Rothacker Reviews

Branding: The 72 Cutlass

You've heard the expression, "the advertiser buried the axe in the consumer's brain."  Well, I advertised  my mechanical aptitude and abilities to Rosemary one summer day in 1988 and it's still fresh in her memory today. 

It was eight o'clock Saturday morning and I was out in the driveway changing oil in my 1972 Cutlass.  Rosemary said goodbye to the visible part of my body and went to work.  I encountered a problem right away.  I couldn't get the oil filter off and while in the process of trying to do so, shredded every piece of metal off of it.  This meant there was nothing left to put the wrench on.  Two hours later and I had to walk away.  After cooling off, I called my brother and asked him what to do. 

I ran a couple of errands and went back to the Cutlass, confident that my brother's advice would work.  It did.  It was now four o'clock in the afternoon and Rosemary pulled in the drive, back from work.  She walked up to my car and noticed that I was in the identical position as when she left me.  I must have moved a leg, confirming to her that no harm had come to me.  At that point she was overcome with a bout of uncontrollable laughter, so outrageous, that I still hear it today! 

By 1988, we had been married for eleven years.  Rosemary knew the drill.  David tries to fix something.  David calls someone to fix it, plus what he screwed up.  The image of me laying under the car in the identical position as she left me, buried the axe of my mechanical ineptitude forever in her mind.

So the battery dies in Rosemary's van yesterday.  Now, we're not talking about removing the battery from a 1966 Ford Galaxy.  I believe Chevy plopped a battery on the assembly line and built the van around it.  After relaying this information to Rosemary, I had set the stage for a four hour wrestling match.  Half an hour later I come in the house, tell her I'm done and that the van is running fine.  She looks at me and starts laughing.  Take a guess at what incident that she was thinking about.

Believe it or not, I've been successful at a few home chores.  I fixed our washing machine once, I can hang pictures on the wall and replace a faucet washer (sometimes).  When it comes to doing stuff like this however, I will always be identified by the 1988 incident. 

I wonder if your business can prosper from David's branding session?  Provide consistent service and, when the time presents itself, do something outstanding.  If emotion, like, say laughing, is tied into the deal, you can bet you will be remembered.

"Dad, my bike is broke.  Can you fix it?"

"Sure Carla, as soon as your Mom stops laughing."

He Gets It

I have found myself using the term "gets it" when describing a person's business acumen.  Many folks that I converse with are like-minded and acknowledge this statement with understanding.  They get what I am getting at when I say, "he gets it."

Recently however, someone asked, "what do you mean by he gets it?"  This was a most excellent question and one that I had never been asked before.  My attempt to answer it will help to clarify my own meaning.

In a general and foundational sense it means in order to receive you must first give.  When one gives without intending to get, the foundation becomes exponentially stronger.  Connections between human beings can be found at the next level.  It's not a store selling a stereo receiver.  It's Bob in the audio department asking you about your needs, listening and then making a recommendation based on your needs, not his or his store's. 

A form of "getting it" that I do not include in my normal definition, but one that is at the top of the pyramid is collaboration and beyond.  I will reserve these thoughts for another discussion.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Kevin Eikenberry: Vantagepoints on Learning and Life

Kevin Eikenberry's latest book is titled Vantagepoints on Learning and Life. It is a collection of fifty-six essays that consist of Kevin's Vantagepoints on Learning and Life.  That's it.  Kevin's title is clear, succinct and tells you exactly what his book is about. 

I have read Kevin's book twice and there is one word that keeps rising to the surface of my conscience: Connections.  Kevin possesses that rare ability to observe life's moments, learn from them and connect them to objects of relevance via the written word.

The page turner for me in this book is Kevin's connections to life's moments that most of us have experienced.  For instance, he talks about a game that his family plays in their car when going on trips.  I am not going to reveal the game at this time, but I have been familiar with it all my life and I bet you are as well.  If you have admired a night sky crammed with stars; if you enjoy hand-cranked homemade ice cream; if you thought rainbows were magical; if you've been to a Jimmy Buffett concert...  The list goes on and on.

Kevin's connections delve into associative memories and pave the way for a learning experience.  Your brain is stimulated when hearing the story about hand-cranked homemade ice cream.  It races to make connections with memorable experiences.  Once your brain has made the connection, it is primed for additional learning.  Now, the lesson from Kevin's ice cream story will not fade away very easily.

Vantagepoints are an outlook on learning and life.  But one doesn't simply plop down on Earth and suddenly have vantagepoints of merit. This leads to another fascinating factor that surfaces in Kevin's work - his upbringing.  A solid family upbringing on a farm in Michigan with a Purdue education, a thriving consulting practice, a blossoming family of his own and the influence of many wonderful people who no doubt recipricate Kevin's own goodwill, lead to the outstanding fruit that can be found in Vantagepoints on Learning and Life.

Go here  to buy your copy today.

Sales

Here is the synopsis:  If a person doesn't agree with me or come to understand my point of view, I'd rather not spend time in debate...or in dragging their body through a submarine.*

I feel this way even if I am passionate about something.  I had a friend who was a brilliant and passionate consultant in my industry.  He logged over two-hundred days on the road per year and met with thousands of people over a period of at least fifteen years.  Five percent of those people understood him.  Less than one percent ran with his stuff.  I asked him how and why he did what he did.  He said you have to get in there and battle with people.  In essence you have to professionally beat sense into them.  Tom lived to better that less-than-one percent.

Tom was unlike most consultants in my industry.  If he had battle scars, you never felt or saw them.  After trying to do business with their current or prospective customers, most of these consultants look like something the cat dragged in. 

