Humility vs. Humiliation

May 7, 2015

Nobody is perfect.  Not everything you do as an artist and creative business owner works.  You will be wrong.  More to the point, you will be wrong more often then you are right. The goal is not to be wrong less, it is to be really really right when you are right and slightly wrong […]

Read the full article →

A Pig In A Snake

May 1, 2015

If you are a regular reader of the blog or talk to me for ten minutes, you know I love my analogies.  The Apple Tree, Rowboats and Motor Yachts come to mind.  The one I have been having the most fun with of late is the idea of a pig in a snake. There are […]

Read the full article →

Bet On Black

April 16, 2015

In the life of a creative business, you will have a choice: you can keep doors open to all possibilities or bet on black.  For non-gamblers, bet on black refers to going to a roulette table and choosing to bet on the little ball to end up on a black number not a red (or […]

Read the full article →

Your Core

April 2, 2015

I have just finished rereading Good To Great, Jim Collins’ awesome five-year study of companies that went from good to great.  He studied what made these companies great relative to their peers (and the market in general — the rock stars of business) and how they stayed that way.  Much too much to talk about […]

Read the full article →

Your Clients Want What You Want

March 18, 2015

We all evolve.  Me too.  When I first started working with creative businesses, Preston and Vicente very much included, I thought that the work had to be to reach into the mind of a client and translate their vision into your art.  Focus on listening, then presenting, and ultimately creating for clients. While this framework […]

Read the full article →

Empowerment and Process

March 11, 2015

I had the great pleasure to finally talk in person with Bill Baker last week after being social media friends for the last three or so years.  Ostensibly, we were talking about how I might offer advice on broadening Bill’s speaking engagements.  Sure.  As Bill is much further along in that endeavor than me, I […]

Read the full article →

Into The Sun

March 2, 2015

The time to risk it all is when you have everything to lose, not when you have nothing.  When you have nothing, only one place to go – up.  There is a safety in that.  If you are wrong, who cares, you are at rock-bottom anyway.  But if you are right, there is the way […]

Read the full article →

Integrity 101

February 18, 2015

When life is good, the tank full, bank account brimming over, integrity is easy.  Why?  You can tell yourself your creative business does not need to compromise.  So you do not.  Sure, you can become a diva or, worse, an a—hole, but mostly you can create the art you and your creative business were meant […]

Read the full article →

Power

February 2, 2015

What if you were the only one?  And customers had to have (or really really needed) what you were selling.  Say cold water at the beach where there was no other water allowed.  With limited supplies.  The ultimate monopolist.  How would you behave? Power tends to corrupt and absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely says […]

Read the full article →

Pricing 2015

January 7, 2015

Tis the season.  The question I get over and over is, how do I price my work?  Here is the real answer, more than any number, concept (i.e., percentage, hourly, flat fee, etc.) or market convention (i.e., here is what we get for being florists in Chicago): value and process define price, not the other […]

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →