The Scope Creep We found the guy. No. Really. We found the actual Scope Creep. It turns out he's a dude named Delbert Furgulak, one of only 64 residents (as of the 2,000 census) of Unimak Island, the first island in the Aleutian chain that begins at the southern end...

The New Year will be extra exciting for the Bennett family. This January, we will be welcoming our second child, a son. His due date is January 12th, but we know he could come at any time.

Meltdown Over Hot-Melts Prelude Long ago, in a land far, far away, I worked at an advertising agency. (Since the owner of the agency didn't have a sense of humor and tended to be litigious, I won't name him or the agency here.) One of our clients was a company that...

This year, I want to challenge myself, and you. Let’s try to make the time with family and friends something joyous. Let’s leave all the worry behind.

Blaising Email I don't know how many of you noticed, but Common Sense died in October. That's right. Its obituary was published as an article in Fast Company entitled, "4 Ways To Make Your Painfully Long Email Shorter". The obituary alludes to the long life and proven...

In today’s social media driven environment, one of the best ways to get publicity is by having your target audiences talk about you on social platforms.

The Big Spin One of the things I love about getting older (there are many) is that I get to see The Little Wheel turn many times. The Little Wheel is a smaller, less consequential part of The Big Wheel. It spins faster. It gets people excited. It attracts more...

We will never be successful if we try to be jacks of all trades. Knowing your strengths and focusing your energy on those will always lead to triumph.

Nothing Up My Sleeve While perusing my Facebook feed, I saw a notice for a local event. The notice was promoting a marketing seminar by, and I quote directly, a former illusionist. If you're anything like me, you haven't even gotten to this third sentence yet because...

In today’s fast-paced, information- and opinion-overloaded society, it is easy to overlook the individuality of our prospects and clients. But we have to if we want to uncover their individual message.

Full Circle That clicking sound you just heard was the latch on the loop closing because we've finally come full circle. The closing of that loop has become so obvious that Adweek ran an article noting its closure during the summer entitled, "Why Brands Should Shift...

I hope we can all remember to be thankful for all we have this year – the good and the bad.

Everything is True ... Until It's Not I can't tell you how many times a day people walk up to me and ask, "OB, what the hell's wrong with the news?" My stock response is this: "There are two things wrong: (1) In the slanted, hyperbolic tripe it's peddling, the news...

Ever have one of those days where every time you tried to accomplish even one simple task, it took entirely too long? You’re not alone.

How Many Innovators Can Dance on the Head of a Pin? If you go to Wikipedia and look up the age-old question — how many angels can dance on the head of a pin? — this is part of what you'll find: In modern usage, it ... has been used as a metaphor for wasting time...

Most of the time the word savings evokes happy thoughts. Saving money, saving time, and saving energy are some that come to mind.

Live and Active Cultures For as many things as pass through my active but feeble imagination on any given day, it never occurred to me to correlate yogurt with working environments. But then two things happened almost simultaneously: I read the label on a container of...

Black is my favorite color. Every car I have owned is black, both of my dogs are black, and my engagement ring is a black diamond.

My wife, Anne, and I went to a local diner for breakfast this past Saturday morning. (The establishment shall remain unnamed lest it become the target of harassment or forced closure by The American Heart Association, The American College of Cardiology, The American...

Adapting and re-formulating your plans is necessary. Being static won’t get you ahead. A new destination may be one you were meant to conquer all along.

One of the things I love the most is believing I'm vigilantly aware of all things language — only to have some word, phrase, abbreviation, or acronym float through my consciousness about which I never had the vaguest inkling. Case in point: FUD. Prior to seeing that...

Adapting and re-formulating your plans is necessary. Being static won’t get you ahead. A new destination may be one you were meant to conquer all along.

I saw the photo above on the Web the other day. It opened the floodgates. One day in early 1970, I was at the home of a friend, a neighbor who lived across the street from my childhood home. His name was Paul. He wanted me to hear the new Zenith console stereo his...

The business world will always ebb and flow, so you have to be flexible, or you will lose the people who matter most: Your clients!

People are complex beings made up of different experiences, driven by their brains’ generalizations, and trying to prosper in a sometimes-senseless world.

I can't even tell you how badly I want to be making this up. Harvard Business Review (HBR) published an article called, "The Benefits of Saying Nice Things About Your Colleagues". As I read, I didn't know my jaw was hanging slack. But my panic at noticing the front of...

No one in the history of humans has ever had the brain capacity to understand everything. It’s a fact. But who should you trust?

Stop the world. That's right. Slam on the brakes. Lock 'em up. Bring the orbital spin to a screeching halt. And let the planet stand in hushed, anticipatory awe. Another generation has arrived. Oh, joy. We haven't yet completed the onslaught of all the re-inventing we...

I have always preferred to think of myself as an empathetic person, but I don’t think I was always as patient as I have become in the last two years.

The Irony Man Competition My Dad was a Marine. My next-younger brother is Keith. When we were kids, Mom was forever taking us to the doctor for those booster shots every kid was required to get, seemingly every other week. We were never sure exactly what they were...

It’s September. While technically it is still summer, we can feel the change approaching in the Northeast.

I Want My Turn I saw another one of those really annoying informercials on LinkedIn the other day. This one — "How to Escape the VP of Sales Hamster Wheel" — was particularly irksome because of its pernicious pastiche of presumptuousness and pedantry. Get this: The...

We need to set some limits and remind ourselves that it is good to also get out there and have face-to-face meetings with other humans.

The Best Advice I've Ever Received A friend and professional colleague, Rob Berg, recently brought a LinkedIn post to my attention. He liked it. Because Rob and I are connected on LinkedIn, I saw it. And because the day after the celebration of  Labor Day in the...

When things seem scary and you don’t know what to do, help. Be one of the helpers.

Please take this portion of your day to donate blood, money, or time to victims of Hurricane Harvey. With over 13 million affected, every bit helps.

Driven to Drink If I should meet my demise suddenly or unexpectedly, please be assured that I will have died a happy man. I've now — officially, unequivocally, indelibly, and horrifyingly — seen it all. The Hidrate Spark has arrived. (Insert primal scream here.) You...

There are a few phrases that give me the willies when it comes to client relations, and one of them is “Looks great, now I’ll socialize it!”

The clothes we wear can influence how we see ourselves and affect how we perform at our jobs. Apply that to your brand, and you can guess what happens next.

I became aware of an article in the Wall Street Journal the other day that grabbed me by the attention and shook me into contemplation. It was called, "Investors Bet on Unicorn for Spinning Classes". Since I was unable to read the complete article from the source...

Instead of baselessly judging one another, we should try to be a pinch more empathetic. Scientifically, this is referred to as theory of mind (ToM).

We finally seem to be waking up to the fact that our writing skills are going the way of empiricism, common sense, and critical thinking. As a result, there seems to be a spate of how-to missives purporting to impart some magic formula or other, guaranteed to make our...

Whether financial stability, diversity in passion, or the need to touch everything defines your happiness, more power to you. We all tick in different ways.

Lock-in is a business concept that I thought we’d seen the last of after the United States vs Microsoft Corp. It seems I was wrong…

While most will answer yes to the question of consistency importance, I think fewer of us would say, “Yes,” to the question, Is your Brand Consistent?

As the 3rd quarter passes and we prepare for 4th quarter hibernation, here’s a look at three notable changes in an otherwise unremarkable year.

My wife and I live in a very small community (21 homes). The community is governed (to our unending chagrin) by a homeowners association. My wife (God bless her) is president of the association. As such, she routinely receives all manner of crank communications from...