Inc has a nice piece this month on “green companies.” In my experience small business owners seem to take a more proactive stance to environmentally friendly practices. I don’t know, maybe we’re just a little closer to the consequences of not.
Here’s a nice little slide show
This just in from Reuters news source:
By Ben Blanchard
BEIJING (Reuters) - Humans are stripping nature at an unprecedented rate and will need two planets’ worth of natural resources every year by 2050 on current trends, the WWF conservation group said on Tuesday.
“For more than 20 years we have exceeded the earth’s ability to support a consumptive lifestyle that is unsustainable and we cannot afford to continue down this path,” WWF Director-General James Leape said, launching the WWF’s 2006 Living Planet Report.
“If everyone around the world lived as those in America, we would need five planets to support us,” Leape, an American, said in Beijing.
People in the United Arab Emirates were placing most stress per capita on the planet ahead of those in the United States, Finland and Canada, the report said.
“Broken Windows was the brainchild of the criminologists James Q. Wilson and George Kelling. Wilson and Kelling argued that crime is the inevitable result of disorder. If a window is broken and left unrepaired, people walking by will conclude that no one cares and no one is in charge. Soon, more windows will be broken, and the sense of anarchy will spread from the building to the street on which it faces, sending a signal that anything goes.â€
Michael Levine, author and media/PR expert, has just published a book, BROKEN WINDOWS BROKEN BUSINESS, applying the broken windows theory to business. Levine’s premise is that a broken window in business happens when someone isn’t paying attention to details. Levine writes,
“A broken window can be a sloppy counter, a poorly located sale item, a randomly organized menu, or an employee with a bad attitude. It can be physical, like a faded, flaking paint job, or symbolic, like a policy that requires consumers to pay for customer service. When the waiter at a Chinese restaurant is named Billy Bob, that’s a broken window. When a call for help assembling a bicycle results in a twenty-minute hold on the phone (playing the same music over and over), that’s a broken window. When a consumer asks why she can’t return her blouse at the counter and is told, “Because that’s the rule,†that is a broken window. They’re everywhere. Except at the really sharp businesses.” [SOURCE LINK]
According to Levine, broken windows are telltale signs to customers that a business doesn’t care, that it is poorly managed, and or it has become too big and arrogant to adequately deal with little details.
He warns businesses that customers draw wide-ranging conclusions based upon their perceptions of the broken windows they find. These negative perceptions will undermine a business as they can turn once highly-satisfied customers into very-dissatisfied customers who choose take their business elsewhere.
Levine contends the best time to fix a broken window is the moment they occur. He continues by saying the only sustainable way to avoid and repair broken windows is to foster a culture where obsession to detail and a compulsive drive to fix broken windows permeates throughout a business.
According to James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling, “A successful strategy for preventing vandalism, say the book’s authors, is to fix the problems when they are small. Repair the broken windows within a short time, say, a day or a week, and the tendency is that vandals are much less likely to break more windows or do further damage. Clean up the sidewalk every day, and the tendency is for litter not to accumulate (or for the rate of littering to be much less). Problems do not escalate and thus respectable residents do not flee a neighborhood. The theory thus makes two major claims: 1) further petty crime and low-level anti-social behavior will be deterred, and thus 2) major crime will be prevented. Criticism of the theory has tended to focus only on the latter claim.”
It truly is amazing what such a small changes can make.
So does this theory relate to you and your business in any way? If so, how? Sound off.
Maybe the video clip below does very little to concern you. After all, your not the one responsible for the city’s sore eye, nor is there anything you can do to fix it. Who’s problem is it anyway? Is it the city’s problem? or is it a problem only for the men and women and children who call this place their home which only occupies a microscopic slither of land on what we call planet earth?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77tlgjdeGwM
The reality is that, this example of “visual pollution” is unfortunately everyone’s problem. When I say everyone, I mean everyone as in the entire world. I mean all of humankind. There is not one person on the face of this planet that is exempt from the devastion and destruction caused by our fellow man whether it is in South Africa or in the next town over. In fact, it really doesn’t matter how far away you are from it…just know matters will only get worse before they get better.
Well, again you may be thinking “so what” this is not my problem and I could really care less about what goes on in a place where I be lucky to visit once or twice in my entire life (and that’s only because Mister wasn’t paying attention and accidentally got off the wrong exit). Decidedly so, if it’s not your problem now it might become yours one day or worst yet, passed on to your children and their children’s children (that never ending cycle).
