Early Mentor Passes Away

I have been trying for quite some time to get a letter back to Dr. Mose Tjiterdero, the Namibian House Speaker who encouraged me to "stop playing it safe" and start my long dreamt-of company when I returned to American after a summer in his country. The recent article from my hometown newspaper spurred me to again try to reach him. Today, I found out why he was so difficult to reach: he'd unexpectedly passed away.

Still, his influence touches me. When I insisted I didn't know enough to start a company, he casually asked me if I knew what his occupation was before becoming House Speaker: He was an educator with no government experience and least of all, no legislative experience. He told me that when tasked, we find we already have what we need.

And I did.

The Falling Dollar and International Business

Oil prices are soaring and the US dollar is falling (the Canadian goose--or is it moose--is worth more than the sawbuck, for criminy's sake!). At a recent OPEC summit, leaders from Iran and Venezuela suggested tying the price of oil to the Euro instead of the U.S. dollar. Those of us who conduct our consulting biz internationally are finding ourselves to be considered more of a bargain, with our prices showing more favorably against our foreign competitors.

What I'm not sure of yet, is how this inflation-related price differential will effect the willingness of prospects to consider us. One friend, Hy Mariampolski, a brilliant ethnographer, tactician and founder of international consumer research firm, Qualidata, found that people whose budgets were tight before are more willing to consider his invaluable services. Stateside, consultants who's prices are too low are dismissed as newbies or desperadoes. Hope this isn't the case on the other side of the Pond.e

Queen Bassist Made Chancellor

You know how there were bands and artists from your youth that you followed throughout your life? For me, one was Queen. Fat Bottom Girls, Bohemian Rhapsody and all the rest were anthems to me. Almost orchestral, with lyrics that had me looking stuff up in the enclopedia (Scaramouche, like Freddie, was "born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad") I remember where I was when I hear that Freddie Mercury has died and it struck me more than the passing of John Lennon or Elvis Presley.


Now, Queen's guitarist, Brian May has continued to amaze me. Before joining the group in 1970, May had completed a Baccalaurate degree in science (with honors) had already started work on a PhD at the Imperial College London departments of Physics and Mathematics, "studying reflected light from interstellar dust and the velocity of dust in the plane of the Solar System." Um, damn!

Yesterday, it was announced that he had been selected Chancellor for Liverpool John Moores University, succeeding Cherie Blair (wife of the former PM).

He's written Bang! The Complete History of the Universe and a host of scholarly articles in astrophysics.

Certainly May and Queen have challenged conventional wisdom. They're role models to me of working from a uniquely inspiring vision and having at it!

...and She Gave Me a Microphone..!

This is going to be fun. Lisa Thomas, from the P3 Group, has asked me to appear on her BlogTalk Radio Show, Power Boost, this morning at 10:00. Our topic will be on how vision relates to business success. If you have a minute, be sure to navigate over and listen or download it if you can.

Every Workday Needs a Game Plan - NY Times

It's Turkey week, ooops, The week of Thanksgiving, some people won't be in the office, some take a few days off and others relish in the the reduction of calls and emails and cubicle visits that disrupts their daily work flow. So are you going to use this week at least from Monday to Wednesday to plow through lagging items on your today list, or will you just let things idle until next Monday. Well either way, you better have a plan for everyday. Not just a to-do list but a get-it-done plan. Here's an excellent article in the NY times.

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In the News

I appeared in the Lafayette Journal and Courier today. Seems they wanted to hear from members of the hometown crew that do well in business and remember where they came from. Here's a little bit of it:

She coaches businesses to succeed with less struggle
By MAX SHOWALTER
mshowalter@journalandcourier.com

A zeal to help businesses chart a course for the future and train, staff, plan and coach employees led Lafayette native Lalita Amos to start her own firm in Indianapolis.

And the path to entrepreneurship was first paved with employment at the Sycamore Girl Scout Council in Lafayette, RR Donnelley & Sons in Crawfordsville and a nonprofit organization in southern Africa.

"I got to really make a difference there in the time I was (in Namibia) and got to spend quite a bit of time with their House Speaker, Mr. Mose Tjitendero, who suggested that I stop playing it safe when I went home. So I hung out my shingle in 1996 and haven't looked back," said Amos. "I started my company, Total Team Solutions, as a way to bring all the things I'm passionate about in business together.

"I help business owners and executives make more money with less time and have more satisfaction with less struggle. I challenge them to fulfill on meaningful goals and establish new capacities along the way so that they can maintain the ground they take." (read the rest)

Sweet!

And It Started Working Again...*

For those of you who have been giggling at the fact that my beloved Kyo 7135 smartphone went up in a greasy puff of smoke (some foolishness about technology not lasting forever), you'll love this.

Just as I was unhooking the docking cradle and getting ready to say "bye-bye" to my trusty smartphone forever, I opened it up for one last look. The ugly "I'm dead, Jim" screen that I've been staring at for the last several weeks...was gone. It works. Now, at this point, Garland, who was nearby, said "Lalita, don't be fooled" likening it to the way a dead man can sit up and appear to sigh, he held my grubby mitts as he forced me to put it down and then he watched while I disconnected it.

Oh, the humanity.

Is this how you feel today?

You’re juggling a whole bunch of projects, and having a hard time managing all of them, and not completing many. More projects keep being added. It’s really stressing you out.

read this....now.

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LNB #050: Gobbledygook

Leverage... Cutting edge... Scalable... ...and the list goes on.

When did our business communication stop being authentic and start being a frantic race to leverage robust world-class business intel that offers flexible, yet scalable, capabilities to help achieve (I really wanted to say "leverage" again) potential and future stakeholder value?

Listening to what passes for business communication sometimes give me hives, like Frank Zappa's Valley Girl with its collection of "likes" and "totallys."

Fer sure.

We can do much better when speaking and writing to each other. We just don't. Gobbledygook, a kind of mutated chat or scribe to impress has become a nearly Olympian sport and is far less entertaining to witness. Many of us could use a Gobbledygook Book (a Dictionary of Acronyms Abbreviations Initializations & Esoteric Terminology) to keep track of the arcane terms we hear in meetings and, hell, on TV.

Use language that is clear and check in to make sure that your intended meaning is coming across. Trust me: people will cheer.

Read this article from Web Ink Now on gobbledygook in marketing. It's a good one.

Listen Now: 13:44