Category: Corporate Games

After working through yet another long weekend,
I got accused by a former coworker
(whose BBQ I dodged)
of being a workaholic.
I prefer to call it passion
(and smart evasion tactics).

I don’t work for work’s sake.
I am, actually, quite lazy.
I work because I am passionate
and have purpose.

Working on my projects makes me happier
but overall,
workaholics are no happier
or unhappier
than the average person.

If you look at the twenty questions
of whether or not you are a workaholic,
it is all about balance
and purpose.

When you throw a knife,
the impulse is to put everything you have
into it.
A mistake.
If you overextend your arm,
you can damage your joints
and
you won’t be able to throw another knife
until you heal.

The same thing happens in business.
If you overextend your money, time,
or other resources on a specific project,
these resources will be unavailable
for other opportunities.

That could be good,
or bad,
depending on the results.

Think before you put 110% into anything.

You’re told you have to downsize
your department/division/company.
Who do you let go?

Harvey Mackay in We Got Fired! advises
“When a smart boss fires someone
the first question they should ask is NOT:
How do I feel about this person working for me?

The first question they should ask IS:
How would I feel about this person if
he or she were working for my competitor?”

He also points out that the
“best time to hire people is during a downturn
when everyone else is firing them.”

I remember my first kiss.
I remember my first boss.
I know I will always remember
my first fan letters
(from my first novel).

Nothing is ever quite like the first.
If you can be part of that first,
you, your product, your company
will be remembered forever.

How to do that?
Seek out the new
and then
support it.

Today is my one year blogoversary
on this new domain name.
(As some of my readers know,
I guest blogged for a few years
on the now defunct Road To Forbes domain.)

What have I learned over this past year?

The blog business has gotten tougher.
It used to be that you could write some posts,
ping technorati, and
watch the traffic come in.

Not any more.
Too much competition.

This is a normal part of the product cycle.
Usually around this stage,
you’ll see a clear split
between the have’s and the have not’s
traffic-wise.
Eventually the gap widens so much,
it becomes a barrier to entry.

I was part of a discussion
on the future of writing.
One author said straight out
that if the future of writing was advertising,
she wasn’t interested.

Hold up.
Wait a minute.
You don’t know what the “advertising” deal is,
yet you’ve already excluded yourself
from that conversation?
Dumbness.

Even if I didn’t want to go that route,
I’d still like to hear what my competition was doing.
Keep open to ideas
and yourself part of the conversation.

When you think of people with patience,
Donald Trump’s isn’t the first name coming to mind.
Yet in Trump: How To Get Rich,
he says
“I’ve spent from five minutes to fifteen years
waiting for a deal.”

Does waiting mean do nothing?
No
and that is the big difference
between doers and dreamers.

Doers continue to work on the deal,
to be part of the negotiations.
Dreamers simply dream.

Be a doer.

Seth Godin posted about his gmail spam filter
blocking orders from Google.

Is this surprising?
No.
All of my email accounts block legit messages.
One even blocks emails
from addresses in my address book.

Does this mean the spam filter is useless?
Another no.
I read each message reaching my inbox.
I scan each message heading and email address in my trash.
It still saves time.

What are you missing out on
thanks to your spam filter?

A friend plans to invest in real estate.
For the past three years,
he has been learning “everything” there is
to know about real estate.
He admits he still has a lot left to learn.

Another friend also wanted to invest in real estate.
He looked at the first step,
learned what he needed to know to in order to take it,
and then acted.
He did that for the next step and
the next step after that.

Does he know everything about real estate?
No.
But he HAS become a successful real estate investor.

If time is unlimited,
learn for learning’s sakes.
If you want to take action today,
learn only what you need to know.

Sometimes the best candidate
for an open position
is a former employee.

So how to facilitate that?
Fiorella Callocchia,
founder of HR Impact,
advises expanding your open door policy
to include not only communication but
welcoming back past employees.

That means keeping in touch and
recognizing past service.