Assume The Sale Quotes

If I had a dollar for every time a random woman walked up to me and tried to seduce me, I'd have 50 cents. That's assuming drag queens are half price.

With the money I spend on alcohol, I could support a family of four, assuming they are all heavy drinkers.

Trust in the process, assume the sale, and they will come.

If love smelled like cheese, as some people assume it does, then I'd rather be a goat and make love all day long.

If I ever see an alien fishing in Scotland, and witness it catching the Loch Ness Monster, I’d probably assume the world would want me to write a poem about the event, rather than take pictures of it.

I like transparent boxes, so would-be thieves can see what’s inside. Deception by invisibility—the walls are invisible, and that makes the contents inside visible, and therefore invisible, because people look but they don’t see, as they assume nothing of value would be out in the open.

If I asked God to see into the future 50 years, and I couldn’t see myself, I wouldn’t assume I was dead. No, I’d assume I was simply hiding.

When the solution to a given problem doesn’t lay right before our eyes, it is easy to assume that no solution exists. But history has shown again and again that such assumptions are wrong. This is not to say the world is perfect. Nor that all progress is always good. Even widespread societal gains inevitably produce losses for some people. That’s why the economist Joseph Schumpeter referred to capitalism as “creative destruction.” But humankind has a great capacity for finding technological solutions to seemingly intractable problems, and this will likely be the case for global warming. It isn’t that the problem isn’t potentially large. It’s just that human ingenuity—when given proper incentives—is bound to be larger. Even more encouraging, technological fixes are often far simpler, and therefore cheaper, than the doomsayers could have imagined. Indeed, in the final chapter of this book we’ll meet a band of renegade engineers who have developed not one but three global-warming fixes, any of which could be bought for less than the annual sales tally of all the Thoroughbred horses at Keeneland auction house in Kentucky.

Don't take this as a compliment, but you actually don't smell that bad." Dan let out a burst of surprised laughter. "What did you expect me to smell like?" "Well..." I wrinkled my nose. "I heard you guys soak your uniforms in urine." "So you assumed I'd smell like pee." "Yes," I said. "But you don't," I added kindly.

If somebody kills me, at least I won’t be accused of murder. Well, assuming all my clones have alibis.

Because of the age difference, I assumed they were related, mother/daughter. But they weren’t. They were father/son/possible lovers.

My amazing feat features shoes (and feet)—it’s how far I’d walk for love. Guess how far? However far it is from the point I ran out of gas to wherever she is, assuming she’s hanging out at a gas station.

If you're going to err, err on the side of simplicity...assume that you have a very brief time to make an impression, and that you'll be allocated a tiny amount of memory space in overloaded and preoccupied brains of your audience.

Sales is all about the relationship; rules are similar: Don't assume, ask. Be open to discussion. Be Always ready with the details, Don't say anything you can't stand behind fully. Have integrity. Listen more — understand their feelings.

Never explain anything. “The more you have to explain,” Whitaker said, “the more difficult it is to win support.” Say the same thing over and over again. “We assume we have to get a voter’s attention seven times to make a sale,” Whitaker said. Subtlety is your enemy. “Words that lean on the mind are no good,” according to Baxter.

Discounted Cash Flow The discounted cash flow method of valuation is the most sophisticated (and the most difficult) method to use in valuing the business. With this method you must estimate all the cash influxes to investors over time (dividends and ultimate stock sales) and then compute a “net present value” using an assumed discount rate (implied interest rate).

Last year, I was conversing by e-mail with an acquaintance who was investigating the black market in cadaver parts. She came into possession of a sales list for a company that provides organs and tissues for research. On the list was “vagina with clitoris.” She did not believe that there could be a legitimate research purpose for cadaver genitalia. She assumed the researcher had procured the part to have sex with it. I replied that physiologists and people who study sexual dysfunction still have plenty to learn about female arousal and orgasm, and that I could, with little trouble, imagine someone needing such a thing. Besides, I said to this woman, if the guy wanted to nail the thing, do you honestly think he’d have bothered with the clitoris?

