Violent crime in America declined each year from 1993 to 2004. Then just about the time the iPod became popular in 2005, violent crime began trending upward. CONCLUSION: iPods cause violent crime. Or at least that was the conclusion of a 2007 report published by The Urban Institute, a research organization based in Washington. (I […]
Moses was 40 years old when he tried to lead Israel out of Egypt by the strength of his own arm. He failed, then ran from the anger of Pharaoh like a little girl. But who can blame him for trying? He was, after all, the only Israelite who lived in the palace under the […]
Christian Jürgensen Thomsen was a young man interested in archaeology so when the Danish government of 1816 needed someone to climb into the attic of Copenhagen’s Trinitatis Church and sort through the rubble that had collected there, Thomsen was their man. Upon entering the attic, Thomsen reported random items in “dust and disorganized disarray, hidden […]
I became an advertising salesman so I could buy groceries. A college dropout with no financial safety net, I installed aluminum guttering on houses during the day and changed reel-to-reel tapes in an automated radio station at night. Our format was radio preachers who needed your money to pay for the airtime we sold them. […]
January 27, 2010: It’s weird when you think about it: Apple releases the iPad just as Salinger breathes his last. It feels like the ending of a play. J.D. Salinger and Jack Kerouac were the tortured voices that led us into forbidden places in our minds. We followed them, spellbound, as they sauntered into dark […]
In 1969, spending time with your friends meant piling into a car and driving around. Every town had a strip called “the drag,” a place to see and be seen as you cruised back and forth at 20 miles an hour. It's how you made contact. And when you and your friends weren’t in your […]
If you knew it was there, they wouldn’t call it a blind spot. Hidden within your blind spot is your limiting factor, the thing that holds you back and limits your success. Find your blind spot and stare your limiting factor in the face. Acknowledge the reality of it. Then decide whether or not you […]
Transactions can be immediate or transactions can happen over time. The purchase of a “Flashing Blue Light Special” is an immediate transaction. I give you something. You give me something. Now we’re done. Transactions like these indicate an Exchange Market where customers are in Transactional shopping mode. Make no mistake about it: Big things can […]
You’re about to begin seeing The Full Plate Diet everywhere you look; bookstores, grocery stores, airports, wholesale clubs… everywhere. This is an interesting story. I think you’ll enjoy it. Especially since you’re a big part of it. Read on. Ray Bard served as the first chairman of Wizard Academy, a 501c3 nonprofit educational organization […]
It’s entirely possible that today’s memo will make you think less of me. Maybe not. We’ll see. People fall into 4 categories in my mind: 1. People I owe.2. People I know.3. People Invisible.4. People I must fight. If you object to people being put in categories, please keep in mind I said we’re talking […]
The Las Vegas Hilton, 2003: The stagehand said, “This is the stage where Elvis appeared when he played Vegas.” He was helping me set up to speak to the managers of all the local, county and state fairs in the English-speaking world. When my stage buddy said we were good to go, the floor attendants […]
Most businesses target an imaginary customer because someone – probably an advertising salesman – once asked, “Who is your customer?” Ask any businessperson, “Who is your customer?” and he or she will likely answer with a singular customer profile. Something like, “My customer is a career woman between 28 and 44 years old, college educated, […]
It’s hard to read the label when you’re inside the bottle. Sometimes you need to get away from it all, step outside your surroundings and make some new decisions. To help you do that, we\'ve built you a business school. Some people think of Wizard Academy as a retreat center. Others see it as a […]
Romulus Whitaker is saving the rainforest in Tamil Nadu, and with it, dozens of species of animals. The problem is complex, but so is Romulus Whitaker. Tim Bauer is fighting air pollution in the Philippines with a 2-stroke cylinder head that reduces hydrocarbon emissions by 89 percent. Thousands of engines must be retrofitted. The […]
They say you can never go home again, just like you can’t step into the same river twice. Things change. Have you ever been to a class reunion? “Cigars had burned low, and we were beginning to sample the disillusionment that usually afflicts old school friends who have met again as men and found themselves […]
Tom Hennen has a line in his poem, The Life of a Day, that says, “We examine each day before us with barely a glance and say, ‘no, this isn’t one I’ve been looking for,’ and wait in a bored sort of way for the next, when we are convinced, our lives will start for […]
Ads are often written under the assumption that we can get people to care about things they don’t really care about. But this approach rarely succeeds. Traditional ad-think says: 1. Target the right people2. Leverage the right media (visual media for visual products, etc.)3. Use creativity in delivering your message. But nontraditional ad-think gets far […]
