Dodo Loves Marketing

These markets operate over weekends and public holidays and offer a wide and very general range of merchandise — in fact everything from clothes and curios, inexpensive goods from the East and India, food, jewellery and music – as well as hand made crafts. ..more

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Ten major reasons why new businesses fail

Cash flow problems

This is the single most common cause of new business failure. Many businesses, even profitable ones, fail because they run out of cash — they go insolvent. Insolvency occurs when a firm is unable to meet its obligations such as salaries, creditors, interest payments and expenses. It is caused by cash flowing out of the business faster than it comes in. Although a firm can sometimes survive a period of insolvency by delaying the payment of its obligations, it is liable to be sued by its creditors or employees (or have its electricity or telephone cut off) at any time. ..more

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Selling everything a company can make until you have reached the point where the marginal spending to produce and sell the product won’t yield the return you want.

The implications of that and how a company needs to include marketers in all of its decision-making processes. That’s because if you really want to maximize profits, you need to know how much you can sell before you decide how much to produce. For the moment, however, I will focus on current capacity and simply say that ..more

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I am a big believer in reshuffling and reconfiguring my offering during the negotiation phase. I will never simply discount my price, but I will, as suggested in the earlier question, throw out a different price to determine whether or not it will work for the prospect. Once I determine that it will, I will go back to the drawing board and redraw and rearrange my offering, taking elements out and putting new elements in, so that I can find a new and different mix that will work for this prospect in this situation. ..more

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Some conflicts are hardly noticeable as they ebb and flow through our daily social encounters. Others grow into intense disputes that spawn interpersonal tragedies. The severity of conflict ranges from insignificant Annoyances through a middle range of Clashes to severe Crises that threaten the life of the relationship.

Just as a golfer selects the proper club for the shot, and a mechanic chooses the right tool for the job, different levels of conflict call for different strategies. ..more

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Recall that one of our Wrong Reflexes is Non-communication. We too eagerly disengage from the other, withdraw, escape to safety behind a wall of inaccessibility.

Being unavailable for contact ensures that conflict remains unresolved. A sage once said, ‘Abstinence from communication is the essence of conflict‘. Without doubt, no resolution is possible without communication. So, the first and most fundamental requirement is to establish a time in which communication can occur.

It works even betterwhen both people know it. But on many occasions you alone will initiate and actively manage the process. So we will assume that you are solely responsible. ..more

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The purpose of planning the context, is to create a setting for effective communication.

Location

A private place that is free from interruptions should be selected. Importantly, phone calls and people walking in should be prevented. Even music should be eliminated. Moving objects or people are visual distractions. The meeting should occur in a private room that other people will not inadvertently enter. A place where neither person feels on home turf, or a site preferred by your Other is best. ..more

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3. Invent OPTIONS for mutual gain.

Interest-based bargaining promotes a less contentious climate in the Dialogue that aids the search for both-gain solutions. In this more collaborative mode, you may search creatively for alternatives that might benefit both of you. Now the Dialogue is a problem-solving discussion where your orientation is us-against-the-problem rather than me-against-you. Ideally, both disputants can brainstorm possible solutions, listing as many ideas as you can think of without worrying about how practical or promising they are. Once a pool of alternative solutions has been brainstormed, each option can be tested for compatibility with each disputant’s underlying self-interests. ..more

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Simply engaging in face-to-face conversation in the appropriate context while complying with the Cardinal Rules helps people manage their differences and build more satisfying relationships.

But the sceptical reader is asking, ‘What about skills? Aren’t special skills needed in the Dialogue?’

How old are you? You have that many years’ experience in the school of life. You have learned more than you may realise about how to communicate, about how to get along with others. Of course, we also learn ineffective communication patterns along with more positive skills. But, on balance, most adults who are able to maintain friendships, hold jobs, join groups, and survive the crucible of family life possess sufficient communication skills. ..more

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The problem does not have to be solved for the conflict to be resolved.

`Hogwash!’ you exclaim. ‘That doesn’t make sense!’ Let’s take a closer look.

Many people find it surprising that the path to harmony winds through a jungle where anger, resentment and similar ‘negative’ feelings flourish.

A Lesson from Psychology

One of the most common tasks of psychotherapists is to help clients become aware of their repressed anger, and to aid them in learning to express it in non-destructive, non-violent, healthy ways in appropriate situations. Seldom do therapists find it suitable to help their clients suppress angry feelings. Repressed anger is a major cause of neurosis, particularly depression, and poisons interpersonal relationships. ..more

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Reality-Testing

Unless perceptions are tested against objective reality (what the Other really means), inaccuracies can grow. Talking together tests the accuracy of our perceptions against the replies of our partner. Effective day-to-day management of interpersonal differences requires conversation.

When interdependency is high and time for communication is limited, the burden on both persons’ abilities to efficiently check out perceptions is heavy. Being busy people, time is seldom so abundant that the burden of reality-testing does not occasionally exceed our abilities to communicate, to hear and understand the Other. ..more

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This desire for peace is surely understandable, but it can lead to trouble. If unchecked, the hope for conflict to disappear brings the expectation that if mediation is successful, my client’s relationship will be free of conflict in the future. If that is my mission, I am doomed to failure.

A Fantasy

Our fantasy is that conflict should be absent in ‘good’ relationships. We regard conflict as a social disease, and assume that there must be a cure. ..more

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Organisational Cancer

There are six cancers that affect the health of organisations. They are Change Paralysis, Score Politics, Havoc, Mission Drift, Stampede and Nepotism.

Organisational cancers are caused by the attitudinal and behavioural responses of business managers and their teams to the priority declarations, strategies, decisions, policies, regulations, value systems and practices originating from owners, chief executives, boards of directors, functional custodians (such as accountants and engineers) and strong individual leaders. ..more

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During the first fifteen years of life, the carving of these synaptic connections is where the drama unfolds.

From the day she was born, the child’s mind begins to reach out, aggressively, exuberantly. Beginning at the center of the brain, every neuron sends out thousands and thousands of signals. They are trying to talk to one another, to communicate, to make a connection. Imagine every one alive today simultaneously trying to get in touch with 150,000 other people and you will get some idea of the wonderful scale, complexity, and vitality of the young mind. ..more

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In a process-orientated company, many of these new performance indicators used in benchmarking and elsewhere are non-financial. That is, they will focus management’s attention upon the truly critical areas of performance — i.e. those that drive profitability and align the business unit with its strategic goals. In the case of marketing logistics, we might expect to see metrics that capture such things as customer satisfaction, flexibility and employee commitment. Management meetings should therefore begin their agenda not with the financial review — that will come later — but with a review of non-financial performance indicators. These will necessarily differ between organisations, but may include: ..more

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“I am ultimately responsible for the quality of all teaching in my district. Yet every day, in every classroom, there is a teacher and there are students . . . and the door is shut.”

Gerry C., a superintendent for a large public school district, captures the manager’s challenge perfectly: How can you get people to do what _you want them to do when you are not there to tell them to do it? Gerry knows what all great managers know: As a manager, you might think that you have more control, but you don’t. You actually have less control than the people who report to you. Each individual employee can decide what to do and what not to do. He can decide the hows, the whens, and the with whoms. For good or for ill, he can make things happen. ..more

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