Earlier this week, I flew the friendly skies to visit with a few of our clients in the Northeast. Having just finished reading the book Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable by author Seth Godin, I couldn’t help but think about the airline safety announcements at the start of every flight. In his book, Godin argues that the key to business success is to find a way to stand out–to be the purple cow in a field of monochrome Holsteins. And, let’s face it – the average pre-take-off safety briefing isn’t exactly
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Today is my favorite day of the year–it’s the day the kids go back to school! Each year, when this blessed Monday arrives, I’m like a kid on Christmas. I pop out of bed at 4:30 am, ready to greet the day. In my house, it’s tradition that I make a big family breakfast on Saturdays, Sundays, and The First Day of School. So this morning, as per our annual tradition, I fried some bacon in a pan and poured tall glasses of milk for my 15-year-old, Denver, and my 6-year-old, Timothy (we fondly
Read more →It’s not really a crisis; it’s an epidemic. In the late 80’s, when I started my career in the brokerage industry, our carrier screening process was geared toward ensuring that carriers had a satisfactory safety rating and were properly insured. Today, although safety ratings and insurance coverage are still important, identity theft has become our greatest concern. Defrauders use false identities to commit a number of crimes. For example: Pretending to be a carrier, a scammer calls in “loaded” and then steals the fuel advance from the broker. Swindlers search available load boards for
Read more →I am no stranger to falling on my face, and sometimes falling on my…ahem…derriere. Last week, I did it again. In case you missed it, I wrote about my obsession with Star Wars (or Han Solo, in particular) as an intro to my newest Star-Wars inspired sales presentation. Despite checking my work and having at least four other people in the office proofread it, I managed to misspell Chewbacca. As Bob (my boss) pointed out, I referred to his distant cousin, Chewbecca, instead. Not once, but twice. When I realized my error, I let
Read more →Feedback. For some people it’s the “F” word; they avoid it because they think it’s synonymous with “criticism and complaints”, but done right, constructive feedback is one of the most powerful gifts we can give or receive. Did you know that feedback is the shortest word in the English language containing the letters: abcdef? Even though feedback contains the six first building blocks of our entire communication system, there is nothing elementary about it. Change Management Consultant Rick Maurer said: “We believe we do a better job at giving feedback than we really do.”
Read more →I blame my brother for turning me into a Star Wars geek. In 1977, when the first Star Wars movie was released, like most boys his age, he became obsessed. My obsession wasn’t so much with the Empire as it was with a certain Han Solo played by a young Harrison Ford. Forget Princess Leia, I would have gladly traded places with Chewbacca just to get closer to my crush, Han. Who cared that I would have had to wear a costume made of yak hair and mohair? Who cared that my voice would
Read more →A truck leaves Boston for Philadelphia at the same time another truck leaves Philadelphia for Boston. The truck from Boston travels at an average rate of 45 miles per hour; the other truck travels at an average rate of 55 miles per hour. Which truck should you hire? If you’re like most people, algebra, geometry and statistics were not your favorite subjects, and you’d probably rather have a root canal than try to make sense of mathematical word problems like the ones above. But me? I’m a numbers geek. I actually enjoy reading financial
Read more →If you’re struggling to find a reason to smile this morning, you are not alone. According to British researchers, Monday mornings are so depressing that, on average, we don’t crack our first smile until 11:16 a.m. That early??? In my first installment of Just Another Mary Monday, I figured it was my duty to make sure you hit that target today. A couple of Fridays ago, our company President, Bob, shared an “out of the mouths of babes” moment he had with his daughter. His email prompted a friend to send a joke that
Read more →I’ve heard it said that bowling is the ideal sport because it is basically “an hour of drinking beer occasionally interrupted by six seconds of exercise.” That’s precisely how the entire Matchmaker Logistics team rolled when we recently gathered together in Wilmington for a Friday night outing at the bowling alley. Accessible to folks of all ages, skill levels, and fitness levels, bowling is a simple game that provides hours of good, clean fun. And, we definitely had fun. Fueled by beer towers and laughter, I’m told that the team kept on going long
Read more →If your day has been anything like mine, you’ve been swamped! As for me, I’ve been working with my colleague on a freight challenge; I’ve been revising job descriptions with our Office Manager; I’ve been trying to hit my quota for sales calls; and my 15-year-old son just called to announce that he’s tired of babysitting his 6-year-old brother and could he please go to a friend’s house instead? Oh, and by the way….what’s for dinner? After telling my son: “No” and “Spaghetti”, I got back to worrying about coming up with an idea
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