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Bill gates posted a really interesting picture to Twitter today.  http://twitpic.com/4cc7up.  Take a look at that picture.  Here’s the richest man in the world (depending on how his stocks are valued compared to Warren Buffet and the Walton kids. And that guy in Mexico) and he’s just sitting on the ground with a bunch of people who have probably never heard of him.  I wonder if they have any concept of just how much money this man and his wife control.

I wonder how often this happens to me.  I know some rather successful people here in Utah and have bumped into them in public on occasion.  Usually I’m with people who don’t know who we just bumped into and they don’t ever really grasp it.  I remember bumping into Ray Noorda back in the day and had I not already know him I would of thought he had less money than me.  He was a real down to earth guy.

But then I think there’s the time when I was a waiter at the Olive Garden. There were two LDS people on the staff and we were both working in the same section that day.  In walks newly ordained Apostle Jeffery R Holland and his family.  She picked up his table and was acting quite calm and collected about the whole thing.  So I had to stop and ask her “Do you know who you are waiting on?”  She didn’t.

And that got me wondering, who else has crossed my path that I should have recognized and didn’t.

So how can I know who I should know but don’t?

At one point or another we have all sat next to that guy in the diner that we haven’t ever seen before but somehow ended up talking with him for half an hour.  I imagine he has met quite a few people over the years who he already knew but didn’t recognize.  And I imagine it works out pretty good for his networking.

What if you or I were to try that?  You know, just sit down and start talking with people. Introduce yourself, talk about the other person, ask some good questions to understand what that person does, explore things you have in common.  I bet that more times than not you end up with a good contact to put in your rolodex.  And I bet that on occasions you even meet someone who you already know, know of, or want to get to know better.

Of course this is all just speculation.  Only one way to find out.

There’s a really good little clip on youtube by Tom Peters about the importance of Thank You notes.

I would add one thing that I don’t think Tom calls out in this video. That’s to hand write the Thank You note.  Why?

It’s the same reason that I hate getting Thank You emails.  A “thank you” is meant to show appreciation right? I get Thank You emails all the time and most are just a waste of time and don’t really make me feel appreciated.  I know that person is grateful but I already knew that in 99.9% of the cases.  There are a few small exceptions to my “no thank you email” rule.

Last week our entire department received a thank you email from our boss (the VP of marketing) where he called out specific actions and milestones that our team had accomplished.  Not only had we just launched the new corporate site but we had launched a plethora of smaller but still  hugely important sites.  And then he took it a step further, he copied all the C-level executives in the company to make sure they knew how well his department is doing.

I have also received a few in the past that detail why a colleague or client is so thankful.  They don’t just say “thanks”, they explain why it was so critical that you did what you did.  Those are good emails to get.

There have been 2 or 3 occasions when I have met with a potential vendor, client, partner, employee and received a hand written thank you note.  Let me tell you, that can make the most unattractive interviewee a potential hire.  Than can make the difference in choosing a vendor in close competition situations. Someone even overnighted me homemade cookies once to apologize when they had called me Todd by mistake. Even though that vendor wasn’t really a contender it was really had to say no to them afterward.

When the Thank You note is hand written you know that they really mean it. ” Who writes anything by hand these days?  I mean wow, they hand wrote this?  And look at this penmanship, he must be a really sharp guy.” Hand writing is the text equivalent of body language.  You can learn so much about a person from their hand writing.

Putting the thank you note on letterhead or a really nice stationary is important too.  If you are doing this in the name of a business this is one of the best things you can do to build your brand.

Related articles

• How To Write a Thoughtful Thank You Note (apartmenttherapy.com)
• Taking pen in hand (dispatch.com)
• PaperTemplates.net

Every Penny Counts

My wife and I have been struggling to recover from the debt we incurred when we closed down a business venture a few years ago.  We were starting to think we weren’t going to be able to make it.

