Snippets
- Gedankenexperimente is how Albert Einstein referred to the ideas he twirled around in his head. You and I just call it daydreaming. (The New York Times, November 1, 2015)
- Jeff Blee, a divisional merchandise manager at Brooks Brothers, says bow ties sales were up 60% in 2012 compared to the previous year. (businessinsider.com, October 21, 2015)
- “If you tie your bow tie a little crooked, cute girls will come up to you in the elevator and straighten it for you.” George Graham
- The first athlete to appear on a Wheaties cereal box was Lou Gehrig. (CBS News Sunday Morning, March 27, 2016)
“The problem with the rat race is even if you win, you’re still a rat” Lily Tomlin
Ideal Workplaces
The National Society of High School Scholars (www.nshss.org/media/55989/2015-nshss-millennial-career-survey.pdf) recently surveyed 18.000 Americans, ages 15 to 29 asking them to rank their ideal future employers. Many of the nominees are predictable, Google, Walt Disney, and Apple. However, there are a few surprises as well.
- Central Intelligence Agency (C.I.A)
- Children’s Health Care of Atlanta
- L’Oréal
- Mercedez-Benz USA
- Boston Scientific
- U.S. Army
- Build-A-Bear
- Wal-Mart
- Major League Baseball
“To think creatively is to walk at the edge of chaos.” Robert Grudin
“We’ll leave the light on.”
“Why are manhole covers round?” is one of the many off-the-wall questions Microsoft is apt to use when interviewing potential employees. As a sixteen-year-old, Aaron Bell, C.E.O. of AdRoll was asked, “How do you know the light goes off in the refrigerator when you close the door? Bell’s answer, “I would put my baby sister in the refrigerator and pull her out and check the dilation of her eyes.” He got the job. (The New York Times, March 20, 2016)
“Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.” Eleanor Roosevelt
Bang for Your Buck!
Many of my students argue that email is dead. If not dead, then certainly not fresh. Online marketing guru, Bob Bly wonders “why marketers are so obsessed with social media, especially when you get much better ROI with email marketing” (www.bly.com)
Regardless, according to FastComany.com (March 30, 2016), the typical office worker receives an average of 120 emails a day. It points out that emails are easy to send but equally easy to ignore. It seems the trick is to get your clients and colleagues to read your email.
FastCompany suggests “Nine Surprisingly Simple Ways to Get People to Respond to your Email.” My favorites include.
- Ask for a response in your subject line—RESPONSE NEEDED at the end of a subject line proves to be very effective.
- Include a greeting. When there’s no personal greeting, one assumes the email was sent in mass and does not require a response.
- Limit emails to 50 to 125 words. Any longer and the likelihood of your document being read begins to slide significantly
- Write at a third-grade reading level with simple words and fewer words per sentence is ideal. As my friend Russ Moxley is known to say, “Don’t hesitate to dumb it up.” Should you want to determine readability level of your documents, check out ReadabilityScore.com.
- Watch the clock. According to Yesware, a software tracking company, emails sent between 6:00 am and 7:00 am are the most likely to get read.
“Being perfect is a terrible way to spend your life.” Donald McCullough
Self-healing Cement?
That’s right, cement that automatically fills minute cracks before they become major cracks. Hard to imagine, but researchers found that substituting bacteria and yeast for water typically added to concrete creates self-healing cement. Unfortunately, this mixture takes longer to cure. However, scientists at The University of Texas at Austin are learning that replacing the yeast with a combination of meat extract and sodium acetate enables the self-healing cement to dry at a normal rate. (The Daily Texan, March 31, 2016)
