Our Business Tips Go To 11

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By Aaron Cheeseman


The buzzwords are here, the clichés are polished, the message is on … (drumroll please) 2007 will be a good year to be smart, a great year to get real and the right time to create your own future. Or not. Does the world really need another January issue full of business tips rehashing the same-old advice with a new coat of varnish? Did the emperor really look good in that suit? We sure hope so, but in case we’re wrong, we’ve decided to test your business savvy and push your branding buttons. Find the real business tip in the following pages and win a prize — the knowledge that you know spin when you smell it. And remember, you didn’t hear it here first, folks.

Don’t hire quitters. When you need to get a job done, quitters will let you down every time. Reinforce this message with your management. Giving up is a losing strategy. Once you’ve quit, you might as well comb your hair like Johnny Depp in that movie.

Intimidation is a good thing. Keep your employees at arm’s reach but have an open-door policy. Let employees know that they’re welcome to make a brief appointment with you through
your administrative assistant’s intern during normal business hours. They’ll appreciate your personal approach and the intern will just love you for it.

Show value with value. In 2007, savvy customers will prefer lower prices among identical items. However, many potential shoppers may be willing to pay more money for items of greater value that are different. Who can figure them out?

Friends can fire friends. You quit college to start the company together. Now you’re in charge, and he’s dead weight. Are you supposed to drag him around forever? Don’t beat yourself up. Just slip a note in his inbox right before you go on vacation. Upon your return, you’ll have lower overhead, more office space, and you won’t have to listen to his sobbing over lunch.

Always be unsatisfied. Success can be downright alarming, especially if you talk about it. No matter how many times you achieve success, you can always try harder thanks to low-simmering self-esteem issues. And so can your employees, the slackers. The worst thing you can do for quality control is to publicly express contentment.

Don’t let employees take advantage of your generosity. Grant them Casual Fridays, and soon they’ll be pushing for Pajama Tuesdays, Belly Ring Wednesdays and Trucker Cap Thursdays. Be firm and find fun ways to help your staff take ownership of their privileges. An inventory spreadsheet on the break room refrigerator is a great way to help the staff budget their monthly coffee allowance, for example.

Hire good-looking people. There are so many benefits to having attractive, well-proportioned staff. It’s a well-known fact in Iceland that people go out of their way to please the cosmetically gifted. Sure, job skills and experience are useful, too. But when skills and experience are manifested in a statuesque Adonis or Helen of Troy or even Bjork, you’ve got yourself a staff member with real power of persuasion. And maybe it’s about time you got a tummy tuck and some face work done yourself, eh?

Be strategic with your use of integrity. Integrity is too valuable a business tool to be used indiscriminately. Don’t sweat the small stuff. Reserve integrity for things like your promise to uphold the stock price and pay out bonuses to your top-level staff, at least those who are related to you.

Outsource your outsourcing. Finding good people is hard. Finding good people overseas is exhausting. And don’t give the task to your HR personnel. People hiring their own replacements just can’t be trusted to give 100 percent.

Don’t spite your clients. You know the old saw about customers: Can’t live with ‘em, can’t live without ‘em. Well, only half of that is true. The second half. The next time you fantasize telling off that bothersome client, throwing scalding hot coffee in his face and pushing him down the stairs, remember who pays the bills. Taking clients’ money means taking their abuse, so just suck it up, pal!

Pay people money for their work. Studies have shown that the absence of remuneration can dramatically increase turnover. Pay employees, and they’ll return the favor with a regular supply of labor. This is what gurus call a win/win.

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What’s Ahead in 2007

Get ahead of the curve rather than behind the eight ball (unless it’s a Magic Eight Ball, boy were those cool) with the latest in trends and technologies.

Traditional media don’t deliver like they used to. Making a big marketing comeback in 2007 will be skywriting with the release of Hewlett Packard’s new SkyPrinter. It easily attaches to a plane’s tail section and is compatible with both Cessnas and Boeings. Though pricing details have not yet been released, industry insiders expect the SkyPrinter will be remarkably affordable. The drums of cyan, magenta, yellow and black, however, will be sold at a premium.

The iPod will remain at the top of every wish list. Following 2005’s release of the lightweight Shuffle and 2006’s credit-card-sized Nano, 2007 will be the year of the iPod Quark. It’s so small, it cannot be seen by the naked eye, but scientists have been able to infer its existence through the use of particle accelerators and cloud chambers. Rather than batteries, the Quark is powered by extremely tiny strings that vibrate in and out of the 10th dimension. The Quark will hit very small shelves in the spring.

Robots are no longer just for the assembly line. The latest android innovation from Tokyo is the MiVo, which combines a blazing fuzzy-logic dual-core processor, a speech recognition card and the recording capabilities of a TiVo. Finally, busy executives can take a break from grueling back-to-back meeting schedules and review conferences at a later time. Fast forward through the pointless anecdotes and PowerPoint presentations. Each MiVo is custom-built to take on its owner’s physical characteristics and programmed to speak favorite catch phrases. The units also come with an emergency cutoff switch in case of a robot uprising. Allowing the robots to hold a majority in any given meeting is strongly discouraged.

What does an executive get for the mate who has everything? Have a star named after him or her? Come on, there are billions out there. Cities across the Sacramento Valley have found an innovative way to cover the spiraling costs of suburban sprawl. For a fee, you can have a street in a new housing development named after your significant other. Just imagine taking a romantic moonlit stroll with your lover down Jennifer Woloshanksi Ridge Drive. In addition to the value as a status symbol, you both get in and out privileges at all parties and family dinners on that street.

Forget the Sidekick and the Blackberry. Microsoft will soon release the much-anticipated Borg 9000. It provides the functionality of a cell phone, walkie-talkie, 25 megapixel camera with 100x optical zoom, laser pointer, scanner, 500 GB hard drive, internet browser, digital planner, voice recorder, GPS navigation system, virtual reality simulator, infrared night vision goggles, taser gun, klieg light, oxyacetylene welding torch and plasma cutter. At first glance, it looks like a hands-free cellular phone ear piece on steroids. In fact, it’s an all-purpose neural interface that plugs directly into a temporal lobe adapter just behind the ear. Installation of the adapter is free of charge with a one-year service contract. Be the first person in the office to get one, and soon all coworkers will be assimilated.

Viral marketing? Guerilla marketing? That’s so 2006. This year, savvy marketers have turned to the one medium people just can’t help looking at. Babies. The Gap, Target and Exxon are just a few of the corporations that have discovered the marketing value of temporary tattoo strips and impossibly cute baby cheeks. In addition to the money cash-strapped parents get up front, the child-based logo includes a discreet bar code offering a 20 percent discount on the promoter’s retail prices. 

Green is the new bling; 2006 was the year of the money clip, banishing bulky wallets to the back of the sock drawer. Well move over, wallet; the money clip will be keeping you company. Inspired by hip-hop culture, fashion-conscious executives in 2007 will do away with currency pretensions altogether. Nothing says “I’m comfortable with my success” like a big fat roll of cash tamed with a single heavy-duty rubber band (preferably recycled from a head of Romaine) and paper-clipped to your lapel. 

EXTRA ONLINE BUSINESS TIPS:Click here for extra business tips from the region's savviest movers and shakers.

 

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