I just finished scanning the thoughtful blogpost by Martin Lindstrom, Why Brands Should Strive for Imperfection. You’ll like his central message: brands that consistently show a perfect face to their audience in their advertising and promotion (from unblemished fruit to unblemished babies) mistake perfection for connection.Turns out, however, that we humans are attracted to flaws. Why?Because we value what’s real.And in our house, neither fruits nor babies are free of those small irregularities that make each individual unique and interesting.
Homemade, not mass-produced. Special.
As wary confidence grows in the economic recovery, anxiety is starting to bubble around workforce loyalty and retention.The concern on the part of many line managers and HR professionals is this:that the stresses and strains of the last two years will drive their workers, even the most valued ones, to look for new jobs outside the firm as soon as they get the chance.Part of their motivation may be money. Part of their motivation may be a fresh start.Part of their motivation may be simple revenge.How long can you “do more with less” before feeling taken advantage of, no matter what the rationale?
Whatever the mix, these employees are at risk of leaving just as the company most needs their experience in the products, services, markets and business processes required to fuel new growth. If those same workers believe that leadership handled lay-offs and other tough decisions insensitively during the downturn, the danger of employee flight is even greater.
How can you as a leader bring them back into the fold?Be honest with yourself. Then be honest with them.Did you do a good job of leading during the tough times?Did you manage to balance the human with the business?Or, like so many quite flawed and well-intentioned leaders under great pressure, did you retreat to the bottom line without due consideration for what that meant for the people?
Think about it. Communicate what you think. Admit your mistakes. Connect your imperfect self into the lives of those around you.
Thank you, Martin Lindstrom.
(Please check out my imperfect new website.Would appreciate any comments on how to render it less flawed.And please email me at katejsweetman@gmail.com if you would like to connect with my own imperfect self).
Nightmare: You wound up on a nonprofit board that's not a fit for you. How did this happen? It started when you decided that you wanted to serve on a nonprofit board, since you've achieved success in your business career, have expertise to offer, a bit of money, and you want to give back. So you went online, picked an issue you thought interested you, picked a nonprofit that appeared to be in your charitable giving range. Soon enough, you were on a board. Oops. First board meeting, you're wondering what you are doing there. This is not what you expected.
This is not only a nightmare for you. It's a nightmare for the nonprofit. You're disappointed, maybe embarrassed, and not sure what to do. Not willing to fork over the $5,000 they now expect from you, nor to attend endless meetings. The nonprofit is annoyed to have a new board member who is not doing what was expected.
Imagine this scenario instead: Your company has a board program through which board experts train and place your firm's executives and professionals on nonprofit boards. The board experts have been immersed in building nonprofits, consulting to nonprofit boards, and placing and coaching business executives interested in nonprofit boards. Your board expert guides you through a process of exploring boards that address a variety of issues in innovative ways you never even imagined.
Your board expert works with you until you find the board that really excites you; the variety of nonprofits might be global, national, and regional. Before you go on the board, you learn from your board expert what the circumstances are on the nonprofit board and at the organization and how you can add value. You meet the nonprofit's CEO and board leader, make a site visit, and review key organization materials. The process might take a few months; it's a process of discovery. You're also trained and prepared about the role of nonprofit boards as well as the role of the particular board you are going on.
Because the match is so purposeful, your board experience is likely to be rewarding and an opportunity for professional and leadership development. From the nonprofit's perspective, you are likely to be a highly effective and engaged board member, and even to advance into a board leadership role as an officer or committee chair.
From the company's perspective, their executives and professionals will develop into better leaders and professionals, reflect positively on the company, steward the company's philanthropic investments, and advance nonprofits in making communities more vibrant and successful.
Companies that invest in a deliberative process for board-matching will see the greatest benefits.
As mudslides on the west coast and an epic blizzard on the east coast competed for news coverage last week, nothing could dim the glow of an economic report that contained a remarkable conclusion: Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick is trying to make California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger look like a carbon girlie man.
According to the Eastern Research Group, Massachusetts is on target to cut carbon almost 20% below 1990 levels by 2020, thanks largely to significant programs that improve energy efficiency in factories, buildings, and transportation. Those programs will save money, making Massachusetts more competitive than, say California. Governor Patrick is also doing it with wind and solar energy incentive programs, creating jobs and new domestic energy sources.
