.
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The CEO Who Needed to Hire Salespeople
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| Yesterday I spoke with a CEO who asked for some help recruiting salespeople. It seems that the salespeople they had previously hired had failed. As I learned more about their business, a few things became obvious to me: |
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Jim Collins Fortune Interview Translated for the Sales Force
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| Jim Collins was interviewed in the February 2 issue of Fortune.
He was asked this question: "Right now, it seems as if people are panicking - or are paralyzed about decisions." |
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Adding Value to your Corporate Christmas Gift
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| Choosing the right promotional product to give your customers and staff can be a complicated process which is why JEM Promotional Products have written an article about Adding value to your Corporate Christmas Gifts. We have focused the article on three main methods of adding value to your corporate Christmas Gifts which are Personalisation, Picking an appropriate Product and Attention to Detail. We hope that it makes picking your gifts easier this Christmas! |
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Why External Diagonal Career Moves are Rare
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| An external diagonal career move occurs when someone moves into a more senior or broader role in a different organisation in either the same or a different industry. For example, if a Marketing Manager in an organisation moves to become a General Manager or Chief Operating Officer or CEO in a different organisation, I call this a diagonal move. They are rare. Most of the time people move either vertically or horizontally. |
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Who Should Your Sales Force Call On
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| It's not always obvious. If your company sells oil drilling rigs to oil companies, then your salespeople know who to call on. If your company sell luxury cars to wealthy people, you know where to find your prospects. But what if you sell products or services that could be sold to a much broader range of customers or clients? Who should your salespeople call on then? |
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Best Practices: Annual CEO Expense Audit
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| I’ve started a new category on my blog called “Best Practices.” These are going to be posts inspired by my experiences with various companies that I feel are above and beyond the normal activities you’d expect. The first one comes from Matt Blumberg, the CEO of Return Path. Earlier this week the board received an email from him that included the following: |
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Are You Tired of CEOs Milking Companies I Am
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| Tired of seeing CEO's milk companies just like Merrill's Thain did? Let's talk about it and discuss some bright spots out there. |
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Employee Development - Whose Responsibility Is It? (Part I of II)
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| Learn how to develop your employees more effectively |
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Franchise Opportunities many don't know about.
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| One of the most common question I am always asked is "What's Hottest business out there?" The reason people ask that, is because everybody wants to be on board when the next "Best Thing" comes out. Today, I am going to tell you how to be the first to bring the "Next Best Thing" to your area, your city or your country. There are two opportunities available with Franchises that most people do not know about: Master Franchisee and Area Developers. |
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Be the CEO of Your Life and Your Business!
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| Learn how to be a leader and take control... |
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Business in 2009 - Do you really need to be a Fortune Teller
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| No know really knows how the overall economic climate will play out over the coming months and possibly years. What we can say is that individual businesses will be defined by the decisions they make and the actions that they take. |
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10 Steps for Your Sales Force to Survive and Thrive in the Recession
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| I was in the pool, playing catch with our six-year old son, when Henry began a "dialog" with me. He said, "You can't play catch in the pool. It's against the rules."
I was stunned, but apologized, said I wasn't aware of that rule and removed the football from the pool.
There was another guy in the pool and he mentioned to me that the pool rules did not include an exclusion about playing catch. I mentioned that to Henry and he became irate because he owns one of the resort's units, wrote the rules himself, and said, "It better be on that sign!"
So what's wrong with this picture? |
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Less is Often More
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| I just got off the phone with the CEO of a company who was steaming mad, not at me fortunately, at his senior V.P. who had just made a really, really stupid mistake.
I have been coaching this man and know him quite well. However, one of the lessons he has yet to learn is when to "zip it". He thinks, and we have talked about this, that because he is the head honcho he can say whatever he wants whenever he wants and there will be no repercussions.
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Hottest Women's Franchise Business Opportunities
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| Women are quickly becoming champions of business, and if you think you have what it takes to live up to the standard set by your female gender, here are business opportunities to look into. |
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Mirror, Mirror on the Wall?
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| Perception is a concept that can be related to every area in your life. It is important to remember that that way you think your being perceived and the way others are actually perceiving you might not always be in alignment. |
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Leads for the Sales Force - Not
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| I received an email last week from a LinkedIn connection promoting his new super duper lead engine that connects salespeople with the most powerful buying influences in the world.
