I’ve been off my weekly blogging schedule the last 3 weeks as we are going through a complete change and re-focus as we attack a new market. In the last 18 months the competitive and economic landscape has changed so much that we have had to think deeply about our business plan. Threadless and several other competitors have gone from niche to main stream and with the change in the retail market we are seeing other opportunities. Collarfree.com is not going anywhere, but we are going to roll out a B2B platform Artistic Hub in Jan 2009.
For the last 3 weeks, i have taken a step back to evaluate our plan, listen and read about what is going on Social Media, and write a whole new business plan. On Nov 24th we made this decision. Since we have written a new exec summary and presentation, designed a new logo, a new website set to launch next week, a new market strategy, and we are in final contract review with our first client and our second client meeting is later this week. We are also expecting to double our revenue from last month to this month on the corporate apparel and product side because of this laser focus and commitment to our new plan.
So I will share more when we launch the new site, but for now i wanted to share a great article in Inc magazine this month, “Education of a CEO“. It was about a son who took over his dads cashew business and had to transform himself from academic to business leader on his own.There are some great insights and the son, Jeff Koeze, shared some great books I wanted to pass on as a reading list. I’m going to use some of his insight to transform our company in an ever changing recession market and I recommend others do the same. Sometimes evoking change is just a matter of knowing where to start.
Books and Articles
Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, by David Allen (Penguin, 2001). Allen’s influence is seen in the setup of Koeze’s office, his emphasis on delegating, his indifference to his BlackBerry, and more.
Punished by Rewards: The Trouble With Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A’s, Praise, and other Bribes, by Alfie Kohn (Houghton Mifflin, 1993). Individual incentives, Kohn argues, treat workers like lab animals and ultimately undermine productivity. Koeze adopted a Kohn-style profit-sharing plan.
Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big, by Bo Burlingham (Portfolio, 2005). Koeze had long wondered about the costs and benefits of growing slowly. Small Giants gave him the answer. “It’s the first book I’ve read that holds out the possibility that you can have a thriving and successful business without putting growth at the forefront of your objectives,” he says.
“Tricks of the Trade: On Factory Floors, Top Workers Hide Secrets to Success,” The Wall Street Journal, July 1, 2002, by Timothy Aeppel. This article inspired Koeze to begin recording processes so that the loss of a key worker wouldn’t mean the loss of a successful work method.
Seminars
Gerald Bell on hiring. Koeze attended a Bell seminar, then trained his staff in the methods, which involve phone screening followed by three sets of daylong interviews.
Roger Schwarz’s “Group Facilitation and Consultation.” Schwarz argues that leaders cause the behavior they dislike by communicating poorly.
Plus: Koeze On Business
“The Three Levels of Work,” an essay by Jeff Koeze. Being a boss is stressful and humbling. How to cope? “The classic defense is bravado, ruthlessness, and the claiming of certainty in the face of obscurity,” Koeze writes. “Greed, materialism, and social-climbing is the second defense.” His prescription: breathing exercises, friendship, and finding satisfaction in the work one performs.
Books and articles can be also found online at: The Well-Read Entrepreneur
Jimmy Hendricks
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