“What IF?” vs Nebraska Floods… a GREAT story!

Evan gathered his team together and in the face of flood waters and every adversity said, “The community needs what we sell to recover from this flood. I know this is crazy, but what if we could open today, by 8AM, how would we do it?

Don’t Follow Your Heart, Lead It

Years ago after my presentation for the National Speakers Association about how to get bookings, a very sweet woman, an aspiring speaker, shared that she was having problems getting bookings. I asked what she spoke about and she said (I can’t make this up): “The history of aprons.” Yep, the history of aprons. I asked, […]

How Losing Made Me A Winner!

I wish this was a great “David and Goliath” story but it’s not… Goliath won this one.
I spent most of the match on my back, in pain, fighting just to not get pinned.
I lost 17 to 1… they call that a “superior decision.”
The “superior decision” gave McLean five teams points, instead of the six they’d have gotten had I been pinned.
I felt I like an embarrassment to the team, but they welcomed me back to the bench.
But check this out… As a team, we won!

What are three ways you irritate your customers?

No one wants to think they’re irritating their customers, but… if we are… don’t we need to know that?
This is an invitation to revisit your entire business process, your sales process, your customer relations.

Predicting the Future the Easy Way (Part Two)

Look, unpredictable events, good and bad, will happen. In fact, they happen so often that you could say they’re… predictable? The real variable in predicting the future is you.

Err On The Side Of Grace – The Only Way To Change The World

Err On The Side of Grace. The Unlikely and Only Way To Change The World A man got on the subway with four young children who began to misbehave, disturbing the other passengers. It was getting out of hand. Worse, the father seemed distant, not correcting or even seeming to care about his kid’s behavior. (Doesn’t […]

Ideas Mean Nothing. The Measure of Your Success Is the Measure of Your Ability To ________?

I’ll answer this at the bottom. Don’t skip ahead, read all of it, it’s good. Why in the world would I, a guy who teaches innovation, say ideas mean nothing? To try and disrupt the all-too-common belief that innovation, transformation, and profit are all about ideas. I’ve heard it said that “We live in an idea economy.” Bull. If that’s true, I should own a small country.