Posts from — July 2008

Today I like to educate you about a phenomenon most of us have experienced before. I became aware of the description through an investment newsletter I receive. In it Jeff Clark describes it. It’s called the Puke Effect.

Don’t be mistaken. It doesn’t only apply to investing. It applies to many things and in some cases has become a behavior.

Look at your team meetings:
Have you put meetings on your schedule that you feel are totally redundant or unnecessary, and only waste your time? Ask yourself how many of these meetings just get created because one person wants to impress another person in the hierarchy.

How often do you think it happens because nobody wanted to make a clear decision, so it was elected to have another meeting about a subject?

Here is how Jeff describes the Puke Effect:

“The cruise was going along just fine.”

Captain Bill was describing the worst sailing trip he had ever chartered. “We were about halfway to the island when one of the passengers started to get sick…“He didn’t quite make it all the way to the railing and he threw up on a bunch of the passengers who were sitting right there on the starboard side of the boat.”Captain Bill then went on to describe how the passengers who had been puked upon started vomiting as well. Some of them managed to vomit over the side of the boat. But they were throwing up into the wind, and a good portion of “breakfast shrapnel” blew back into the boat, soaking the clothes, hair, and faces of anyone standing nearby.

At the end of every quarter, portfolio managers dress up their accounts by purging stocks that haven’t performed well. After all, who wants to show shareholders they’ve been hanging on to the worst-performing stocks in the market? So, one by one, the portfolio managers jettison the equities overboard. As the selling pressure mounts and the losses deepen, more and more managers feel the need to purge. Eventually, even the most experienced money managers are throwing up stocks at bargain-basement prices. It happens every quarter.Jeff Clark

It is rather simple:

You need honesty, confidence, and communication skills.

If you are confident to voice your opinion in a clear, non-threatening way, and communicate convincingly, you will avoid meetings that nobody needs. You will be able to make decisions when all aspects have been discussed. You will be in a role that keeps discussions from escalating into a Puke-Fest.

Best of all, you will be respected, maybe even adored, and people will want to work with you and seek your advice. One way of learning to have the required combination of confidence, honesty, and communication skill is coaching. You might want to try it for 3-6 months and see how much you can gain in a fairly short amount of time. This is especially recommended if you find yourself in a position of power and responsibility and recall events that qualify for the Puke Effect.

To get an impression of the materials we use at AMC LLC, you can start with the package we offer at http://tinyurl.com/4hqyzq and then upgrade form there.

On a lighter note, I like to suggest watching the video (link below) and getting a clear perspective on where time has gone – in case you have days you ask yourself: “I did things all day long, but it appears as if nothing got done – other than that stupid meeting with the Puke- Fest in the middle. Where did all the time go?”

http://youtube.com/watch?v=4P785j15Tzk

Axel Meierhoefer, AMC LLC

I am not a huge fan of providing material from other people, as they all have their own outlets. I always assume that visitors coming here would like to see and read what I have to say. Well, today we make an exception because I think what Paul Maloney said about social networking and business is importnat.

I have been working on my social network presence and will do much more this months in preparation of a massive effort for the second half of 2008. I think you will benefit from reading about Paul’s perspective. (italic)

Social politics in business: then and nowImagine its 1985 and the current office gossip is about a young fresh recruit getting a promotion because of their looks or behaviour. If the employee losing out on the promotion wanted to do something malicious they could write a letter, photocopy it and give it to all the staff, they could make banners and hang them outside the building or they could write to the local paper and reveal the juicy gossip.

Imagine the reaction in 1985 seeing an article from a colleague printed in the local paper about office gossip, assuming any paper would print it. An example of how office gossip worked back then in the 80s can be found at the New York Times.
Fast forward to 2007, the same two people, in the same position.

This time the losing candidate heads home (or even sits at their desk) and writes about it on their personal blog, adds some incriminating photos (possible faked with Adobe Photoshop) to Facebook and encourages other colleagues to add comments, and the BBC have a story that shows how this impacts individuals in the 21st Century.

Call it bullying, intimidation, discrimination or just plain abuse, these types of personal commentary on office life don’t just affect the individuals involved, they affect the image of the company. Even embarrassing tricks and behaviour can affect the company and peoples jobs. Would you want to be the Health and Safety Manager explaining the videos in this Contract Journal article?

Analysing the Social Network profile of a company should be something done on a regular basis, but it should be combined with policies, training and guidelines. If the employees don’t know how to behave correctly when revealing details about the company then disciplinary action can be hard to take.

Managing a businesses Social Network ProfileStart with the training, show employees what damage thoughtless comments on a Social Network can cause to them, their colleagues and the company.
Detail the things you expect them not to post about and the things they can post about.

Use the example of Kevin Colvin to show personal impact, his photo appeared in major newspapers around the world, potentially damaging future career prospects.
Follow up the training with procedures and guidelines to ensure everyone has the same understanding. The policies should detail the consequences of ignoring them.
Once all these measures are in place the Social Network Forensic Analysis can begin.

On a regular basis, use search engines and Social Networking websites to find information on the company.
Use the company name, address, any abbreviations or nicknames for the company and also the names of employees.
Review any content and see if it breaches any company policies that are currently in place.

