Relationship Economics® Newsletter

The Nour Group, Inc. | January 2007

New Year's Resolution For All of Us!

Here is a New Year’s resolution for all of us!  Someone gave it to me years ago and I thought it might serve others as well as it has me:

“Promise yourself to be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.  To talk health, happiness and prosperity to every person you meet.  To make all your friends feel that there is something in them.  To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.  To think only of the best, to work only for the best and expect only the best.  To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.  To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.  To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.  To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.  To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.”

– Christian D. Larson

Happy New Year!

David

The Value of Holiday Cards?

By Ronda Harris , Sr. Associate

Total cards we received this holiday season: 318

Total number of cards that were impersonal (i.e., a standard message and company name preprinted inside, with David Nour’s name on the address label): 237

Cards received from people we don’t know: 128

Duplicate cards from the same person/company: 6

Cards that included life dissertations about 3rd cousins twice removed: 14

Last minute e-cards sent by those who just didn’t quite make it to the mailbox: 32

Value of the effort for many companies: Useless!

We’re not trying to be ungrateful for friends and colleagues who thought of us during the holiday season.  But, as the stack of cards piled up on our front desk, we kept wondering about their effectiveness, not just at our firm, but at any of the intended destinations.  If you’ve heard any of our keynote speeches, David talks about the return on relationship investments.  What return did you realize from your holiday card efforts?

How did you individually personalize, creatively customize, insightfully verbalize or appropriately sanitize the boredom that has become the chore of sending out corporate holiday cards?  Were your cards memorable or practical?  Will they be remembered and repeated?  Do you really need a holiday to tell special people that you’re thinking of them?

Click here to get a copy of the full article including examples of some of the ones we really liked, such as the one below from The Arketi Group...

The Cost of a Bad Executive Hire

By Tom Mallory, Acadia Associates

What are your costs of a bad executive hire?  Few companies know.  Paradoxically, while most companies don’t measure the costs of bad executive hires, they believe these costs to be large and growing.  David Norton (co-author of The Balanced Scorecard, 2001) “up to 85% of a corporation’s value is based on intangible assets and in our New  Economy, human capital is the foundation of value creation.  The asset that is most important (human capital asset) is the least understood, least measured, and least managed.”

Our published report, The Costs of a Bad Executive Hire, is sourced from 25 independent experts and contains:

• The estimated costs of a bad hire for an executive base salary of $150K

• A framework to help companies measure their costs of a bad executive hire

To receive a full report, click here.

Tom Mallory is President of Acadia Associates, an executive search firm based in Atlanta, GA.  Tom has been placing executives with small- to medium-sized technology and service organizations for the past decade.  He holds an MBA from Harvard and a BA from St. Lawrence University.

Calling It Strategic Doesn't Make it So!

By Marcia Steele, Strategic Realities

I'm constantly reminded that just because a company projects a successful persona on the outside doesn't mean that they are actually savvy on the inside.  What if everything up on the walls at your last annual planning session was nothing more than a wish and prayer?  How can you tell if your strategies are good and those initiatives are the most viable for the long term viability of the organization?

Countless companies spend an inordinate amount of money, time and resources on planning of all kinds, yet most fail to execute their goals.  One of the main reasons is that they either had "strategies" that weren't strategic or they had the right answers to the wrong problems.  More astonishing is that many of these plans are developed by expensive "Big 4" type consulting firms.

My years at GE exposed me to many factors that influence and ultimately drive how strategy is crafted and executed.  Begin by reviewing your potential barriers to success. Think through the circumstances of how, where, and when, “Murphy’s law” could show up.  Then take a look at the strengths you must leverage, things that must go right for you to seize and maximize your opportunities.

Click here to get the complete article.

Marcia Steele is the Managing Partner of Strategic Realities, Inc. specializing in Strategic Outcomes and Opportunity Leadership® - How to courageously move towards Contribution Based Profits®.  Her long list of satisfied clients includes 3M, Amgen, CISCO, Coca-Cola, General Electric, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Panasonic and NASA. She can be reached at 404-633-3889.