Chicken Little and Ten Bucks for Butter

If you consume news at all, you know the general tone is fear and concern. The pandemic is far from over despite full stadiums at sporting events and airports no longer asking about covid symptoms. The world's population is about to go over 8 billion and there are about half a million or so new cases every day. Some would said that is a small percentage; I say it's lot of people.

The affect of the pandemic is showing up at the gas pump, the grocery store, and everywhere else we buy stuff. The "R-word" is dominating pontificators' commentaries while we pay $10 for butter and in my country of Canada, somewhere between $1.60 and $2 for a litre of gas.  

It is strange that almost all of my clients are desperate to find employees and yet the news reports say we are in a financial crunch. Perhaps millions have opted to try and become a TikTok star in lieu of actual work?

Meanwhile this happened.

There have been 13 recessions since World War II which is defined by a period of temporary economic decline during which trade and industrial activity are reduced, generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters. I'm not completely sure why that means we should run for the bunker for fear the sky may actually land on us.

Some of the companies which were founded during global recessions include; Disney, HP, Netflix, Microsoft, Uber, Pinterest, General Electric, HBO, WhatsApp, Ford, Revlon, Ocean Spray, IBM, Airbnb, American Airlines, Dominos, Instagram, General Motors, Hyatt Hotels, FedEx, and iRobot - which Amazon acquired this past summer for $1.7B. 

What about us?

How does that affect you and me while we live our lives, get by, and not fear our next paycheck is in jeopardy like it was over the past three years? Well, I'm still here to write this post and you're still here to read it, so let's keep going. 

While Chicken Little worries about the sky falling on her head, we have survived worse. We might have to drive less and eat less butter, but community has never been more important than it is right now. So while the experts opine about the next 12 months, perhaps we can do something to make life a bit brighter.

Ask someone how we can help them.

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Enough is Enough

The annual strategic meetings are on. The big boss says profit margins need to widen. The new product line has to help increase market share. The southwest division has to pick it up on sales results. The list goes on.

The desire for infinite monetary growth permeates the room. No one is allowed to say this may be a flat year because of market shifts and customer demands. No one would suggest business comes with ebbs and flows as does life.

More of more!

In the developing world, it appears the need for prosperity and material possessions is a core belief and desire. Do we really need the four bedroom house on half an acre? Will granite counter tops bring us nirvana? Are 34 dress shirts enough? Can profits increase infinitely? Will we ever have enough?

We know buying stuff keeps the economy going and all of us employed. We need to ensure we can sustain our lives now and into retirement but the desire for something that we can’t even define is creating widespread unhappiness and uncertainty. Perhaps the bigger decision is to figure out who we want to spend our time with and what experiences we want.

More is rarely better.
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We Need More!

The annual strategic meetings are on. The big boss says profit margins need to widen. The new product line has to help increase market share. The southwest division has to pick it up on sales results. The list goes on.

The desire for infinite monetary growth permeates the room. No one is allowed to say this may be a flat year because of market shifts and customer demands. No one would suggest business comes with ebbs and flows as does life.

More of more!

In the developing world, it appears the need for prosperity and material possessions is a core belief and desire. Do we really need the four bedroom house on half an acre? Will granite counter tops bring us nirvana? Are 34 dress shirts enough? Can profits increase infinitely? Will we ever have enough?

We know buying stuff keeps the economy going and all of us employed. We need to ensure we can sustain our lives now and into retirement but the desire for something that we can’t even define is creating widespread unhappiness and uncertainty. Perhaps the bigger decision is to figure out who we want to spend our time with and what experiences we want.

Or we could continue deploying the hope and wish strategy.
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Do You Trust?

The Merriam-Webster dictionary lists "trust" as a belief that someone or something is reliable, good, honest, and effective. They use words like assured reliance on the character and a charge or duty imposed in confidence.

Trust is a big word we far too often toss around like it's part of a sales pitch. Trust me, my friend. It's all about trust. I trust that guy. But what is trust, really?

Trust is the transference of faith and Rachel Botsman examined the trust economy and collaborative consumption in her 2012 TEDTalk which continues to grow.


