Posts Tagged ‘Business’

What do you do if a competitor starting slinging mud at you, making outright false claims, or excessively stretching the truth about you?  Should you descend to their level and start slinging mud back?

A company’s president recently faced this basic question. The topic made for perhaps one of the most interesting, fresh topic, posts I’ve read in a while. So, do you sling mud too, or, ignore it, push forward, and take the high road?

Here’s something to think consider

Personally, I agree with the sentiment to avoid slinging mud. But there’s a difference between participating in the same behavior and standing up for yourself. In today’s social media world of broad transparency, you cannot afford to ‘not’ say anything.

Borrowing from a Harvard Business Review post yesterday, a happy coincidence:

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Given current economic conditions it is hard to believe there may be a looming labor shortage in the U.S. Periodicals of all size and repute have discussed the topic. Just do a search (boomer “labor shortage”) and read a few articles to reach your own conclusion.

The short version, as soon as 3-5 years the U.S., due to increasing numbers of Boomers retiring, will be left with a smaller, less-experienced work force.

There are so many variables, the argument won’t have been decided for another 20-30 years .

Tied to concerns of a potential labor shortage are concerns involving knowledge transfer.  As the more ‘worldly’ move on, they’re taking their hard-won knowledge with them.  Those left behind will have to relearn everything themselves.  There is a potential loss of competitiveness from things like lost productivity, re-learning, and ability to recruit to meet needs.

Here’s a real-world example.

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For the past few days I’ve been watching a discussion over what SaaS (Software as a Service) is. The interactions seem to have broken down into two main camps.

On one side, there are those who feel SaaS is defined by it’s technology platform, particularly whether it is single or multi-tenancy*. If you’re not using a multitenancy* platform, you can’t be profitable and you’ll fail. Period.

Just because a service provider does not have MT does not doom them to failure. If you have a very large scale customer, particularly in relation to the rest of your customer base, it may make sense to stand up a separate environment just for them.

The discussions have reminded me, a lot, of the old UNIX versus Windows diatribes 15 years ago. They were something along the lines of: Only UNIX for ‘real’ work; Windows for the ‘little people.’

If another major customer came along that might represent a 30% revenue bump, it just might make sense standing up yet another MT as ST instance for them as well. Is my business doomed? No. Very happy actually. Whichever path chosen, it would be economically driven.

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With so many people looking for work, seeking answers to win the next opportunity, this question is all too common.  At the same time, the suggested answers vary wildly but, for the most part seem to miss the crux of the issue.  Why should I hire you?

Consider these common responses:

I am:

• Accustomed to a fast pace and will hit the ground running
• Will be a valuable asset to your organization
• Able to handle stress and pressure
• Think quickly on my feet
• Am a team player

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I was catching up on blogs today…been away from my reading awhile…and saw one of Seth Godin’s dozens of philosophical questions.  The crux of his article was about doing indispensable work and cheating the clock.  We face more distractions, greater demands, more complex lives than ever before—nothing new there at all.  You also cannot work more than 24 hours in a day.  Too many folks work 10-12 hours a day, or, at least they’re ‘there’ that long.

One of his questions struck me as being worth discussing with my readers: What If…you were only allowed 5 hours a day to do your job?

Here are some suggestions:

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This past Friday, I attended a competition worth $50,000.  In short, five entrepreneurs had been selected as finalists in a business plan competition.  Each had 3 minutes to present their business plan and then do a 1 minute Q&A session.  Targeting about :30 for all 5 to present, it actually took just shy of 40 minutes.

Here were the five companies:

• Data center cooling solution
• Sign language system (for the deaf)
• Coffee shop point of sale (POS) system
• Diesel/Ethanol hybrid fuel system
• Pre/Post conception gender determiner

Of all the companies originally submitting it is hard to imagine a more diverse group of finalists.

Question is, if you were being asked, as an investor, to pony up $50,000 based on a 4 minute discussion, how would you decide?  Surprisingly, keeping this frame of thought in mind, it became very clear, very quickly, who I would put my money behind.

At a very high level:

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Here in the U.S. we’re a competitive, creative people.  Not claiming that we have the corner on the market, but it is core to who we are.  Unfortunately that also comes across as arrogance (ask folks internationally).  Generally, being competitive is a good thing.  In some regards though, how we compete needs to change ASAP.

For a very long time, here in the U.S., we spent a lot of time competing amongst ourselves.  There is the State level:

And then, within a State, we have counties.

And, if that weren’t enough, we can add on a stack of other, lesser, but no-less-self-important municipalities at the City, Town, Township, Village, or other levels.

Before you know it, you have hundreds, thousands, of individual governmental and societal entities that feel it is in their best interest to compete directly with their adjacent neighbor(s) on everything from who has the best high school football team, to economic concerns.

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Ann Arbor SPARK hosts a monthly series, Starting Your Own New Business. The day-long seminar includes presenters on finance, accounting, marketing, product development, and other topics related to launching one’s own business. Below, is the high-level presentation for Friday, March 19, 2010.

This high-level presentation discusses:

• Do you have what it takes…to be an entrepreneur
• Key topics important for successfully moving the Idea for a product, through development, and ensuring it survives to reach fruition.

For some time now, we have been hearing about a looming labor shortage in ‘10-15 years.’  That forecast has been out there quite a while now.  It seems odd that, even as we’re suffering higher unemployment than we are accustomed to, that this remains an almost certainty.

Why is that?  If you’ve not monitored labor trends, there are at least two key drivers.  One, is that the following generations (X-, Y-, …) are smaller than the baby boomer generation.  As the boomers begin retiring, there are fewer to replace them.  At the same time, other major parts of the world, such as India, China, and Brazil, are rapidly developing and more effectively competing for those same people we’d normally bring to the U.S.  Now, they’re returning or simply not coming to our shores to begin with.

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Even though I’ve had my iPhone for quite a while now, I continue to be amazed at the sheer range and depth of application offerings available for it.  Even when there were ‘only’ 20,000 apps available, there was always something available to solve the need of the moment.  Now there’s over 133,000 apps, the sky’s the limit.

One of my favorite examples was while having coffee with my friend and minister.  He was bemoaning the fact he had the Bible installed on his smartphone, but that it wouldn’t let him read anything past about Matthew or Mark.  Sure enough, I was able to find, download, install, and show him a copy of the Bible on my iPhone, with 6 translations, in about 2 minutes.  There really is, an app for everything!

So here are some of my own ‘top’ apps for the iPhone, based on my current activities:

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