My son’s cell phone rang. He answered, “Hello?” “I’d like to speak to Booty Williams, please.” “This is Booty.” [long pause] “Is your name really Booty Williams?” “That’s right. Booty Call Williams.” “That’s awesome.” The call was from a telemarketing firm that had purchased my son’s contact information from a magazine to which he had […]
Slide 210 from The 40 Year Pendulum, a Dec. 2003 presentation of the Wizard of Ads Back when I was an advertising salesman, business owners would often dismiss me by saying, “I believe in word-of-mouth.” Then with a smug, self-satisfied look, they’d say it again, as though the words made them feel fine and righteous. […]
In 1869, Monet was painting at La Grenouillere when he realized that the color of an object is modified: 1. by the light in which it is seen, 2. by reflections from other objects, and 3. by contrast with juxtaposed colors. Monet translated his observations into the glowing phenomenon we know as French Impressionism. Remember: […]
Business midgets focus on profit margin, “I can sell these for double my cost!” But business giants focus on turn, “How many more would I sell if I lowered my price?” Retailers call it “inventory turn.” Restaurateurs call it “table turn.” Either way, it’s a measurement of how efficiently a business uses its assets. […]
Every life has a scoreboard and how you choose to keep score is up to you. How are you measuring success? I’ve known men and women who measure success by their ability to attract the opposite sex. You’ve met these people, too, haven’t you? Some people measure success by their ability to inflict pain […]
If it takes money to make money, how does one make money when he has no money at the start? A person without capital has nothing to leverage but his or her time. This is why millions of Americans wear the handcuffs of hourly wages. When I was 14, my life sold for $1.60 an […]
Did you recently – finally – begin to receive the Monday Morning Memo after having subscribed some time ago? We’ve been trying to get it to you, really we have, but the internet gods have not been kind to us. We've known for 4 years that thousands of you have been unable to receive the […]
When I was a boy, I noticed that people often remember things as having been better – or worse – than they really were. I would listen to friends and family and think, “That’s not what happened at all. I was there.” Call me jaded, but I came to believe that the average American is […]
Few people are as tiresome as the person who lives life in a minor key. Pessimistic people remind me of Eeyore the donkey: “I don’t think we can do it.” “This idea will never work.” “It’s probably going to rain.” On the other hand, few people are as terrifying as Eeyore’s opposite. Have you […]
The warm-up band is leaving the stage amidst thunderous applause, bowing and waving to the crowd, throwing kisses, fists pumping into the air. Now it’s time for the headliner, the living legends, the singers you came to see. A drummer takes the stage and launches into a repeating musical figure. He’s joined by five […]
“Give a product away, and it can go viral. Charge a single cent for it and you’re in an entirely different business… ‘Free’ has the power to create a consumer stampede.”– Chris Anderson, Free: The Future of a Radical Price A few weeks ago I announced that Bard Press – America’s most successful publisher […]
We've invented a machine that lets you select your mood. This astounding device can be adjusted to make you feel however you’d like to feel. It’s called a radio. The distinct advantage of humans is our ability to attach complex meanings to sound. The most important sounds are called words. NOTE: The written word […]
A group of students from the University of Texas recently asked Corrine Taylor to set up an interview with me on the subject of leadership. My schedule hasn’t allowed me to do that interview yet, but their request did trigger some thoughts on the subject. Maybe I’m splitting semantic hairs, but businesspeople who say “leadership” […]
Magellan was a misfit, a visionary with a better idea, a curious explorer of things unknown. He would have fit right in at Wizard Academy. But a similar outlook on life isn’t the only thing that connects us to Magellan. There’s a tangible connection as well. More about that later. Magellan was 13 years old […]
The Full Plate Diet is an incredibly cool book. And because you’re a friend of Wizard Academy, you can have a no-charge advance copy. That’s right. No charge. Nada. Zero. Zip. The publisher – Wizard Academy board member Ray Bard of Bard Press – is giving away 20,000 pre-release copies to trigger a nationwide buzz. […]
A close friend told me last week why his wife doesn’t like me: having seen me speak before a crowd, she is convinced I lack humility. I am a boastful man, arrogant and unprincipled, merciless and cold. She’s not the first to have said these things. I see her point and I make no […]
Did you know I’ve been writing these Monday Morning Memos for 15 years now? And in all that time: 1. There’s never been a Monday when I didn’t send a Memo. 2. I’ve never repeated a Memo that had been previously sent. I’m going to break that second rule today because I think it’s what […]
