Business In Washington - Business Operations & Management Consulting

Read a great article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, in their “small business” section. It is entitled “Entrepreneurs Pack Up and Go Home”. It describes the recent trend of small businesses abandoning their “brick and mortar” locations and moving their businesses into their homes. The move is usually triggered by a big drop in business and the inability to renegotiate leases.

The main point of the article, of great interest to me as a business consultant, is that the move can be done, but requires many adjustments and some careful planning. Among other considerations, it is critical to check zoning laws in your neighborhood regarding any restrictions on operating a home-based business. One company mentioned in the article, a dancewear business, was really screwed by the local zoning board. Zoning laws vary widely, so don’t assume. Check it out.

Beyond zoning considerations, moving a business home changes the marketing dynamics. You can’t put a “sale” sign in the window any more to generate additional traffic. Marketing and advertising on the web is “doable”, but certainly different from advertising a brick and mortar store. Another area demanding careful thought and preparation.

Bottom line is that there is more to moving your business home than saving the monthly lease money. Like most business changes, some preparation in advance will help ensure that the move goes smoothly and that your business survives.

Interested in reading the article? Press here.

Considering the move home for your business? Already completed the move? Please share your thoughts and experiences!

Okay. Spelling is one thing. Grammar, punctuation, language usage - all of these are important facets of effective and sometimes eloquent communication. When the words move from page to lips, there is one more VERY important component - pronunciation. And today it is the topic emerging from my frustration!

I confess. I am an HGTV junkie. Since I would love to buy a new house myself, I revel vicariously in House Hunters, even House Hunters International, although I would never consider leaving my country to live elsewhere. HGTV has a wide variety of professionals gracing its programs. Designers, builders, contractors, subcontractors, agents and brokers all cross the HGTV stage to our TV screens. These people, and the announcers who promote them, are supposed to be professionals. Yet, the recent promo for some sort of competition begins dramatically with these words: “Twelve relators….”

Huh? What the heck is a relator? I haven’t a clue, but I think the HGTV pros should.

Of course I am kidding about not having a clue. I know very well what a “relator” is. It is the VERY common, and VERY annoying mispronunciation of “Realtor”, the title given to real estate professionals who belong to the National Association of Realtors. I used to be one, so I can attest to the fact that at least 90% of people mispronounce this title, including many who hold it!

This grates on my nerves. What is so difficult about this word? It begins with “real”, just like “real estate”. Duh. It isn’t “rela” estate, is it?

Try it. Practice. “Real - tor”. There, that wasn’t so hard, was it?

English is our primary language in the United States. (Some among us wish it were our official language, but we’ll save that for another post.) It is a magnificent language, rich in its variety and vital in its continual expansion. As The Word Cop, I may decry some aspects of that expansion, but I still applaud the ability of the language to reflect the vitality and progress of the people who use it.

The process of change has certainly accelerated lately. The development of new expressions, new combinations of old words, pregnant with new meaning continues apace. (Now there’s a word I don’t get to use every day! According to the American Heritage Dictionary, apace means “at a rapid pace; swiftly” or “In such a way or at such a speed as to keep up the requisite momentum; abreast.”)

I was struck by one new combination of words I heard from a commentator on a national news network. Commenting on the 90% tax rate legislation pending to address the perceived bonus abuses at AIG, the man referred to “vigilante taxation”. I wrote it down immediately so I wouldn’t forget it. I wish I had also written down the man’s name and I apologize for quoting him without attribution.

I love the expression! Very creative. I am not so sure I love what it says about us and our government right now.

It was probably inevitable. The AIG bonuses, followed by Congress’ knee jerk response. The final straw. The tipping point that would convert economically frightened and somewhat paralyzed Americans into a raging group of Howard Beales. Remember him?

Howard Beale was the character in the 1976 movie “Network” who encouraged people to “get up right now, sit up, go to your windows, open them and stick your head out and yell - ‘I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!’ Things have got to change. But first, you’ve gotta get mad!. You’ve got to say, ‘I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!’ Then we’ll figure out what to do about the depression and the inflation and the oil crisis. But first get up out of your chairs, open the window, stick your head out, and yell, and say it: I’M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I’M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!”

I am struck by the parallels here, both the economic conditions of the time (I was there. The economy at the time was worse than now.) and the helpless outrage of the people. We need to be angry now. There are very good reasons for our current outrage. My concern is that we direct it at the proper targets. Although many want to aim at the AIG execs themselves and castigate them as greedy SOBs, beware the mob mentality that sends death threats to their family members. As Americans, we can and must be better than that.

Instead, let’s channel our anger into positive action. First, understand the causes and players here. Learn the facts. Then, consider actions that are more likely to make a difference. As business people, there are some real dangers looming as well as some real lessons to learn. Here are points I am focused on at the moment and I offer them for your consideration.

• The bonuses were huge and completely inappropriate, but they were contractual and legal.
• Key members of Congress and the administration were fully aware of the bonuses ahead of time. In fact, language they deliberately placed in recent legislation allowed the dollars to flow.
• The move in Congress to tax them at 90% is most likely NOT legal, or constitutional. (And this from our supposed lawmakers! Have they read the Constitution? I have. Haven’t you?) It is also a dangerous precedent that business people need to watch very carefully.
• Not all corporate execs are greedy bad guys. In fact, most are not. As a business owner, I am a business exec, and I assure you that I place ethics and integrity at the top of my corporate principles. Corporations are not evil entities, but people like you and me, making a product or offering a service as a fair exchange for a customer’s dollars.
• Actions have consequences, some of them unintended but still very real. Congress needs to study this principle, especially now that our Treasury Secretary is proposing a public/private partnership to address the toxic asset problem strangling our banks and lenders. Will private companies and their executives (some greedy, most not – don’t forget that!) feel comfortable participating if they fear punitive taxation, especially when it comes after the fact, essentially altering the rules of a game in progress?

I think our government should abandon their punitive mentality and go after these guys with simple, old-fashioned shame. Take the higher, principled road and use the bully pulpit to encourage greater integrity. For example, try returning all those campaign dollars they received from AIG. Perhaps then Congressional actions will be viewed as examples of the best in America, rather than political pandering.

Finally, remember that the profit motive is really a positive thing. It only becomes greed when it goes too far. A healthy profit motive, the hope of reasonable reward for effort, is what encourages Americans to innovate, build, become entrepreneurs, and ultimately drive our capitalist economy. It will not help our economy recover if our government keeps punishing success!

Greetings, gentle readers! The Word Cop was enjoying a peaceful lunch break just now, listening to the news and attempting to ignore the commercials. In spite of my best efforts, one commercial intruded on my reveries and the fighting Word Cop had to come out!

The ad was for Guaranteed Tax Relief. First off, let me state categorically that my comments here are not intended to insult or otherwise disparage this company. I know nothing about them. They may very well have a heck of a fine service. I will leave potential customers on their own to make that judgment.

My only issue here is with their grammar. Their URL, that primary tool of branding and communicating on the internet, is www.lesstaxes.com. AAARRRRGGGHHH, to quote Charlie Brown. You can pay “less tax” or “fewer taxes”, never “less taxes”. Got it? It’s a simple concept. “Less” goes with a single item and “fewer” goes with a multiple of something. So, for example, to prevent cavities, eat less candy or fewer candies.

Now, I realize that the owners and employees of a company like Guaranteed Tax Relief are financial professionals, not grammarians, so I would like to cut them some slack. However, if you are going to spend money advertising and branding, wouldn’t you like to create an impression of professionalism? Poor grammar won’t help with that.

This company is stuck with a URL that declares to all and sundry on the web, and watching television since it was on their ad, that they have an English problem. Their own knowledge of proper English is lacking, they are too cheap to hire skilled editorial help, or they simply don’t care.

It is my fervent hope that this is just a simple oversight, soon to be corrected. As promised, slack from the Word Cop!

Managing people is one of the most difficult and ultimately rewarding jobs anyone can have in business. For most of us, it doesn’t come naturally. Part science, part art, and part psychology, it is a learned and practiced skill that has to bend to suit the situation and the individual employee. Management training (it was called “charm school” when I went) helps initially and refresher courses over the years help build on what you know. However, the primary management “teacher” is experience. You learn to face and deal with difficult management situations by working through each challenge and learning as you go.

One of the biggest lessons I learned was the importance of communicating regularly with employees. They need to be kept in the loop and informed of a company’s goals so they can be active participants. Nothing is more demeaning to workers than to feel as if they are nameless cogs in a corporate machine that has little or no meaning to them. When fully informed, they are far more likely to buy into your mission and help you achieve it.

In addition to understanding what they are working towards, employees need feedback. They need to know when they are doing well, and also when they are not. That’s the tough job for most of us - how to look an employee in the eye and say that his/her performance is not up to par. I always got over my natural hesitation and dislike of confrontation by reminding myself that not giving an employee this information and allowing a chance to fix a performance issue was to do him/her a very serious disservice.

So, take some time to praise and also to correct. Remember to praise in public, but discipline in private. Don’t overdo the praise, or you will erode its value. Don’t avoid the criticism when it is warranted. There needs to be responsibility and accountability from employees.

As we move into a New Year, I keep hoping I can lay down the mantel of The Word Cop. Then I see a title such as this one:

“How to Standout in a Shrinking Economy - Publish or Perish!”

Now, you can be a “standout” or you can “stand out”. Verbicide, the act of creating a verb by plugging in any convenient noun, continues unabated. The Word Cop sighs sadly.

To make this one worse, the writer is talking about publishing! Wouldn’t it help the credibility of a so-called writer’s works to be grammatically correct? Call me crazy, but I can’t help but think quality writing is even better when it includes the high quality application of the English language.

I lift that heavy mantel back onto my shoulders and resume my trudge into the New Year…..

Hope yours was a Happy New Year celebration at the very least.

People tend to be political animals.  I confess to being something of a political and news junkie, especially during an election year.  However, I am reaching the saturation point this time, and I suspect I am not alone.  Too many ads and most of them are awful.  They contain platitudes and falsehoods most of the time.  The news reports, most on the horse race and not on anything of useful substance, are worse.  Enough already!

To add insult to injury, the language is deteriorating.  I tried to look at the brighter side in my last blog entry, which focused on political slogans.  This time, I move to the Dark Side.  I must protest the recurring, deadly crime of verbicide.  That crime is the deliberate slaying of nouns by turning them into very bad verbs.  The worst offenders are the so-called language professionals - broadcasters.

Two recent examples set me groaning, then writhing in pain.  Have you heard all those news reports on early voting?  I heard a TV news reporter discussing citizens going out to “early vote”.  Ouch!  How about having them vote early?  It doesn’t even cost you extra words!

Then there is the non-stop effort to build up the coffers with election cash, otherwise known as fundraising.  No longer do party stalwarts get out there to raise funds.  No!  They get out there to “fundraise”.  Fundraise?  When did that verb make it into Webster’s?  Or the venerable Oxford dictionary?

At least there are some really wonderful commentators out there, literate and blessed with the ability to communicate in clear, educated, even erudite sentences.  I actually heard one of them use the word “obstreperous” in conversation.  Now there’s a word!  The sound of the word, with all of those interesting consonants, actually enhances the meaning of the word itself.  And you don’t hear it every day.

The Word Cop (that’s me!) pleads for mercy!  We have lots of wonderful words - verbs and nouns alike.  Let’s use them, dare I say (Dare! Dare!), correctly.

I love the English language, its richness and variety, and its vitality.  Although I generally decry many of the recent abuses and misuses of popular vernacular, it is still fascinating to watch the language grow in such creative ways.  (Granted, some of that creativity yields results that are downright painful to the ears, but you have to take the rough with the smooth.)