Keep it simple. Rhyming’s good (“For Jimmy and me, vote ‘yes’ on 3”). Never explain anything. “The more you have to explain,” Whitaker said, “the more difficult it is to win support.” Say the same thing over and over again. “We assume we have to get a voter’s attention seven times to make a sale,” Whitaker said. Subtlety is your enemy. “Words that lean on the mind are no good,” according to Baxter. “They must dent it.” Simplify, simplify, simplify. “A wall goes up,” Whitaker warned, “when you try to make Mr. and Mrs. Average American Citizen work or think.”85

The explosion of government and spending under Obama insured that while the rest of the nation continued to suffer stagnant job growth and slow housing sales long past the time when a recovery should have been underway, one city was booming like a five-year-long Led Zeppelin drum solo: Washington, D.C. According to the 2014 Forbes ranking of the ten richest counties in America, none were in New York, California, or Texas. Before Obama took office, five of the richest counties surrounded Washington, D.C. Now, seven years after Obama took office on his promise to rid the place of big money lobbyists, and Democrats assumed complete control of the White House and Congress for two years, six of the richest counties surround Washington, D.C. Bear in mind that unlike Texas or California, where money is generated by creating products people actually need, such as oil or computers, Washington, D.C., produces nothing but government. In other words, six of the ten richest counties in America got that rich by being parasites. A case could be made that under the current leadership, crony capitalism is more rewarding than actual capitalism. And with all that government around business people’s necks, it’s certainly a heckuva lot easier.

With regard to the price then of the men themselves, it is obvious that the public treasury is in a better position to provide funds than any private individuals. What can be easier than for the Council to invite by public proclamation all whom it may concern to bring their slaves, and to buy up those produced? Assuming the purchase to be effected, is it credible that people will hesitate to hire from the state rather than from the private owner, and actually on the same terms? People have at all events no hesitation at present in hiring consecrated grounds, sacred victims, houses, etc., or in purchasing the right of farming taxes from the state. To ensure the preservation of the purchased property, the treasury can take the same securities precisely from the lessee as it does from those who purchase the right of farming its taxes. Indeed, fraudulent dealing is easier on the part of the man who has purchased such a right than of the man who hires slaves. Since it is not easy to see how the exportation of public money is to be detected, when it differs in no way from private money. Whereas it will take a clever thief to make off with these slaves, marked as they will be with the public stamp, and in face of a heavy penalty attached at once to the sale and exportation of them. Up to this point then it would appear feasible enough for the state to acquire property in men and to keep a safe watch over them.

How exactly the debt should be funded was to be the most inflammatory political issue. During the Revolution, many affluent citizens had invested in bonds, and many war veterans had been paid with IOUs that then plummeted in price under the confederation. In many cases, these upright patriots, either needing cash or convinced they would never be repaid, had sold their securities to speculators for as little as fifteen cents on the dollar. Under the influence of his funding scheme, with government repayment guaranteed, Hamilton expected these bonds to soar from their depressed levels and regain their full face value. This pleasing prospect, however, presented a political quandary. If the bonds appreciated, should speculators pocket the windfall? Or should the money go to the original holders—many of them brave soldiers—who had sold their depressed government paper years earlier? The answer to this perplexing question, Hamilton knew, would define the future character of American capital markets. Doubtless taking a deep breath, he wrote that “after the most mature reflection” about whether to reward original holders and punish current speculators, he had decided against this approach as “ruinous to public credit.”25 The problem was partly that such “discrimination” in favor of former debt holders was unworkable. The government would have to track them down, ascertain their sale prices, then trace all intermediate investors who had held the debt before it was bought by the current owners—an administrative nightmare. Hamilton could have left it at that, ducking the political issue and taking refuge in technical jargon. Instead, he shifted the terms of the debate. He said that the first holders were not simply noble victims, nor were the current buyers simply predatory speculators. The original investors had gotten cash when they wanted it and had shown little faith in the country’s future. Speculators, meanwhile, had hazarded their money and should be rewarded for the risk. In this manner, Hamilton stole the moral high ground from opponents and established the legal and moral basis for securities trading in America: the notion that securities are freely transferable and that buyers assume all rights to profit or loss in transactions. The knowledge that government could not interfere retroactively with a financial transaction was so vital, Hamilton thought, as to outweigh any short-term expediency. To establish the concept of the “security of transfer,” Hamilton was willing, if necessary, to reward mercenary scoundrels and penalize patriotic citizens. With this huge gamble, Hamilton laid the foundations for America’s future financial preeminence.