Then about 3 months and 6 days ago were were given a tough choice to make.  We could either settle our single largest account or let it go to a legal firm for collections which could only mean one option at that point.  I have always been against that option and so has my wife.  So against all odds we accepted the settlement offer.  We had 3 months to come up with more than we would have normally paid in almost 2 years on that account.  It was a great offer considering it was less than a third of what was owed on the account but still, it seemed impossible.

“How can we do this when we can’t even make the minimum payment?” I wondered  several times out loud.  “We’re really just buying a few more months until we have to do the unthinkable.”

But we sat down and made a list of every possible option we could think of for generating some additional income.  Sell the car, sell old school books, cut out this expense, cut out that expense, skip a payment or two on this thing and that thing, get extra student loans, apply for as many grants as we could think of, do some small design jobs, find some larger design jobs, make some crafty things to sell to neighbors and friends, etc, etc, etc.  Our list of what we could see as possible income was a little more than what we would need but the odds of those things panning out was still a long shot.  Ok, long shot is a little mild. It was downright impossible without some major influence from Heaven.

Immediately we cut all our spending on anything that wasn’t essential to live.  Then we started working on the additional income.  Well one miracle after another they started to pan out.  One old client from said failed business venture even called out of the blue asking for some work that could only be done by myself and my former partner.  I definitely didn’t see that one coming.

Well the deadline was last Thursday. And we made it, barely but we made it.

The most amazing part of it all is to see how the impossible can be possible when you think about money a little different. And when you get a little divine help.

So there are a number of things that I have always thought about money and our society but I think I finally know them now.

1. In our society we are taught to think about money and jobs to make us part of the system. We contribute by putting in our time and consuming every bit that we can. We have been taught to purchase things  on credit that cost more than what we bring home in a single paycheck.  We focus on our credit rating because we are taught that without good credit, we can’t do anything or go anywhere in life.
2. Well, it’s all lies.  Consumption doesn’t help build the economy.  Especially consumption that uses credit to exist.  It doesn’t create happiness.  It doesn’t create stability or security. It creates dependence and slavery. It’s the opposite of freedom.
3. Buying into the whole “go to school, get a degree, get a good job, retire when you are 62.5″ that’s just ludicrous.  It just doesn’t make sense.
4. Credit is stupid.  Buying on credit is stupid. Thinking you need a good credit score is stupid.  Did you know that people will still accept cash?
5. Here’s the way I see it now:  Make a list of needs. Make a list of wants. Save for each.  Save a large amount for emergencies (at least 10% of income).  A budget isn’t about tracking where the money has gone. It’s about planning and not buying until you have the money budgeted or set aside for that purchase.

So here’s my challenge.  Now that this painful experience is over I am going to live by my budget and only buy things with money that is sitting in my bank account.  I don’t really care what my credit rating is because honestly, I don’t plan on ever needing it again.  I’ve proven to myself that when you create a goal and honestly strive to reach that goal, you can accomplish what you have previously thought impossible.

Related articles

• Stop Being a Slave to Debt (and Banks) (frugaldad.com)
• 10 Reasons to Have Multiple Income Streams (money.usnews.com)
• Budgeting For Mistakes (getrichslowly.org)
• MICHELLE SINGLETARY: Rainy Day Planning (kitsapsun.com)

A few months ago I posted that I one of the goals in my bucket list was to read 1000 books.  And well, I promptly stopped reading.  Shame on me.

See, I have the tendency to get busy working and living and forget my goals sometimes.  Just to be fair though I am doing pretty good on my goal to practice golfing. I even took Jonathan out for 9 holes at good ol’ Cascade.  I’ll also say that I’m not doing so great on my goal to hit a 72.  And also not so good on the “Sail Across the Atlantic” goal.  I had hoped to take sailing lessons this summer but this thing called life keeps getting in the way.

Well I have been trying to be a little more organized (not a bucket list goal by the way) and I actually forced myself to sit down and pick up a good book.  Only took me 3 nights of reading before bed to read through “Good to Great” by Jim Collins.

