A friend of mine was the COO of a company for 13 years. The company was sold 6 months ago and the new owners let him go with only two weeks of severance pay! Those sorry dogs!
Anyhow it got me thinking. It's not only business owners like me who need multiple income streams but everyone needs a diverse occupational portfolio -- as I think of it. so here are my 10 reasons to have alternate income streams.
1. Jobs are no longer secure regardless how big the company is and how lofty your position is within that company.
2. Employers no longer feel a responsibility toward employees and will lay off as a first resort, not a last resort.
3. Your retirement investments are not in one stock, you diversify your investments for better security and income balance. You should do the same with your earning streams for the same reasons.
4. You can never be fired from 100% of your income when they come from multiple sources.
5. You have better control of your financial situation because you make the decisions for each income stream.
6. You have options of which income stream you want to focus on depending on what is doing well at the time. Ride the wave of one while it’s hot and when it’s down you can ride the wave of another income stream.
7. It maintains excitement for work because you have variety. So you are less likely to fall into a rut.
8. You meet different types of people in different jobs providing you greater growth potential and a larger network.
9. You always have options and flexibility.
10. Make sure one of those income streams is from a home based business. You are in complete control of that business.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
10 Reasons Not to be a Cynic
Are you like me tired of every where you turn you run into a cynic? It seems the economy, poor business leadership and questionable government actions, not to mention professional cynics on TV, seem to be turning us to a country where cynicism is the default emotion. I say those of us who dislike the cynical attitudes and desire a more positive approach to living copy the following list and send it to our cynical friends and family.
Let's turn this negativism around one person at a time!
10 Reasons Not to be a Cynic
1. Always taking a contrary position puts you at constants odds with people.
2. If you never trust others, deep down you no longer trust yourself.
3. Cynicism never made anyone a better person.
4. It’s easy to always say, “No” but the person you hurt most is yourself.
5. If you always think negatively, you get what you expect.
6. The definition of cynicism: an attitude of jaded negativity. Does that sound healthy?
7. Most cynics look for opportunities to be critical. Isn’t it better to look for opportunities to be constructive?
8. It takes character to make a positive difference. It takes little effort to be destructively cynical.
9. Cynics are fuels by anger. Optimists are fueled by eagerness. Which do you prefer to fuel your life?
10. Is “Pissed Off” the default setting you want in life?
Let's turn this negativism around one person at a time!
10 Reasons Not to be a Cynic
1. Always taking a contrary position puts you at constants odds with people.
2. If you never trust others, deep down you no longer trust yourself.
3. Cynicism never made anyone a better person.
4. It’s easy to always say, “No” but the person you hurt most is yourself.
5. If you always think negatively, you get what you expect.
6. The definition of cynicism: an attitude of jaded negativity. Does that sound healthy?
7. Most cynics look for opportunities to be critical. Isn’t it better to look for opportunities to be constructive?
8. It takes character to make a positive difference. It takes little effort to be destructively cynical.
9. Cynics are fuels by anger. Optimists are fueled by eagerness. Which do you prefer to fuel your life?
10. Is “Pissed Off” the default setting you want in life?
Monday, April 6, 2009
Living Life in Beta
Gmail turned 5 years old yesterday (and still considered to be in beta testing.)
On September 26, 2006 Facebook was opened to everyone of ages 13 and older with a valid e-mail address. In less than 3 years it now has 175 million users.
Twitter was opened to the public in March of 2006 and is currently growing at 1382%.
The Blackberry smartphone was released in 2002 and now has 21 million subscribers.
Technology is changing how we interact as a society, how we process information and how we think. In other words, we are a completely different society than we were on September 10, 2001. That's not even including the social trauma impact we felt in this country the next day. I’m just looking at the technological impact.
Where are you in the transition of society?
When I hear employers talking about having to adjust to employees having “cell phones” I cringe at how slow they are adopting to the changes going on around them. I have witnessed technology speakers asking their audience members to turn off phones and laptops during their presentations. I see savvy business leaders refusing to blog, get involved in social media online and claim to be cutting edge because they have a static page on LinkedIn.
Business executives in this country need to be using the technology available to them to revamp, retool and reposition their businesses in these dormant economic times. Instead of wring hands and gnashing teeth wondering where the next order is coming from, focus on what this time is presenting you with: the best opportunity to recreate your business without losing significant market share.