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Enough Already!

The annual strategic meetings are on. The big boss says profit margins need to widen. The new product line has to help increase market share. The southwest division has to pick it up on sales results. The list goes on.

The desire for infinite monetary growth permeates the room. No one is allowed to say this year will probably be a flat year because of market shifts and customer demands. No one would suggest business comes with ebbs and flows. And so does life.

We Need More Stuff!

In the developing world, it appears the need for prosperity and material possessions is a core belief and desire. But as we emerged from the worse economic downturn in eight decades there could be a slight shift in some perspective.

Do we really need the four bedroom house on half an acre? Can we wait another year before we buy that new car? Are 34 dress shirts enough? Does anyone need that many pairs of shoes?

When will we have enough? When will it be enough?

We know buying stuff keeps the economy going and all of us employed. We need to ensure we can sustain our lives now and into retirement but the desire for something that we can’t even define is creating widespread unhappiness and uncertainty.

Perhaps the bigger decision is to figure out who we want to spend our time with and what experiences we seek.

Or we could keep hoping we find enough.
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What is Trust?

The Merriam-Webster dictionary lists "trust" as a belief that someone or something is reliable, good, honest, and effective. They use words like assured reliance on the character and a charge or duty imposed in confidence.

Trust is a big word we far too often toss around like it's part of a sales pitch. Trust me, my friend. It's all about trust. I trust that guy. But what is trust, really?

Trust is the transference of faith and Rachel Botsman examined the trust economy and collaborative consumption in her 2012 TEDTalk which continues to grow.


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Infinite Growth

The annual strategic meetings are on. The big boss says profit margins need to widen. The new product line has to help increase market share. The southwest division has to pick it up on sales results. The list goes on.

The desire for infinite monetary growth permeates the room. No one is allowed to say this year will probably be a flat year because of market shifts and customer demands. No one would suggest business comes with ebbs and flows. And so does life.

We Need More Stuff!

In the developing world, it appears the need for prosperity and material possessions is a core belief and desire. But as we emerged from the worse economic downturn in eight decades there could be a slight shift in some perspective.

Do we really need the four bedroom house on half an acre? Can we wait another year before we buy that new car? Are 34 dress shirts enough? Does anyone need that many pairs of shoes?

When will we have enough? When will it be enough?

We know buying stuff keeps the economy going and all of us employed. We need to ensure we can sustain our lives now and into retirement but the desire for something that we can’t even define is creating widespread unhappiness and uncertainty.

Perhaps the bigger decision is to figure out who we want to spend our time with and what experiences we want.

Or we could keep hoping we find enough.
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Kneale Mann | People + Priority = Profit

How Much is Enough?

The annual strategic meetings are on. The big boss says profit margins need to widen. The new product line has to help increase market share. The southwest division has to pick it up on sales results. The list goes on.

The desire for infinite monetary growth permeates the room. No one is allowed to say this year will probably be a flat year because of market shifts and customer demands. No one would suggest business comes with ebbs and flows. And so does life.

We Need More Stuff!

In the developing world, it appears the need for prosperity and material possessions is a core belief and desire. But as we emerged from the worse economic downturn in eight decades there could be a slight shift in some perspective.

Do we really need the four bedroom house on half an acre? Can we wait another year before we buy that new car? Are 34 dress shirts enough? Does anyone need that many pairs of shoes?

When will we have enough? When will it be enough?

We know buying stuff keeps the economy going and all of us employed. We need to ensure we can sustain our lives now and into retirement but the desire for something that we can’t even define is creating widespread unhappiness and uncertainty.

Perhaps the bigger decision is to figure out who we want to spend our time with and what experiences we want.  

Or we could keep hoping we find enough.
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Kneale Mann | People + Priority = Profit

istock

Springing Forward: Does it Help?

The debate over daylight saving time – which affects much of the planet – has been going on for a couple of hundred years. Does it save energy? Does it give us more time to do things? Does it help our lives? Governments can’t get more than a third of the registered voters to cast a ballot in any election, so the chances of the entire planet agreeing on this issue would be zero. So we can move on.

