When organizations need new employees they start up their recruiting process (preferably earlier, but that is not the topic of this article). Once the first candidates are selected the interviews will start.

In the April issue of Fast Company there are quite some facts listed about stress.

I just finished the inspirational book ‘Change By Design’ from Tim Brown. You can feel the passion as Tim describes the difference between being a designer and thinking like a designer.

That passion, like most other passions, is contagious.

Last week I had a series of interviews with executives form a company which manufactures cancer treatment equipment.

What stood out were two things:

Recently I did receive a card, which mentioned that on the 17th of March a preventive maintenance call was scheduled for my heating system. There was no time mentioned.

As I was abroad at that time I did call for a new meeting. Okay, that was scheduled, but they only could plan the call in the morning (8am – 1pm) or in the afternoon (1.30pm – 4.45pm). They said that it was not possible to give me a more specific time.

Last Sunday I had a stopover at the airport of Frankfurt, as I was flying from Ahmedabad in India to Amsterdam. I already had a boarding pass for my flight to Amsterdam and the gate was B7 at Frankfurt airport. We were early and our flight did not appear yet on the monitor, so I asked the customer service repr when my flight would be put on the screen. She said that her collegues would arrive in half an hour and then everyting should be okay. However, no customer service reps showed up and my flight was not mentioned on the monitor of the gate. Read More »

In his book Rules of Thumb, Alan Webber writes that change is a math formula. Change happens when the cost of the status quo is greater than the risk of change:

C(SQ)>R(C)

 In the week before Christmas I did send an inquiry to an organization. I had to send it to their info@ address as there was no other name mentioned on their website. This raises my first comment. Many people agree on the fact that what now counts in marketing is having conversations and building relationships.

So, how can I have a real conversation with Mr/Mrs Info?! Anyway info@ reacted very quickly informing me that they will come back to me in January. Well, that is a long deadline for a relatively easy question.... these guys must be busy.

Recently I was in a meeting with a general manager and I explained what service innovation could mean to him.

 If there is one thing that everyone agrees on than it is the fact that changes are the norm and they are becoming more and more unpredictable as well. This means that what worked in the (recent) past might not work in the future anymore. At least some of this (old) knowledge is becoming obsolete. In this situation it is key to learn fast and to act fast.