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I’m especially excited about writing this article. Why? Because I am going to be making fun of myself. Last weekend I held my first annual Big Pow! Global Takeover Summit in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Some of our people work remotely, and I wanted everyone to have a chance to get together, share ideas, and spend…
DetailsI just got off the phone with an occasional client of mine who works in the energy industry. I don’t know if you know this or not, but a few weeks ago the International Energy Agency said that, thanks in large part to new drilling techniques, the United States is on track to become the…
DetailsWelcome to the week of Thanksgiving, where we take a break and give thanks for all the truly important things in our lives – flush toilets, the Internet, and wallabies (they’re so freaking cute, and I’m thankful that they exist).However, some of us are currently thankful that we get a four-day reprieve from our colleagues.…
DetailsSo last week I spoke at a competition for entrepreneurial students at Illinois State University. I have to admit, it was a pretty impressive affair. Sixteen students presented their ideas to a committee of judges comprised of entrepreneurs, angel investors, and faculty advisors. Then, three student teams presented a business plan, and the winning team…
DetailsHello, and congratulations to approximately 51% of you – your guy won the election! I don’t know about you, but elections always inspire me. For months and months we get to listen to people tell us groundbreaking things like “poverty is bad” and “children are good” and “I like living in America”. We wait breathlessly…
DetailsSo I went to a wedding in Houston this weekend, which for those of you who have never been is approximately 4 billion miles wide. Seriously, if you live on the west side of Houston and you want to have dinner with your friends on the east side, you’d better start driving right after lunch.…
DetailsI worked in the restaurant industry for seven years, so I think I can speak with some authority when I say what all of you already know: customers are really, really annoying. For starters, they are constantly bothering you with endless, aggravating questions like “Can I have more Sprite?” or “What would you recommend?” Then…
DetailsSo this weekend I participated in a color run to help raise money for the Ronald McDonald House, which as you know is the fund established to help Ronald McDonald finally get off the streets. (I’m just kidding about that; if you want to know more, go to www.rmhc.org.) Now I think we can all…
DetailsSo I’m trying to learn Spanish. I figure that Spanish-speakers are eventually going to take over the country, so I may as well be able to talk to them when they do. I originally thought it would be super simple, since you can usually just add ‘o’ to the end of every English word and…
DetailsHello, everyone! I’m typing this entire blog post with only one finger today, because my other nine have been heavily bandaged during a freak towel-folding accident I suffered last night. And it occurred to me that I have never yet discussed workplace safety.So here we go! As you know, workplaces are annoyingly safe. Very rarely…
DetailsLet’s face it – customers are annoying. They’re constantly asking for things, and they touch everything – and there’s no telling if they washed their hands the last time they went to the bathroom. Customers are gross. They should be illegal. But unfortunately they’re not illegal. There’s an election coming up, and I’m hoping to…
DetailsIt is impossible to tell you how excited I am to be writing about today’s post. You see, every year I do one presentation that falls so far outside the norm that I don’t even truly know how to explain how I ended up doing that particular job. One year I performed in a loading…
DetailsGreetings from Pennsylvania! Today I am in the land of Hershey, a town which really does smell like chocolate. They gave me a Hershey bar when I checked in, and the lampposts in the town are capped with replica Hershey kisses. The cobblestone streets are made out of Reese’s Pieces, the grocery stores only sell…
DetailsHello my loyal readers! Apologies for being absent for so long. If I were your long-distance boyfriend, you would have probably broken up with me by now. I’m sorry for being such a bad person. However, like all people who stop calling for too long, I have a good excuse. We have been working on…
DetailsHello peoples! I am writing to you today from my living room. I’m wearing frayed slippers, plaid flannel pajama pants, the same T-shirt I was wearing yesterday (and which spent the night crumpled up on the floor beside my bed), and a plaid flannel shirt over top of that. Do my two plaids match? Not…
DetailsYou know, I like to think of myself as a creative person. I don’t want to brag or anything, but I made quite the impressive collection of pinch pots when I was in elementary school; one of them was so incredible, in fact, that I should really refer to it as a pinch jug. So…
DetailsHello, devoted readers! I’m writing today from Wichita, Kansas, which I learned yesterday is the airplane manufacturing capital of the world. You wouldn’t know it to look at the airport, since it would fit rather cozily into most suburban backyards, but Cessna, Lear, Airbus, and Boeing all have manufacturing facilities in the city. I learned…
DetailsHello everyone! I’ve just come back from a meeting that literally made me want to rip my own ears off. If there had been a window in the subterranean dungeon we were sitting in, I would have flung myself through it and fallen peacefully into a row of thorny bushes (side note: why does anybody…
DetailsHello, aspiring shopkeepers (that’s a more entertaining word than ‘business owners,’ so I’m going with it). As the occasional shop patron, I have noticed a handful of amusing tricks that some vendors are using to frustrate their customers. In some cases, these tactics are so successful that you can actually prevent people from buying things…
DetailsHello everyone! I’m in a pretty good mood today. I’m in Durango, Colorado, about to present at the college here, but I got in early enough to go skiing for half a day. It’s gorgeous, and my life seems to be heading in a happy direction. Which of course bodes ill for this post, since…
DetailsHello again, and welcome to another Martin Luther King Day. Today we honor one of America’s most impressive orators, a man who helped usher in the most sweeping social change in the United States since the Civil War. The civil rights’ movement of the 1960s would probably not have accomplished as many things or commanded…
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