Business Growth Ideas #314 This week: Forecasting, Reconsidering, Alertness

GREG’S BUSINESS GROWTH NEWSLETTER #314
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Quick notes to help you grow your business in less time with less effort. . . sometime next week.

In this issue:

– Techniques for FIT
– Being Human
– Random Stuff

Techniques for FIT
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• Sales forecasts are mysterious because predicting the future is hard. Most forecasts are improved if taken at face value, even when low, and followed with, “What do we have to do. . .?” and “How can we. . .?”
• Finding a great new hire is hard. A system/algorithm makes it easier but let’s face it, it only improves things so much. The future is messy, accept it, and prepare. You already have a mental list of things that go wrong post hire. Start there. 

• If you are starting a new job search, use the data at your fingertips. Pick your aspirational job titles, pull the job requirements, and start mapping your experiences. Use a word cloud tool to highlight common words and use them in your profile, resume, and cover letter. Mirroring in action.
• Another job search tip: consider the process of filling a job. By the time a job is public there will be hundreds if not thousands of applicants. It’s like an RFP in sales. Getting in front of the right person a week before the job is posted will do wonders for your job offer success rate.

Being Human – Reconsideration
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Who doesn’t love a generous listener?

I am reading “A Gentleman in Moscow” by Amor Towles, a novel about a man ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel. The main character is full of wisdom and insights. One jumped out and demanded to be shared with you, gentle reader. It comes after he is reacquainted with a guest.

“After all, what can a first impression tell us about someone we’ve just met for a minute in the lobby of a hotel? For that matter, what can a first impression tell us about anyone? Why, no more than a chord can tell us about Beethoven, or a brushstroke about Botticelli. By their very nature human beings are so capricious, so delightfully contradictory, that they deserve not only our consideration, but our reconsideration–and our unwavering determination to withhold our opinion until we have engaged with them in every possible setting at every possible hour.”

The ability to consciously reconsider. Something to aspire to.

Good stuff.

Random stuff

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“They said, ‘There’s too much caffeine
In your bloodstream
And a lack of real spice in your life’
I said, ‘Leave me alone
Because I’m alright, dad'” – The Smiths, 

I got some new toys for Christmas. A new album from the Parquet Courts, an espresso machine, some socks, a couple of great books, and a new toque. These helped pass the time during sickness and quarantine. Dialing in the coffee machine, making new drinks, padding around and jamming new tunes.

Besides battling boredom, the worst part about being sick is the interrupted sleep schedule. I keep a regular sleep schedule, seven to nine hours a night. When lying around all day it’s hard not to drift off, or watch an extra episode of something. When you’re feverish it’s hard not to toss-turn then wake up and stare at the ceiling.

I’ve been a week without symptoms but on Monday morning I wake up at 2am. Wide awake. Almost giddy. I grab a book and tip-toe downstairs because on the rare occasions that I can’t sleep a non-fiction book usually helps. This one doesn’t.

I sit at my desk and start on some reports I do for myself each year. Then I do a few for clients. Then a few for old projects from earlier in the year. I mess around with editing some photos in Photoshop, work on the calendar for 2022, and outline a few projects as the sun comes up.

Once the sun is up I run through more work. All the year-end activity I missed is lined up and worked through. I am weirdly productive. I feel alive.

Then lunchtime comes. I can barely keep my eyes open. I mention this to my lovely bride and complain about the ‘rona throwing me off my game. Stupid plague I say, shaking my fist at the sky. What have you done to my circadian rhythm?!?

My bride pushes herself from the table and says, “How many of those Americanos did you make yesterday,” pointing at the new espresso machine as she walks out of the room.

“Oh, maybe five,” I reply. “Why,” I ask, but she’s gone.

I stare out the window for a moment.

You know, she might be on to something.

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