“It [the Cheshire Cat] vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.” – Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) I never ask the graduates of Wizard Academy, “What could we have done differently? How might we improve?” To […]
Maybe it’s because I was a young adult in the Dress-for-Success, go-go 80’s and retain vivid memories of those hollow days. Maybe it’s because Pennie and I had close friends who stepped on the landmines of “Get Rich in Real Estate With No Money Down,” “How To Make Millions Selling Soap,” and other glistening schemes […]
Portals create intrigue in paintings, photographs, literature and movies. Architects use them to lengthen the time we spend in landmark stores and theme parks. Portals say, “Come on in. Stay awhile.” Dr. Nick Grant, a close friend, was examining a group of photographs in my Accidental Magic collection when he said, “Oh! You’re a portal […]
I write today with some hesitation, the same hesitation I felt 2 weeks ago when I wrote about the romance of shadows and the piercing of horizontal planes. You may recall that I asked, “Was this stuff interesting for you or did it go over your head?” Three hundred and ninety-one responded with variations of […]
The keeper of my calendar told me a few weeks ago that David Rehr had called to schedule a day with me in Austin. I scratched my head and wondered why. David served as a congessonal aide on Capitol Hill when he was young, then he took a broken-down trade group, The National Beer Wholesalers […]
Illumination and Proximity are 2 of the 12 languages of the mind. Your feelings about an item are affected by the way it’s illuminated. Feelings of romance, intimacy, prestige and adventure are triggered by the hot spots and shadows of a campfire, a fireplace or a candle in a dimly lit room. Hot […]
The Tinkerbell Effect describes things that exist only because people believe in them. Remember Tinkerbell, the fairy in Peter Pan who is revived from near death by the belief of the audience? [Tinkerbell has drunk the poison meant for Peter Pan.] PETER PAN: Her light is growing faint, and if it goes out, that means […]
A year before the birth of Barack Obama, John Steinbeck bought a pickup truck, named it “Rocinante” and went looking for America. His final book, Travels with Charley (1962,) is a journal of his thoughts and memories as he drove that pickup 10,000 miles across 38 states looking back across the years of a lifetime. […]
As you know, I’ve been trying to get one of my favorite business authors to the Academy to host a 2-day event. Today I’m pleased to announce that July 28-29 you can meet and be mentored by the great Jon Spoelstra. Jon is going to teach you how to thrill the public and rock your […]
Your unconscious writing style is how you write when you’re simply being yourself. You also have a formal style and you might even have a whimsical style. But three styles is usually as good as it gets. Language, however, is extraordinarily plastic. You can make it do anything you want. With a little conscious effort, […]
Minor key life is the mournful echo of a hollowed-out gourd, bleached in the sun, hard and empty. Life should be lived in a major key, drenched in the colors of nature, quivering with energy, throbbing with purpose. Last week I showed you how to extract liquid color pallettes from famous paintings. This week I’ll […]
We learned last week that numbers are a language. Things communicated in numbers can be spoken in no other language. And because numbers are language, numbers can lie. Color, too, is a language. We use the language of color to reinforce – and contradict – statements made in the languages of shape and symbol, illumination […]
The key to Activity-Based Accounting is never to separate the numbers from the activities of the people represented by the numbers. When numbers in a business lose their connection to people and their actions, the numbers are no longer trustworthy. Never forget these 3 things: 1. Not all facts are helpful.2. You lose sight of […]
I spoke to a small auditorium full of business school grad students at the University of Texas last month. They were fascinated by my case study of Transactional vs. Relational customers. I saw their eyes widen and their heads move up and down slowly as I explained how the Relational shopping mode is the foundation […]
1. Never promise everything you plan to deliver.Leave something to become the delight factor. That unexpected, extra bit you deliver “because we love you” will go a long way toward helping the customer forgive and forget any areas where you may have fallen short. Great ads are written in three steps: (1.) How to End. […]
I am reminded of what Michel Eyquem De Montaigne said with tongue in cheek during the French Renaissance 450 years ago, “My life has been filled with terrible misfortune; most of which never happened.” As expected, we received a firestorm of email 2 weeks ago as a result of the Monday Morning Memo of March […]
The rocks of Gobekli Tepe (pronounced Go-beckly Tepp-ay) are a curiosity, and curiosity rocks. Travel with me to that ancient land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in southeastern Turkey. A shepherd wandering on the hillside where grows a solitary Mulberry tree, spies the top of an oblong rock that appears to have been […]
