Changing Lanes is NOT a Bowling Alley

This is a cautionary tale about information and how easily we can lose control over our brand/image/name.  Cautionary from the viewpoint that if we put "noise, comments, images" on the internet - redacting, changing and correcting can be a long process.   Even when you didn't do it!  So, beware what you post, others post about you and your business and even what your paid advertising is posting about you.  Solution - still in the works. 

From 2000-2004, Changing Lanes paid for a yellow page listing under the heading "Business Consultants".  Now, I know that yellow pages is generic for business directories, but this was the book that was part of our telephone service from AT&T.  We would be listed alphabetically by our business name along with the category listing.  When we first got this listing, if someone thought they wanted to find our number in the book, they would go to "C" for Changing Lanes and NOT find us. 

Why?  Because, AT&T felt strongly that out business name was Lanes, Changing - you know, like Chemical, Sun; or Corning, Owens; or Nobles, Barnes.  Right?   Read More or check out our ongoing blog at Changing Lanes

To Whine or Not to Wine

If you are not working ON your business at least 5 hours a week, then maybe on your way home tonight you will want to pick up some cheese and crackers so when you “whine” you won’t be doing it on an empty stomach. In Michael Gerber’s The E-Myth Mastery as entrepreneurs, we are reminded to work ON our business and not IN our business. In reality, the business owner with less than 15 employees will often not have the luxury to spend all her time ON the business. Here are some questions to start your thinking beyond the day to day work:

1. When will you spend 3 hours planning weekly? Is it scheduled?

2. What can you do this week to create a better tomorrow? (write it down)

3. What core competencies do your employees possess which can be leveraged to affect sales growth? (write them down)

4. What is the number one bottleneck in your business that is holding back growth of sales, profit or both? (Document these)

5. If you had to price everything your employees and you do on an invoice for your customer, how many of these items would your customer recognize as value-added?

 Read More or check our most recent blogging at Changing Lanes

Multitasking - Interviewing - Ego

Multitasking - Not!
By Linda Fayerweather

In 1740, Lord Chesterfield offered the following advice: "There is time enough for everything in the course of the day, if you do but one thing at once, but there is not time enough in the year, if you will do two things at a time."

Repeatedly, science has shown that multitasking does not save time, in fact it can make you stupid! A Wall Street Journal article from 2003 titled the Pitfalls of Doing Too Much at Once to an August INC magazine article titled Multitasking is Making You Stupid.

We would all agree, that texting while driving is a big no-no. But what about reading while riding the exercise bike? Or listening to music or the radio while driving? Or cooking dinner with a baby on your hip? Here is where I draw the line on what is OK multitasking and what is not. Our brains can only preform one higher level task at a time. The higher level tasks or functions require attention and focus, the lower level tasks are routine and often repetitive. When we try to preform two higher level tasks it is like trying to watch two different tennis matches at the same time - you are going to miss something. This is also why texting and driving is so deadly - two higher level tasks that cannot co-exist.

Read More and get tips on Inteviewing Questions and Ego Driven Peers

Labor Day 2012

The first Labor Day holiday, created by the Central Labor Union of New York, was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882 and now many of us see this holiday as end the of summer.

Celebrate today the 364 days you work and help make the world economy revolve. Yes, we are the world as all of our work is linked to others through vendors, customers, employees, subcontractors and neighbors. Finding meaning and purpose in our work is important and for some, labor is an exchange for the resources to give meaning to life. For others, work is what we do to meet our life mission or goals. Knowing your own personal mission is something that may help define you and your work. Dr. Britt Andreatta has created worksheets for helping you develop your own statement and it is worth a look. Personal Mission Statement

Read More includeing tips about The Human Contact Factor and Selling Tips.