Survival strategies

The Non-Mobile Society

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Calculated Risk: Labor Mobility: Starting to Increase

This blog post on CalculatedRisk references an article from the Financial Times.  I am struck by the differences in word choices.  FT uses “picks up sharply” while CalculatedRisk states “starting to increase”.  In conversations with my recruiter friends I’ve become aware of slightly higher activity in job openings.  Some of these openings included paid relocation.  A few years ago employers stopped offering paid relocation.  These changes are not insignificant.  But the job market remains weak.

Starting to increase is a better choice of words.

Have a Plan for Business Continuity

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Missing List in Joplin Tornado Drops to 156 – WSJ.com

“The Joplin Area Chamber of Commerce said Friday that at least 400 businesses and 5,000 jobs were affected by the tornado.”

If you click through and read this WSJ online article, you’ll notice a small video window.  The opening picture of the video is an electric guitar embedded neck first into a wall of a house.  I had never thought of my guitars as deadly weapons, but in the right weather conditions they are.
When I read about the number of businesses affected I silently hoped these businesses had disaster recovery and business continuation plans in place.  Unfortunately, the most likely answer is no and most of these businesses will ultimately fail.
Not many of us think about total destruction from an F-5 tornado.  But if you manage to survive at one point you will have to get back to work.
Time to spend some time revising my own business recovery and continuity plans.

Change or Die

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Seth Godin: The New Face Of Publishing « Radio Litopia

One of the most difficult things you ever have to do as a manager, executive or consultant is helping others to change.  Follow this link to an interview with Seth Godin.  It’s about 30 minutes long but well worth listening to.  Godin’s thoughts about the future of the publishing industry are both scary and on target.  Could there be another business so entrenched in the past, so tied to doing things the way they have always been done that its leaders are unable to see the changes all around us and that doing nothing becomes the perfect strategy for a slow and painful business death?