My staff can hardly get any work done. It seems the whole world is calling to ask what I think will happen with our economy. The President of the United States made a primetime speech last week. The press is an interesting animal. The Chicago Tribune predicted the president’s speech would “live among the annals […]
Ten years ago I taught you how to create relational ads that target the right hemisphere of the customer’s brain. Advertisers who learned this technique made a lot of money. Five years ago I taught you that 2008 would be the final year in a series of 40-year cycles and that the position and direction […]
It was exactly 10 years ago. I was on the telephone with an 87 year-old man I had been hunting for several weeks. I needed this man’s permission to publish a private letter he had written to America’s Chief of Naval Operations back in 1963. The man’s name was William Lederer. “Where you calling from […]
America, I think, is not a place. If another people lived here, the geography would be the same but it would not be our nation. America, I think, is not a government. Our pendulum swings from one extreme to the other and our politics are not unique. America, I think, is not an economy. Free […]
“If you say that there are elephants flying in the sky, people are not going to believe you. But if you say that there are four hundred and twenty-five elephants flying in the sky, people will probably believe you.” – Gabriel Garcia Marquez,winner of the 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature Ah, the power of details. […]
A new generation of entrepreneurs is emerging from the shadows. None of these is well funded but they are focused, relevant, and in step with the public. Some of them will grow to become business icons by mid-2012. (Three and a half years from now I’ll give you a hyperlink back to this column so […]
We’re living in a time of tumultuous change. A misinformed president declares a war. The value of homes – which were never supposed to fall – fell. The SEC can’t make Wall Street color between the lines and 700 billion dollars goes missing. A 50 billion-dollar Ponzi scheme is perpetrated by one of the most […]
TRIZ is the Russian acronym for a string of words that mean “Theory of Inventive Problem Solving,” an innovation matrix of the late Genrich Altshuller, a Soviet scientist who proved:1. there are only about 1,500 basic problems in life and 2. implementing one or more of 40 archetypal answers can solve each of these problems. […]
A successful consultant uses small indicators to make big decisions. If he explains his methods to data-worshippers, he sounds like an idiot. When it later turns out that he was right, the doubters claim he was lucky, saying, “You can’t possibly extrapolate that outcome from that data.” Consider the following: A large group of 4-year […]
Albert Schweitzer. In background, clockwise from lower left: Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Ann Radcliffe, Horace Mann, J.M. Barrie, Marian Wright Edelman, Anne Frank Albert Schweitzer was a musician and physician who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1952. This is the message he left for us when he died: “I don't know what your destiny will […]
First it gets dark, then the air slaps you from every direction and the ocean falls from the sky. Laws of gravity have been repealed. Your thoughts reach up like flowers for sunlight but the sun cannot be found. I am darkness. I am the storm. And the witch rides her broomstick across my sky […]
Run the following ad in any newspaper:2006 Honda Civic DX 4dr, White, 63,000 miles, $8,100. Call 555-1212 These are the questions you’ll be asked by nearly half your callers:“What year is that Honda Civic? Is it a 2-door or 4-door? What color? How many miles on it? How much are you asking?” I know this […]
The coming year will be fun, adventure-filled and profitable for people who have their wits about them. A number of small business owners are positioning themselves to overtake their much larger rivals. Will one of these companies be yours? Not many years ago, General Motors and Circuit City were the dominant players in their categories. […]
Chapter six in John’s story about the life of Jesus tells us how he fed 5,000 people with 5 loaves and 2 small fishes. I have no problem reconciling God and science, so the miracle bit doesn’t stumble me in the least. The thing that fascinates me – the piece I woke up thinking about […]
Tom Wanek believes credibility can be “purchased” by risking one or more of six currencies. The more you put at risk, the more believable your message. Currencies that Buy Credibility: 1. Material WealthOf the six currencies, we see material wealth risked most frequently in money-back guarantees and statements like, “Find a lower price anywhere and […]
Most women can tell at least one funny story about a tragic first date. In most of these stories, a misguided man spends the entire evening saying, “Here's an example of how wonderful I am…”“Let me tell you what I can do…”“…and that's what makes me special.” Although we’re rarely drawn to people who begin […]