At the same time, by participating in the regional carbon cap-and-trade program, Massachusetts earned about $50 million last year that provided the seed money for these programs, along with funding of home heating efficiency retrofits for low-income families and job training for these emerging low-carbon industries.
Never one to shy away from competition however, Governor Schwarzenegger delivered a speech last week by satellite to the Delhi Sustainable Development Summit in India, pledging California’s continued leadership in renewable energy investment and innovation. His audience needed no reminder that it was California’s low carbon policies - - from auto emission standards to solar-powered homes - - that had set the example for other states and nations (Massachusetts’ Global Warming Solutions Act of 2008 looks suspiciously identical to California’s version of 2006, for example).
Schwarzenegger also announced a plan to cut sales taxes on manufacturing equipment for solar panels, alternative fuels, and other cleantech products. Aiming squarely at states like Massachusetts, the Governator said the tax break would encourage manufacturers to expand their businesses in California rather than moving to other states that already offer the tax exemption.
With state budgets suffering these days, why give tax breaks to anyone? Because it makes good business sense. Like most states, California saw a steep decline in employment over the past two years - - with the notable exception of cleantech jobs, which grew by 5%.
So who will be the real winners of this carbon weight lifting competition? Companies that invest in states like Massachusetts and California are going to prosper, because incentivizing efficiency and new industries creates much more long-term value than continuing business-as-usual.
Carbon is simply a measure of waste - - and waste in any state or business is an unnecessary and unaffordable expense. Even a girlie man can understand that.
If you are looking for an investor
and decide to work with a group or an individual angel investor you
need to know what they are likely to propose for a deal structure.If you are a working with an experienced angel investor it is very likely you will find terms such as:
Board of Directors – the Board will comprise of five members.One
is the CEO, one a nominee of the angel investor, and three nominees
that are independent of management which everyone agrees on and who
will have a meaningful investment in the company.
Share and Option Vesting – Angel
investors may ask the entrepreneur who started the company and is
looking for investors to roll back their shares previously issued in
the business and earn them over time.A typical framework
would look like this: 50% of the shares will vest daily over a three
year period and the other 50% will not vest unless and until there is a
sale of the company.
Sale of the Company – There will
likely be a “drag-along” clause which allows owners of 51% of the
business to force the sale and drag-along the remaining 49%.
Convertible Debt – The ability
for the investor to provide a loan with interest only payments over a
period of 1 to 2 years as well as the option to convert debt to equity
at their choice.
Legal Fees - The company will pay the legal fees to structure the deal.
As you look for investors in your company keep in mind there are plenty of ways to structure a deal.The deal structure points above are simply examples of what some investors are using today.
I would highly suggest asking any investor you are
working with for a one page term sheet spelling out their requirements
before you go too far down the path of having them invest in your
business.Remember, it’s not the amount they will invest, but the terms of the investment that really matter.
Last year, I had the pleasure of meeting Ranjini Manian through our mutual friend Barbara Annis. Ranjini, who serves with Barbara on the Women’s Leadership Board at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, is author of Doing Business in India for Dummies as well as founder and CEO of a very clever firm based in Chennai called Global Adjustments.
I say “clever” because, as far as I can see, Global Adjustments provides everything that a non-Indian relocating to the subcontinent might possibly need to navigate the personal and practical changes required to make one’s way in a new part of the globe. Moving to India can be quite daunting, and requires the orientation that only an insider can bring.
I have not moved to India, but I did experience the value that an insider sensitive to the requirements of change can bring when Ranjini provided invaluable editorial insights around a piece I recently contributed to the Economic Times (of India).She also recently published this Fireside Chat with me in her own magazine, At a Glance, India’s only intercultural magazine for ex-patriots (soon to be called Culturama), also focused on questions of change for women, for teams and for India.
From this experience with Ranjini, I have gained valuable insight into how one thoughtful Indian thinks about change in a way that is quite different from how those in the West often express our reactions to change.“People fear change” borders on cliché in our organizations, and managing change requires reducing fear, or so the logic goes. Not so, says Ranjini, or certainly not necessary.To help ourselves move into new places both literal and figurative, please scroll down to Ranjini’s editorial letter in her most recent edition of At a Glance.
Her central message: it is necessary to both love and to let go for change to take place with grace.
