Comments on: Good Reasons Not To – Lessons for Young Wannabees http://www.dr-smith.info/good-reasons-not-to-lessons-for-the-young-wannabees/ Turnaround Management, Senior Adviser, Board Member, Executive Coach, Author, Speaker, Radio & TV Guest & Panel Member Sat, 13 Mar 2010 23:02:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Buddy Willare http://www.dr-smith.info/good-reasons-not-to-lessons-for-the-young-wannabees/comment-page-1/#comment-7832 Buddy Willare Tue, 10 Mar 2009 22:24:34 +0000 http://www.dr-smith.info/?p=2916#comment-7832 Sir, I commend you on your observations. Not many have the wisdom to take such time. And a very gracious thank you for sharing as I think that even more rare than the people that spend time contemplating life are the people who actually tell others what they came up with. A portion of your speech/lecture/observations require a degree of wisdom in which I don’t think I have yet. So I am indeed grateful for your insight. Thank you very much and don’t stop, Buddy Sir,

I commend you on your observations. Not many have the wisdom to take such time. And a very gracious thank you for sharing as I think that even more rare than the people that spend time contemplating life are the people who actually tell others what they came up with.

A portion of your speech/lecture/observations require a degree of wisdom in which I don’t think I have yet. So I am indeed grateful for your insight.

Thank you very much and don’t stop,

Buddy

]]> By: Ken Yager http://www.dr-smith.info/good-reasons-not-to-lessons-for-the-young-wannabees/comment-page-1/#comment-7774 Ken Yager Sat, 28 Feb 2009 02:26:23 +0000 http://www.dr-smith.info/?p=2916#comment-7774 I like your observation. I work as a crisis manger and have for years. It is all that I want to do. I enjoy the work and have taken the philosphy that I only work with other professionals that I can work with me and only where I can help people fix terrible situations (or land as softly as possible). I do the work only because I like it. In that line of work I come across a great number of business failures. Some come from people that have no real business sense. But most just do not know the business they run or the people they are trying to serve. It shows in the way they either know nothing about the business, talk only about the numbers or only know pieces of the business that reflect their professional silo (accounting, sales, engineering, etc). Do what you love and be really sure you know the people around you (suppliers, employees and customers). After all, that is all there is at the end of the day. I like your observation. I work as a crisis manger and have for years. It is all that I want to do. I enjoy the work and have taken the philosphy that I only work with other professionals that I can work with me and only where I can help people fix terrible situations (or land as softly as possible). I do the work only because I like it.

In that line of work I come across a great number of business failures. Some come from people that have no real business sense. But most just do not know the business they run or the people they are trying to serve. It shows in the way they either know nothing about the business, talk only about the numbers or only know pieces of the business that reflect their professional silo (accounting, sales, engineering, etc).

Do what you love and be really sure you know the people around you (suppliers, employees and customers). After all, that is all there is at the end of the day.

]]> By: Steven Hacking http://www.dr-smith.info/good-reasons-not-to-lessons-for-the-young-wannabees/comment-page-1/#comment-7765 Steven Hacking Thu, 26 Feb 2009 10:21:38 +0000 http://www.dr-smith.info/?p=2916#comment-7765 Earl I agree with your observation and sadness that so many people lack passion in the part of their lives that they compartmentalise into "business" (in contrast to other parts of their lives where they display both passion and excellence). Our observation of successful UK businesses is that you need both passion and a clear grip on commercial reality to create an exciting and valuable business. A metaphor I like is to compare a business senior team with the (now maligned) description of the two sides of the brain: you need to engage both the right (passionate, creative) and left (analytic, rational) to work with proper effectiveness. Businesses we observe that have passion alone seem to shine for a while, but crash and burn; businesses that have the analytic alone seem condemned to mediocrity, albeit profitable mediocrity. To pick up the philosophy theme, one of my favourite philosophers said there are two questions to ask with every decision we face: "Is it fun? Does it work?". I think your observations capture this very well. Earl

I agree with your observation and sadness that so many people lack passion in the part of their lives that they compartmentalise into “business” (in contrast to other parts of their lives where they display both passion and excellence).

Our observation of successful UK businesses is that you need both passion and a clear grip on commercial reality to create an exciting and valuable business. A metaphor I like is to compare a business senior team with the (now maligned) description of the two sides of the brain: you need to engage both the right (passionate, creative) and left (analytic, rational) to work with proper effectiveness. Businesses we observe that have passion alone seem to shine for a while, but crash and burn; businesses that have the analytic alone seem condemned to mediocrity, albeit profitable mediocrity.

To pick up the philosophy theme, one of my favourite philosophers said there are two questions to ask with every decision we face: “Is it fun? Does it work?”. I think your observations capture this very well.

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