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A couple of nights ago I made sauteed chicken breasts for dinner, with a white wine pan sauce to make it a little more interesting. Briefly, here’s how you make a pan sauce (and yes, I promise this is going somewhere): you add a quarter cup of wine and a quarter cup of chicken broth to the pan, perhaps with a bit of mustard, and then boil it until the half-cup of liquid is reduced down to a total of ...
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I hate to be the one to point this out, but most of the corporate businesses in America are run by cowards. [You: “Wait a minute, Stainton. I run a corporate business and I’m not a coward!”] Really? You think not? Then answer this question—honestly: What drives most of your decisions? [You: “Well, let’s see. There are many elements: the profitability of the company, the cost/benefit ratio, consumer expectations….”] Bull. It seems to me that most corporate decisions made in ...
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Let’s see, what’s Paul McCartney been up to lately? Well…
All of this, ...
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There’s a little Italian restaurant near my home where I go when—well, when I want to eat Italian food. Duh. So I was there the other evening (because I wanted to eat Italian food), and the hostess was seating an elderly couple. I wasn’t really paying attention, but apparently they asked if they could be seated closer to the window. The hostess very nicely explained that that wasn’t possible, for some reason that I didn’t catch. But the owner, who ...
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“Where do you see yourself in five years?” That’s a pretty common job interview question. The answer, of course, is “Someplace better than the pathetic job I’m applying for right now.” I was talking about this question recently with a friend of mine who works in Human Resources, and she said that most applicants respond to this question with what she called “lofty, unrealistic goals.” She went on to say, “The truth is, five years really isn’t all that much ...
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You know how, when you have a cold, you just don’t feel like doing anything? There’s the coughing, the sniffling, the sore throat—and they all combine to create a mood of general lethargy. Well, welcome to my world! That’s where I’ve been for the past week. And you know what I found out? Having a cold makes a great excuse! “No, I can’t go to that party…I have a cold.” “Sorry, can’t talk on the phone now…I have a cold.” ...
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Why do we spend so much time focusing on the things we don’t do well? Honestly, we beat ourselves up all the time. It seems that no matter how many things we’re good at, we choose to dwell on the weaknesses:
Alan (despondently): I just can’t hang pictures. Look at these. They’re all crooked. I’m going to kill myself.
Kari: Are you crazy? You’ve won a Nobel Peace Prize, cured swine flu, and you’re currently starring in the ...
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I attended a workshop yesterday at my local Mac store, and the conversation turned to iPhones. This was pretty inevitable, because we were surrounded by the bloody things; still, it turned out that one attendee, whom I’ll call Cheswick because it’s a funny name, had not yet made the switch. He fully intended to, but said, “I guess I just haven’t reached my pain point with my current provider yet.”
I’ve been thinking about that, and it occurs to me that ...
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I think you need to see other people.
I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with your current relationship, or your current colleagues, or your current friends. I just think you need to see other people. We all do. Because if we keep interacting with the same people—just the same people—we’re going to keep hearing the same points of view, and sameness is the mortal enemy of innovation. Just this morning in Indiana, President Obama said, “The United States led the world’s ...
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I haven’t blogged in over a week. Nor have I Tweeted, Facebooked, or LinkedIn. I’ve fallen off my self-imposed schedule. Part of this is for good reason: I’ve been meeting with colleagues face-to-face, in Phoenix, Denver, and Breckenridge. Social media is great, but nothing will ever beat getting together with colleagues over a glass of wine or a couple of beers and talking shop. So that’s the good reason. The bad reason is that I got lazy. I got used ...
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