Peter Wenders chooses stories and illustrations for children’s books. It’s 1954, and today is a day like any other; Wenders sits innocently in his office, believing that people are who they claim to be. And he assumes they’ll do what they say they’ll do. But today a man with round glasses and a large […]
Americans have always treasured independence and achievement. We’ve seen ourselves as fighters who stood tall after every victory, chin up, chest out, shoulders back. And to the victor go the spoils, right? Big houses, big cars, lavish vacations; these were the American dream. But we recently learned that America is not an only child. There […]
“The brain has three natural roadblocks that stand in the way of truly innovative thinking: 1. flawed perception2. fear of failure3. the inability to persuade others.”– Dr. Gregory Berns, neuroscientist, psychiatrist, and Distinguished Chair of Neuroeconomics at Emory University. Need a fresh perspective? Want to alter your perception, think new thoughts, create a whole new […]
On January 19, 1998, I wrote a Monday Morning Memo titled, Creativity is an Inert Gas. It was published as chapter 89 in The Wizard of Ads. These are a few of its paragraphs: Moments of emotional recovery are the best times to think about problems you have not been able to solve. Great, […]
I recently had dinner with a young friend who has been married for about a year. When he said that he and his wife were hoping to have a child, I knew it was time for The Talk. An older friend gave me The Talk twenty-eight years ago when Pennie was pregnant with Rex, our […]
Greg Farrell, bottom left, with Bill Aberman, Jeff Sexton, and the rest of the class known as The Midnight Revellers at Wizard Academy in June, 2004 I met Greg Farrell in 1999 while on a book tour promoting Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads. We shared a bottle of red wine at the Waldorf-Astoria’s […]
I recently asked a group of 14 men to share a snapshot from their photo albums of random memory, a vivid image, unfaded, a moment inexplicable, captured forever by a long-ago click of that camera in the brain. Here’s what they handed me on scraps of paper: “Trish’s laugh as she walked out of the […]
Elizabeth was a young Quaker girl who fell happily in love and got married in 1929. “Morgan Vining, my husband, swept my little boat out of the shallows into the sunlit depths of life’s stream and we had almost five years together before, in a single moment, he was gone.” Car wrecks happen quickly. Elizabeth […]
Real estate is a business involving mountains of money. It’s also a business in crisis. Put these together and it means ka-ching if you know how to make the phone ring for realtors. You ought not be surprised that I know how to make phones ring. What should surprise you is that I’m willing to […]
It’s like you’ve asked him to defend his religion; the business owner who believes in growing his businesses through exceptional service delivered by extraordinary people gets testy when you ask him to name a business that has successfully employed this strategy. It’s like trying to convince a believer there is no God. I’ve encountered dozens […]
Our American men dropped the baton in the 4×100 meter relay. It was embarrassing. Unthinkable. A few minutes later our American women did precisely the same thing. The commentators were brutal, but accurate: “You have to look at the new leadership at USA Track and Field and wonder if it’s been a vacuum of leadership. […]
Advertising salespeople are highly paid because rejection hurts. They told me to rub Zig Ziglar on it, but the sting and the ache stayed with me. I was 20 years old. The smiley seminar speaker said, “Look in the mirror each morning and repeat these affirmations.” Sorry, I’ve already got a religion and it makes […]
You walk into a room, empty but for a table carved from crystal. Girdling the table are 11 other persons whose occupations are similar to yours. You place ten thousand dollars on the table, your gift to the group. Each of the other 11 does the same. But this is a magic table. You don’t […]
Commercially speaking, where are things happening in your town? Move to where the action is. Follow Best Buy, Home Depot, Starbucks and the other Big Boys who have already done the research. Nothing draws a crowd like a crowd. Media costs are escalating and the public is hiding from ads. These are just two of […]
You’re attracted to art 1. when it stands for something you believe in, 2. when it shows you a reflection of your own core values, or3. gives you a glimpse of your inner face. You're drawn to a brand for precisely the same reasons. A cultural icon is a contemporary archetype, mass-appeal public art, the […]
Mom’s off-white Formica table with wobbly metal legs had a charred circle on top where I once set a pan that was way too hot. Mom couldn’t afford a tablecloth to cover it, but whenever she suspected a person might have nowhere to go for Thanksgiving dinner, she’d always invite them to our house and […]
Traditional wisdom says, “Advertise in the newspaper. Everyone reads the newspaper. There are lots of radio stations but only one newspaper.” The problem with traditional wisdom is that it’s usually more tradition than wisdom. Take a look at the chart at the top of this page and you’ll see that the total, combined ad revenues […]
