Some years ago I offered “Ken” a summer job.  He called me the day he was supposed to start to tell me he had decided to take another summer position. Later, Ken asked me several times about part-time work.  My short answer was no thank you. 

I've been reading more articles about how some job applicants simply don't show up for interviews. They simply fail to contact the company that they are no longer interested. If someone simply doesn't show up for an interview but tries to set another time to talk, why would the company want to hire a person who has already demonstrated unreliability?  

When most businesses begin, one of the first goals is to create a logo for letterhead, vehicles and advertising material. Many may disagree with me, but my perspective is most logos are over rated. Ask the simple question, how many times does one buy your product because of the logo? In my view, rarely. We buy a product because solid marketing has created brand awareness that helps us recognize a logo. Coca-Cola, Apple and McDonald's are examples. Almost everyone knows what the logo stands for, but we buy the product because we like it; not because of the logo.

I read a recent article about a partnership between Kroger and Nuro, a driverless car company, to deliver groceries to customers’ doors. As consumers we demand more convenient delivery of our products. Amazon offers quick delivery for a large number of items that show up at your house almost as soon as you order them. Target now offers same day delivery for some products. Many stores offer advanced ordering with curbside pickup, aiding convenience. In the future we are promised that our groceries will be easily delivered to our house. 

An effective website is one of the most critical parts of landing customers for business. To accomplish that, we often invest substantial amounts of money and time using someone’s creative efforts and adding beautiful artwork. Granted, our website should not be ugly; however, beauty is not the most critical factor.

Orbit Media Studios published a survey in which respondents said that 76% of the time, ease in finding the information they wanted was most critical. We need to think through how customers see our site when they first investigate us. Information about where to go next may be obvious to us, but it might be very confusing to our customers.

A guest was checking out my vegetable garden and noted that my potato patch was growing extremely well. “Adam” commented that his potato plants were wilted and appeared to be dying. I mentioned a few things I did to keep my potatoes healthy and suggested how Adam might treat his sick plants. Immediately Adam took issue with my ideas. I quickly backed off because I didn't want to get into an argument. However, I was thinking how I wasn’t the one with sick potatoes. I believe part of the issue was that Adam didn't see me as an expert in gardening.

I've noticed that people have a tendency to argue with expert advice. I've had business clients argue with me intensely when they believe their business decision is correct and they don't want to make alterations. Inflexibility makes going forward in a different direction very difficult. In those moments I think to myself, I'm not the one with the failing business.