supposed weakness on national security. Ours was a brief exchange, filled with unspoken irony—the elderly Southerner on his way out, the young black Northerner on his way in, the contrast that the press had noted in our respective convention speeches. Senator Miller was very gracious and wished me luck with my new job. Later, I would happen upon an excerpt from his book, A Deficit of Decency, in which he called my speech at the convention one of the best he’d ever heard, before noting—with what I imagined to be a sly smile—that it may not have been the most effective speech in terms of helping to win an election. In other words: My guy had lost. Zell Miller’s guy had won. That was the hard, cold political reality. Everything else was just sentiment. MY WIFE WILL tell you that by nature I’m not somebody who gets real worked up about things. When I see Ann Coulter or Sean Hannity baying across the television screen, I find it hard to take them seriously; I assume that they must be saying what they do primarily to boost book sales or ratings, although I do wonder who would spend their precious evenings with such sourpusses. When Democrats rush up to me at events and insist that we live in the worst of political times, that a creeping fascism is closing its grip around our throats, I may mention the internment of Japanese Americans under FDR, the Alien and Sedition Acts under John Adams, or a hundred years of lynching under several dozen administrations as having been possibly worse, and suggest we all take a deep breath. When people at dinner parties ask me how I can possibly operate in the current political environment, with all the negative campaigning and personal attacks, I may mention Nelson Mandela, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, or some guy in a Chinese or Egyptian prison somewhere. In truth, being called names is not such a bad deal. Still, I am not immune to distress. And like most Americans, I find it hard to shake the feeling these days that our democracy has gone seriously awry. It’s not simply that a gap exists between our professed ideals as a nation and the reality we witness every day. In one form or another, that gap has existed since America’s birth. Wars have been fought, laws passed, systems reformed, unions organized, and protests staged to bring promise and practice into closer alignment. No, what’s troubling is the gap between the magnitude of our challenges and the smallness of our politics—the ease with which we are distracted by the petty and trivial, our chronic avoidance of tough decisions, our seeming inability to build a working consensus to tackle any big problem. We know that global competition—not to mention any genuine commitment to the values

What I thought was a black hole turned out to be nothing more than a splatter of ink on my tie. And I assumed I was wearing the most astrological outfit of the century.

Let’s look at the case of Opsware. Why did I sell Opsware? Another good question is why didn’t I sell Opsware until I did? At Opsware, we started in the server automation market. When we received our first inquiries and offers for the server automation company, we had fewer than fifty customers. I believed that there were at least ten thousand target customers and that we had a decent shot at being number one. In addition, although I knew the market would be redefined, I thought that we could expand to networks and storage (data center automation) faster than the competition and win that market as well. Therefore, assuming 30 percent market share, somebody would have had to pay sixty times what we were worth in forward credit to buy out our potential. You won’t be surprised to find that nobody was willing to pay that. Once we grew to several hundred customers and expanded into data center automation, we were still number one and were more valuable stand-alone than any of the prior acquisition offers. At that point both Opsware and our main competitor, BladeLogic, had developed into full-fledged companies (worldwide sales forces, built-out professional services, etc.). This was significant, because it meant that a large company could buy one of us and potentially execute successfully (big enterprise companies can’t generally succeed with small acquisitions, because too much of the important intellectual property is the sales methodology, and big companies can’t build that).

