business management

Food for Thought is our way of sharing interesting concepts on corporate leadership and management with others who might find it useful. The thoughts offered are intended to be controversial and thought provoking. They always follow our motto of helping develop logical leadership.

I get a ton of emails asking to solve sales dilemmas. Here are a few that may relate to your job, your life, and (most important) your sales thought process right now:

Many, if not most, salespeople (not you of course) walk into a sale with product knowledge, a few questions, a sales pitch, and hope. This is a strategy that will result in “How much is it?” Bad strategy.

Some of Michigan’s numbers could knock you down: Nearly 2 ½ years of monthly double-digit unemployment figures Detroit, once proud of the nation’s highest per capita income, falls to No. 50. Two families leave the state for every family that moves in. Jim Chamness has decided that his Michigan company won’t stay down.

I have no business plan. I have no spreadsheet with five years of projected earnings. There are two reasons: Most business “plans” never come to fruition, and five-year sales projections are about as accurate as political polls.

The leader of a symphony orchestra knows how to play every instrument. He also knows how those instruments blend together to create a symphonic sound. The leader of a choir knows every note that everybody has to sing, and knows how the voices and notes blend together to make harmony. They’re actually called “conductors” – but you know what I mean.

It occurred to me that most people who write about leadership are no longer leaders. Easy for them to espouse their Monday morning philosophy-harder for the leaders under fire to take ” former leader” direction. I just read an article in a business magazine written by a well-known “former leader.” I was horrified. One of the “key” points was that “clarity is the antidote of anxiety”; therefore “clarity” is the main concern of the effective leader. What a bunch of baloney. If you’re a leader, and clarity is your main concern, nothing much is going on.

Simon has autism. Simon loves to win. Actually Simon needs to win, and thrives on coming in first. Simon also HATES to lose, and some of his autistic symptoms manifest themselves when he can’t claim, “I WON!” or even, “I DID IT!”

If a shocking budget crisis, soaring unemployment and surprisingly flat population growth stuns Californians, consider what it’s like to run a business there. If you’re Peninsula Crane and Rigging, the correct term is “trying” to run a business there. Says Joe Bauer, president and sales director for the San Jose-based company, “This is still Silicon Valley, but it’s not what it once was.

Walking through Seattle’s Pike Place Market (where the inspiration for the book FISH! came from, and also the location of the original Starbucks), I couldn’t resist the Queen Anne cherries. Huge and just picked. “Give me a half a pound,” I said with positive anticipation of eating them as I walked around. The young woman running the fruit stand obliged, and weighed them.