publishing

Bio and Interests: Nancy Anne Shaw

Nancy Anne Shaw — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 12:52:54 -0400

Graphic Designer who creates design that informs and educates. Provides marketing communications and editorial design services. Typical projects include: brochures, product sheets, magazine design, newsletters, trade advertising, advertorial marketing, web pages, web direct email, high level business graphics, infographics, logos and icons.

The Transfer of Power -- Giving Permission to Lead

Corey Blake — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 08:46:34 -0400

I happen to be heavily involved in a
book about followership as it pertains to leadership and one of the
principles we’ve been discussing lately is that those in the
followership role have an obligation to step forward and challenge the
leader when necessary. This line of thinking spurred an exceptional
vision call that I had with our team last Friday that centered around
them challenging me more. Often times I have felt like my team is
reluctant to challenge me because I am the boss, because I sign the

Developing Your Book: How We Do It

Corey Blake — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 15:29:21 -0400

Writers of the Round Table Inc develops manuscripts with clients who
are looking to engage the world in a massive conversation. What we do
is work with a client to 1) Organically define the message; 2) Build
the Vision; and 3) Create the delivery vehicle for the conversation.
Our company principals have defined our process over more than a
decade, building stories in film and now in manuscripts. What is unique
about our company is that we only use story to engage readers in the
higher level conversations our clients are looking to pioneer.

Eating Crow Towards Balance

Corey Blake — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 13:02:17 -0400

I posted this on my own site a couple of weeks ago, but loved the point here and wanted to share:

Calling a Spade a Spade

Corey Blake — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 12:55:20 -0400

The buck stops with the leader.
Ultimately, they are accountable for the performance of the entire
system. When something is not working, people often make excuses or
avoid taking responsibility and just try to push through, typically
leading to further delays in productivity and to results. This is not a
luxury the leader has. So to maintain the integrity of the system, a
leader often has to point out the company’s standards that are not
being met and enforce a solution, or at least motivate another leader

Finding the Alternative Solution

Corey Blake — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 12:45:56 -0400

You’ll see from a few posts ago that we were having major issues with
our online shopping cart. Our design division director was working hard
to learn what he needed to learn to create a working shopping cart that
enforced our brand. Try as he did, programming is not his focus by
profession. He is a good programmer, but his heart lies in design.
Persistent and wanting to get it right, he continued to bang his head
against the wall, going round and round to solve problems that kept
popping up. When it began affecting our clients, we had to stop playing

The Solution Business of Leadership

Corey Blake — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 02:41:48 -0400

Probably the most important key to effective leadership (in my somewhat
ridiculous world of entertainment and publishing) is looking up from
the daily mess of creation to see the big picture and recognize the
need for renovation–for a new solution to a problem that is lingering
and not getting solved. In our world right now at Writers of the Round Table,
we have been struggling with the distribution of our books. As I have
mentioned in other postings, we have spent years (a decade myself)

In a Virtual World the cost of gas is irrelevant

Corey Blake — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 02:40:11 -0400

I have to say that lately, myself and my staff are loving that we all
work from home. We have nearly two dozen people who freelance for our
company and they do some from the confines of their own residence. As
I was watching the news this morning, I see that companies are starting
to talk about possible four day work weeks to combat the high price of
gas. Typically four 10 hour days that would replace the standard five 8
hour days. As I was watching that, I felt suddenly blessed. With the
flattening of the world, has come the ability to run a business

The Absence of Leadership

Corey Blake — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 14:17:15 -0400

The Absence of leadership is often
felt by a company, but not recognized. I was recently talking with a
friend in a high up position with a national non-profit and she is
stuck in an environment that is demotivating, where everyone is playing
in their own sandbox and not interested in helping out the team unless
it advances their own career or reputation. We started discussing the
absence of leadership and how, often, the players in the system mostly
recognize the symptoms of a pained structure, as opposed to the core

Leadership is Attitude

Corey Blake — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 14:16:24 -0400

As the co-author of Edge! A Leadership Story, and the President of Writers of the Round Table Inc.,
I often blog about leadership. Yesterday, we were on a call with our
client Dr. Kay Vogt, a family business advisor, working on the
storyline for her upcoming book, The Family Business. Our discussion
centered around something that hit very close to home with me and that