Aviation of Business

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Jul 18

I was listening to WCBE (90.5 in Columbus, Ohio) early this week. It’s Central Ohio’s NPR station.

While listening, I heard some news about the debate on setting goals to start reducing the U.S. footprint in Iraq. Apparently, the congress is debating (or, more accurately, the Republicans are filibustering) the idea of setting goals (which are the cornerstone of any success in any activity in life - ask any successful businessperson).

The filibustering isn’t the good part… my favorite part of the NPR story was the quotes (and I wish I could remember who said them):

“The best way to support our troops is to support our troops…”
“The best way to defeat Al Qaida is to defeat Al Qaida…”

Okay…

So…

What?!?

It could be said about anything that the best way to do something is to do it.

“The best way to fly a plane is to fly a plane.”
“The best way to lose weight is to lose weight.”

Yeah. Duh. But it’s not that simple.

There HAS to be a plan. There HAS to be something more than a blanket statement of the obvious… HOW do we support our troops? HOW do we defeat Al Qaida? WHY do we need to? WHO is going to do it? WHAT needs to our troops have? WHERE do we focus our limited resources to do so? WHEN do we check to see what kind of progress we have made?

I am sure there are many that nodded and agreed with the statements made by our distinguished representatives from Mt. Obvious. Those people, I’m sure, think that those statements were deep and thoughtful. I think that they were a waste of time and a sad statement about the people running our country. Don’t give me soundbites - especially not inane, stupid ones. Give me substance.

And we all know - the best way to talk about something sustantial is to talk about something sustantial.

Fair Winds,
Andrew

posted by Andrew Hartley - Business Consultant & Entrepreneur on Apr 21

Here’s something interesting: Small Business Week coincides with Earth Day.  I don’t know if that is the case every year, but in 2007, here we are. 

President Bush has praised small business owners in the days preceding Small Business Week, but he has not latched on to the opportunity these shared celebrations present.  If you would like to read the full text of the President’s proclamation, click here (HTML) or here (PDF). 

Here’s the thing: we all know that the environment is in dire straights.  We’ve heard the hullabaloo about Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth (both a book [aff] and a movie [aff]) and have seen the many recent reports on Global Warming (or Climate Change - choose your poison), a topic which has finally hit the mainstream as it deserves.

So what is to be done?  Bush missed a BEAUTIFUL opportunity to link Earth Day with Small Business Week.  According to the Small Business Administration (SBA), small business represents 50% of the United States’ private, non-farm gross domestic product (GDP).  In fact, small business ranged from 18 to 85 percent of each sector of the US economy!

Imagine what could happen if there was a strong call for small business to usher in a “green revolution!”  What if all small businesses began to run in an environmentally-friendly (even an environmentally-enhancing) way!  How great would it be if the ideas laid out in books like Green to Gold [aff] and Natural Capitalism [aff] were truly brought to fruition by the ingenuity and creativity of entrepreneurs and small-business owners!

Now think about what WILL happen if no small businesses think about the environment.  Nothing will change.  We’ll continue on exactly the same path we are already on - and, as we entrepreneurs know, avoiding change is not an option.  The status quo is a death knell for business.  In this case, the death knell would only warn us of the impending doom from climate change.  It may not end things, but it would DRASTICALLY change life as we know it.

So if President Bush won’t do it, I will.  I (and Aviation of Business) challenge all small business to try to think “outside their box” and “think globally while acting locally.”  And putting the clichés aside, I truly do believe that small business is up to the challenge of redefining what business can be.  I believe that small business, with its ability to change quickly and with its creativity and ability to mitigate risk (even though it can never be completely eliminated) is more likely to cause the environmental revolution than big, bumbling, slow conglomorates that slog through committees and make tiny, incremental changes so as not to misstep and (god forbid) make a mistake! </rant> Small business entrepreneurs know that mistakes are lessons, and that “incremental” actually means “slow and scared.”

So take the challenge, please!  Find any and every way you can make your business “green.”  Then let ‘er rip!  Leave a comment telling us how you currently “green” your business, and come back and add to the list if you hear about or think of a new, creative way to increase the “greenness” of your company!

Fair Winds,
Andrew