One of the things that we have been conditioned to believe in both business and in life is that mistakes and errors need to be avoided.  This idea pervades our education system, our mindset as employees, and our behavior as business owners.  It is important to understand that mistakes cannot be completely avoided.  Thus, an attempt to “eliminate” mistakes generally results in hiding them until they are so large that they become devastating.
This is what precipitated the financial crisis of 2008.  A long history of regulations that consolidated power in …

Contemporary business theory places great amounts of emphasis on strategy and long-term thinking. A These concepts are most definitely of great importance, but there is one critical aspect of successful long-term strategy that many theories and systems fail to comprehend. A That critical insight is how all strategies, regardless of how large or small ultimately distill down to steps that must be acted upon in the present tense. A Furthermore, these action steps frequently break down into smaller steps.
Thus, it becomes true that the largest, most grand, and most complex strategies all come …

Most people who have not been taking up residence in a cave are aware of Groupon, the web’s #1 group buying site and fastest growing company ever.  The notoriety of the company grew even greater when it turned down a $6B takeover bid by Google.  Many consumers are aware of the extremely low prices that are available through Groupon daily deals, but there is a basic problem implicit in its business model that may so the seeds of disaster for the small businesses that Groupon depends on for its revenue …