Saving Money and Boosting Profits with Greener Shipping and Packaging
Even in the Great Recession, businesses in every industry are pushing forward with sustainability because boosting profitability and going green go hand in hand.Still, it can be surprising how much of their eco-benefit often comes from beyond their walls through factors like shipping and packaging.Partners like Hisco that deliver greener shipping solutions from ExpandOS, Hexapack, 3M, and Green Line Armor pallets can extend sustainability throughout supply chains.
Shipping and packaging have a major impact on the environment and the bottom line.Wal-Mart is developing a more efficient fleet of trucks, hoping to double the efficiency of its long-haul fleet by 2015with steps like inflating tires, cutting down on idle time, and buying more efficient trucks.
The impact of shipping also comes from packaging material, crates, and pallets.Wal-Mart is eliminating all packaging waste from its US stores by 2025, a major issue with foamed styrene products, packaging peanuts, and other packaging materials that generate tons of waste and aren’t usually recycled or reused.They also don’t always provide the best protection against breakage.ExpandOS are an inventive alternative, with small triangular folded structures made of strong, rigid paper that provide both more sustainable packaging and superior protection, saving space and reducing shipping costs.Heath Ceramics, the producer of high-end tableware, found that losses due to breakage dropped dramatically when they switched to ExpandOS, from 30-35% losses down to less than 0.01%.
Hexapack is another shipping solution that reduces costs and boosts sustainability with a revolutionary alternative to wooden crates.Hexapack is made from paper constructed with a honeycomb shape that provides very strong support and crush resistance but at a fraction of the weight of wood.Lighter means cheaper for shipping, and greener because less virgin wood is used for crating, with less waste produced.
Pallets don’t always get a lot of attention, except when people want to burn them.And that’s part of the problem.Pallets cost money but wood pallets are weakly constructed, prone to damage, often stolen, and waste wood as well as money.Of all the trees harvested in the US, 40% are used to make these pallets that are largely disposable, making pallets the eight most common object filling up landfills.To solve this, Green Line Armor is producing the Hybrid Sustained Use Pallet (SUP) with extremely durable bio-composite material protecting their ends.Built to last, these pallets are sturdy enough to last far longer than regular pallets, slashing wood use, and using less money to buy new pallets.Green Line Armor pallets are also protected by RFID technology to keep them from getting stolen, and their ten year warranty shows that these guys mean business.
Tapes, sealants and adhesives are essential for shipping, and 3M has been a world leader in both sustainability and tapes for decades.They are replacing solvents with water, doing to “cradle to cradle” analysis of products, and using more renewable resources.Constantly finding new ways to improve their environmental profile, 3M manufacturing has reduced waste by 34%, reduced energy use by 50%, and reduced VOC emissions 78% since 2000.Their extensive R&D effort with tapes, sealants, and adhesives has made them an industry leader in performance and value, as well as sustainability.
Necessity is still the mother of invention, and businesses need inventive solutions like these.Businesses like Hisco can make the change to better and greener shipping easy.Visit the Green Manufacturing Expo West 2010 at the AnaheimConvention Center, February 9-11 to talk to Hisco and get started.
Glenn Croston is the author of "Starting Green" and "75 Green Businesses", and the founder of Starting Up Green, helping green businesses to get started and grow.
Is it Googleability, Bingability? Through much work and many
conversations I was selected as a trend expert for the Dr. Phil show. While
scheduled to air January 20, 2010, "Trends For 2010: The Good, The
Bad And the Ugly" was filmed in front of a live studio audience January 11 -- just prior to the Haiti
tragedy.
I consider myself a professional trender of purpose focusing
at once on the chaos happening in our society, and the tremendous opportunities
we create. While I gave the content of this show my innovative directional
spin, I admit that only a small part of it got through to the millions of home
viewers watching Dr. Phil on January 20.
Though filmed prior to the earthquake, it ended up airing when
Haiti was most in need and Obama was being questioned on his first year
anniversary. On the show we were shown looking at people struggling with
serious media addictions ... A mother addicted to Facebook and Farmville, and a
young woman who stalks actresses online via celebrity blogs, copycatting their
lifestyle choices 24/7. If only I had the chance to discuss trends such as
small living, innovative low carbon lifestyle or perhaps even how the economic
and earth changes are moving us more toward meaningful living.
