The Agile Scaleup

Ten Ideas That are Changing the World

"...keeping you great" Ten Minutes with the Growth Guy

HEADLINES: Print-Friendly Version

NOTE: March 21 Deadline - Hotel Reservations for  Sales and Marketing Summit -- our $159/night room rate expires March 21 -- if you plan to attend the April 22 -- 23 Sales and Marketing Summit in Orlando, please make your hotel reservations -- here's a link to info. We try and get the hotel to extend the rate for late registrations, but it's never guaranteed. And you can cancel later, so reserve a room if you think you might attend.

Ten Ideas That Are Changing the World -- this is the cover  story of the March 24 issue of Time Magazine.  Idea #7 is "Authenticity" and  features Jim Gilmore and Joe Pine, authors of Authenticity: What Consumers Really Want as well as their  best-seller The Experience Economy. BTW, Jim  is one of the main keynote speakers at our upcoming Sales and Marketing  Summit.  Here's a link to their piece in  the extensive article.
 

Jim and Joe are referenced  throughout the article, written by Time staff writer John Cloud who interviewed them extensively for the piece. We're honored that this venerable magazine is devoting so much coverage to why the desire for authenticity is now driving consumer behavior and business change and we're excited to be hosting them at our event. We encourage you to read what Time is saying about the growing role of authenticity and when you're ready to continue the conversation about authenticity, be sure to go to www.AuthenticityBook.com where you can explore, learn, and share your own ideas on getting real in an  increasingly unreal world.

FORTUNE Small Business Focus Group -- see  invite to participate in a focus group session at the Sales and Marketing  Summit -- under DETAILS below. $100 Amex gift certificate for each participant -- plus experience how the focus group process works, something you can use in your own sales and marketing activities.
   
No Thursday insight -- I'm on spring break  with my family -- I'm taking a break from writing which is why this one is short  as well.

DETAILS:

We are recruiting a select group of small business owners who read FORTUNE Small Business to join us in Orlando during the FSB and Gazelles Sales and Marketing Summit to share their valuable insights and opinions on how technology helps grow business.
 
This invitation-only focus group will be conveniently held in the same hotel as the Growth Summit -- the Marriott Orlando Airport, Orlando, FL-- and will not conflict with any of the conference program. The focus group will last approximately 90 minutes. We recognize that your time is valuable, so if you are selected, you will receive $100 in American Express Gift Cheques for your participation.
 
If you are a small business owner and a FORTUNE Small Business reader and you would like to participate, please visit the link below and enter your contact information:
 
http://www.businessownerscouncil.com/surveys/m/3033fg/invite.asp

Best Tagline

"...keeping  you great" Ten Minutes with the Growth Guy

 

HEADLINES: (All About Employees!)

How Do  You Handle Dress Codes -- FORTUNE Small Business Magazine is looking for small business owners who would like to share the challenges they have experienced and/or the solutions they've come up with in dealing with their employees' dress codes. Whether it's tattoos that are covered up or out in the open, jeans or slacks, lawsuits or wardrobe allowances, we want to hear about it. By small business we mean 1 to 100 employees and/or $1 million to $100 million in annual revenues. We also prefer businesses located outside the New York area. If you have something to contribute to the story, please contact [email protected] with the subject heading: "DRESS CODE IN THE WORKPLACE."

How to  Know if Someone Has to Go? -- Wallace  Brumley, CEO of Brumley Professional Employer Services, has a simple way to know if an employee should go. Annually he sends out a letter commemorating an employee on their employment anniversary -- and it includes hotel and dinner. If he doesn't feel like sending the letter, it tells him it's time for the employee to go.

The  Southwest Airlines of the Portable Storage Industry -- A Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG) is a key tool for  motivating employees.  Stephen Shang, CEO  of Falcon Storage   sent me the following note on Monday "Our BHAG is "To be the Southwest Airlines of  the portable storage industry." I had always thought that this was just a 'rallying cry' for our Boxperts (what we call our employees).  What I didn't realize was that it was a way to share the dream of Falcon Storage with the world, and when they are on board, they help make that dream come true in ways I never dreamed possible."

