Almost running a marathon is worthless.
Almost traveling the World actually means you haven’t left your couch in months.
Almost going on a diet means nothing, actually, it means you found a better reason not to go on the diet. Effectively worthless.
Tag Archive for ‘Attitude’ 
13 Ideas on Being ‘Cool’
When you are cool you can get away with a lot. It’s difficult to become “cool” though, most of the time it’s engrained in employees/owners/companies from the very beginning. Being “cool” can be (and almost always is) a competitive advantage, just ask Threadless, 22 Fresh, Coda Clothing or Vitamin Water. It’s developing your own personal social object, your purple cow, your hedgehog strategy. It’s the reason people both love and hate Howard Stern. It doesn’t matter what you think of him, he has an element of ‘cool’.
Here are a few ideas on being “cool”.
- It’s a culture, a natural way of life.
- It’s being different and sticking to your guns.
- It’s pissing some people off to make another group happy.
- It’s that moment when you are unsure if you should do something or not, and you do it anyway.
- It’s holding a contradictory opinion from everyone else.
- It’s not listening to the people who put you down, they aren’t the cool ones.
- It’s making other people extremely happy.
- It’s going against the grain, not following trends but creating your own.
- It’s tweaking the norm to make it more enjoyable.
- It’s taking a seemingly regular event and making it irregular.
What we take for granted
Helping out at Regina’s Canada Day in Wascana Park I met a young gentlemen who was volunteering for the day. Blain, a quick-whited kid, just a bit younger than myself, had an adorable dog named Dewey with him at all times.
Just after sunset in the park, a man rushed over to Blain and I, he had a severe problem on his hands. Here is how the he started the conversation, “I have to go to the washroom but when you close the outhouse door you can’t see anything in there and the Legislative building is locked, I need to go to the washroom, what should I do?!?” Without missing a beat in a condescending tone Blain snapped, “well I could guild you!” Trying as hard as I could not to laugh at what just occurred in front of me, I helped this guy explore his washrooms options, apologized to him for not having lit outhouses, and he went on his way. It was a very interesting moment for me.
You see, Blain is blind but that doesn’t really stop him from doing anything. He can golf, get to and from places on his own (via talking GPS device), Continue Reading
University of the Future
In University I took Business, when I began six years ago there were mandatory courses and there are still mandatory courses. My problem isn’t with having classes mandatory but the fact that the courses I had to take six years ago are still the same courses new students have to take today. Recently I discovered that the Business faculty does a curriculum review every five years, in a World where information changes daily you’d think the institution that is responsible for our “brilliant” business minds would adapt. They don’t.
Instead of complaining about how I think the University should be ran, lets start small and brain storm the first five classes any student should have to take. As of now, in your first year of almost any degree you must take psychology, a math, english, a social science and computer science (give or take a class or two this is what first years are forced to take). What if those were changed to a different five? A better, more relevant five?
We go to University to get jobs in the real World, shouldn’t the real World have a say in what we learn? How about we vote on it, alumni Continue Reading
A Cinderella Story
A good friend of mine’s Father taught at the University of Regina, Al Derges was one of the best professors, ever. You can even see for yourself here, an almost perfect rating on RateMyProffesors.com. My time spent at University had very few memorable classes to say the least, but Al had more than one exceptional class and this one had some significance for me recently.
Pygmalian in Management was a Harvard Business Review article we were to read and write a response to. It’s a great story and I encourage you to read it but the moral is “a manager’s expectations are the key to a subordinate’s performance and development.”
What we expect out of people is usually what we get.
I coach volleyball, high school senior boys. When I go into a season I expect the best from them, nothing less. This year we began the season with only one returning player, so we were a very young team, if not the youngest in the league. Rebuilding year everyone thought, I’m sure even some of the players had thought that as well, but not the coaches. The head coach and I decided that we were going to set goals as Continue Reading
Don’t be an Asshole
There is a man who lives in my city, I’ve seen him around for quite some time now but anytime I say hello or talk to him it’s like he doesn’t have the time of day and saying hello to me is a burden. He’s an asshole. I questioned my friend that knows him much better than I do and he said the same thing, “Yup, definitely an asshole.” So it’s confirmed, he is in fact an asshole. Maybe he doesn’t mean to (highly unlikely), maybe I come off the same way to him (I’m a smiler so highly unlikely) so why does he do it? I think some people are just not happy people, they don’t want to meet anyone else, they’re satisfied with their friend circle and yes maybe saying a cheery HI, HOW ARE YA!?!? to me is a burden.
But wait, there is a silver lining to my cloudy relationship with this asshole. Recently I heard he started his own company. HIS OWN COMPANY? An asshole trying to make it as a business owner? I had to see for myself and low and behold when I checked online he did start a company. Personally I Continue Reading