We know our most precious resource is time yet how often do we spend it unwisely? Discussions about the pros and cons of moving our clocks an hour happen twice a year. The rest of the time we grumble about how busy we are doing busy things being busy. Time flies, life moves fast, and suddenly we reach a point where we take stock and try to calculate how much of our finite time we actually spend enjoying this experience called life.

It's just clocks and money?

David Thackston wrote: “A positive effect that Daylight Saving Time has on the economy is that it gives people the opportunity to spend more time outside of their homes in the evenings, attending sports events, shopping, and in most all cases, spending money.”

As leaders, how can we ensure the entire team is spending their time wisely rather than doing busy things that make us all look like we’re progressing? Perchance we should take a moment to pause and reflect how we are spending our time together. We may not need that additional meeting this week. Perhaps we should afford people more time to grow and think and create.

Or we can continue to complain that we have no time.
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Kneale Mann | Leadership Strategist, consultant, writer, speaker, executive coach facilitating performance growth with leaders, management, and teams.

timecenter

The Dreaded C-Word

The responses are interesting when I ask about company culture. Often it's a visceral response. Sometimes it induces a look of bewilderment. Occasionally a dismissive laugh. Who has time for culture? What does culture have to do with work? We need revenue not all that touchy feely stuff.

Culture is a tricky topic. Many have trouble defining, creating, and maintaining it in the work space where deadlines are endless and revenue stress is constant.

The Greyhound Effect

When leaders are more focused on the bottom line than their people, collaborative culture is often replaced by a competition where the prize can never been caught like in a greyhound race. It’s telling how many executives I speak with earmark the importance of people yet often remain the catalysts for a carrots and sticks management style.

My passion is to help leaders and organizations put culture and collaboration at the forefront of their efforts. I'm currently collaborating on a process with a colleague which will help business owners, executives, teams, or companies of any size. It merges culture with measured results. More on that soon.

Berber Carpet and Exposed Brick

A relaxed dress code and premium coffee in the lunch room doesn't create good culture. Open collaboration, fair leadership, and clear direction are a good start.

Make your business an inviting place to work and people will like working there. Open lines of true communication and you will tap into your most valuable resource. If we curate a collaborative atmosphere with people as our focus, business will thrive.

If we focus solely on money, talent retention will remain 
a mystery and revenue will suffer.

Kneale Mann

flickr

2011: Did We Make It?

Historians may write their summation of 2011 a bit different than we are writing it now. When you look at it you can certainly say we have endured another challenging year. As we step into the Google Zeitgeist for 2011, the words that I keep thinking about are adversity, hope, conflict and empowerment.

What are yours?


Kneale Mann

visual credit: google | song credit: mat kearney - sooner or later

Developing Your Offline Business

Nice to Tweet You

If you work hard, remain open to all possibilities and build a connection, it is astonishing how many people will help you. Each connection is a person, not just another number to add to our LinkedIn profile.

The digital universe can connect us with people who can help us, work with us, hire us, befriend us and collaborate with us. In the last five years, I have had the pleasure of meeting hundreds of people and not all through quick clicks and shares. It takes time but it's well worth spending if you take the connection to the next step and get to know the people you bump into in cyberspace.

Digital Will Only Help So Far

You may say it's the power of social media but that is just the starting point. We bump into hundreds, perhaps thousands of people every day and make no connection. It is when we set up a call or meeting and get to know each other outside of the busy online world and connect as people that the power begins to be realized.

The in-person meeting or phone call will never be diminished and should never been removed from your business plan. It is the single tactic that can crush you or help you.
I can't speak for you, but I know I need to pick up the phone more often!

Often companies don’t put forth the effort because they don't want to put forth the effort. They can point to other reasons but perhaps they don't care to hear what customers are saying about them. The world is shrinking yet the basics have never been more critical – reading, writing, partnerships, service and being human.