Enter Herb Kelleher, founder of Southwest  Airlines -- continues Shang "You see, I've been doing a lecture at the University of Texas Entrepreneurship program.  When asked where I envisioned our company in 30 years, it was only logical to mention our BHAG.  Well one of the professors knew Herb Kelleher, and recommended that we meet.  We had lunch this past Friday and needless to say, it added JET FUEL to our BHAG!!!  The meeting helped us really flesh out what it means to be the Southwest Airlines of our industry; we gained so many nuggets of wisdom from Herb.  For Falcon's culture, this meeting will be one of those legends that we tell for many years to come.  Most importantly, it helps us gain a laser like focus on this Big Hairy Audacious Goal." Here are a couple photos of Herb and Shang's team and a poster they  presented to Herb with all their Boxperts' signatures.

Best Tagline -- and I love Falcon Storage's tagline "It's a box... you put stuff in it!" You  don't get any more basic than this!

Capturing Employee  Intellectual Capital -- Lee Rosen, President of Raleigh-Durham based Rosen  Law Firm, launched an internal company wiki. Note's Rosen "I used a $1000 contest to encourage our lawyers and staff to contribute to the wiki and within a year we had over 4000 pages of intellectual content!" Rosen also pointed me to the recent Inc. article about how companies are using wikis which provides more details behind Rosen's use of their wiki.  BTW, check out Lee's video segment on their home page -- an excellent example of how to  use imbedded video to help your customers and establish credibility. 

Less  Employees Paid More Even for Schools! -- my favorite article since my  last insight (and my personal favorite so far in 2008) is this NY Times piece on Lee Vanderhoek's bold experiment with a new charter school in NY where he's cutting out administration, laptops, elective courses, and increasing student/teacher ratios and then taking the savings and offering teachers six figure salaries, in many cases twice what they make now. Quoting Vanderhoek in the NY Times article "I would much rather put a phenomenal, great teacher in a field with 30 kids and nothing else than take the mediocre teacher and give them half the number of students and give them all the technology in the world." BTW, Vanderhoek, a 31 year old Yale graduate and former middle school teacher, built a test preparation company that pays its tutors far more than the competition -- once again, showing the power of entrepreneurs to lead and change the world.
   
Employee  Education -- and this note this week from David Rich, founder of  ICC/Decision Services, a leading customer experience management and measurement  company, "Wanted to let you  know that we bought your Rockefeller Habits DVD and have put it to good use. At the beginning of each weekly staff meeting we show a section. It is a great review for those who have attended the workshop and a great introduction for those who have not. Over the years I probably have had 80 hours of Rockefeller Habits (BOG, YEO, EO, plus THREE Gazelles 2-Day Rockefeller workshops)....HOWEVER I always gain motivation to do something a little better with each viewing/exposure." Repetition is the key to mastery.
   
Principles  of Persuasion -- persuasive skills are crucial in dealing with employees, customers, and the rest of your stakeholders/people. For everyone that raved about Dr. Robert Cialdini's two-hour presentation at the last Growth Summit (the finest presentation I've EVER seen), I encourage you to participate in one of their two-day workshops. I sent three of my team members to their workshop this week in Phoenix. They are also hosting a workshop in Montreal April 10 -- 11 in conjunction with the McGill International Executive Institute. FYI, it's a workshop highly recommended by Charles Munger, Warren Buffett's partner. Enough said! For more information, please visit www.hrdpop.com.