Mark Ellis makes a number of good points in his blog, the most important one being to seek legal advice on the whole procedure before relying on it for disciplinary action.

Using the sledgehammer approach to this and forbidding all posting about the company can have two very negative effects. The first that people continue to blog and comment on Social Networking websites, relying on either not being caught or the disciplinary action not being enforceable.

The second negative effect is that it could reduce the positive publicity from Social Networking activity, Josh Ledgard discusses the impact corporate blogging had on Microsoft.

One way to view this whole area is to treat it like the anti-smoking legislation; everyone knows smoking is bad for them, but some people can’t stop. The company can encourage them to stop, promote alternatives and provide information on how smoking is dealt with in the workplace. If they smoke at home and the company has done everything they possibly can then there is some justification to place personal blame and fault. Positive encouragement can go a long way for both smokers and bloggers…

Paul Maloney is a Certified Information Systems Security Professional and a Specialist of the Business Continuity Institute.

Are you sick and tired of having to pay more and more of your hard earned money for gas?

Did you get one of these nice SUV’s when they were offering them with huge discounts, 72 months financing, employee pricing?

What about all the other things that seem to get more expensive daily? Are you ready to shout and find someone to blame?

I know how you feel. I just bought 2 apples for my wife for $3 and they weren’t anything special. The same purchase last years was about $1.49. Also, for the first time since I own my car (which only allows 16 gallon per filling) I actually reached the $75 limit at the gas station before the tank was full.

Don’t get me wrong. I am a big fan of protecting the environment, recycling what we can, and finding new technologies for the future, like Hybrid cars and hopefully soon, electric cars.

What makes me angry is the story of inevitability we are being fed every day. The government says that it isn’t in the business of regulating free enterprise. Ok- but why would you then allow the oil companies to keep tax benefits when they make more money than ever?

The oil companies say they can’t do anything about these insane prices because the oil is traded on the world markets and they only buy it for the barrel price the market dictates.

Actually, that’s not really true because these same oil companies are the ones that pump the oil out of the ground. Do your really believe the Saudis invented their own systems? No, they brought in the western companies, just like the Iraqis are doing now, the Kuwaitis did, the Mexicans did, even the South Americans.

In some cases, especially South America, the socialist governments decided to nationalize the equipment after the fields were ready to produce, but they didn’t come up with the technology.

Lately Congress, the oil companies, consumer advocates, politicians, and anybody else you can find have begun blaming the speculators at Wall Street for the high price of gas.

There is probably some truth in all of these arguments and taking it all together brought us ever closer to $5/Gallon.

So what will happen next? – I bet the prices will keep going up until somebody finally takes action and stop the robbery of the customer at the pump.

I assume while you reading this you are probably nodding and asking yourself who this someone is going to be?

Well, let me tell you. It’s you and me and good old fashion demand-and-supply.

Why is it that we are very aware of demand and supply, getting told about it every day, but accept that it doesn’t really apply when it comes to getting gas?

In my town and many places I visited around the country and actually around the world, there are several gas stations, but curiously, gas is always priced within a few cents of each other, no matter where you go.

We are paying the same if the gas is pumped in the Gulf o Mexico or the California Coast, basically on our doorstep, as we do for the gas that comes here all the way from Saudi Arabia. How is that possible?

I tell you how. The oil companies don’t consider us, the consumer, in the pricing. They look at every aspect, from taxes, to transportation, to refining, to sales volume of the gas station owner, but not at you and me.

Economy works best when the product that gets the most sales has an advantage over the one with the least sales. – Sounds familiar? Sounds like Economy 101?

Yes it is. So what we need to do to force some change for the prices at the pump is being selective.

In reality every expert will tell you that the quality of the gas you pump is so similar across all brands that it doesn’t make a difference if you choose Shell, Exxon, Mobile, Union 76, Citco, BP, or any of all the other brands. In the vast majority of cases it doesn’t even make a big difference if you get regular or premium (your engine might run better and smoother, but it would run with regular if you let it)

If we want to take back the influence we can have over gas prices at the source of sale, I suggest to avoid pumping any gas from any of the largest station, like Shell, Exxon, Mobile, Texaco, and BP. Typically within a few miles you will find plenty of other choices.

I am sure if we all stop getting gas from the biggest oil companies they will start asking themselves what happened. Quickly they w ill realize that the consumer is getting gas at other places. I am sure you agree that they still want to sell us gas and make the Billions of dollars of profits, so they will have to start competing.

When they lower prices, we can all switch to them and force the rest to review their prices, and so forth. Only when we take back our power as consumers will we have some influence on the prices. We can do that through conservation and jumping on new alternatives as they become available. In the mean time, let’s only get gas from the little guys and leave the tanks of the large oil companies full.

I am telling my more than 3000 readers here today. If you forward this idea to everybody you know (typically about 50 – 100 people) and they do the same, we will have millions of consumers by the end of next months taking back their power over gas prices.

I am sure that will change the prices. Supply and demand has always won over foreigners, speculators, currency fluctuations, and whatever other reason they throw towards us. I hope you join me in this effort and tell as many people as you can about it.

Axel Meierhoefer, AMC LLC