How I Used Outlook 2010 Quick Steps to Eliminate Custom Macros
In 2008 I wrote a blog post entitled “Outlook Macro: Flag and Move Message to Follow-up Folder” which has become one of my more popular posts. Nearly two years later this method has, fortunately, become obsolete because of the additions in Quick Step features in Outlook 2010. As part of my Getting Things Gone process [...]
Home Office In a Box For $6000
One of the things that is important for any person looking to work more effectively the occasional quiet space to concentrate. Of coures not everybody has room in their home for a home office but I found this great video that explains how to turn a shed into a home office in lieu of taking [...]
Marketing Premium Goods
Image via Wikipedia In Seth Godin’s blog post entitled “Luxury vs. premium” he defines the difference between luxury and premium goods were at their core “Luxury goods are organized waste” and “Premium goods…are expensive variants of commodity goods.” With a premium good you get better performance while with a luxury good you are primarily getting [...]
Follow-up Ensures Customer Satisfaction Even If You’re Not a Salesman
In a recent post on luisrocks.com called “Fighting Cognitive Dissonance one Customer at a Time” Louis makes a point that follow-up one of the most critical tools to ensure your consumers remain happy after a sale. At first this lesson my appear to apply primarily to traditional selling and customer relationships I think the [...]
Tactics to Save IT Jobs in Tough Times
In a recent CIO.com article entitled “Why IT Leaders Shouldn’t Cut Staff” the Denise Dubie discussed the impact of loosing embedded knowledge and skill. While I agree with Denise that this is a significant risk I also believe that CIO and other IT executives need to be creative in trying times express the [...]
First Movers Advantage is Only Valuable for Competent Movers
Today Seth Godin published a post that considers first mover advantage and while it is an old concept he makes an interesting distinction by using the term “first competent mover.” It is important to keep in mind that first movers only maintain advantage if they are competent and will willing to retain the advantage. [...]
Review – Easier, Simpler, Faster: Systems Strategy for Lean IT
Easier, Simpler, Smarter, Faster: Systems Strategy for Lean IT is one of the few books I have found addressing lean implementation and Information Technology. It is a reasonable quick read by Jean Cunningham (co-author of Real Numbers) and Duane Jones that covers a number of topics regarding the impact of lean on business systems including: [...]
How to Create Goal Alignment with a Top-Down Approach
We are nearing the end of the year and most of us in management positions are being asked to provide our plans for next year including budgets, staffing plan, high level project identification, and numerous plans. Thought the year I try to take stock of my position consistently but we all get wrapped up in [...]
Social Media for Business Users 101
In a recent article on TwiTip Darren Rowse provide a number of hint for Twitter users who are looking to interact for business purposes. While these tips apply to Twitter they reach much further into other social sites. Be more interested in helping than making money. Create relationships first. Introduce your company at [...]
50 Most Influential People in Business IT
Recently Baseline released a slide show of the 50 Most Influential People in Business IT that includes the likes of many of the technology thought leaders, CIOs and CEOs of extremely influential companies. While there are many obvious names on the list there are many not so obvious. I found the list to be inspirational [...]