Have to say, thoroughly enjoyed the book.  But I find myself asking what kind of business person do I want to be.  Part of me wants to manage something great, part of me wants to start something great.  But rarely are both done my the same person.  There are a few rare examples but for the most part, you’re either good at starting something or keeping something running – not both.

Either way, I’ll be reading Good To Great again.  There’s so much relevant knowledge in there.  If you haven’t read it and even if you’re not up to your neck in business I still recommend reading it.

A Friend asked me the other day what I would do if I had been challenged to make $1000/day.  I think he was half expecting a short answer.  And I tried to figure out how to put it into 140 characters or less.  Not that it was on twitter, just that 140 is a nice round number.

Well I couldn’t. So I am attempting to do it in a blog post.  Here goes.

Step 1 – Find something that’s worth $1000/day. I have chosen a business.  Mine is a plan for a scalable online SaaS (software as a service) that will be sold not by me, but by resellers looking to offer something solid on a very flexible pricing model.  I have run the numbers over and over on this one and I see it being quite a bit larger than $1000/day.  I started with about 25 business ideas that could have easily sucked up as much time and effort as this one.  Only 1 or 2 of them even approach this one in terms of monetary potential.

Step2 – Learn as much as possible about managing a business that can pay me $1000/day.  I have resorted to blogs, LinkedIn, and Twitter.  I have found some of the more expert people in various aspects of what I need to do.  I read A LOT from these guys.  And I’ve learned a lot about how I want this business to run and how to market it.

Step3 – Don’t go alone.  I started this out with 2 partners.  We have kept each other on track when it was most tempting to give up or take the short way out. I  think attacking something like this alone is a stupid idea. Don’t do it.

Step 3 – Create a solid plan. I have spent the last year and a half building this thing.  We started out with 2 solid months of planning. Sometimes for several full days each week. (one of the advantages of being unemployed at the time) We analyzed the competition and anything out there that remotely touched our sphere.  I might also add that I have been working in this technology for that last decade.  Part of being able to create a solid plan is to follow one of Warren Buffett’s rules “stick to what you know”.

Step 4 – Be flexible. We have stuck to our plan but not been so blind as to not recognize when we had something wrong and needed to go back to the drawing board, or white board in our case.  We have made major shifts to the project.  But (and this is the most heartening part) our overall strategy has not changed. The marketing and industry we are targeting is evolving into what we need it to be.  Had we launched a year ago, we would probably have not been well accepted because the market wasn’t ready for it.  Now I’d say it has almost been perfectly primed.

Step 5 – Don’t give up. We’re still not done but we’re approaching the completion of version 1.  We have thought we were close before.  We even thought we were done at one point.  Thinking this would have been done toward the end of 2008 and still not having it done by mid 2010 could really suck the spirit out of a lot of people.  I think having the right partners has made us be able to keep going.  Did I mention the importance of having partners?

So I guess there isn’t much else I can really say without showing everyone what this project is.  Well, I’m not ready to show it off.  And I’m not really sure when it will be.  Don’t worry, once it’s ready, that’s all you will be hearing about.  Just stay tuned.

And keep in mind that this isn’t what I would tell everyone else to do, this is just what I have chosen to do.  For some people I would say the best way for them to make $1000 per day is to go to law school and work their way up in a law firm and get to where they can charge $250/hour and work 4 hour days.  That’s just not me.

Good luck.

So the government is toying with the idea of regulating airline prices.  Just because one airline wants to start charging extra for your carry-on luggage.  Now a Senator from NY thinks he can figure out the fair market price that airlines should charge for various fees.  How can he think he can possibly have a clue what the real cost of goods are?

How have we arrived at a place where anyone in the government feels it is their place to decide how a company makes ends meet?

When the government backs away completely from a market where there is healthy competition between companies, the consumers get a better price and a service level that fits with their expectations.  If an airline wants Continue reading