Wow. |
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Blind CEOs
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| It is amazing how many toxic environments exist in organizations. One would think with all the leadership training it would be harder to find oppressive cultures. A larger conundrum is why so many top leaders simply cannot see their contribution to the malaise. In this article I explore the problem of blind CEOs and offer some antidotes.
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Is Your Sales Model Effective? Know Your Salesforce ABC's
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| What happens when you compare a model like Deborah's - if you're gonna go hunting you'd better come back with dinner - with a model that has its salespeople making 3 sales calls per day, or around 60 per month? Do you think those salespeople come back with 60 new customers or orders per month? No chance! They probably sell 10. That's why they're on so many calls.
What would happen if you told those salespeople that you only wanted them to go on 30 calls per month, but you want them to be a lot more selective, and you expected them to close 50% instead of 10%? |
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10 Steps to Create More of a Sales Culture
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| I spoke to a very lively group of 130 CEO's in Cincinnati today and the question about creating more of a sales culture came up. There are ten steps to accomplishing this: |
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Are Your Salespeople Selling Value Like Nordstrom's or Price Like Sam's Club?
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| Nordstrom's was busier than Walmart and salespeople are trying to get appointments based on low price. What does this say about the state of the economy and more specifically, about discounting and trying to win business based on price? Read the exciting details... |
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Fire Yourself and Fix Your Business
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| Should you be fired? Are you more committed to being the boss or fixing your business? When you run your own business, it is sometimes hard to see the forest for the trees. However we often look at other people’s businesses and know immediately what we would do if we were running their business |
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Keeping Your Employees Focused in an Uncertain Economy
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| In these tough times it's becoming more and more difficult to keep employees focused and motivated. This article gives business owners a few tips on how to keep employees motivated and focused in these tough economic times. |
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Hiring Salespeople is Like Baseball Expansion
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| Hiring salespeople is scalable until you get to a dilution point - very similar to the expansion that took place in baseball... |
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Your Salespeople Call on the Wrong People and Expect Them to Buy
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| How many sales opportunities fail to convert because your salespeople failed to meet with the individual(s) in the company that could do something about it? |
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Where Do You Stand As A Leader?
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| 45% of your company’s reputation is based on the public’s view of your CEO. Staggering isn’t it? |
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The agenda
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| The job of the CEO isn't to check things off the agenda. Her job is to set the agenda, to figure out what's next. |
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Doing the Right Thing in Leadership
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| Many times, doing the right thing has penalties. In leadership, those penalties are magnified because there are less safety nets for team members in leadership positions. People in leadership positions are more visible so when they face issues of ethical penalty, it is more widely known. Although you can never avoid the penalties for doing the right thing, there are a couple of skills that can be embraced to reduce the impact of them. |
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Are your people better off when they leave than when they got there?
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| In today’s ever changing and often turbulent economic environment, you are facing challenges that your predecessors would not have been dreamt about. How do you ensure that you have the leadership tools and strategies on hand to ensure you come out on top?
Any time two or more people are gathered together for a purpose, an organization exists and there is an opportunity for leadership. There are many thousands in leadership positions today know that they are failing their people and desperately desire help in developing effective leadership skills. Many have long ago recognized that the old ways of leading through command-and-control and barking orders are largely ineffective when working with a diverse workforce. |
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The Essence Of Managing
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| These articles come in a six part series:
1) The essence of managing
2) Re-engineer yourself to be a manager
3) How to go from employee to supervisor in 6 months
4) How to go from supervisor to entry level manager in 6 months
5) How to go from entry level manager to mid level manage in 6 months
6) How to go from mid level manager to top-level manager in 12 months
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Succession Planning: Refilling the Pipeline
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| In the next 3 to 5 years, the first surge of Baby Boomers is expected to exit the workforce. The volume of turnover could be unprecedented and its impact on all organizations will be dramatic. Beyond the loss of people, there will be significant loss of experience, knowledge, perspective and wisdom. This prospect of losing so much talent and knowledge in a short period of time has forced even the most reluctant to take notice and begin focusing on succession planning. |
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Sales a Strategic Boardroom Issue
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| Long the corporate stepchild, sales has largely been ignored by academics and many executives. However in increasingly competitive markets and increasingly sophisticated buyers a top notch sales force is no longer a nice to have but a must have. Farsighted executives are taking an increasingly critical look at their sales forces and asking searching questions about the ROI they are receiving from this significant investment. |
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Is Your Leadership Characteristics Limiting Your Business Success?