Anyway, the point of my post (by the way thanks for reading this far down in the post!) is no matter how daunting of a task it may seem to rid this cancer and make our environment a better place to live (not just for us but for our great, great grandchildren) is there is no one who is without resources to change the world. In other words, everyone and anyone has the resources available to make a difference.
Whether that difference is on a large or small scale, the message is LOUD and CLEAR: It all depends on you. It depends on each and everyone of us. As Daniel Quinn said,
“USE YOUR BEST RESOURCES TO DO WHAT YOU CAN DO. And that’s what I’m doing. Doing what I do best, I’m reaching hundreds of thousands of people all over the world in the cause of saving the world.”
Taken directly from Seth Godin’s blog at www.sethgodin.com
There was a good reason for this. Value was added in ways that big organizations were good at. Value was added with efficient manufacturing, widespread distribution and very large R&D staffs. Value came from hundreds of operators standing by and from nine-figure TV ad budgets. Value came from a huge sales force.
Of course, it’s not just big organizations that added value. Big planes were better than small ones, because they were faster and more efficient. Big buildings were better than small ones because they facilitated communications and used downtown land quite efficiently. Bigger computers could handle more simultaneous users, as well.
Background
This insect has a famous history as a bloodsucker and is named due to its tendency to feed on a bed’s occupants at night. The bed bug primarily attacks humans but can feed on any warm blooded animal such as birds, mice, and pets.
Identification
Adults are just under a 1/4†long and are relatively flat, nearly as wide as long, and oval in shape compared to most other insects. The color is brown to reddish brown. The body may have short golden hairs and will exude a “sickening sweet†smell from glands on its body.
Reproduction and Biting
Female bedbugs can lay over 500 eggs over a lifetime and each bed bug will molt or shed its shell five times as it grows. If blood meals become scarce, bed bugs can slow their life process until a blood meal source is found. The saliva of the bed bug may cause a swelling or redness on most people when they are bitten but they do not leave a wound.
Habits
The bed bug is able to crawl into very small crevices in and around the human environment. These include between mattresses, seams in bed linens, upholstery, behind wood trim, inside electrical boxes, in floors, behind wallpaper, and in any other area near a blood meal that will hide a very thin insect. Note, however, that bed bugs will move distances at night for a blood meal which is why infestations occur in beds commonly, so merely washing bed linens or other infested areas might not eliminate the source.
Commonly, the first sign of bed bug infestation is the appearance of small brownish or reddish dots on bed linens. These are fecal spots or droppings on the surface of linens from these bugs. Occupants may also notice swelling where they have been bitten.
Control
The first step of control is to have us thoroughly inspect the area. This inspection is required to determine the places where the bed bugs are living. Once the inspection is complete, we will determine the proper type of control technique; treat the area and most likely return for a follow up inspection.
Of course if you suspect bed bugs please let your technician know or call our office for an evaluation.
It’s not about us. It’s about you.
You are busy – drowning in paper work, phone ringing off the hook, answering inquires, drafting memo’s, responding to emails, planning your schedule, and of course the list goes on and on….
So what makes us think you have the time in your day to write and offer us feedback to help our company improve our service? Read the rest of this entry »
Crickets are a group of insects related to grasshoppers and katydids. You can identify them from their long 
antennae (as long as their body or longer) and their large back legs, which they use for jumping or hopping. Adult females have a conspicuous sword-like ovipositor or egg-laying device extending backwards from the tip of the abdomen. Crickets are famous songsters. Male crickets chirp by rubbing their wings together. Crickets are usually active at night. While crickets are common outdoors, they may accidentally enter homes or businesses. Crickets only have one generation per year and seldom reproduce indoors. They enter buildings through open doors and windows, cracks around poorly fitted windows, in foundations, in siding, and spaces under doors, so it may be difficult to find the exact point of entry. In our area, the most common crickets found in homes are the field cricket and the house cricket. Read the rest of this entry »
You are not a robot.
You are not an assistant or a manager.
You’re not an employee, either.
No, you’re important. A valuable asset to your family and your community.
A person who can make a difference.
You are capable of having an impact, leaving a legacy,
making a mark on someone else’s life who is less fortunate.
You are not ordinary.
In fact, you’re remarkable.
Now, hurry. Don’t let yourself (and the rest of us) down. Join the cause.
For most people, the boxelder bug needs no introduction. This bug is about 1/2 inch long as an adult, black with three red lines on the thorax (the part just behind the head), a red line along each side, and a diagonal red line on each wing. Boxelder bugs mainly become a nuisance in and around homes from fall through early spring. Read the rest of this entry »