Traditionalists moan and wail over the loss of how things were.
People leading organizations at the top of their industries resist change because the are the best at the old rules.
Innovators always create and embrace change because they believe life should never settle into a rut.
It was brought to my attention from a twitter colleague that Gmail is still considered to be in beta testing five years into the process. It got me thinking; as rapid as life is changing, aren’t we living in a state of constant beta? With Gmail, facebook and twitter all less than five years old, what changes do the next 5 years have in store for us? Life in beta indeed.
My view on live is I'd rather have life in beta than life in boring. You can quote me on that.
On September 26, 2006 Facebook was opened to everyone of ages 13 and older with a valid e-mail address. In less than 3 years it now has 175 million users.
Twitter was opened to the public in March of 2006 and is currently growing at 1382%.
The Blackberry smartphone was released in 2002 and now has 21 million subscribers.
Technology is changing how we interact as a society, how we process information and how we think. In other words, we are a completely different society than we were on September 10, 2001. That's not even including the social trauma impact we felt in this country the next day. I’m just looking at the technological impact.
Where are you in the transition of society?
When I hear employers talking about having to adjust to employees having “cell phones” I cringe at how slow they are adopting to the changes going on around them. I have witnessed technology speakers asking their audience members to turn off phones and laptops during their presentations. I see savvy business leaders refusing to blog, get involved in social media online and claim to be cutting edge because they have a static page on LinkedIn.
Business executives in this country need to be using the technology available to them to revamp, retool and reposition their businesses in these dormant economic times. Instead of wring hands and gnashing teeth wondering where the next order is coming from, focus on what this time is presenting you with: the best opportunity to recreate your business without losing significant market share.
Traditionalists moan and wail over the loss of how things were.
People leading organizations at the top of their industries resist change because the are the best at the old rules.
Innovators always create and embrace change because they believe life should never settle into a rut.
It was brought to my attention from a twitter colleague that Gmail is still considered to be in beta testing five years into the process. It got me thinking; as rapid as life is changing, aren’t we living in a state of constant beta? With Gmail, facebook and twitter all less than five years old, what changes do the next 5 years have in store for us? Life in beta indeed.
My view on live is I'd rather have life in beta than life in boring. You can quote me on that.
Friday, March 27, 2009
America Dines at the Trough of Excess
What happened to self control in this country? What happened to enough was enough? This evening at a Chinese buffet the man at the table beside me vocalized to his table mates he set a mission to eat 100 oysters on the half shell. As soon as the oysters would come out from the kitchen he would load up two dinner plates and take them all, leaving nothing for anyone else. At one point the kitchen stopped restocking and he demanded more oysters.
Some people may think if they put oysters on the buffet and tell people it’s an all you can eat buffet then those oysters are fair game. Those of us who own businesses feel for the restaurant owner who is offering a nice variety of items and yes a few more expensive items. But does that mean we fore-go self restraint and self respect and just gorge at the trough of excess? Apparently so.
AIG offers large bonuses not tied to performance. Auto executives fly in private jets with their hands out crying poor mouth to Congress. Congress screams at TARP recipients for Vegas “Junkets” yet flies with expensive security details to Europe on junkets of their own. for millions of American, four door sedans weren’t enough we needed Hummers. A modest home within our financial means wasn't enough, we needed to live in McMansions we couldn't afford
When gas in the Carolinas hit a shortage and prices jumped 50 cents a gallon in one day I watched a man pull up in his pick-up truck with a 55 gallon drum in the back he was filling with gasoline.
Screw everyone else as long as I got mine. What an attitude.
To the rest of the world we are the land of opportunity and when they see how we are with the gluttony, excesses and the wastefulness we have in this country they are disgusted. Now that our greedy attitudes are impacting the global economy, they like us even less.
I know we are in a deep recession yet restaurant parking lots are full. Malls are full of people. The new IKEA store in Charlotte has long lines of traffic of people wanting to get in and make purchases.
Could America really handle sacrifice? Could we handle self control for the benefit of the entire country? Or, have we gone too far down the path of “me first” that we will never again worry about self control and only worry about the controls and regulations placed on us?
