How to Think Like Your Customer | Page 19

February 13, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

To make sound business decisions, you need empathy. Here’s how to get your employees to use it wisely and make it the coolest part of your company.

One of the biggest criticisms executives face is that they’re too removed from their customers’ needs and wants – and oftentimes, that’s a totally valid statement. After all, what do the analytical minds at a corporation like Jell-O have in common with the 5-year-olds who obsess over the colorful, wiggly product?

In Wired to Care, authors Dev Patnaik and Peter Mortensen discuss how empathy provides a connection to customers that helps generate new insights and greater success. When Jell-O experienced a drop in sales, executives spent hours poring over data to figure out why it happened. But the truth was, no trend report or market analysis could bring them the right answer – because none of them had eaten Jell-O in the past six months. That’s right: the cold, hard, jiggle-free truth was that they lacked the ability to put themselves in their customers’ shoes.

Weekly Economic Update | LAEDC

February 13, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

v.19 n. 07 – Released February 12, 2015

This Week’s Headlines:

January Labor Market Report: Strong Hiring Continues
U.S. Light Vehicle Sales Off to a Strong Start
Events of Interest
- February 18, 2015: LAEDC Economic Forecast Event Featuring Tourism and Hospitality

Could cricket flour bring bug eating to the mainstream? | Inhabitat

February 12, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

While it might sound like something out of the Survivor reality show, two University of Oregon students have found a way to increase the world’s intake of protein without clearing another acre of forest. Cricket Flour is not a trendy name; it’s an actual description of what Charles Wilson and Omar Ellis are bringing to market—and it’s tastier than you might think.

“My first thought was that this would not work in a Western culture,” said Ellis, an MBA student. But Wilson, a law student, had come armed with a 2013 UN report named “Edible Insects: Future prospects for food and feed security,” which detailed the importance of insects as a food source, according to The Oregonian. Wilson and Ellis recognized two things: First, that the world needs protein, but second, that we cannot continue to feed protein to the world at our current rate of farmland consumption. Conventional protein sources consume a vast amount of resources.

Intensive fishing is destroying a primary source of protein for some of the population and putting it financially out of reach for others. “Governments around the world,” according to The Oregonian, “are scrambling to prevent overfishing and fish farms are criticized as polluting the water.”

10 Simple Steps to Turn a Bad Business Day into a Good One | Small Biz Trends

February 12, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Some days we just feel off, or overwhelmed. These negative feelings can affect our work and the work of those around us.

Sometimes it’s best to just take a minute to turn lemons into lemonade. Here are a few quick tricks to turn a bad business day into a good one when your day seems like it’s going south.

Take a Deep Breath

When you’re feeling overwhelmed or just in a sour mood, take a moment to step back and breathe. Deep breathing can help reduce stress and center your mood, helping make a bad day just a bit better, if only for a moment. Take this moment to get your thoughts and feelings in check.

How to Handle Chronic Complainers On Your Staff | Inc.com

February 11, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Editor’s note: In this new column for Inc.com, Alison Green will be answering questions about workplace and management issues–everything from how to deal with a micromanaging boss to how to talk to someone on your team about body odor. Here’s our inaugural letter, from a reader asking about managing a team that never seems to stop complaining:

I was hired to manage a team of fairly experienced salespeople. I originally was a manager of a different line and left for a better opportunity, and returned for a promotion as sales coordinator. I had known the team already and had a respect built with them.

What Apple Just Did in Solar Is a Really Big Deal | Bloomberg Business

February 11, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

It was a year ago this week that Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook responded to a climate-change heckler at the company’s annual shareholder meeting with an impassioned rebuttal in which he famously told investors who care only about profits to “get out of the stock.”

Now Cook is putting his prodigious sums of money where his mouth is, proclaiming the “biggest, boldest and most ambitious project ever,” an $850 million agreement to buy solar power from First Solar, the biggest U.S. developer of solar farms. The deal will supply enough electricity to power all of Apple’s California stores, offices, headquarters and a data center, Cook said Tuesday at the Goldman Sachs technology conference in San Francisco.

It’s the biggest-ever solar procurement deal for a company that isn’t a utility, and it nearly triples Apple’s stake in solar, according to an analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF). “The investment amount is enormous,” said Michel Di Capua, head of North American research at BNEF. “This is a really big deal.”

This Incredible Hospital Robot Is Saving Lives. Also, I Hate It | WIRED

February 11, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The robot, I’m told, is on its way. Any minute now you’ll see it. We can track them, you know. There’s quite a few of them, so it’s only a matter of time. Any minute now.

Ah, and here it is.

Far down the hospital hall, double doors part to reveal the automaton. There’s no dramatic fog or lighting—which I jot down as “disappointing”—only a white, rectangular machine about four feet tall. It waits for the doors to fully part, then cautiously begins to roll toward us, going about as fast as a casual walk, emitting a soft beep every so often to let the humans around it know it’s on a very important quest. It’s not traveling on a track. It’s unleashed. It’s free.

The robot, known as a Tug, edges closer and closer to me at the elbow of the L-shaped corridor and stops. It turns its wheels before accelerating through the turn, then suddenly halts once again. Josh, the photographer I’d brought along, is blocking its path, and by way of its sensors, the robot knows it. Tug, it seems, is programmed to avoid breaking knees.

War Of The Wallets | TechCrunch

February 10, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Being a contender in the mobile payments space is becoming a coveted position by large and small businesses. A largely fragmented sector with several unexpected turns over the years, the digital wallet battlefield has recently been showing signs of maturation, which tells us that the market is starting to consolidate and that prominent players may soon emerge.

Since the inception of mobile payments, there has been a lack of a cohesive solution by key players in the space. For example, businesses and payment vendors are at odds with the banks over sharing transaction revenues. And now cellular providers are creating a proprietary solution to avoid dealing with Apple and Google. As we leap into 2015, mobile payments are expected to become mainstream within the next 12 months, and the market has already begun to straighten out.

Must-Know Advice On Wills And Inheritance For Entrepreneurs | Get Entrepreneurial

February 10, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

In the challenging cut and thrust world of the entrepreneur, it’s all too easy to let the mundane aspects of life slip by. Making a Will is one of those things. We all think we have plenty of time, with more important or pressing things to do right now in launching or growing the business.

Given the uncertainty of the future, this can prove a costly mistake should the worst happen. Are you sure your hard-won business assets will land in the right hands when you’re gone? Entrepreneurs work long, hard hours to build their businesses, yet it can vanish in a flash if you don’t make your wishes plain by writing a Will.

5 Personality Traits of All Good Bosses | Business News Daily

February 10, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

If you’re looking to move up the ranks and take on more of a managerial role, your employer is expecting more from you than just being able to make good decisions.

When promoting professionals to management positions, more than half of executives said they look for employees with strong motivational or leadership skills, while 19 percent said they want someone who has good interpersonal or soft skills, according to a new study from The Creative Group.