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| I have worked with stacks of businesses over the years. Often I am asked to name the most important indicator of whether or not a business will succeed or fail – my answer is always “Look at the CEO”. CEO’s and their personal leadership characteristics can make or break a business.
A good CEO sets clear direction and boundaries, provides assistance and support to the team and then gets out of the way to let them accomplish what needs to be done. They help unblock roads if needed and provide guideposts along the way – but their management style is such that they do it in a way that creates independence of action rather than dependence.
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Teaching Large Companies To Think Like The Little Guys
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| The fact that innovation and entrepreneurship run rampant in smaller companies, but is often suppressed in larger companies is nothing new. Management guru Peter Drucker first addressed the issue in his 1985 book, Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Drucker wrote that one of the most often-asked questions in many a 1985 boardroom was, “How can we overcome the resistance to innovation that plagues most organizations?” |
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Key Steps to Reach CEO-Level Contacts
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| Key Steps to Reach CEO-Level Contacts |
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Buying Your Way to the Top
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| Here are some networking tips you can put to use in your own business right now that will help win the business |
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Signs That The Economy Will Soon Improve
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| We saw it again. It happened this summer, the tell tale tip off that things are turning around, that CEO's are feeling confident enough to... |
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What the Best CEOs Know by Jeffrey Krames
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| Jeffrey Krames gives us a glimpse inside the minds of 7 of the top CEOs. He profiles: Michael Dell, Jack Welch, Gerstner of IBM, Andy Grove, Bill Gates, Herb Kelleher and Sam Walton. These men were all at the helm of very large companies and some faced seemingly insurmountable problems. Others had policies that allowed them to get far ahead of their competitors. Read on to find out what you can learn from each of these CEO's and how their experiences can help your business. |
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Strategies That Get You Hired
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| If you are in sales, pursuing a new job is much like pursuing a sales prospect. Your marketing tools have to present you in the most relevant light. This article tells you how to effectively use them. |
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Selling to Larger Accounts - Find the Chauffeur
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| Dave Kurlan's unique insight on major account sales is not to find the champion, coach, influencer or decision maker. It's to find your chauffeur! |
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Managing the Manager
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| While the shareholders are watching the CEO who is trying to keep an eye on everything and is focused on the forrest rather than the individual trees, and management is focused on the employees at shop floor level... who is keeping an eye on the managers? |
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Yes, Smart Women are Unique!
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| We are all unique. We each have our own distinct gifts, talents and preferences. There is only one you. Ladies, that’s powerful! Take some time to explore your unique gifts, where your energies lie, and bring it to the world. Everything is possible. Everything is waiting for you. |
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CCPro is Paving the Way for the New Entrepreners
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| Jay Kubassek states, "While virtually every other opportunity out there uses a broken business model with people competing against each other, we designed CarbonCopyPRO to be a professional sales and marketing system where everyone gets to share and leverage each others' success. This is about creating a story and a legacy. It is something that has never been done before." Debra Bolton adds “You can not go wrong with Jay’s system. It is working for me and I am new to direct marketing; so anyone can do it!”
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Turn Cold Contacts into a Hot Network
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| Most Sales People sell at networking events, successful ones build credibility.
