Stand Tall

He was all spit and polish. New suit, shirt, shoes, tie. He was the picture of the perfect employee. She sat across the table, looking at his resume, a mass of acronyms, military terms and titles, and countries she didn’t even know about. She looked up. “How many people have you killed?” Your answer, if…

Forestry – Is It a Lost Art

We were settling into our room. I had just turned from admiring the view of the forest, commenting, “It’s amazing! There’s not a sign of a beetle kill tree anywhere. I wonder how they’ve avoided this.” An ominously large shadow dropped past the window. I turned back but didn’t see anything. I joked, “I think…

Waste Not

Landfills around the world are growing by the minute. They pollute everything around them, poisoning air, food, and water. There seems to be an endless supply of waste.A small business can contribute to problem-solving. Every operation has waste. Every process can be more efficient. An acquaintance had been off work for quite a while because…

Stop Firefighting

“If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” The trouble with that is that, if you’re a small business owner, there’s only one of you. You wind up spending all your time problem-solving, firefighting. Outsourcing locally is your opportunity to focus more attention on your customers, production, and profit. You want…

Customer Satisfaction

More and more, customers want to know that the providers of their goods and services are doing something to clean up the environment. Big companies pay six figures for help with that. Small businesses can’t afford that! Small businesses can’t afford to do … nothing. Expand your definition of “the bottom line” to the “triple…

Distant Deadlines

We will save trillions by making this transition by 2050! We will reduce emissions by some amazing number if we change this by 2030! We will improve, increase, remove, decrease, all by some distant deadline. Where is the sense of urgency? Can anyone say they have never crammed for an exam? How many people who…