Name Price First

"...keeping you great" Ten Minutes with the Growth Guy

HEADLINES:

Negotiators Who Name Price  First, Win!!  We've posted a short video  from Dr. Victoria Medvec's presentation from last year's Sales and Marketing  Summit where she outlines this critical point -- you'll see it in the right hand  column of our Gazelles.tv website. Take three minutes and watch this video -- attendees at last year's Summit have shared with me story after story how her four-hour program has made them millions of dollars and particularly her point about naming price first. There's a reason Goldman Sachs is one of her main clients -- and now her entire four-hour workshop is on an interactive DVD. John Ratliff, CEO of Appletree Answers, who had the fastest growing company in the 2007 Private Company Index (PCI), has been putting all his key leaders and managers through her DVD interactive course (also online) with great results.

Sales Superstar Checklist -- one of the complimentary  tools for this year's upcoming Sales and Marketing Summit faculty is Jack Daly's "Sales Superstar Checklist." Jack, from my viewpoint, is the top sales management trainer. It's sales management (or lack of) that is at the root of most sales function challenges. I'm always excited to hear Jack -- it's like I need my yearly dose of "Jack." Here's a  link to the tools. 

"Five People you MUST Meet" Update -- I made a huge mistake in programming our IntroNetworks system which eliminated a bunch of obvious "matches." If you already posted your profile, please log back in and take a look at your push pin diagram -- there are likely several people in our network that are close matches to your interests, questions, etc. (those with pins in your "inner circle"). Take a look at their profiles and find out why there was a match. I, myself, found a critical match to a key question for our company -- that person has agreed to give me a hand in solving our problem -- thanks Jim. And if you haven't posted your profile, then take five minutes and join the "Gazelles  Community" and find the five most important people you MUST meet  -- for User Type leave as "Member" unless you're planning to attend the Sales  and Marketing Summit, then make it "Member@Summit" since we're going  to make physical connections at the event.

Long Lost Friend Found -- Brian Wolf, CEO of Baltimore-based Activus Technology Corporation, sent me this short note "I registered for the intronet your company put together.  I want to thank you for doing so.  While looking over some of the other members of the network, I came across someone I knew years ago but had lost contact with.  We've been able to reconnect, and renew a friendship.  Much thanks!"

FORTUNE Small Business Magazine Focus Groups -- FSB is going to run some more focus groups at the Sales  and Marketing Summit -- a way to garner feedback from leaders of small to mid-size firms. Those that participated last year had a blast and enjoyed seeing how the "pros" run these focus groups -- let us know if you would like to participate in a focus group session -- they will run from 5:30pm -- 7pm Tuesday, April 22 in Orlando at the Summit.

Old-School Networking Best Practices -- Matt Heinz, Senior Director of Marketing for Verdiem  sent me this note last week  re: our networking system "Good stuff.   I published a column this morning on old-school professional networking  best practices, thought you might enjoy it given the topic..." -- thanks Matt. I particularly enjoyed his detailed list of activities toward the end of the article. BTW, Verdiem is a green technology company focused on reducing the carbon footprint of every IT device worldwide i.e. a way to manage the electrical usage of your various PCs. Check them out and "go green."

Why Not the Sales and  Marketing Summit? -- during my "council" meeting Monday morning (you do have a "council" yourself -- if not read pages 114 -- 116 in Jim Collins book "Good to Great") the key question we explored was "given the competitive environment and the economic challenges and the importance of sales and marketing, we're surprised not EVERYONE in our network of 15,000 aren't attending the Sales and Marketing Summit." Even though we're on pace to have a record turn-out, it pales in comparison to our network. So I thought I would just ask you! Where ideas are the most important thing an executive of a growing company can provide the company, why aren't you taking two-days to hear from the top thought leaders and getting away from everyday challenges to give yourself some time to think? All feedback is appreciated.

Warren Buffet's Letter

"...keeping you great" Ten Minutes with the Growth Guy

HEADLINES:

Warren Buffet -- once again on top, Buffet was named the wealthiest person in the world by Forbes magazine with a net worth of $62 billion (Gates third with $58 billion) and his firm, Berkshire Hathaway, was named the second most admired company in the U.S. -- a good week for Warren.

