Posts in Business
I believe the true purpose of a business is to express the values and intent of the owner to the world. It’s an opportunity to practice life. It is a vehicle for freedom, for creativity, for the pursuit of mastery, for artistic expression. It’s a chance to say “this is how I think a company should interact with employees, with customers, with the outside world. This is what matters to me.”
Why you should destroy your HR department (0)
Why most HR departments, intentionally or not, take a philosophical approach that could become a major liability in a global, idea-based economy.
Jelly Chicago - Now every Monday and Wednesday! (1)
Jelly gets regular
Jelly Chicago on Thursday, May 8th (2)
Next Thursday - we hope to see you there. You can sign up here or here.
Free wireless, free coffee, free printer, free long distance land line, free XBox, good people, tasty lunch options, eclectic music. If Shoeless Joe were a web worker, freelancer or entrepreneur he’d think it was heaven…
On the road to becoming a better manager (0)
2008 is going to see yours truly try to become less of a managerial incompetent. Here’s what I’m doing so far towards that end.
Jelly Chicago on January 15th (0)
Next Tuesday - we hope to see you there. You can sign up here or here.
(note: there’s an XBox in the household now for those of you who like that sort of thing…)
Join us for Jelly Chicago Next Friday! (4)
Come work with a bunch of creative people.
How to make any resume better (2)
Six suggestions for dramatically improving your most scrutinized piece of personal marketing
Better living through retail (1)
How dramatically could your business change by embracing the benefits of retail?
Get an accountant (0)
5 reasons to offload your finances to an expert.
Pushing Through The Dip (1)
Godin explains why winners often quit
Why Bathrooms Matter (3)
Latrines represent a major competitive advantage for companies catering to wireless workers. Why do so few take advantage?
Can Desire Be Contagious? (1)
Can you teach passion?
Living the mission (0)
A trip to Google uncovers the ’secret ingredient’ to their success - unbridled passion for what they do.
Meet some people. Check out NextNY (2)
Went to the NextNY roundtable conversation tonight, and had a blast. About 50 people gathered to hear the CEO of Weblogs, Inc, the President of Del.icio.us, and some of the more prominent angel and VC investors in New York. the food and drinks were great, the energy was great, the insight was great.
It’s only been […]
The real paradigm shift (0)
There’s a lot to love about the nature of the web community these days. People working on cool projects, loving what they do, excited to get up each day, truly believing that they have the creativity and passion to change the world in some small way. It’s the complete antithesis of so many corporate environments.
But […]
Simplicity (3)
Simplicity is a difficult thing to come by. We live fragmented, disjointed lives, always running from something, to something. We’re trying to get more and more done with less and less time. It’s an impossible race that leaves us tired, empty, drained.
We as a society love to prize the man or woman who can do […]
Swept anyone off their feet lately? (1)
Overheard a conversation at the coffee shop this morning. A girl fell in love over the weekend.
The guy really did sound amazing, but the thing that struck me the most was that he wasn’t doing anything that remarkable. Rare, but not remarkable.
The guy’s an actor (in New York of all places.) - The thing about […]
Grow Up (2)
When I was in college, I skipped a lot of class.
I used to rationalize it by saying to myself I was busy with other things. I was running a couple student groups, I was coaching football, I was working a job, I was spending a lot of time at the local bookstore reading marketing books. […]
Free Lunch (2)
With the wedding and my upcoming move to Chicago, I’ve been worried a lot about money lately. This week I resolved to not spend any money eating out.
This afternoon, as I was sitting in a Starbucks, I realized that I hadn’t eaten anything all day. A few minutes after I realized I was pretty hungry, […]
web designers and Web Designers (4)
A lot of programmers I’ve talked to lately are worried about Ruby on Rails. They are worried that this framework is going to put a tremendous amount of power in the hands of anyone with a computer and a free weekend. They’re concerned that, just like Frontpage and Dreamweaver did to web design, Rails and […]
two hundred posts. (1)
It’s been nearly three years since I started writing. It’s amazing what a person learns…
I learned for the first time what mourning meant when I lost someone very close to my heart - my childhood beagle, Lucy. I learned that though they may not have complex brains…or skills marketable in the professional workplace…or refined table […]
Wine, cheese and entrepreneurship (0)
Had a great dinner last night with some good friends at work, and the discussion turned to my love for entrepreneurship. Why do I think that it’s such a noble and worthwhile endeavor? Why do I believe in it so much? When you see all the ills that are brought upon the world by a […]
Makes you want to be an Athiest (2)
For all my character flaws, I feel as though I’m generally a pretty good natured guy. But these past few weeks I’ve been extremely angry.
The majority of clients we work with are fantastic - good natured, easy going, and excited to be collectively striving to acheive a shared goal. But once in a while you […]
Don’t open a bank account online (1)
I love online banking. Between online bill pay, statements that are constantly updated, the lack of junk mail and live chatting whenever I need it, it’s very close to the perfect service provider solution.
Unless I want to open a new account.
I needed to open a new checking account and decided to do so online. […]
Blowing up Basecamp (1)
I just blew up Basecamp.
Our company had been searching for a project management solution for a long time before I first joined the team. They had evaluated the pros and cons of Microsoft Project and other tools, and had deemed them all too user-unfriendly for their purposes.
In I trotted with the diea that we use […]
Burning your business into the ground - Part 1 (2)
A little over a year ago, I burned a business into the ground.
People tend to look at me funny when I talk about failing in business. They seem to still believe what we’re all taught in school - that failing in work or in a relationship or in a business means that the person failing […]
Reflections on an un-conference (0)
There’s a whole other world out there, and I caught a glimpse of it this past weekend.
There are people who have started successful consulting firms and have worked for two major media companies…and just reached an age where they can legally buy alcohol.
There are people who have had their lives shattered in the wake of […]
The lost art of networking (1)
Ryan Carson talked sales over at the SvN blog. Lots of good stuff, particularly about networking.
I dedicated a whole chapter to this in A Bright Red Package - networking represents the number one way to get a job, generate sales, find a vendor or look for employees. The business world is entirely about people, and […]
What Are Blogs? (2)
Seth Godin had a very introspective moment yesterday as questioned what exactly blogs are. He has historically prided himself on using his blog to inform and excite its readership - not to contstantly push his books, businesses and other endeavors at us. Interestingly, he views his books as the beginning of a conversation - he’s […]
Mind Your Business (0)
My freshman year in college, I started a painting business. I was spectacularly successful at making sales, racking up $50,000 in paint jobs before the summer began. I was also spectacular successful at planning, purchasing my paint sprayer, my power washer, and other equipment in anticipation of the windfall of referral business I was sure […]