A company’s revenue engine is a critical success factor. I had seen from my own direct experience how easy it was to get caught in silos: marketing people would just think of marketing, salespeople would just think of sales, and accounting wouldn’t think of itself as part of the revenue engine at all. Furthermore, product and the revenue engine were too often thought of completely independent of each other. The need for a more integrated approach was on my mind from the beginning. The revenue engine is a whole system. It encompasses a diverse set of integrated components, each doing its part to advance the system’s purpose. The engine is not just comprised of marketing and sales— it includes product, accounting, and the underlying technology and data infrastructure required to keep everything flowing. It involves people, tools, workflow, and metrics. Its purpose is to optimize reach, conversion, and expansion of customer spend. I call my revenue engine model “the bowtie schema.” It was the product of continuous iteration. As I interacted with marketing and sales practitioners and waded through the research, the model slowly emerged. The final model conveys not just the product and customer journey across the bowtie, but also the foundational layers that support that journey-- the interaction between people tools, workflow, and metrics that make it all happen. The most basic question a CEO must answer is whether the product has achieved a value breakthrough. Without that, the revenue engine is irrelevant. Once product-market fit is confirmed, the next step is to clearly identify your ideal customer profile (ICP) and your business model. This includes the lifetime value (LTV) profile of your company. Assuming a strong product, a clear ICP, and a solid understanding of the constraints composed by your unit economics, the path forward is clear. Then, the focus will turn to uplifting the maturity of your revenue engine and scaling it efficiently.

In startups the emphasis is on “get it done, and get it done fast.” So it’s natural that heads of Sales and Marketing believe they are hired for what they know, not what they can learn. They assume their prior experience is relevant in this new venture. They assume they understand the customer problem and therefore the product that needs to be built and sold. Therefore they need to put that knowledge to work and execute the product development, sales and marketing processes and programs that have worked for them before. This is usually a faulty assumption. Before we can build and sell a product, we have to answer some very basic questions: What are the problems our product solves? Do customers perceive these problems as important or “must-have”? If we’re selling to businesses, who in a company has a problem our product could solve? If we are selling to consumers how do we reach them? How big is this problem? Who do we make the first sales call on? Who else has to approve the purchase? How many customers do we need to be profitable? What’s the average order size?

The government would have to track them down, ascertain their sale prices, then trace all intermediate investors who had held the debt before it was bought by the current owners—an administrative nightmare. Hamilton could have left it at that, ducking the political issue and taking refuge in technical jargon. Instead, he shifted the terms of the debate. He said that the first holders were not simply noble victims, nor were the current buyers simply predatory speculators. The original investors had gotten cash when they wanted it and had shown little faith in the country’s future. Speculators, meanwhile, had hazarded their money and should be rewarded for the risk. In this manner, Hamilton stole the moral high ground from opponents and established the legal and moral basis for securities trading in America: the notion that securities are freely transferable and that buyers assume all rights to profit or loss in transactions. The knowledge that government could not interfere retroactively with a financial transaction was so vital, Hamilton thought, as to outweigh any short-term expediency. To establish the concept of the “security of transfer,” Hamilton was willing, if necessary, to reward mercenary scoundrels and penalize patriotic citizens. With this huge gamble, Hamilton laid the foundations for America’s future financial preeminence. As his report progressed, Hamilton tiptoed through a field seeded thickly with deadly political traps. The next incendiary issue was that some debt was owed by the thirteen states, some by the federal government. Hamilton decided to consolidate all the debt into a single form: federal

both Tesla and GM think battery prices will come down fast enough for electric cars to be more affordable than equivalent gasoline cars by the early 2020s. The Chevy Bolt sells for less than $35,000, after subsidies. Tesla plans to be producing Model 3s at a rate of hundreds of thousands a year by 2019. Other electric car companies, new and old, are developing competitive strategies. It is still difficult to predict how quickly the sales of electric cars will overtake those of gasoline vehicles. Even assuming all goes well for Tesla and their electric competitors, it could take years, or decades. Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s study estimated that electric cars will account for 35 percent of new car sales by 2040. That’s based on battery prices decreasing at a slower rate than Tesla and GM anticipate. But, as noted earlier, gasoline cars will face the difficult task of competing with electric cars that are both cheaper and better.

As a result, the most important recommendation for organizations of all shapes and sizes moving forward is to anticipate worst case scenarios at a minimum. Even in cases where organizations cannot or will not make some of the operational changes recommended below, the exercise of focusing on nonsoftware areas of a given business can help identify under-realized or -appreciated assets within an organization. Particularly ones for whom the sale of software has been low effort, brainstorming about other potential revenue opportunities is unlikely to be time wasted. One vendor in the business intelligence and analytics space has privately acknowledged doing just this; based on current research and projecting current trends forward, it is in the process of building out a 10-year plan over which it assumes that the upfront licensing model will gradually approach zero revenue. In its place, the vendor plans to build out subscription and data-based revenue streams. Even if the plan ultimately proves to be unnecessary, the exercise has been enormously useful internally for the insight gained into its business.