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Branding Your Business
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| It's not enough to just have a name and logo for your business-you need to create a brand that incorporates your whole identity. Our experts share how to establish your business as a successful, brand-name company. |
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Finding The Right MLM Company For You
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| Not all of the Multi-level Marketing companies are the same. There are thousands of MLM companies just on the Internet alone to pick through. How do you know if an MLM company is the right one for you? |
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Building a better board
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| CEOs are advised to build better boards, but doing so is hard. Most plough the leader's lonely furrow and board building does not make the priority list. Other CEOs recognise the value and build better boards, which provide solid advice, facilitate business introductions and help raise funding. |
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The 9 Chill out steps to C Level Selling
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| How many times have you thought about engaging with the CEO, then when it comes to making the call you bottle out and call another point of contact lower down the chain, sounds familiar. I know the feeling. |
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Role of Leadership in Planning
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| Executives love to talk about planning… most complain their processes don’t work very well. Harvard Business Review reports that only 11% of CEOs believe that strategic planning is worth the effort. Most planning processes are too complex, and only document decisions already made. CEOs have the responsibility to make their planning processes effective; I believe the key is to keep the processes simple and focused. |
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How To Hold Sales People More Accountable
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| In working with a client of mine, keeping sales people and distributors accountable is a top priority. |
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Slam-dunk Speech Openings that Grab your Audience
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| You only get one speech opening, so learn to make it work! There are special techniques that help you bond instantly with your audience. I call these “I-You-We” moments. I will talk about the power of “I-You-We” moments and how to create them.
You are making a speech. You have done your homework, and know who you are talking to and why. You have spoken at length with the client and are clear about what needs to be accomplished in your talk, and what the client wants the audience to feel and do as a result of your talk. The content of your talk is written. Now you need some slam dunk speaking techniques that will humanize you, create trust, and completely bond you with the audience you are with. And you need it fast.
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'Playing the Game' or 'Politics'. How do women approach networking in a large company?
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| Is it a manipulative game, using people for one's own ends? Or simply a key part of building a career, of particular importance for a woman in a male-dominated world?
Andy Lopata looks at the importance of networking for women in corporate life. |
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The Biggest Marketing Secret in the World - Even Billion Dollar Companies Don't Know This
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| The biggest marketing mistake is caused by not knowing a simple fact...
People like to buy from people they relate to. Are you failing to making your business relate-able without even realizing it? |
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Monthly Dinner With My Brother
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| Last night I had dinner with my brother Daniel, one of the partners at Slice of Lime, a Boulder-based web design and development firm. He and I were at TechStars at the end of the day where I gave a talk on “How To Be A CEO.” Afterwards, we had a nice dinner together at The Cheesecake Factory (his choice – I don’t think I’d been there in a decade – and it was surprisingly good), a great talk, and dynamite brother hang out time. |
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What Game are You Really Playing?
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| All choices have consequences. Consider we all have our own warning and support system if we choose to listen to it. The challenge of course is it isn’t quite so structured, but it is there if you look for it. Read on to find out more. |
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How to Gain Mastery and Become World-Class at Anything
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| Chet Holmes was said to be “America’s greatest sales and marketing executive” by Charlie Munger. He said that he had run 40 businesses and never seen anybody consistently achieve the kind of breakthrough results that Chet Holmes had achieved again and again.
Chet Holmes shared his formula and it is SO simple that I’m already smiling because I know what kind of “That’s it?” reactions this will get. What he managed to do is pretty impressive.
He said that if you can do 4000 activities 12 times, or 12 activities 4000 times, which would you pick.
4000 activities 12 times might be fun, depending on the situation…I wouldn’t want to watch 12 movies 4000 times, for example. But there is a trade-off.
Chet Holmes is a ‘turn-around expert’, and he chose the latter option: 12 activities 4000 times. |
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Attract the Business Relationships You Desire
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Do you seem to attract business with people who don’t have a clear vision of what they want, or who are negative in their approach? Some examples might be: We need sales, we’ve got to make our numbers this quarter. Or, the market right now is so bad, it’s really affecting our business. Or clients who say, “I’d love to, but I really can’t afford your services.”
Let’s stop a minute. Are you attracting people and business that you want, or connecting with what you don’t want? Let’s see how you can enable situations, people and events that bring you the joy, success and the wealth that you deserve. |
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Public Relation’s Bad PR
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| Public relations has bad PR. It is known for its fluff and hype, for the sleight-of-hand work, and, whereas, all of that exists, the glitter and flash isn't what makes for an effective campaign. What makes media placement effective is that it tells a story, it educates, it gives the public information on a particular topic or field that they otherwise wouldn't have access to. |
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What are the 3 biggest challenges faced by supply chain/purchasing professionals today? (Survey Result 4)
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| There are many factors both internally as well as externally that are affecting supply chain/ procurement practices today. From the growing talent vacuum to the continuing lack of collaboration between Finance, IT and Purchasing relative to corporate initiatives.