I was reading the latest online copy of “Michigan Today”, an alumnae publication from the University of Michigan, of which I am a proud alumna.  (Go Blue!)  There was an article by Professor Emeritus Richard W. Bailey.  His topic was “Campaigns and slogans”.  Certainly an appropriate topic at this particular point in history. 

I don’t know about you, but regardless of political persuasion, many if not most of us are heartily sick of this endless campaign.  So I thought it would be a good time to have some fun with words and join Professor Bailey in looking at some campaign slogans.  In his article, he states, “Political words with semantic heft have the power to endure.”  Unfortunately, he doesn’t see much hope for many of the inventions coming out of the current campaign.  As an example of a good slogan that will live on, he goes back to the Eisenhower campaign of the 1950’s with its slogan I Like Ike.  Eisenhower was already well known by the nickname “Ike”, the slogan embraced him with the word “like”, it happened to rhyme, and fit conveniently on a button.  What’s not to “like”?

Ignoring the current campaign for a moment (Whew! What a relief!), let’s look back a bit.  How about 1948’s “Give ‘Em Hell, Harry!”  I like that one.  It appeals to the feisty, everyday American psyche and offers a sense of a spirited fight. 

Looking further back, there is 1928’s slogan, “A chicken in every pot.  A car in every garage.”  It speaks of a promise of prosperity offered, if not realized, by Herbert Hoover.

In 1964, it was, “All the way with LBJ.”  Another catchy little rhyme.  Of course, the young people responded with, “Make love, not war.”  In 1992, it was, “It’s the economy, stupid.”  Maybe we should be using this Clinton cliche now!

Our language can be fun!  It can also utilize that entertaining fun to offer powerful, persuasive communication.  We will have to see in the years to come if any of the words being used in the 2008 election have the staying power Professor Bailey discusses.

I will indulge myself and close with a non-political, partisan University of Michigan slogan that came out of my years as a student, a time when Bo Schembechler was our coach and Woody Hayes still led the Ohio State Buckeyes (the enemy!!).  I was walking from central campus to the “Big House”, as the stadium is still known, one football Saturday in the early ’70s.  It was the annual Big Game at the Big House - Michigan versus Ohio State.  I walked surrounded by other students, alumnae and football fans, all excited and enjoying the chilly, late fall day.  There were many vendors on hand.  I stopped and purchased the following irreverent button, which I have kept all these years:  “Give Woody a Bo Job”

Go Blue!

Hurricane Gustav has moved on, losing its category 3 punch along the way.  It was still a very bad storm.  And it is worth remembering that Katrina was a cat 3 when it hit New Orleans.  But this time it was a far lesser event, certainly not the huge disaster the media was predicting.  (Actually, they were left scrambling for disastrous news to report, resulting in some amusing over-dramatizations.)

What made this one different?  Well, there are certainly differences in the storm itself, but that’s not my expertise or my concern here.  I will leave that to scientists and meteorologists.

From my perspective, the difference here is primarily due to planning, before the disaster, and then following the plan.  So simple!  And yet so unlike the response to Katrina from all concerned.  Most of the blame after Katrina was heaped on the Federal Government, particularly FEMA and President Bush.  However, one should not forget the State and Local authorities, which careful analysis done after the event suggests were far more culpable.

Regardless of the level of blame, President Bush was certainly determined to do a better job in future emergencies.  The efforts at the Federal level certainly showed.  FEMA has new leadership and new plans.  Along with new leadership and new attitudes from old leadership at State and Local levels, as well as excellent coordination and cooperation, the real potential disaster simply didn’t happen.

There is a great article in the Wall Street Journal today on just this topic.  It offers kudos to new FEMA Chief R. David Paulison.  He earns them with his cool head in a crisis, leadership, and excellent planning efforts.  I recommend the article to my readers.  You will find it here: 

There are great lessons to be learned here, for businesses as well as governments.  With good leadership and planning, you may not be able to avoid disasters, but you can mitigate the negative effects!