17Jun 2021 by CJ
Make every interaction count to help build your overall customer experience

Make every interaction count to help build your overall customer experience

Generosity & Kindness, Information & Education
“Make every interaction count, even the small ones. They are all relevant.” - Shep Hyken The pandemic has forced some industries to the brink of extinction while allowing others to flourish at unprecedented levels. One of those industries is home improvement. As people found themselves at home more than they’d ever been before over the last year, they started to notice the “imperfections” of their environment and suddenly the industry exploded. Halfway through 2020, searches for home improvement companies were up almost 50% and according to Porch.com, 3 out of 4 homeowners surveyed completed a major renovation project since the start of Covid-19, and roughly the same percentage already have one scheduled. With this flurry of new business, one might hope that home improvement companies have not lost a critical…
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16Sep 2020 by CJ
Investing in yourself through education highlights your character

Investing in yourself through education highlights your character

Information & Education
“Investing in yourself is the best investment you will ever make. It will not only improve your life, it will improve the lives of all those around you.” - Robin Sharma It’s been a long time since I’ve meandered through the halls of an educational institution where the ultimate goal was investing in yourself through learning, growth and experience. For many, one of the pitfalls of inhabiting the working world with some longevity is a sense of superiority. This often supports an all-knowing attitude which renders us believing that personal and professional development is only for those with limited career success. I myself have easily fallen into that rhythm. It wasn’t until a communications issue with a co-worker arose that I realized I might have something more to learn about…
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20Aug 2020 by CJ
Driving While Black shows how often whites take traveling for granted

Driving While Black shows how often whites take traveling for granted

Information & Education, Life & Living
Driving While Black: African American Travel and the Road to Civil Rights, is a book penned by Dr. Gretchen Sorin, a distinguished professor at The State University of New York College at Oneonta (SUNY). I was made aware of the book’s existence in a very unlikely place – a guest article in my latest edition of MotorTrend. For those of you unaware, MotorTrend is an American automobile magazine which dates back to September 1949. My wife and I had just completed reading several informative books on race – White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo and So You Want To Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo. I highly recommend both. When the September issue of MotorTrend landed in my mailbox with the Driving While Black guest article, it seemed like fate was…
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03Aug 2020 by CJ
Phubbing – competing with a hand-held device for your time

Phubbing – competing with a hand-held device for your time

Information & Education, Life & Living
You’ve probably never heard of the word “phubbing” before, but I’d wager to say you’ve applied what it means with some regularity. On Psychology Today, Emma Seppälä, Ph.D. writes, “Phubbing is the practice of snubbing others in favor of our mobile phones.” In other words, when someone is having a conversation with you or a small group, you’re on your cell phone pretending to listen. Such practice was originally thought to be linked to inconsiderate and entitled teenagers who had little to no understanding of what it means to be respectful. But phubbing no longer discriminates by age as 40 somethings and even 70 somethings now practice it consistently on their cell phones and smart watches regardless of whose company they’re in. A Time magazine article states, “Several studies have shown that…
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20Jul 2020 by CJ
An emergency fund is an important investment in yourself

An emergency fund is an important investment in yourself

Information & Education, Life & Living
During this global pandemic, many financial experts have offered advice on how much money should be in your emergency fund. Popular responses range from three to six months, with famed personal finance expert Suze Orman bucking that trend and recommending eight months. In her recent LinkedIn post, Orman says, “I have long told everyone to build an eight month emergency fund. And my goodness, I get plenty of blowback for that. The critics say it is too much and too impossible.” I offer the following statistics from a CNBC article on why Americans struggle to save for retirement, by contributor Steve Adcock. Adcock says, “A 2019 report from Ladder, a life insurance company, found that the average adult spends $1,497 per month on non-essentials. That’s roughly $18,000 a year on things…
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