Drop the tweet and pick up a phone

Kneale Mann

image credit: rachelcreative
original post Apr 2011

One Simple Way to Save Your Economy

We All Want It. Do We All Give It?
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You've done your online research, you asked some people who already have one and you are now at the store with money in hand ready to buy one. The guy behind the counter has never heard of it, the person in aisle 27 can’t find it and the manager looks annoyed to be interrupted for something so trivial as a paying customer.

That familiar generic voice on the customer service line says they are experiencing a high volume of calls. You have to endure 17 minutes of some instrumental soft rock nugget until Bernie gets on the line. You explain the problem and he tells you he has to transfer you to another department. Another 11 minutes of another ditty and Jennifer picks up the phone. She informs you that Bernie was incorrect and back to yet another snappy number while you wait for George.

You Give Up

It begins to make more sense to toss the thing in the garbage. Your time is more valuable than what you spent on the it, it never worked properly, the claims in all the advertising were misleading and it's time to cut the bait.

Clearly many of us are giving terrible service. Is that really the best way for us to turn our economy around? Should we not give a crap and hope people buy our stuff? If we really really really want them to pay us money, it won't matter that we don't care, right?

Serving Customer Needs

Have a complete look at your business. Have someone outside of your business have an honest look at it as well. Then actually ask your customers for their feedback. This is not to tear it apart but rather to find the weak spots. It will help stop the head scratching when revenue dips. You may think it’s a product issue but it’s often something deeper and much more human.

It’s sad that we are resigned to the fact that the bar for customer service is so low it’s scraping on the pavement. Lift it up a few inches and you will slay your competition. If we want to turn your economy around, actually care.

Do You Think It Will Work?

Kneale Mann

image credits: despair | robotnine
I am available for a 30 minute complimentary introduction call to discover where I can help your business. Feel free to contact me via email and let's chat.

Huffington’s Big Business Idea

There’s no denying that Arianna Stasinopoulosis Huffington is a successful person. According to compete.com, the mega news agency CNN's website has approximately 28.5 million unique visitors a month. That is a pretty impressive number but with their worldwide footprint and huge staff it’s understandable. Well, Arianna's site The Huffington Post – which was purchased by AOL this past February for $315 Million – receives about 23 million unique monthly visitors.

The work involved in building such an online empire is immense. It took long hours and a lot of sacrifice. At 60, Huffington works hard. But anyone who is an overachiever will admit (perhaps only to themselves) there is a physical cost to all this work. Like so many before her, Huffington almost paid the ultimate price for her achievements.

In this TEDWomen talk held in Washington DC last December, Arianna Huffington outlines her big business idea that she believes can be the secret to success. [video]



Kneale Mann

visual credit: TED

Starbucks and the Economic Meltdown

As recently as 4-5 years ago, many of us who do business presentations used Starbucks as an aspirational brand. It was the trading up transaction. You would do without something to get that $5 latte and millions of people go into their 17,000 stores every day and do just that. Then the economy took a kicking and suddenly Starbucks was viewed – by some – as too expensive or a frivolous luxury we couldn’t afford.

So instead of assuming what people were doing or thinking, the company thought it would be wise to actually find out. Matthew Guiste is the Director of Global Social Media at Starbucks. In this video presentation, he talks about how they engage millions of fans through Twitter, FourSquare, YouTube, Facebook and various other channels.

Your business may not be as big as Starbucks but this could give you ideas for engaging with your customers.



Kneale Mann

video credit: leaderlab

Rights and Privileges

We All Remember Where We Were When

That is a phrase that is only uttered a handful of times during a lifetime. Depending on your age, that is a reference to the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the death of Kurt Cobain, September 11th or last night when the world tried to digest the news that one of the most sought after criminals had been killed.

At the height of the frenzy, there were over 4,000 tweets a second and every news agency on television, radio, print and online were scrambling for information. We were the news cycle. We were instantly brought back to 2001.

Your Vote Counts

Today is a national election in my country. Canadians were cynical that the government had passed a non-confidence vote in our house of commons to force the minority leading Conservative party to call an election. It’s expensive and no business or country or individual can afford to spend unwisely these days. According to the polls, this will be an historic day. Time, as they say, will tell.