I’ve known Richie Starkey since I was five. He turns 68 today. Richie said the only thing he wanted for his birthday was for you to pause today at noon, wherever you are in the world, make a peace sign with your fingers and say with a smile, “Peace and Love.” Will you do it? […]
If I told you our experiment was constructed specifically to test radio versus newspaper, I’d be lying. Like most discoveries, we stumbled on this one by accident. Here’s how it happened: Lifestyle Centers of America is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to lead you and me to a healthier, happier life through better nutrition, […]
The thinnest human hair is half a million angstroms thick. Typing paper is a million angstroms. Yet the layer of quicksilver that turns plate glass into a mirror is only 700 angstroms thick. It would take 714 such layers to equal the thickness of a hair, yet it’s this impossibly thin layer that reflects a […]
“The fundamental shortcoming of most mission statements is that everyone expects them to be highfalutin and all-encompassing. The result is a long, boring, commonplace and pointless joke. Companies are all writing the same mediocre stuff.” – Guy Kawasaki Most organizations try to define themselves by telling us what they believe in, what they stand for. […]
My friend Kary Mullis once said, “Claims made by scientists… can be separated from the scientists who make them. It isn’t important to know who Isaac Newton was. He discovered that force is equal to mass times acceleration. He was an antisocial, crazy bastard who wanted to burn down his parents’ house. But force is […]
The Medium is Not the Message Marshall McLuhan’s famous line, “The medium is the message,” is at best a Japanese koan (ko-ahn.) You know, “What is the sound of one hand clapping,” and all that? I’m sure I’ll get a thousand ranting emails about this, but I’ve always felt koans to be a silly attempt […]
Back When We Killed for Tennis Shoes MAY 14, 1990 – The cover of Sports Illustrated showed a pistol being shoved into the back of a high school kid. Those were the days when an alarming trend swept this land of purple mountains, majesties, above the fruited plains. Kids were killing for tennis shoes. Remember? […]
Visuospatial Sketchpad (the movie screen in your mind) Time travel is fun. Want to learn to do it? Follow me. The year is 1608. England buzzes with William Shakespeare. Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear are performed to rave reviews while 44 year-old William grieves the death of his mother. A team of 47 translators works […]
Sholem Aleichem (SHO lem a LAY kem) When Samuel Langhorne Clemens began to write, he adopted the pen name Mark Twain, a common shout among riverboat pilots on the Mississippi river. When Sholem Rabinovich began to write, he adopted the pen name Sholem Aleichem, a common Yiddish greeting whose most accurate translation would be, “Peace […]
Horizontal Thinking American education teaches a subject vertically, narrow and deep. And the deeper one plunges into the subject, the narrower it gets. Specialization. 1a. Liberal Arts1b. Literature1c. Spanish Literature1d. Spanish Literature of 1492-16811e. Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616)1f. Don Quixote de La Mancha by Cervantes (1605)1g. Symbolism in Don Quixote And then you write your […]
Customer Profiles I’ve never seen a business fail due to reaching the wrong people. But if you listen to advertising sales reps, “reaching the right people” will solve all your problems. And guess who has exactly the right people for you? The conversation usually goes something like this: the sales rep says, “Tell me, who […]
How to Make Business GoodWhen Times are Bad Archetypal Patterns, Part 3 Here's the Pattern: When times are tough and customers are scarce, business owners buckle down and try to become even better at the things they do well. They do this because they trust the Guide pattern, “This has always worked in the past.” […]
Archetypal Patterns Part One. Reconciling the Challenge pattern to the Guide pattern Half your brain sees a hierarchy. Deductive reasoning is a product of this. Vertical. Sequential. Objective. Scientific. Hard facts. Details.“Be for what is.” The other half sees connectedness. Intuition is a direct result. Horizontal. Chaotic. Subjective. Relevant. Relationships. Big picture.“Recognize the pattern.” Intuition […]
The Future of Radio Ten years ago, Eric Rhoads asked me to appear on the cover of Radio Ink in a suit of armor. Since Eric is one of my closest friends and a major supporter of Wizard Academy, I agreed to do it for him. Since 1998, my Wizard of Ads column has appeared […]
Ancient Greeks and Turning Fifty Socrates was right, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Most of us have moments when we ask, “Am I happy? Is this what I want to do? Am I making a difference? Would I be missed if I were gone?” Introspection is like medicine. It’s beneficial in small doses […]
Contemplation Twenty-five years ago, my friend Richard Exley read me some words I've never forgotten.Here they are: If I had my life to live over, I’d try to make more mistakes next time. I would relax. I would limber up. I would be sillier than I have been on this trip. I would be crazier. […]
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