Look under the carpet...

Small Business...

Remodeled Restroom

 Last fall we had a break-in at the small business.  The intruders threw a large concrete block through an opaque window, probably thinking it was an office.  It was the rest room.  The wall caved in and it took a while for me to get the majority of the work done and as in most projects there are always a few little things that linger on.

For many years I attempted to be really good a everything I attempted to accomplish.  Now I've become comfortable with saying "it's good enough."  As I stared at the trash can and a box with a few tools and paint that I was using for the minor but never-ending touch-ups I was reminded of the comment that someday everything you do will be thrown away.  That completed the restroom remodel.

Instead of Target, Walmart...

Target is a subject often re-visited here simply because my former employer did a great deal of work for them and the Twin Cities is the location of their headquarters and...well, I used to really like Target.

As I headed off to work on my daughter's old house (now that my commitment on the new (old) house is complete) there was a need to pick up a few items.  Target now has defined their future as re-visited groceries, fashions and upscale home furnishings.  I needed a furnace filter, some window glazing and a really stiff cleaning brush to deal with the residual of a totally deteriorated rubber-back carpet, all of this dirty work.  Target is for clean people.  Walmart is for people who like dirt, work in dirt or are comfortable dirty.

Story has it that when Walmart opened in Mexico the stores were first built like those in the US.  Sales were not good.  Walmart fronted their retail centers with large parking lots.  People in Mexico ride the bus and did not like or take the long walk across the asphalt.

It was 150 yards from my vehicle to the front door.  Once inside there was probably another 600 yards of shopping.  In the old days you would have parked downtown, somewhat centrally, and visited the hardware store, the paint store, the show store and probably watched a little TV through the Sears & Roebuck window.

Know your customer.  Know your vendors.  Support small business.  Be happy with the big box retailers that know your needs.  Repeat:  support small business.  Worse case is when the big box  retailers care more about Walmart that their customers.
 
Looks can be deceiving...

This attic expansion space was remodeled, perhaps just updated a few years ago.  The carpet was sort of 1970s but for attic space it seemed OK.  Now as we update and stage my daughter's old house to get it on the market we're re-visiting all that seemed OK a few years ago.

Organizations now all talk about innovation and strategic plans and being nimble in a quickly changing market.  It's important to spend a little time looking back, too, not because anyone cares about your history but because most of your management staff typically has been around for a while and because your vision statement and mission statement (no one has ever been able to provide a succinct differentiating definition of those to me) come from that history which is all know and molded into the future which none of us know.

The carpet was rotten underfoot when we thought it was OK.  Over time it might have shared a bit of an odor as it reverted back to powder and felt a bit squishy to the bare feet.  A smell test and a bare foot test are both good for organizations. 

Outplacement firm...

Two days ago via LinkedIn I saw that the local office of my outplacement firm had a management change.  The head guy clearly was leaving the executive rank and returning the the consultant hallway.  That led to reach out to my consultant.  I've been on sort of a sabbatical because of time conflicts but want to leverage a few of their electronic resources and bring closure to the program both for my sake and the outplacement firm.

My consultant was on sabbatical.  It's sort of a what condition is your conditin in situation.

Amazon Echo...

My regular pitch in the tech world is for the Samsung Chromebook which I've not been using daily for at least three years.  Printers, phones, tables, notebooks, wireless, bluetooth...really at a point who cares?

I have a Sonos system in place for music and it's great, simple to set up and a pleasure.  Obviously it's much easier today to leverage cloud storage and whatever device you might be touching to hear your tunes.  At the teaser price of $99 I did purchase the Amazon Echo which goes by the name 'Alexa.'  This, I like, too.