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INTRODUCTION
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The articles previewed on this page will be featured in future updates of The CEO Refresher. Starting August 1 we have been adding four or five new articles per week and updating other features as available. We will do our best to advise you when your article is featured however, please visit the current issue often to view the latest updates. You might also wish to subscribe to the RSS feed to be notified of the last ten articles added to the site.
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Rick Sidorowicz
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P.S. A subscription to The CEO Refresher would be an excellent gift for your valued clients and colleagues. See Gift Subscriptions for information.
Anatomy of a Promotional Postcard Mailing
by David Foley
Postcards can be an inexpensive and highly effective format for customer promotions provided that one can quickly communicate the offer and call to action. This article will delve into the details of a promotion, since these details may assist you in determining if – or when – a postcard mailing would be appropriate for your business or clients.
Selling Yourself Short?
How to Stand-out Without Lowering Your Price
by Jeff Mowatt
Is what you do for a living perceived by potential customers as being a mere commodity; more or less the same as others in your profession? When that happens, customers revert to the easiest differentiator – price. The good news is you can change customer perceptions by changing the way you describe what you do.
What Can a Good Question Do For You?
by JoAnna Brandi
David Cooperrider, who helped develop 'Appreciative Inquiry" (AI), encourages us to stop looking at business as a problem to be fixed and start looking at it as a mystery to be discovered. AI involves the ability to ask questions that will strengthen the system's capacity. The focus on strengths - both individuals and organizational - is a strong foundation of the Positive Psychology movement.
Optimal Conditions
by JoAnna Brandi
Every time I think of the term "optimal conditions" I remember the time I had the opportunity to study with Dr. Olaf Isachsen, author of the 'Joining the Entrepreneurial Elite' and 'Common Sense Isn't That Common Anymore.' Dr. Isachsen has the ability to distill complex ideas down to simple concepts and often has a sentence or two that ends up in my "keeper" file and as the subject of one of my tips.
What's All This Talk about Value?
by JoAnna Brandi
Value has a lot of elements. Price is only one of them. Value is both tangible and intangible. Value is what the Customer says it is. Value is relative, not fixed. Value changes over time depending on what the Customer needs and desires. Value is an equation. It's up to you to find out what components of value are right for your customers - and what value you, personally, contribute.
The Almond Effect® - Up Close and Personal
by Anne Riches
Self-aware leaders learn how to catch themselves in the clutches of The Almond Effect® before it clouds their judgment. This way they mostly avoid making poor decisions based primarily on irrational emotional responses not cognitive thinking.
How to Enhance Relationships, Increase Fulfillment and Empower Yourself by Being Authentic
by Mike Robbins
We live in a culture that is starving for authenticity. We want our leaders, our co-workers, our family members, our friends, and everyone else we interact with to tell us the truth and to be themselves. Most important, we want to have the personal freedom and confidence to say, do, and be who we really are, without worrying so much about how we appear to others and what they might think or say about us.
Why It Can Be Hard to Be Authentic
by Mike Robbins
Why is it hard to be authentic? More important, why is it hard for you to be authentic? This isn’t an accusation or a judgment, it’s an important question. If we can ask and answer this question honestly, without judging ourselves, we’re well on our way to becoming more of who we really are and ultimately more authentic.
Interestingness
Evernote is a remember-everything notebook app beloved by obsessive developers, project managers, and generally forgetful creatives everywhere.
Movies can be an amazing source of insight and inspiration.
Sheila Patek clocks the fastest animals
Biologist Sheila Patek talks about her work measuring the feeding strike of the mantis shrimp, one of the fastest movements in the animal world, using video cameras recording at 20,000 frames per second.
Guest Satisfaction Soars as Hotels Cut Back
Amid a historic industry downturn that has cut revenues to the bone, hotels are trimming operating expenses to follow suit, refocusing on those parts of a hotel stay that matter most to guests.
