Tag Archive for ‘Regina’

How Do You Save a Neighborhood?

In Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, he talks about how New York reduced it’s crime rate by a substantial amount in the 1990′s by implementing some simple yet very powerful tactics. One of those was to keep the Subways clean. Based on the concept developed by James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling in a 1982 article titled Broken Windows, by eliminating the small offenses (such as a broken window) it is much more difficult to commit the larger more serious ones.

In January of 2007 Maclean’s magazine wrote an article titled Canada’s Worst Neighborhood which described the North Central Regina neighborhood. Since then many changes have come about for the better but there is still much work to be done. Here’s my thought experiment for the day, it’s now your job to let me know if it’s feasible or not.

High school kids are looking for jobs
Neighborhoods need work to be done but the majority of home owners can not afford to pay professionals
Considering the broken window theory, if we made neighborhoods look good they would be less prone to serious crime

If someone started a non-profit organization supported by the city or donations, these
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University of the Future

Jeph Maystruck November 20, 2009 4 comments

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
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Tell Me a Story

Jeph Maystruck October 22, 2009 2 comments

If you want to get your point across tell me a story. Stories, fable and urban legends have all been around for years for a reason, they are easy to remember. History’s told in stories; our ancestors told parables to pass on knowledge. Think about how a chilling urban legend will be remembered for years, how does this happen? It’s a story.

When we’re told a story we actually go through a metal simulation in our minds, this is why it is much easier to remember than random fact, it’s like we’re actually there. From Chip and Dan Heath’s book Made to Stick it says this; “Why does mental stimulation work? It works because we can’t imagine events or sequences without evoking the same modules of the brain that are evoked in real physical activity”.

Our minds have a difficult time piecing random fact together, but put in our minds a vivid picture of the story you are telling and we can recite it almost word for word as if we were there. So if you are an educator, manager, or anyone that needs to make a point stick in some ones mind (which we all should be striving for)
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Goodwill on a Billboard

Jeph Maystruck October 21, 2009 2 comments

SaskEnergy has put up billboards all over Regina about their latest offering. If you need a furnace you can get a loan from SaskEnergy for prime plus two percent. Seems like a normal billboard right? Wrong.

SaskEnergy obviously understands that many households are in need of a new high-efficiency furnace but can’t afford one. How do you help out low-income homeowners and create some goodwill for your organization without spending thousands of dollars? Offer an affordable method of obtaining a furnace. The two percent covers the cost of advertising and admin work so they are probably breaking even financially, but in the eyes of the community SaskEnergy looks great.

SaskEnergy went out to advertise their newest offer and came back with some goodwill. If only more of our crowns would set out to attach some goodwill to their advertising.

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Who Are You?

Jeph Maystruck October 20, 2009 0 comments

Transparency on the internet is becoming more and more important, if I can’t put a face to your company’s name the chances are I don’t trust you. It’s not difficult to write a little blurb about yourself and why you started the company in the first place, so why don’t you do it? To me it looks like your hiding something, you don’t want me to see who is behind this new company and therefore I don’t trust you.

Websites can be built within hours so how do I know this isn’t just another larger companies subsidiary entering the market? If you’re just a new company, great, tell me about yourself, tell me who works for you, tell me what they’re good at. The people working for you should be an asset, showcase what their strengths are. The more talent I see working for you the better chance you have to garner my business.

Gone are the days of phantom companies on the internet, we want to see who’s behind all your good ideas. Finally, if you don’t want to disclose who works for you because it might hurt your brand maybe they shouldn’t be working for you in the
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The Digital Billboard Formula

Jeph Maystruck October 16, 2009 7 comments

Have you noticed an increasing trend in your city with these digital billboards? Animation on an illuminated sign offering state of the art advertising, sounds like the future doesn’t it? Hardly. If you haven’t noticed, these signs are popping up all over the place, a friend and I counted off the top of our heads how many there are in Regina, sixteen. (to see them all click here) sixteen billboards all claiming to offer thousands of “views” per day depending on the location.

With the city being saturated with these digital boards paired with the difficulty to measure their effectiveness, paying clients to fill the spots are becoming sparse. So who’s advertising on these boards? The surrounding businesses. Count the next time you’re at a red light how many ads show up that are for business in the vicinity of the sign. It’s astounding.

So if the sign owners aren’t making the money and it’s still not a good medium for your company to buy time on, who wins? Obviously the sign manufacturer’s stock is rising.

Now I would hate to complain about this phenomenon without offering a solution. If you still want one of these signs we put together
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