What in your own experiences and opionions are the top 3 issues that procurement professionals face? |
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What Does A CEO Do
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| The CEO has three fundamental roles. First, a CEO is a leader. As a leader, the CEO establishes and directs the vision and mission of the team. In this capacity, the CEO is the source of visionary strength of the company and keeps it on a consistent track to achieving the vision. Second, a CEO is a project manager. In this role, the CEO is responsible for directing the operational activities of the company by scheduling the utilization of the company’s resources, including people and capital equipment. The CEO is responsible for establishing and executing the company’s operating plan that is necessary to achieve the company’s objectives. Third, a CEO is a coach, and as such picks the people for the management team and improves the performance of people through ongoing counseling. |
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Getting Greener
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| Revealing misconceptions about the effort to go green and demonstrating the plentiful benefits. This article was featured in USBusinessReview; I and other local business people provide insight into the benefits of building green business practices. |
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Part I: Can LinkedIn Increase Your Sales?
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| Wondering if social media sites like LinkedIn are worth your time & effort? If so, you've come to the right place. When you read this article, you'll discover how others leverage this unique tool to connect, create opportunities and more. Make sure to check all four articles in this series. |
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The Chaordic Entrepreneur: How Dee Hock Achieved Success
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| Even if you have not heard of him, chances are your wallet is very grateful to Dee Hock. The founder and former CEO of VISA, Hock was no ordinary entrepreneur. He left the business world at the top of his success to focus on creating a new organization theory centered around chaordic organizations. Today, his business and theoretical legacy live on. |
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Owner vs CEO vs Employee how do you manage being all three
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| Would you, as an owner or CEO, keep you on, as an employee? |
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Fixed vs. Growth Mindset
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| Is the brain static or can it be changed? Is it a muscle or more like a bone? This article explores the idea of a fixed vs. growth worldview. |
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Janitorial Power
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| Everyone in your organization should be as powerful as possible. Think about it…When your janitor is powerful, the CEO doesn’t need to mop the floors! |
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Selling with Humor (and a Sorry Butt)
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| Obviously you have to be careful with humor in sales. But sometimes a sorry butt can be your best friend. |
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If You Are A New Manager Make Sure You Copy This
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| If you were to join the James Dyson Company, within your first week, if not first day, you will build a vacuum cleaner. This is whether you are an accountant, call centre operator and or any other job at Dyson’s. Make sure all your team understand the business they are working for. |
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What New Managers Should Know About Their New Team
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| I was at a conference recently, where the CEO of a large UK Corporate stated only 3% of the company’s staff was talented. That implied 97% were not. Poppycock! |
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Checklist for Setting up a Strategic Plan -- To Win
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| What factors make for a strategic plan that you and your company actually will do? Here are key questions to ask yourself to avoid the most common planning mistakes: |
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Visionarys Disease and the CEO
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| We all know the value of vision. The Greek philosophers spoke about it. Former President George Bush recommended attention to "the vision thing." What happens when an organization's problem isn't a lack of vision but too much? What happens when the CEO's vision changes monthly, weekly, or even daily-driving his organization crazy? Welcome to Visionary's Disease. If you are consulting to someone who suffers from it, you are probably very frustrated. |
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Take Your Stand… with Courage and Humility
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| Taking a stand, for anything, requires courage. Courageous leadership is knowing what's right and then acting on it.
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Treat Your Internet Home Business Like The Investment It Is
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| When you run an internet home business you own all the shares and you decide what is done with the profit. This article will outline how sound investment advice strategy can be used to grow an internet home business that you can profit from well into the future. |
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Eleven Ways to Generate Leverage from Your Business
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| Too many businesses – even fairly large ones -- are more like mom and pop entities that take too much time to run, barely make a profit after factoring in the owners’ time, and aren’t worth much on sale. Business owners need to develop sources of leverage so that their business runs without them. That way, work becomes more enjoyable and the business becomes more valuable.
This article describes eleven ways that business owners can generate leverage in their business. |
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New Years Resolutions For Your Sales
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| January 1st always begs the question, 'What's your New Year's Resolution?" Make sure you include these 5 when it comes to setting resolutions for your sales and your business. |
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Your Career Plan - Be The CEO Of Your Own Career!