Control that is imposed on you is always tougher to handle than the controls we place on ourselves. I pray in this country we never have to learn that lesson the hard way, when it’s too late.
Some people may think if they put oysters on the buffet and tell people it’s an all you can eat buffet then those oysters are fair game. Those of us who own businesses feel for the restaurant owner who is offering a nice variety of items and yes a few more expensive items. But does that mean we fore-go self restraint and self respect and just gorge at the trough of excess? Apparently so.
AIG offers large bonuses not tied to performance. Auto executives fly in private jets with their hands out crying poor mouth to Congress. Congress screams at TARP recipients for Vegas “Junkets” yet flies with expensive security details to Europe on junkets of their own. for millions of American, four door sedans weren’t enough we needed Hummers. A modest home within our financial means wasn't enough, we needed to live in McMansions we couldn't afford
When gas in the Carolinas hit a shortage and prices jumped 50 cents a gallon in one day I watched a man pull up in his pick-up truck with a 55 gallon drum in the back he was filling with gasoline.
Screw everyone else as long as I got mine. What an attitude.
To the rest of the world we are the land of opportunity and when they see how we are with the gluttony, excesses and the wastefulness we have in this country they are disgusted. Now that our greedy attitudes are impacting the global economy, they like us even less.
I know we are in a deep recession yet restaurant parking lots are full. Malls are full of people. The new IKEA store in Charlotte has long lines of traffic of people wanting to get in and make purchases.
Could America really handle sacrifice? Could we handle self control for the benefit of the entire country? Or, have we gone too far down the path of “me first” that we will never again worry about self control and only worry about the controls and regulations placed on us?
Control that is imposed on you is always tougher to handle than the controls we place on ourselves. I pray in this country we never have to learn that lesson the hard way, when it’s too late.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
A Dozen Dings I Miss
I am not a nostalgic person and always look for the cutting edge ideas, approaches and technology. I also know I am auditorily stimulated because I couldn't survive without my music. But today for some reason I started thinking about sounds that were so familiar to me that I no longer hear and miss from years gone by. Do any of these conjure up a memory or two? I’d love to hear comments about the sounds I forgot to include in my Dozen Dings I Miss.
1. The deafening sounds a Summer thunderstorm makes pouring buckets of water onto a tin roof. You couldn’t talk over it, you just sat and enjoyed the roar sipping on a Dr. Pepper moving back and forth in your porch glider.
2. The ringtone of a rotary phone is pure and always begged to be answered. Even at dinner you ran to a ringing phone because you knew it must be important. The other sound of the rotary phone memorialized in the Beatles song, “Come Together” is the click, click, click of the dial coming back after you rotated it forward.
3. As a kid I used to take a clothespin and clip baseball cards into my bicycle spokes to make “motor” noises. Sure a Nolan Ryan rookie card (Worth $1500 today) got eventually shredded in those spokes, but in a simpler time – it was all about the noise and never about the money.
4. Nothing signals being at the golf course better than the sound of metal spikes on the parking lot asphalt as you walked from the trunk to the club house. At first light on a Saturday morning it sounds like a concert there were so many golfers milling around. Wow do I miss this one a lot!
5. As I said I would be hard pressed to live without my music and in college there was nothing like cranking up the speakers on my Montrose album and just before Sammy Hagar burst out with his vocals the dusty static of the stylus hitting the LP about to burst out in a wall of sound was the greatest anticipation sound in my memory. (Akin to the greatest anticipation silence when the recorded music gets turned off just before the band hits the stage.)
6. For my family, reunions were retreats back to the family farm at the pavilion by the lake. The sounds of farm animals on the other side of the fence, kids running and playing in the grass, the ladies chattering and catching up on conversation created the back ground for the one sound I will never forget from my family reunions at the farm: The sound of the Five Brothers, two generations older than me, playing horseshoes and that unmistakable clang of a ringer horseshoe on an iron post.
7. Today when the ice cream truck tours through the neighborhood I swear I’m going to go postal listening to that kiddies’ song through bad speakers that plays over and over and over again. Just give me the Good Humor truck bells with the guy in white clothes and black bow tie. (I think the current ice cream guys are on a work release program!)