It is a time of external and internal chaos in which we may
understandably turn our heads and look elsewhere for distraction, and yes,
celebrity blogs and much more are on the rise for this very reason. Yet I
strongly believe we are also seeing a trend of normal and extra normal people persevering
and surviving as living reminders of the growth, evolution and triumph that can
occur in challenging times. The movie "Precious" is one such story that stands
as a strong and honored example.
The volunteers and our own donations to help with the crisis in Haiti
are others. To his credit, Dr. Phil focused recently on the heroic survivors of
Haiti.
It seems it is important to scale back from extremes, live
simpler lives filled with meaningful connection to personal contribution than
distraction. Positive, pleasurable and destructive escapism will always happen,
particularly during times of challenge. Also most important currently is bringing
each person fully present to deal with the issues at hand. Attention, tools and
commitment to our community, country and global issues are being awakened in us
through tragedy and crisis of economy and earth.
Backstage After filming the Dr. Phil trend show, back stage stood the
young celebrity admirer who stood supported by women all around her. While I
did not say it on stage, I did put my arm around her briefly and whispered how
it just may now be time to live her own dreams and no one else's. She has full
permission and we certainly each do, to bring what we have to the table during
these times of great change.
Kudos to Dr. Phil and the female producers of the show who voted
me into this trend episode knowing my focus is more on the positive future than
the scary, sensationalist one. While it is one thing to have women viewers
continually witness other women in distress on the show, it is another to have
three female experts - one on stage and two in the audience to counterbalance
and "represent" another path.
Back, Backstage For me, it was a personal moment to visit the palm-lined,
historic Paramount Picture Studios of Hollywood; the dressing room with my name
on it, the door opening, arm holding, hair fluffing, makeup caking and wardrobe
styling ... Not to mention all the interesting people I would not normally meet,
like the male makeup artist who worked with Pamela Anderson for all of 19 years
and the hair stylist who had worked primarily on The Young and The Restless
(many stories there). On exit, how about the town car waiting and the door held
opened gracefully as I almost slipped in ... Wait, this is not my town car, I drove
myself there in my hybrid!
It was all over in a flash, and rightly so. Time to get back
tasks at hand.
A special thank you again to our editor Elizabeth Adams
Of ElizabethAdams.biz!
Next blog waiting in the wings: An interview with Jerri Chou of Lovely Day, TBD, All Day
Buffet and The Feast Social Innovation Conference--How young people are making
a difference through creative and socially innovative business models.
Last week I co-presented a session at the Working Mother Flexibility Leadership Conference entitled, “Flexibility is the Answer When Rightsizing is the Question.” We explained how to use strategic flexibility (e.g. flexible scheduling, reduced schedules, furloughs, compressed workweeks, telecommuting) to manage costs and minimize job cuts in response to a business downturn.
In the presentation, I emphasized that it was important to focus on all of the broad benefits of strategic flexibility beyond just minimizing layoffs and managing costs. This includes increased engagement, healthier employees, expanded global client coverage, improved sustainability, and individual work+life fit. Why? Because the reality is, depending upon your vantage point, the same flexibility can be seen either as a blessing or a curse.
One person’s reduced schedule that allows him to care for his aging parent is another individual’s bitter recession concession that keeps him from working full-time. One person’s contract employment provides challenge and freedom, but to someone else it’s an endless series of “gigs” that they would trade in a minute for a full-time job with benefits
Employers and employees face a difficult conundrum. In today’s global economy, rapid change is reality. Business operating models need to respond more creatively and flexibly. The same is true for individual employee work+life fit. We need more flexibility to manage our work and lives but we also need to be agile in navigating a more flexible career path that could include periods of full-time employment, reduced hours, layoffs, contract work and career breaks.
How do we resolve the need for greater flexibility that both helps and hurts at the same time?
This stark dichotomy was presented in the recent BusinessWeek article, “The Disposable Worker.” The article’s title sets the tone from the outset—flexibility is “bad.” And for some of the people interviewed, it is negative. They do feel disposable. But for others, that same flexibility is what they want. They don’t see themselves as disposable, but as a “Flexible Worker.”
There’s the contract-based call center employee who works out of her home. She is paid by the minute and receives no benefits (bad), but is grateful for the opportunity because she lives in an area with high unemployment (bad or good?). She also has a great deal of flexibility to care for her three children, one of whom is homeschooled (bad or good?). Is she a disposable worker, or a flexible worker? Depends upon the perspective.