50 Best Websites You'll Wonder How You Lived Without
Essential sites to add to your bookmarks today.
How To Live The Live You Desire
Inspiring slide show by Earl NightingGale from @MasterMindCoach
What's the Right Thing to Do?
Is torture ever justified? Would you steal a drug that your child needs to survive? Is it sometimes wrong to tell the truth? How much is one human life worth? In the "Justice" program that bears his name, Harvard professor Michael Sandel probes these questions -- and asks what you think, and why.
Jeff Han demos his breakthrough touchscreen
After years of research on touch-driven computer displays, Jeff Han has created a simple, multi-touch, multi-user screen interface that just might herald the end of the point-and-click era.
Robert Sapolsky: The uniqueness of humans
primatologist Robert Sapolsky offers a fascinating and funny look at human behaviors which the rest of the animal kingdom would consider bizarre.
from Deviant art
Quotes
@Maura_Aura: Live your life with love and bravery and you shall lead a life uncommon.-Jewel Kilcher
Singing is a way of honoring oxygen.-Bjork
Pleasure is always derived from something outside you, whereas joy arises from within. E. TolleIn the province of the mind, what one believes to be true either is true or becomes true. - John Lilly
quotme"The impossible often has a kind of integrity to it which the merely improbable lacks." - Douglas Adams
xenstyle It is not what you look at that matters it’s what you see -Thoreau
“We live in this world when we love it.” -- Rabindranath Tagore
“Praise, like sunlight, helps all things to grow.” Jeffrey Fry
“One thing I can give and still keep is my word.”Jeffrey Fry
There are only two options regarding commitment. You're either in or out. There's no such thing as a life in-between.-Pat Riley
The gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.Chinese proverb
I have just three things to teach Simplicity patience compassion These three are your greatest treasures -Lao Tzu
Judge people from where they stand, not from where you stand.
--H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
How am I going to live today in order to create the tomorrow I'm committed to?. ~Tony Robbins
Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out.- John Wooden
“All the statistics in the world can't measure the warmth of a smile." --Chris Hart
“Honesty is more than just not being dishonest.”
--Unknown
aguitarguy95 Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and cannot remain silent. Victor Hugo
@adailypoll Be willing to give your best--before expecting it of others.
@aguitarguy95 “Music is what feelings sound like.”
"The key to success is to focus our conscious mind on things we desire not things we fear." Brian Tracy
There is no such thing as ‘soft sell’ and ‘hard sell.’ There is only ‘smart sell’ and ‘stupid sell.’ Charles Browder from Troy White
If you want to increase your success rate, double your failure rate." --Thomas John "Watson, Sr. from Jeffrey Fry
Things turn out best for the people who make the best out of the way things turn out.” Art Linkletter
To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong." Joseph Chilton Pearce
from Jessica Swanson
Only that day dawns to which we are awake - Henry David Thoreau
"Take the attitude of a student; never be too big to ask questions; never know too much to learn something new." Og Mandino from Jessica Swanson
"Choosing to lead is not always easy, but it IS always worth it." Joan Koerber-Walker
“I am who I am because you believed in me.” - Ulysses S. Grant
"What looks like a loss may be the very event which is subsequently responsible for helping to produce the major achievement of your life." -- Srully D. Blotnick
“This is like déjà vu all over again.”- Yogi Berra
In leadership, as in many other areas of life, the beginning often determines the end. False starts and weak foundations can be ruinous. Here are five insights to help you start successfully.
A Life That Counts
by Dr. John C. Maxwell
As I age, I gain perspective on the illusion of wealth and status as forms of fulfillment. I don't want my life to be measured by dollars and cents, or the number of books I've authored. Rather, I want to be remembered by the lives that I've touched. I want live a life that counts.
Special Features
Today’s Action Item: Reinvent Self!
by Art Petty
I know an awful lot of talented, hard-working people talking about or rehearsing for the process of reinventing their professional selves. This is the silent epidemic taking place in people over 40 that doesn’t garner the same level of attention as our anticipated flu epidemics.
