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Archive | Encouragement

Bird nest-small

Life and Death Leadership

Is tearing up a bird’s nest an act of cruelty or kindness? Last year my wife and I noticed a couple of birds flying up to the dryer exhaust vent above the kitchen window. My wife correctly guessed that they were building a nest so I went outside to check it out. After I came […]

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Customer Service for Breakfast article by Charles Marshall

Customer Service for Breakfast

For  just  a  moment,  forget  about  productivity.  Forget  about  making  your  company  more  money.  Forget  getting  a  better  performance  review. To  me,  good  customer  service  isn’t  really  about  any  of  those  things.  To  me,  providing  good  customer  service  is  about  the  person  that  I  want  to  be. Think  about  the  last  time  you  were  provided […]

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1970s BLOND BOY BIKING WITH CHOPPER HANDLEBARS RIDING DOWN SIDEWALK SUBURBAN STREET

The Cadillac Man’s Christmas Gift

In the early seventies, it seemed almost every kid rode their bike to school. I remember standing in the front of my elementary school staring at the bike rack loaded with well over 100 bicycles of every type imaginable. Some kids were lucky enough to have new bikes with banana seats and monkey handle bars. […]

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Batman picture-small

Real Heroes Don’t Wear Spandex

There have been five live-action iterations of Batman in my lifetime. 1] 1960’s Batman, starring Adam West and Burt Ward. Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson pretty much just sat around Wayne Manor all day until they got a call on the red Bat-Phone from Commissioner Gordon. Then they slid down the bat pole and somewhere […]

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The Turtles-2

What if Your Customer Has a Point After All?

Sometime back in the early seventies, I was getting in our family car in a Kmart parking lot when I looked down and found a badly weathered eight-track tape (ask your mom) on the ground next to the car. The tape was in bad shape but closer inspection revealed that it was The Turtles’ Greatest […]

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George Clooney in O Brother, Where Art Thou? article by Charles Marshall

Handle the Heat Like George Clooney (Director’s Cut: longer article)

With a little prodding, you can get my friend John Hicks to talk about the time he got to act in the Coen brothers’ classic movie, “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” After John saw their first movie he was hooked, so when he learned they were shooting a movie practically in his backyard, he rushed […]

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Education,,Elementary,School,,Learning,And,People,Concept,-,Group,Of

Confessions of an Unsuccessful Liar

When I was seven years old, my parents entertained some friends who had just gotten back from vacationing in Hawaii. Back in those days, it was much more uncommon for people to travel to far away exotic locations, so my parents’ friends were showing off their pictures and souvenirs while my parents ooh-ed and aah-ed. […]

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Pizza,Delivery,Man,With,Work,Uniform,Picking,Up,Pizza,Boxes

The Power of Failure (or not making any dough)

I answered the phone just after midnight and heard the panicked voice of my business partner on the other end of the line. “If you want anything from the restaurant, you’d better come get it now,” Frank said. “They’re kicking us out of the building tomorrow morning.” “What?!” I practically yelled into the phone. “We’re […]

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