We also meet two white collar, contract employees. One is a marketing executive-for-hire who loves the challenge and flexibility of contract-based assignment work. The other is an attorney taking on overflow projects from other firms as he struggles to start up his own business after being laid off. He has no benefits and is not happy about his situation. Two people, the same flexibility. One loves it. One doesn’t.
And it’s not just individuals who can perceive the same flexibility from opposite perspectives. Countries can. At the start of the recession, I wrote a series of blog posts in Fast Company advocating a more flexible approach to downsizing that would minimize layoffs, retain talent and knowledge, and encourage innovation in preparation for a recovery (This series ultimately inspired the Flexibility Rightsizing Tool developed by a group of experts for AWLP/World at Work).
Unfortunately, most U.S. companies responded to the downturn with all-or-nothing job cuts. But Europe, particularly Germany and France, were much quicker to take a more flexible approach. And the benefits are beginning to show as presented in a recent New York Times article. Industries in these countries instituted work-sharing programs that cut hours and save jobs. Companies tolerated the associated lower profit margins, used experienced employees to create innovative new products that they believe position them to grow when the economy turns around. Contrast that to the impact of layoffs in the U.S. described in the BusinessWeek article where psychologists were brought in to two organizations because work had come to a standstill.
In other words, the same flexible response to the downturn that most U.S. companies rejected as bad, European countries embraced as essential.
So who’s right? The white collar worker who relishes the independence of her contract-based employment? Or the underemployed attorney who would like to work full-time for benefits? The quick to cut, higher profit margin U.S.? Or the quick to retain flexibly, lower profit margin Europeans?
Maybe it isn’t a matter of right or wrong, but what’s reality. Ten years ago, someone working on a contract-basis or at a reduced schedule would have been a “disposable” worker, but today these options are becoming part of an average person’s career path.
Then the question becomes, how do we need to prepare differently? How do we manage our personal finances to absorb these flexible shifts when they occur? How do we navigate the different flexible realities to get the type of work+life fit we prefer at a particular time?
Right now we are still locked in an outdated, “I’m not successfully working if I’m not employed full-time, in an office everyday” paradigm. Not so. It’s important to note the a lack of health care makes this process more difficult in the U.S. I consistently find it surprising that the greater flexibility of work hasn’t been a more prominent rationale for health care reform.
And it will be interesting to see which country’s economy does ultimately recover more quickly. Will Europe’s willingness to sacrifice profit for a period in order to retain talent and innovation trump the more profitable cut/hire rigidity of the U.S. response?
For employers, all types of flexibility in how, when and where work is done are foundational strategic levers for rapid response. This includes being able to staff up and staff down quickly. But perhaps an even more importantly how can they use of flexibility to develop and engage a motivated, innovative, healthy workforce? Same flexibility, broad impacts.
Greater work+life flexibility in the way businesses operate and individual’s manage their work+life fit is here to stay. The trick is to see both the positive and negative applications as part of the same whole, and adapt accordingly.
Many people involved in board-matching advise nonprofit board candidates to find the organization that "you are passionate about," and then that's the board for you!
And many people hang around on boards for twenty years or more, because, after all, they are passionate about the organization.
Choosing the right nonprofit board
In my experience in working with board candidates from businesses, I've found that most people have a variety of interests. And if I guide people in understanding the nonprofit sector and exploring options, they will often become passionate about certain organizations once they become acquainted with the compelling work that is being done. Sometimes, an array of issues resonate with candidates depending on their life experiences and personalities.
Look how many people are passionate to help in response to the devastation and suffering in Haiti. Yet, if you had asked them last December, most of them wouldn't have mentioned Haiti, or even natural disasters, among their top three concerns. They've become passionate about Haiti because they've become aware. And that's beautiful. But that's an example of the potential to light up passions by exposing people to needs and opportunities to help.
The business people I work with are usually concerned about finding a board where they can add value, just as much as they are interested in finding a board that serves a mission that they can care about.
Qualifying for a nonprofit board
Having passion alone is not enough to qualify a person to either join a board or to stay on a board--even if you have served on the board for twenty years. The role of the board is to work in partnership with the organization's CEO to imagine the nonprofit's greater potential, create an ambitious yet achievable revenue model, and work with all its might to help accomplish strategic and financial success.
For a board to do the best job in serving the community, it needs to be comprised of people from diverse backgrounds and perspectives, with relevant experience and expertise based on the work of the organization and the nonprofit's aspirations, the wealth and networks to achieve financial success for the nonprofit, and a willingness to give it their all.
