Connecting the dots of life and business

Yesterday, I attended the local chamber‘s structured networking event. I reference the format because it wasn’t your average social/business gathering. Instead, we had 20 minutes at a table with six attendees and a facilitator to discuss three business topics. We completed this cycle two more times, so I chatted with 15 attendees and three facilitators [...]

Two quick stories that reminded me the importance of pushing when appropriate with different methods. First, my friend who owns a growing business and I were discussing how some employees easily accept “No” for answer. He referenced his struggles with a specific employee who either gave up too easily or was just getting pushed around [...]

I recently ordered a couple clothing items from Zappos that didn’t quite fit. No biggie. I called their customer service line and immediately talked to a human being who changed my order to other items, emailed me the new receipt and a printable return label (i.e. – free shipping on my return). In my haste [...]

Many people attend conferences to grow their business and at SXSW it seems folks try REALLY hard to get noticed. Everyone references Twitter’s explosion in 2007, but I also remember Colin and Rob from Viddler as a 2007 memorable company. Their approach was pretty simple… they both wore Viddler t-shirts every day (I assume it [...]

I spent a good bit of my March in Las Vegas (LeadsCon) and Austin (SXSW) at conferences (which I paid for) and loved sharing startup stories with fellow entrepreneurs (Hint: everyone wants to tell their startup stories). Upon my return, I stopped by the bank and after reviewing my trip, she said, “You entrepreneur guys [...]

In 2006, I had the pleasure of meeting Seth Godin and while I read most of his books, I don’t regularly keep up with his blog. However, I ran across his post last week and it struck a chord. The essence is… one person looked for a reason to NOT help and the other continuously [...]