grapevine

One of the joys of working across timezones is catching English media at hours I wouldn’t normally. A neat example of this presented itself to me this week with a typical Yay-or-Nay talking head shout-off. It concerned a 240 wind turbine farm about to be built in the Bristol

With the twelfth Star Trek movie hitting screens I searched out a documentary about the original series. Specifically, how it came about. Creator Gene Roddenberry had already made the journey from WW2 pilot to screenwriter. He now had the idea for his dream sci-fi show. Always called Star Trek. He

[http://www.rosettaroastery.com/] I was in a delightful coffee lab the other day. A coffee shop owner was searching for an alternative supplier and I was lucky enough to be involved in an impromptu tasting. As we waited at the counter, a local business school MBA group were having

Via CNBC, I learn that although Asia is the place for growth, there’s a ‘talent crunch’. And the Number One talent gap? Salespeople. There’s an annual survey in this regard by personnel providers Manpower. They also interviewed the head of ERP firm SAP Asia, Steve Watts [video.cnbc.

[https://salespodder.com/content/images/wordpress/2013/05/hbr-April-2013-on-selling-genes.jpg] This kind of rubbish really winds me up. There I was, reading a Harvard Business Review bought between flights. Suddenly I got all excited. They were writing on Sales. Then I read the piece. All one hundred words [http://hbr.

Here’s a delightful phrase I heard on Thursday. Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee were giving a VP of Google UK, Matt Brittin, a grilling [http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/may/16/google-denies-disguise-operates-tax] . Nasty Google. They pay virtually no corporation tax in Britain. Perfectly legally, they perform all

I was in the room when this fascinating conversation took place. Between a S African accountant and his firm’s chosen outside IT helper. It appeared his hourly rate was R285. His client derided this as too low. The fixer then said he deliberately used this rate so that he

Many solution salespeople struggle with the concept of workshops. Specifically, when does a meeting with multiple attendees morph into a workshop? I recently heard one sage note “the more you put in [to a workshop] the more you’ll get out of it”. He should know. He used to organise

I’ve caught a run of business turnaround reality shows lately. I was struck by one action all the celebrity protagonists at the helm take. They always get out on the streets to confront potential clients. In one particular show, Über Chef Gordon Ramsay in his Kitchen Nightmares show faced