8. The Madden football video game is so lifelike. Kids today get to use championship teams, build their own teams and call their own plays. I grew up playing a pitiful game which had minimal representation to real football, but there was something about that hum sound of the vibrating field of Electric Football that made that silly game worth playing.
9. Concrete driveways are so quiet someone can drive up and be to your front door before you even knew anyone had arrived. A car driving into a loose gravel driveway had a distinctive sound that was either an early warning signal of someone unexpected arriving, or confirmation expected guests has indeed finally arrived! The best driveway sounds came from my neighbors who had rounded rocks of a cream and brown color we used to call Lucky Stones.
10. Computers make their own noises of cooling fans, CD drives and the old modem connection noises (those I don’t miss because it was just annoying.) What I do miss is hearing my mother, a very fast typist, work her manual magic on a manual typewriter. The sound of fingers striking keys, keys striking paper and that fantastic Pavlovian ding signaling the paper carriage needed returned followed by the clackity, clack of the carriage returning to starting position. It was a symphony of sounds!
11. Once upon a time filling your car’s gas tank was not self serve and as you drove into the pumps a small hose was laying across the concrete pad. When the weight of your car drove over the hose it sounded a ding in the service bays to let the gas station attendant know someone had arrived to have their tank filled, windshield washed and oil checked. I remember the excitement when I finally got big enough to ride over that hose with my bike and it sounded the ding. I drove that poor gas station fella bonkers riding over that hose. I just loved that sound.
12. I started this list with a summer memory and I will finish it with one as well. Growing up north of the Mason/Dixon line Summer was the time of year to play outside, have buddies over and enjoy time out of school. We didn’t have air conditioning in those houses so doors stayed open and screen doors were designed to protect the house from invading insects. The energy of youth never understood that design and to our opinion a screen door was designed to charge through swinging it open and letting that small spring located in the center of the door slam it back into the wooden door jam. I’ll bet that door would slam hundreds of times over the course of a summer. The sound of a slamming screen door always meant children having fun.
I know this isn’t an exhaustive list by any means. Do you share in my memories of these sounds? Let me know. What are the sounds you remember fondly and miss? Share those as well so I can enjoy your memories with you. Either write a comment here or email me at RJWhite@pinnaclesolutions.org . I look forward to “hearing” from you.
1. The deafening sounds a Summer thunderstorm makes pouring buckets of water onto a tin roof. You couldn’t talk over it, you just sat and enjoyed the roar sipping on a Dr. Pepper moving back and forth in your porch glider.
2. The ringtone of a rotary phone is pure and always begged to be answered. Even at dinner you ran to a ringing phone because you knew it must be important. The other sound of the rotary phone memorialized in the Beatles song, “Come Together” is the click, click, click of the dial coming back after you rotated it forward.
3. As a kid I used to take a clothespin and clip baseball cards into my bicycle spokes to make “motor” noises. Sure a Nolan Ryan rookie card (Worth $1500 today) got eventually shredded in those spokes, but in a simpler time – it was all about the noise and never about the money.
4. Nothing signals being at the golf course better than the sound of metal spikes on the parking lot asphalt as you walked from the trunk to the club house. At first light on a Saturday morning it sounds like a concert there were so many golfers milling around. Wow do I miss this one a lot!
5. As I said I would be hard pressed to live without my music and in college there was nothing like cranking up the speakers on my Montrose album and just before Sammy Hagar burst out with his vocals the dusty static of the stylus hitting the LP about to burst out in a wall of sound was the greatest anticipation sound in my memory. (Akin to the greatest anticipation silence when the recorded music gets turned off just before the band hits the stage.)
6. For my family, reunions were retreats back to the family farm at the pavilion by the lake. The sounds of farm animals on the other side of the fence, kids running and playing in the grass, the ladies chattering and catching up on conversation created the back ground for the one sound I will never forget from my family reunions at the farm: The sound of the Five Brothers, two generations older than me, playing horseshoes and that unmistakable clang of a ringer horseshoe on an iron post.
7. Today when the ice cream truck tours through the neighborhood I swear I’m going to go postal listening to that kiddies’ song through bad speakers that plays over and over and over again. Just give me the Good Humor truck bells with the guy in white clothes and black bow tie. (I think the current ice cream guys are on a work release program!)