Seven famous founders share money mistakes, smart moves By Laura Petrecca, USA TODAY
Getting Down and Dirty:
Personal Power and Effectiveness as a Leader
by Craig Bentley
A leader needs to know when to operate at the 30,000 foot level and when it's time to climb into the trenches.
How to “Unearth” Ideas, Issues, and Solutions:
Become an “Exploratory Listener”
By Craig Bentley
Media Exposure for Economic Recovery: Steps for Getting Good Press in Trying Times
By Paula Lyons
After the “Re-Org”: 5 Steps for Maintaining Performance, Even When Everything’s Changed
By Sarah Woods
Pay Attention to the Details (link to blog)
by Liz Weber
As a leader, our job is to clarify the future for our organizations and enable clear plans to take our organizations forward. As a manager, our job is to make the best use of the resources available to us to accomplish the current and near-term goals in front of us. Both of those responsibilities are vital to an organization. Both are noble. Yet in both roles, we need to pay attention to the details every now and then – to ensure everyone else is.
Writing in a Web 2.0 World
by D.J. Francis
You’ve heard all the hype about Web 2.0, but what does it all mean? How do you communicate with potential readers and customers in this new era? How should your writing style change? How has online interaction changed and what will this mean for the future of business? What is the secret new currency in this market?
Don't Let Good Grammar Spoil Good Writing
by Philip Yaffe
Over my 40-year career as a writer, I have purposely chosen to "violate" some aspects of English grammar that many people consider to be inviolable. Why? Because I believe their rigorous application often impedes emphasis and/or understanding. I would like to share some of these with you.
Shakespeare: What Can a Great Poet Teach Us about Clear, Concise Communication?
by Philip Yaffe
William Shakespeare was unquestionably one of the world's greatest poets and poetic playwrights. Arguably, his mastery of English far surpassed that of anyone else who ever put pen to paper. So what can Shakespeare -- a genius at playing the language almost like a violin -- possibly teach us about communication, where ideas must prevail and the language made as inconspicuous as possible?
Why Clear Writing Means Aiming for the Lowest Common Denominator - and then Some
by Philip Yaffe
Someone once said: "Nothing is so simple that it can't be misunderstood." I have always tried to live by this maxim, with my experiences in Tanzania as a constant reminder to simplify to the extreme.
Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Mark Twain
by Philip Yaffe
I am a collector of quotations. I am particularly fond of what I like to call "pithy prose". These short quotations can cover an unlimited variety of subjects: love, religion, politics, human nature, etc. What unites them is their ability to say more in one or two sentences than could be expressed in a thousand-word treatise. It would be almost unthinkable to start this series with anyone other than Mark Twain.
Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of Oscar Wilde
by Philip Yaffe
Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900), whose full name was Oscar Fingal O'Flaherty Wills Wilde, was a renowned Irish dramatist, novelist, and poet. His best known plays are "The Importance of Being Earnest", "Lady Windermere's Fan", and "An Ideal Husband", three delicious society farces. "The Picture of Dorian Gray", his only novel, a dark tragedy, is considered to be a classic. Wilde was widely known for his barbed wit, which is clearly reflected in these quotations.
Pithy Prose: The Wit & Wisdom of People Named 'W'
by Philip Yaffe
This article is dedicated to the wit & wisdom of people with surnames beginning with the letter "w". If you don't recognize some of these people, it doesn't matter. The source of timeless wit and wisdom is not important, only what it said.
How Verbal Variety Kills Comprehension
by Philip Yaffe
Intentionally used, repetition improves rather than degrades writing. The key word is "intentionally". As in teaching -- expository writing is a kind of teaching -- saying something once seldom gets the point across. However, constantly changing vocabulary for the sake of variety more often than not leads to confusion, rather than clarity.
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