Each and every person who takes up a precious seat on the board needs to count in a big way, bringing much-needed value in addition to passion.
Passion is necessary, but not sufficient, for being a member of a nonprofit board.
A
little over a year ago I introduced a fabric company that is revolutionizing
the hospitality fabric industry. Valley
Forge Fabrics, once
a small mom-and-pop business, now sells more decorative upholstery fabrics to
the hospitality industry than any other company in the world. I recently got a
chance to catch up with Valley Forge’s leadership when I held an executive
briefing webinar on the secrets of Valley Forge’s success, and you can review
the presentation by clicking here. What I learned was fascinating: over the
past year the company has seen its green initiatives evolve into a breakthrough
new product with the potential to deliver a disruptive competitive advantage.
Read on to see how Valley Forge is harnessing the true potential of ethonomics.
Not only is
Valley Forge the leader in its market, but it is also focused on making sure
its products and processes are green. This focus on sustainability is more than
just lip service – it is a directive from upper management and a mission of the
entire company.
Valley Forge
has made an effort to recycle everything it can. It is the first to produce a
fabric made entirely of post consumer waste (e.g., used paper and cotton).
It encourages other ways to recycle by staff to bring in wine corks on Mondays,
offering a place for employees to bring in their old pairs of Croc shoes,
reducing its carbon footprint and cutting back on the amount of trash it
produces. These might seem like small steps, but Valley Forge has also taken
some huge leaps.
For
instance, Valley Forge has developed a program to reuse hospitality bedding.
Most of the time when a hotel is done with its sheets (usually because they are
starting to slightly fray after so many washes), it just throws them away.
That’s hundreds of millions of pounds of sheets heading into landfills. So
Valley Forge has set up a program in which it picks up old bedding (after it
has been washed one last time) and then delivers those sheets to homeless
shelters or rehabilitation centers within 200 miles of that particular hotel.
Beyond
recycling, Valley Forge has spent the last two years developing a new line of
sheets made with a renewable resource. First it looked at cotton, but after a
lot of research, it realized that cotton makes up 2 percent of the
world’s crops and uses 25 percent of the world’s pesticides. So right away
Valley Forge’s management knew that wasn’t the environmental solution it was
looking for.
Then management
focused on bamboo. But again, they were disappointed to learn that it takes
between 11 and 13 chemical processes to convert bamboo into a fiber that can be
used to make a yard of fabric. All of those chemicals changed the product so
drastically that it really wasn’t an environmentally sound investment.
Finally, the
company settled on working with eucalyptus. You see, eucalyptus pulp can be
created into a fiber by combining it with only one organic solvent. The product
is called Tencel, and it seemed like the answer to Valley Forge’s prayers.
However, it
wasn’t that simple. Hospitality bedding has to go through heavy, industrial
washing, and the Tencel wasn’t strong enough. So after more than a year of
working with Lenzing, an Austrian company that makes Tencel, the two companies
developed Tencel Plus. This “plus” version of Tencel was strong enough to cope
with industrial washers and soft enough to satisfy the most luxurious hotels.
And since
Valley Forge was the partner that helped develop the Tencel Plus, it worked out
a world-wide exclusive deal with Lenzing.
So now
Valley Forge has created sheets made with Tencel Plus that not only feel great
but also take advantage of the natural benefits of eucalyptus. Eucalyptus is
almost like a bug repellent, and therefore it reduces dust mites in the
bed. It also wicks away moisture and heat from the body, and so it cools
individuals down while they sleep.
People love
the idea of wrapping themselves in eucalyptus as they sleep. The fact
that it reduces dust mites and provides a cooler sleep are extra benefits. But
eucalyptus is also a very smooth fiber, so Valley Forge’s 200-thread-count
sheets actually feel like 350-thread-count cotton, and their 300 thread count
feels like a 500 or 600 thread count.
So focused
on a mission to be more green, Valley Forge not only developed a new product
that is better than anything else out there, but it also has the exclusive rights
to use that product. That is the definition of ethonomics.
Ask yourself
the questions below to see how you can follow your dream to create something
that your competitors cannot compete with.
1.What do I really want
to do?
2.How can it benefit
society?
3.Who can I partner with
to develop this new product or service?
4. Is there a way to set up exclusivity to benefit my bottom line?