I think I am more comfortable on the scout team.  Allow me to fire up the Starship and go to where there is no gravity, to where there are no boundaries.  Allow me to radio back the coordinates of those who can help, of things that can help. 

* I have tried real hard to understand and even incorporate this stuff , and other stuff like it.  I've done this because this is what the gurus say to do.  I must say, overall, it doesn't feel right to me.

Slacker Manager: Slacker@Work

Bren Connelly wrote a very popular manifesto titled Slacker@Work, over a year ago. It is free and can be downloaded at Change This . Bren can be found at his most excellent Web site, Slacker Manager .

I first began visiting Bren’s site shortly after its initial launch and read his manifesto about the same time. One only has to listen and open their eyes to see Bren’s definition of slacker is not relative to the broad label that has been slapped upon folks who appear to be doing less.

 Bren says a slacker who is doing what is important to them, can realize the benefit of pursuing their own interests while simultaneously being seen as a superstar at work. A gentleman I worked with fits the slacker definition to a tee. In his mid twenties, Kurt is indeed a superstar at work. He also is passionate about pursuing outside interests. Your typical, unaware Baby Boomer manager would want Kurt to be even more involved at work. After all, he is that enormously talented, why wouldn’t he? But he doesn’t want to be. This is where unaware managers begin to apply the slacker tag. The key to dialing Kurt in however is to respect his outside interests. The key to dialing with precision is to introduce a connection to Kurt’s outside interests and his day job. It might not always be possible to do.

Bren offers a series of tips to hone in on slacker elitism:

• Living the Golden Rule
• Influencing work-related Mavens
• The Four Hour Rule
• Taking a Mental Health Day
• Office effectiveness
• Using lists
• Effectiveness resources
• Banishing procrastination

 

To enjoy Bren’s Web site and reap the most benefit from his essays on management, life and effectiveness, you must first read his insightful manifesto!

A special privilege that I am enjoying is to see how Bren has evolved over the last year. To begin with he continues to offer helpful ideas, points us in the direction of other helpful people and does it with consistency. Of even greater magnitude in my eyes though, Bren’s skills of developing his ideas and his writing have gone Chicago White Sox.

 

Skip Angel: Strategy YOU!

Skip Angel  needs your vote.  He's got mine.

Skip has a proposal over at Change This called Strategy YOU! .  Please go over there right now and vote to get them to publish it.

Skip likens his manifesto to the fact if corporations and businesses create a strategic plan then so too should you and I as individuals.  He promises to walk us through the process of creating, applying and managing our own plan. 

This just makes so much sense!  Everyday we hear trusted, respected and informed folks say we need to think of ourselves as if we were our own corporation.  It sounds like Skip's essay will help us to do just that.

Work: No Boundaries

It was Dave's first day on the job and he was talking with one of the managers.

"I have a tendency to just go and go.  Every once in awhile you'll have to reel me back in."

Did Dave hear that right?  Mitch stated that he had ambition.  He then said that Dave would have to keep that ambition in check.  It was time for Dave and Mitch to talk about boundaries.

"Mitch, I appreciate your enthusiasm brother.  In Dave's world, as long as a company, we're going in the same direction, there are no boundaries and there are no limitations."

Dave had found over the years that once the fences were down, associates could run and run and run.  He also found that once they had permission to run, they wouldn't run away.  The mere fact that they knew the fences were down often caused a spike in motivation. 

Dave also found that as a manager, he was more productive when associates like Mitch went about their business knowing there were no fences. 

Business Relationship: How Do You Say Thanks?

How do you say thanks?  Why with food, of course!

A sharp businesswoman recently told me how she sent food in appreciation of a business relationship.  Vickie was responsible for putting together a campaign for the American Red Cross to collect blood.  Various local businesses sponsored the two month long program.  Advertisements were run on TV, radio and in the newspapers.  Businesses discounted products and all were included in each ad- thereby achieving maximum exposure.  A win-win-win situation.

Here is a sample of one of the ads:Download books4blood_0922051.pdf

This businesswoman and her boss decided to send all of the business partners involved, this gift:

How cool is this?  A cookie basket.  You can't tell in the picture, but the cookies in the back row have personalized notes on them.  The CEO of one of the companies replied himself to this thoughtful gesture, and stated they would participate next year in the same campaign.

Here is a link to the cookie company, which by the way, can be ordered online. 

Six Disciplines for Excellence: Be Excellent

In a business to business world, how does business happen?  Is it companies dealing with other companies?  Or is it people dealing with other people?

The answer is obvious, right?

If it is, then why do we so often feel like we're spoken "at" as opposed to be spoken "with"?  If we are being broadcasted to, there is no one to talk "with", is there?

In the true spirit of the Cluetrain Manifesto , I would like to introduce you to Skip Reardon, Director of Marketing for the Six Disciplines Corporation and master architect of the Be Excellent Web site.  I'll talk about the book, Six Disciplines for Excellence which is about the methodology that surrounds the company, in a future post.  But for now here's my take on Be Excellent.

Skip writes Be Excellent to connect with people, provide value and to help small businesses achieve lasting excellence.  Be Excellent is an organic outgrowth of the Six Disciplines Corporation.  And here is what makes it so cool:  You can't tell where one starts and the other one stops.  (Notice I didn't say seamless. I feel soooo good about that!)  Skip pumps out multiple posts per day that focus on information the small business person can use.  Part of the information is aggregated from other sites and run through the Skip-filter.  This is a huge value-adder for me.  I lack both the skill and time to come up with such focused information.  Other content is derived right from the Six Disciplines Methodology.  Still other content is like this .  Talk about a buzz acclerator!  Imagine Al writing something like, "Did you guys hear what Skip said today about Baby Boomer Transitions?"

Visit with Skip at Be Excellent and enjoy the conversation.