8. The Madden football video game is so lifelike. Kids today get to use championship teams, build their own teams and call their own plays. I grew up playing a pitiful game which had minimal representation to real football, but there was something about that hum sound of the vibrating field of Electric Football that made that silly game worth playing.
9. Concrete driveways are so quiet someone can drive up and be to your front door before you even knew anyone had arrived. A car driving into a loose gravel driveway had a distinctive sound that was either an early warning signal of someone unexpected arriving, or confirmation expected guests has indeed finally arrived! The best driveway sounds came from my neighbors who had rounded rocks of a cream and brown color we used to call Lucky Stones.
10. Computers make their own noises of cooling fans, CD drives and the old modem connection noises (those I don’t miss because it was just annoying.) What I do miss is hearing my mother, a very fast typist, work her manual magic on a manual typewriter. The sound of fingers striking keys, keys striking paper and that fantastic Pavlovian ding signaling the paper carriage needed returned followed by the clackity, clack of the carriage returning to starting position. It was a symphony of sounds!
11. Once upon a time filling your car’s gas tank was not self serve and as you drove into the pumps a small hose was laying across the concrete pad. When the weight of your car drove over the hose it sounded a ding in the service bays to let the gas station attendant know someone had arrived to have their tank filled, windshield washed and oil checked. I remember the excitement when I finally got big enough to ride over that hose with my bike and it sounded the ding. I drove that poor gas station fella bonkers riding over that hose. I just loved that sound.
12. I started this list with a summer memory and I will finish it with one as well. Growing up north of the Mason/Dixon line Summer was the time of year to play outside, have buddies over and enjoy time out of school. We didn’t have air conditioning in those houses so doors stayed open and screen doors were designed to protect the house from invading insects. The energy of youth never understood that design and to our opinion a screen door was designed to charge through swinging it open and letting that small spring located in the center of the door slam it back into the wooden door jam. I’ll bet that door would slam hundreds of times over the course of a summer. The sound of a slamming screen door always meant children having fun.
I know this isn’t an exhaustive list by any means. Do you share in my memories of these sounds? Let me know. What are the sounds you remember fondly and miss? Share those as well so I can enjoy your memories with you. Either write a comment here or email me at RJWhite@pinnaclesolutions.org . I look forward to “hearing” from you.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Business as Usual ? Never Again
Nothing will be the same after the recession as it was before the recession. Consumers habits will be different, technology will be different, controls will be different, regulations will be different, and attitudes toward work, money, trust, loyalty, leadership and borrowing will be different.
Are you positioning yourself for a different market place?
I hear many business owners and executives hoping to gut out the recession and emerge on the other side intact, planning on operating their businesses just as it was prior to the credit crunch, and economic disaster we are calling a recession. That would be detrimental to the future of your business, and could even be deadly. You must reposition.
Permission marketing such as through social networking and blogging and building permission email lists are going to replace cold calls and prospecting. Buyers don't want to be bothered with the process, there are too many sales people knocking on their doors, and the buyer just wants to find the expert they can rely upon.
Are you building your permission assets? Are you getting involved in social networks? Are you taking your sales people out of leads groups and putting them into research mindsets for the blog they should be creating?
Consumers are going to be looking for the most knowledgeable people to talk to and work with. They are searching for someone they can trust. The expectation of finding the trusting supplier, retailer, professional is along the lines of hitting the lottery. It doesn't keep people from trying, but their expectations of finding a winner is quite low. How are you positioning yourself to be that "expert"?
These are just a few of the areas businesses should be working diligently to reposition themselves, and out-position the competition. If you thought the gloves were off before the recession in dealing with competitors; you ain't seen nuttin' yet!
Are you positioning yourself for a different market place?
I hear many business owners and executives hoping to gut out the recession and emerge on the other side intact, planning on operating their businesses just as it was prior to the credit crunch, and economic disaster we are calling a recession. That would be detrimental to the future of your business, and could even be deadly. You must reposition.
Permission marketing such as through social networking and blogging and building permission email lists are going to replace cold calls and prospecting. Buyers don't want to be bothered with the process, there are too many sales people knocking on their doors, and the buyer just wants to find the expert they can rely upon.
Are you building your permission assets? Are you getting involved in social networks? Are you taking your sales people out of leads groups and putting them into research mindsets for the blog they should be creating?