Warren Buffet's Annual  "Letter to the Shareholders" -- a perennial  must-read, please take ten minutes this week and scan through Buffet's letter. And if you're short of time, just read pages 5-8, his section entitled "Businesses -- The Great, the Good, and the Gruesome" -- he outlines three different business models, emphasizing how beautiful his Sees Candy investment has been. Though it's in a slow growing market the key is that it doesn't take much capital to grow the business, therefore the return on equity over time is extremely high (The Great). In turn, businesses that might have nice bottom line profit and nice growth rates can be Gruesome if they require increasingly large amounts of capital to fuel the growth. It's nice to have a business in your portfolio (or product line in your business) that will provide steadily increasing profits without capital infusions, giving you money you can invest in other ventures. This is why they call them "cash cows." Entrepreneurs are generally terrible at maintaining these kinds (or parts of their existing) businesses because they get bored quickly! Read pages 5-8 several times.

Stock  Market Returns More Like 7% at Best -- and if you have a few more minutes, read pages 18-19 where Buffet once again takes on the investment community who wants you to believe you can achieve 8%-10% annual returns in the U.S. equity market. He's thinking 7% max after the hefty "helper" fees. My take, which is the theme for our Growth Summit in the fall -- its time to "get out of Dodge" and go global with your business. I've found some outstanding experts in the field to speak -- stay tuned.

Favorite Buffet Quote -- "My behavior resembled that of a politician Molly Ivins once described: 'If his I.Q. was any lower, you would have to water him twice a day.'"

Entrepreneurs to the  Rescue -- so like EVERY major challenge the world has ever faced, it's the entrepreneurs that must come to the rescue. Notes Stephen Watkins, founder of Entrex and the Private Company Index (PCI), "Buffet's insight into the market returns underscores not the "Bubbles" people talk about...it is an overwhelming "effervescence" caused by the vast increases in the supply of capital through main street American investors buying a limited supply of public companies...we need to recognize that of the 20,000 public entities...trading only happens in 1700 of them...but real economic gains are in the 24,000,000 private companies which not only produce 50% of the GDP but 80% of job growth. Wealth needs to be created, and transactionalized, in private companies which would bring real economic gain to the economic growth engine... away from the hype of supply and demand in the public markets 1700 companies and false economic returns." Hopefully Watkins can create a private company market space -- a vision he's been pursuing for six years! Keep going Steve.

Most Admired Company  List -- and if you need something else to read, FORTUNE released their  annual "Most Admired Company List." Apple landed on top followed by Berkshire Hathaway (way to go Buffet!), GE, Google, Toyota, Starbucks, FedEx, Proctor and Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, and Goldman Sachs Group. And FORTUNE had an outstanding and somewhat critical article on Steve Jobs and then Steve, I think yesterday, responded. It's some fascinating reading for  the week.  And if you only have one  minute, take a look at this segment of Jobs interview -- he describes how Apple would survive without him and why he's so demanding  on people.

Beef Jerky -- FYI, FORTUNE Small Business magazine has a Makeover section and needs a couple "meaty" comments to this month's Makeover of a company that sells beef jerky. The best and most insightful comments will likely be included in the print magazine -- deadline for comments is tomorrow, Friday, March 7. Here's a link.

(Pride Warning) -- Sheikh Mohammed Business Excellence  Awards -- this is Dubai's largest and most prestigious annual business awards program which held its awards ceremony this past Tuesday. What a surprise when I found out that The Dubai Chamber of Commerce wanted to use the Rockefeller Habits book as a core gift, placing it on the seats of all 600 attendees representing the top CEOs and business leaders from the region (yes, I autographed all 600!). The book was positioned as Successful Business habits through the design and stylish packaging. Thank you to our wonderful Dubai coaching and marketing partner Biz-Ability. Our One-Page Strategic Planning template and other tools/techniques are making their way through that part of the world. Go Global!