Do you have a pile of reading, perhaps sitting at the corner of your desk? Clippings that seem particularly important that you would get to "at some point"? Or perhaps, a digital version kept safely in an obscure folder, just waiting for you to find the time to read? These clippings are [More]
Wikipedia defines consumerization as the reorientation of product and service designs to focus on (and market to) the end user as an individual consumer, vs an earlier era of organization-oriented offerings. It speaks to growing markets by looking for a completely different category of buyer, who may also be an influencer for [More]
Would you rather be a reporter, or a columnist? Reporters have a great combination of investigative skills, communication skills, moxy, and pluck. Columnists are made from the same raw material, but they get paid far more. Why? Readers care more about what a particular person is saying than what a generic person [More]
Do you wish that you could be more effective with the written word? Have you always hated writing, from the first time your grade three teacher insisted you write two paragraphs on what you did during the summer? Or maybe you enjoy the idea of writing, but you don't enjoy the reality [More]
There is an old "joke" in the web development world that is both funny and sad: What is the difference between a $20,000 website, a $200,000 website, and a $2 million one? Answer: The gullibility of the client. In 27 years of building websites, I have NEVER met a gullible [More]
In the olden days, external advisors would be called in whenever there is a problem to be solved. Proposals would be reviewed, contracts negotiated, references checked, and the engagement would begin. The consulting team would show up, diagnose the source of the problem, and help the management team focus exclusively on getting [More]
If there has been one significant change in the area of marketing and engagement, it is the almost complete ubiquity of "programs". Some of them have names like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube. Others have names like Salesforce, Marketo, Dynamics, and Infusionsoft. Yet despite the great fanfare, why does the system's promise rarely [More]
Looking back, was there really a surprise that Donald Trump won the 2016 American election? Or that Justin Trudeau won the Canadian one both in 2015 and 2019? Or for that matter, that Brexit happened? These three results have much in common: Politicians and insiders who are perceived as privileged, and think that they [More]
As a speaker or writer, one of the most powerful techniques is to look for common cause with your audience. This may mean using words or imagery that conjure up something from a shared past, or play to a shared cultural experience. Unfortunately, this very same technique is unwittingly used to the exact opposite [More]
Why are all consulting projects not wildly successful? Why are some merely acceptable, and others fail? Without a doubt, consultants are often to blame: they over-promise, under-scope, or take on assignments with unrealistic deadlines. Yet clients also control the outcome of the engagement, and often, unwittingly, sabotage their consultants. Here are [More]
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