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| How can you identify a different job or career, find time to job hunt, and get back to enjoying the game of life? Thinking like a CEO will help you map out a successful career with work that's fulfilling and energizing.
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Leadership Styles - the Ten Top Qualities the Best Leaders Show
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| Leadership Styles vary enormously, but there is one overriding quality that is vital in all top leaders...
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Succession Planning - Vital For Your Business At All Levels
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| There are so many issues in management today and one that so often gets missed is planning for every eventuality. If you have no idea what succession planning is then this article is worth a read - it could make all the difference... |
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Succession Planning - A Bigger Solution Than You Might Think
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| Succession planning is the process by which a company, in effect "hires from within." It refers to the way a company identifies employees and prepares them for moving up within the company confines. Here's more about the benefits of Succession Planning. |
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Business Travelers: Why Are You Puttiing Up with all of the Pain?
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| Business Travelers are dealing with inconveniences in travel that are just not necessary anymore, no matter who you are. |
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What to Give the Exec Who Has Everything
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| Give the gift of time this Holiday Season and buy your special person a Virtual Assistant. |
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Business Succession Planning - Three Fundamental Reasons You Need It Now
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| Succession planning is a simple enough process for managers and business owners to have the people they need, when they need them, all the time. And this brings them significant benefits. If that's what you want right now, here's three great benefits... |
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6 Ways to Get Your Visitors To Contact You From Your Contact Us Page
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| Along with the About Us page, your Contact Us page is one of the most important and crucial pages on your site to get right. In fact, the Contact Us page could be considered the absolutely most important page. Even if the rest of your site succeeds in the goals, if visitors fail to find the information they need to contact you then you will bring their shopping experience to a screeching halt.
Shoppers are often hampered if they don't feel they can get a hold of a real person or are limited in their contact options. With all other areas of the site working, a bad contact us page may cause someone to think twice about purchasing with you altogether.
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How to build a resilient workforce
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| In today's business world, CEO's, managers and staff are under great stress to deliver more in less time. They face conflicting demands, long working hours, and constant change in an unforgiving business environment that keeps getting tougher, busier and faster. Companies are finding it difficult to hold onto valuable team members, and business owners are finding themselves working harder and longer, are spending less time with their family, and are burning out. So, what is the solution? |
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The Genesis of Emotional Branding
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| Anthony Mora discusses how the most effective emotional branding is a result of the systematic use of the PR process. |
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How to Build Your Own Business
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| Every day, millions of Americans think about the “American Dream” and roll their eyes in disdain. Where is this American dream, and why don’t I have a piece of that glorious pie? You may have an Ivy League education, or you may be a high school dropout. Either way, the path to true, independent success, is dependent upon the same things... |
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Churchill on Clear Language
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| Winston Churchill, universally acknowledged as a champion of motivational speech, was an early proponent of Clear Language. |
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Governance in the SME Sector (including NFPs) – A Waste of Time?
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| The importance of governance |
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Compensation Definitions: More Must Knows For the Entrepreneur
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| As an entrepreneur you must be a jack of all trades at times. As your business grows, you will need to become at least minimally versed in the area of compensation. After all, paying people is a key to keeping them around. This article will deal with some of the terminology used when describing a compensation program. |
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Lost in Translations
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| Cross-cultural communication is challenge enough for leaders. Add to this challenge effective translation of material into other languages and there is virtually no record! |
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NEEDED
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| A discussion about Ontario's family doctors |
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How to Create Phone Rage or... Hey Boss Are You Hiding?
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| Here's a great and interesting exercise on customer service. Try getting a hold of the owner, CEO, or "Boss of the Joint".
I keep a list of those companies where employees can't even name who owns the company that writes their paycheck. I thought that was pretty amazing and the list is getting longer not shorter.
My new interest - is asking for the boss' number. Recently with the WAMU and Chase merger I have had some questions regarding my mortgage. Steps taken...
1 I first called and asked my customer rep and was sent to a different department.
2. I've searched both corporate websites.
3. I've filled out comments forms and received the standard automated replies
4. I've done customer service surveys noting my dissatisfaction with their communication link never to hear any response back.
5. I've looked for a fax number on t |
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