At that point in time, Gokul Rajaram was a legendary éminence grise in the ad-tech world. The so-called godfather of AdSense, Google’s secondary gold mine after AdWords, Gokul was a constant presence on the conference circuit, and an omnipresent adviser or investor in just about every advertising technology company worth talking about. He too had come to Facebook via a small acqui-hire, though really that had been just a career breather between his time at Google and his hiring at Facebook. University at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), followed by an American MBA, he was your standard-issue Indian techie, and probably that country’s most valuable export after steel and Tata Motors. “What’s the first thing you would change about Facebook Ads if we hired you?” There was about as much polish and prologue to Gokul as that of a North Korean diplomat. “I’d build a conversion-tracking system. It’s unbelievable you don’t have one yet.” A conversion-tracking system is software that tells you if an advertisement has worked in driving a conversion (or “sale” in marketing-speak), and lets you retweak your marketing campaigns based on performance. An ads system without conversion tracking is like a car without rearview mirrors; nay, it’s like a car without even rear or side windows. All you can see is forward, merrily driving along, not even understanding what’s behind you or what you just ran over. It’s a danger to yourself and others, and it was a sign of just how out-of-touch Facebook Ads management was that this somehow never got prioritized. From Gokul’s smile the conclusion was clearly . . . right answer! And so the conversation went, traversing various potential aspects of the Facebook Ads system, and what the company needed to build. It was a giddy Gokul—I’d soon learn he was almost always giddy—who escorted me out the door. The boys and I had arrived separately, assuming we’d get out at different times, and separately did we go back to the GrokPad. There, we compared notes. MRM and Argyris weren’t exactly rousing in their reviews of the experience. In fact, it was clear that the fascist vibe the company gave off had very much rubbed them the wrong way. They had never really liked Facebook, as either product or company, going back to our visits to their developer events. The daylong hazing had done nothing to charm them.

Do you guys have any questions?" she asked after they popped their first tastes. "Is there butter in this branzino al sala?" asked a ruddy-cheeked guy who was the latest addition to the team, his mouth full of fish. "First, 'sala' is a room. It's 'sale'- as in 'salt.' But only tell people that if they specifically ask, otherwise they'll assume it's too salty. And tell them the salt, which dries into a hard crust that's cracked open at the end, preserves the fish's natural flavors and juices as it cooks so it's moist and tender. And no butter, just olive oil, fresh thyme, chervil, and lemon." "Push this one, guys. We're selling it at thirty-three bucks a pop," Bernard said without looking up from his clipboard. "Really?" Georgia said. "A little high for my taste, but almost worth it." "So, it's rich and flavorful?" the new guy continued hopefully. She shook her head. "Subtle and delicate. Tell them we only serve this when the branzino is really top-notch. Say that and it'll fly.

High Fat, Moderate Protein, Low Carb Breakfast Smoothies Recipes for ‘low carbohydrate’ smoothies abound, but most are also low in fat and assume that anything under 200 Calories from sugars qualifies as ‘low carb’. Here are two basic recipes that provide enough fat and protein to keep you satisfied until lunch, and both come in at or under10 grams of carbohydrates. Note that you have your choice of sweeteners, but the argument for adding some xylitol to the mix is that it does not raise your insulin level, provides useful energy, and protects your dental health. Also note that there are lots of different protein powders for sale, but most whey products are flavored and sweetened. Shop until you find unflavored whey powder with the lactose removed – the label should indicate about 15 grams of protein and less than one gram of carbohydrate per serving. Do not buy soy protein powder or whey/soy mix, as the soy does not dissolve well into the smoothie. This whey powder looks expensive (about $1 per 15 gram serving) but this is the same amount of protein as you get from 2 eggs. Breakfast Berry Smoothie Ingredients: 3 oz fresh or frozen (unsweetened) berries (strawberries, blueberries, or raspberries) ¼ cup whipping (or heavy) cream 1 tablespoon light olive oil 2 tablespoons unflavored whey protein powder (delactosed) sweetener of choice (e.g., 1 tablespoon xylitol and 1 packet Splenda) 2-3 oz ice Blend the ingredients at high speed until smooth (30-60 seconds) Protein 15 grams, Fat 25-30 grams, Carbs 10 grams, Calories 330-380