We live in an instant news world. About two billion of us are online which is still only a third of the world's population, but the power for each of us to publish information has caused exponentially more content. Some is correct, some is reactionary, some is for good and some is not.

The Social Web has Changed the World

Through years of building online relationships, it is an honour to be able to send a message to people I have connected with from all over the world. There are kind emails and texts from caring people from places I’ve never been. They are people, not job titles. Last night, we shared something profound and most of us were alone or with a couple of other people. Billions were getting the news one-on-one.

Digital channels have given us the ability to share information quickly. Last night, major news agencies were quoting the social web as much as their own sources. Twitter, Facebook and the Blogosphere is a constant hum of information and opinion. As the saying goes, we must remember so we don't forget. And millions of us have the ability to share our voice.

Some call that a right, some call it a privilege but it certainly should not be taken for granted.

Kneale Mann

image credit: istock

Your Biggest Business Advantage

Nice to Tweet You

If you work hard, remain open to all possibilities and build a connection, it is astonishing how many people will help you. Each connection is a person, not just another number to add to our LinkedIn profile.

The digital universe can connect us with people who can help us, work with us, hire us, befriend us and collaborate with us. In the last 48 hours
I inquired about three projects with a small handful of people.

I met all but two of them online, I have spent time with three of them in person and four were strangers a year ago.

Digital Will Only Help So Far

You may say it's the power of social media but that is just the starting point. We bump into hundreds, perhaps thousands of people every day and make no connection. It is when we set up a call or meeting and get to know each other outside of the busy online world and connect as people that the power begins to be realized.

The in-person meeting or phone call will never be diminished and should never been removed from your business plan. It is the single tactic that can crush you or help you.
I can't speak for you, but I know I need to pick up the phone more often!

Often companies don’t put forth the effort because they don't want to put forth the effort. They can point to other reasons but perhaps they don't care to hear what customers are saying about them. The world is shrinking yet the basics have never been more critical – reading, writing, partnerships, service and being human.

Do you think it might work?

Kneale Mann

image credit: gruntled

Your Idea Could Save a Life

That may sound like a provocative notion but think about all those ideas that are rolling around in your mind. Yesterday we discussed thinking big versus doing big.

Sebastian Thrun is a professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Stanford University, where he also serves as the Director of the Stanford AI Lab. His research focuses on robotics and artificial intelligence.

He led the development of the robotic vehicle Stanley which won the 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge. Stanley is now on exhibit at the Smithsonian. Sebastian has been working toward a time when we no longer drive our cars. You may think this TEDTalk is about technology and gadgets. It is about a far more important idea.

It's also really freakin' cool! [video]


Kneale Mann

visual credit: TED

Reflective Time

Something happens this time of year.

Obviously, Christmas is not celebrated by everyone but the business world is ruled by two dates around this time of year. And if you have spent any time doing any last minute shopping, we may wonder how far from the original meaning of the Holidays some have gotten. We push envelopes with communications and information but some traditions are deep rooted such as turkey and stuffing and brightly wrapped gifts.

Celebrations increase and the mood leans positive. I have too many people to thank here and would hate to miss someone but the number of people who I have had the privilege to meet through business and the social web is absolutely astounding. And if you have spent any time doing any last minute shopping, one could certainly wonder how far from the original meaning of the Holidays most have gotten.

Review. Recharge. Reload.

There is hope for a fresh new year around the corner and some new challenges to tackle with renewed energy. The world has limped through tough economic times – and perhaps simply because I’m looking for it – many look to 2011 with optimism.

I loved Mitch Joel’s post today about the myth of a work/life balance. This is our lives, this is our work, this is our world. I do take it personally and so should you. But in all of this, we can build that community and kick some serious backsides together.

Happy Holidays :-)

knealemann | email


image credit: pluggd

Google 2.010

Debt, hope, birth, crisis, joy, conflict, death, Olympics, victories, hurricanes, Zuckerberg, happiness, suffering, WikiLeaks, bailout, eclipse, laugher, World Cup, earthquakes, Obama, advancements, economy...

It’s been quite a year.
[video]



knealemann | email


video credit: Google