Consumers are going to be looking for the most knowledgeable people to talk to and work with. They are searching for someone they can trust. The expectation of finding the trusting supplier, retailer, professional is along the lines of hitting the lottery. It doesn't keep people from trying, but their expectations of finding a winner is quite low. How are you positioning yourself to be that "expert"?
These are just a few of the areas businesses should be working diligently to reposition themselves, and out-position the competition. If you thought the gloves were off before the recession in dealing with competitors; you ain't seen nuttin' yet!
Saturday, March 21, 2009
What is the Recession Legacy?
The Great Depression legacy was a generation of savers who believed in hoarding and keeping everything. Remember grandma's tin foil ball? The drawer of reusable wax paper? My mother still washes out plastic bags and brags about still using wedding gift Revere Ware 50 plus years later. Holding onto possession forever is one of the Great Depression's legacies.
The depth and length of the current recession is sure to have a legacy left on the current generations as well. Although the impact will cause a different reaction than the Great Depression caused, it will still have lasting impact on those who experienced it directly.
Expect a greater effort to take care of the planet as this financial meltdown is another example to younger generations of the Baby Boomers wrecking what they touch. Expect first time home ownership to reach a later age than ever before. Because of the volatility of our age, car dealerships and car owners are going to look for alternatives to 60 month and 72 month financing because so much in the world will change in that amount of time. Neither is interested in making that long-term commitment for a vehicle.
During the recession the divorce rate will actually go down because people can't sell joint assets and get out from under mortgages. The younger generations will see this as another trapping of marriage and will opt for cohabitation even more and avoid locking into a marriage commitment.
The need for nimbleness and flexibility will increase because that is the best defense against a negative turn.
Because the internet has made the world a village, expect expatriation to occur with greater frequency as people make use of their nimbleness and become nomadic in traveling to "better" places. Without home ownership, marriage or any other long-term commitments, people will have more freedom of relocation unless governments restrict immigration in countries large numbers of people find desirable.
Already in younger generations there is no hope for social security. They have tremendous distrust of government, and for good reason. Big business is being painted as the bad guy in causing this recession and the younger generations will use this to fuel their entrepreneurial approach to occupation and avoid working for large employers.
College degrees will be questioned because of the large expense with an undetermined return on investment causing more young people to skip the traditional education and instead go for apprenticeships or investing in the purchase of a small business. The volume of information on the internet for running a business and the social networking will make many business school majors as obsolete as history majors.
These are my projections, and the better I can define the world on the other side of this recession the better I can position myself in the correct occupation. What are your projections?
The depth and length of the current recession is sure to have a legacy left on the current generations as well. Although the impact will cause a different reaction than the Great Depression caused, it will still have lasting impact on those who experienced it directly.
Expect a greater effort to take care of the planet as this financial meltdown is another example to younger generations of the Baby Boomers wrecking what they touch. Expect first time home ownership to reach a later age than ever before. Because of the volatility of our age, car dealerships and car owners are going to look for alternatives to 60 month and 72 month financing because so much in the world will change in that amount of time. Neither is interested in making that long-term commitment for a vehicle.
During the recession the divorce rate will actually go down because people can't sell joint assets and get out from under mortgages. The younger generations will see this as another trapping of marriage and will opt for cohabitation even more and avoid locking into a marriage commitment.
The need for nimbleness and flexibility will increase because that is the best defense against a negative turn.
Because the internet has made the world a village, expect expatriation to occur with greater frequency as people make use of their nimbleness and become nomadic in traveling to "better" places. Without home ownership, marriage or any other long-term commitments, people will have more freedom of relocation unless governments restrict immigration in countries large numbers of people find desirable.
Already in younger generations there is no hope for social security. They have tremendous distrust of government, and for good reason. Big business is being painted as the bad guy in causing this recession and the younger generations will use this to fuel their entrepreneurial approach to occupation and avoid working for large employers.
College degrees will be questioned because of the large expense with an undetermined return on investment causing more young people to skip the traditional education and instead go for apprenticeships or investing in the purchase of a small business. The volume of information on the internet for running a business and the social networking will make many business school majors as obsolete as history majors.
These are my projections, and the better I can define the world on the other side of this recession the better I can position myself in the correct occupation. What are your projections?
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