06/28/09 06:56 AM Filed in:
Looking
for meaningful work
There are now more
than five unemployed workers for every job opening
in the United States.
The unemployment
rate has already reached 9.4 percent, and most
analysts now expect it to hit 10 percent or higher.
Economists are currently spreading the word that
the recession may end sometime this year, but the
unemployment rate will continue to climb. That’s
not a recovery. There were roughly seven million
people officially counted as unemployed in November
2007, a month before the recession began. Now there
are about 14 million. If you add to these
unemployed individuals those who are working part
time but would like to work full time, and those
who want jobs but have become discouraged and
stopped looking, you get an underutilization rate
that is truly alarming. “By May 2009,” according to
the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern
University in Boston, “the total number of
underutilized workers had increased dramatically
from 15.63 million to 29.37 million — a rise of
13.7 million, or 88 percent. Nearly 30 million
working-age individuals were underutilized in May
2009, the largest number in our nation’s history.
The overall labor underutilization rate in May 2009
had risen to 18.2 percent, its highest value in 26
years.” So where are the jobs? Read
More...
06/22/09 09:29 AM Filed in:
Management
Marketing
There was a good
article in today’s WSJ about why business plans
fail but as usual they approached the subject from
35,000 feet and did not address some basic reasons
why business plans can and do all too often fail.
With close to 20 years experience in corporate
America here are some additional reasons why I
believe the best laid plans go way off the track
and crash with the shattering of careers.
Read
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06/21/09 06:37 AM Filed in:
Doomed to
fail
There are some
branding moves that at a gut level are so stupid it
makes you say out loud “what the hell were they
thinking”? I could not help but think that when I
saw a news stories about Disney’s move into the
netbook computer market with two models, one for
girls and one for boys. As a Disney employee tried
to justify the move he said “it can block access to
certain Internet sites”...news to Disney
executives: Windows and a variety of simple
software programs allow parents to block access to
unacceptable Internet sites. Read
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06/15/09 07:02 AM Filed in:
Marketing
Strategy
Last
week Apple lowered prices of some Mac Books as well
as announcing that the price for the next OS
upgrade would be only $29. This move seems to have
some analysts worried as Apple has always made
really great margins on products but is this the
right move for Apple and are price cuts a good move
overall? Read
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06/14/09 06:50 AM Filed in:
Twitter
The war of
statistics has started ! Facebook advocates are
ecstatic that Facebook continues to grow while the
growth of Twitter leveled out in May. Those who
don’t understand Twitter are now saying “see I told
you so” and are saying that this could be the
beginning of the end for the overhyped Twitter. A
recent Harvard business publication didn’t help
when they showed that a very small number of
Twitter users are responsible for the most
contribution. Can Twitter get back on track? You
bet but they need to implement some basic business
tactics to ensure growth. Read
More...
06/10/09 01:27 PM Filed in:
Twitter
There was another
warning sign for social media today on CNN.com. A
poll of over 100,000 people showed that 75% of them
are getting tired of social media. While the poll
is unscientific and raw it shows that the attention
span of the public is really poor when it comes to
the Internet and that yes, the buzz around social
media is in fact a lot of hype. Here is a list of
what this really means to marketers and let me know
what you think.
Read
More...
06/06/09 03:26 PM Filed in:
Twitter
The front cover of
Time magazine this week features Twitter and there
is no doubt that this social media property is hot
right now but I would argue that Twitter is the
result of the natural evolution of the Internet and
is in the growth curve of its product life cycle.
The real question is can Twitter adapt as users
needs change and, more importantly, can they do it
while holding off competition and not upsetting
current users who don't seem to like any changes to
their favorite social media platforms?
Read
More...
06/06/09 12:53 PM Filed in:
Working
in corporate America
60% of workers who
leave don't quit a company. They quit a boss. Given
the number of really bad managers out there I am
surprised that number is not higher. During this
economic downturn employees have learned that they
are, for the most part, expendable and that doing
more with less means more stress and more hours and
less work life balance. With so many books about
managing people out there how could so many people
have so many bad managers? Easy, like Scott Adams
has said so many times via Dilbert, incompetent
people are often promoted to manager where they can
often take credit for work they didn't do. Here are
my ideas to reengage employees and win the hearts
and minds of those who are your companies heart and
soul. Read
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06/05/09 05:38 AM Filed in:
Social
Media
When I conducted
research for a Website awhile back with my target
audience one aspect became really clear: women are
about community and love to share information with
each other. New information from eMarketer, my
favorite online source for marketing information,
has revealed that in fact women are both using
social media and are using it to connect with
others.
Read More...
06/03/09 06:37 AM Filed in:
Internet
Trends
Not only does
a product today need to be better to win over consumers it also has
to be easier to use than competitors products. Changing consumer
behavior, from using a search engine in which they are comfortable
using, is going to be very difficult for Microsoft especially when
the competitors product has become a verb.
Read
More...
06/02/09 06:03 AM Filed in:
Internet
Trends
I watched a
keynote presentation from
Google on their new
cloud integrated application called "Wave" and
it's pretty impressive. As I watched the demo a
couple of things became clear to me; first, the
Internet, and the way we communicate, is
continuing to evolve and second, people are
losing personal face to face business
communication skills that are essential in any
relationship. Some are wondering if Google's
Wave could be the beginning of the end for
social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter
but I don't think this will happen. It is,
however, a glimpse of an integrated
communications platform that could be available
to business in the near future.
Read
More...