First, you can assume all the engineers are players. They obviously have technical knowledge they may throw on the table, otherwise why were they invited? The product-management person is also a player as she represents the sales folks in this meeting. Program managers in these meetings are pawns. They’ll make sure action items are recorded and that the meeting ends on time.If you’re sitting in a meeting where you’re unable to identify any players, get the hell out.

The Metaphor That Stuck In 1996, the Summer Olympic Games were held in my home city of Atlanta. As I watched athletes from all over the world perform in their respective events, I remember wondering what motivated them to compete at the highest levels. On the surface, it seemed logical to assume that these world-class athletes were driven by all the positive rewards that would go to the champion—fame, admiration, and of course, the gold medal. After training for most of their lives, who wouldn’t want to experience “the thrill of victory”? But as I watched the games unfold, it became obvious that while some athletes were motivated by positive rewards, many others were trying to avoid “the agony of defeat.” Rather than think about all the accolades that would come from success, some athletes were motivated to run even faster, and jump even higher, because they were trying to avoid an undesirable outcome. Carl Lewis, arguably one of the greatest track and field athletes of all time, and nine-time Olympic gold medalist, was an excellent example of this. After his last event in Atlanta, when he won the gold medal on his final attempt in the long jump, the sportscaster asked, “Mr. Lewis, what were you thinking about just before you jumped?” As it turned out, Carl Lewis wasn’t thinking about medals, money, or having his picture on a box of Wheaties. Instead, he said his primary motivation was that his family was in the stadium and he didn’t want to disappoint them by losing his final Olympic event.

How exactly does social selling work? For the purposes of prospecting for new business, social selling involves contacting prospective customers on social media platforms, most commonly LinkedIn and Twitter. Here are some pointers: Cultivate a relationship: Social selling is not for the quick wins, generally speaking. You can start simply by following a prospect, engaging with their content, and then inviting them to connect. You want to draw their attention, but not overwhelm them. Don’t pitch right away: In the early days of social selling, it was possible to immediately pitch a prospect online with some success. That time has passed, so don’t assume that when someone accepts your connection request it means they want to buy from you. Be someone worth talking to: Your prospects will see your public profile, so be sure to demonstrate your expertise in your profile and content. If you’re still using your LinkedIn account as a resume, you’re doing it wrong. Move from online to offline: The goal of social selling is not to run through the entire sale over social media. As with all initial contacting, your goal is to set up a real-time conversation over the phone or in person. While nearly all great salespeople communicate with prospects across all three of these channels, it’s best to become confident with one before adding another. Cold calling, while unattractive to many, will yield the greatest number of opportunities to learn which offers and messaging resonate with our prospects. The skill of adapting to prospects in live conversation is invaluable throughout the sales process. In fact, it’s one of the most important skills to master in order to advance your sales career.

Structured methods for learning Method Uses Useful for Organizational climate and employee satisfaction surveys Learning about culture and morale. Many organizations do such surveys regularly, and a database may already be available. If not, consider setting up a regular survey of employee perceptions. Useful for managers at all levels if the analysis is available specifically for your unit or group. Usefulness depends on the granularity of the collection and analysis. This also assumes the survey instrument is a good one and the data have been collected carefully and analyzed rigorously. Structured sets of interviews with slices of the organization or unit Identifying shared and divergent perceptions of opportunities and problems. You can interview people at the same level in different departments (a horizontal slice) or bore down through multiple levels (a vertical slice). Whichever dimension you choose, ask everybody the same questions, and look for similarities and differences in people’s responses. Most useful for managers leading groups of people from different functional backgrounds. Can be useful at lower levels if the unit is experiencing significant problems. Focus groups Probing issues that preoccupy key groups of employees, such as morale issues among frontline production or service workers. Gathering groups of people who work together also lets you see how they interact and identify who displays leadership. Fostering discussion promotes deeper insight. Most useful for managers of large groups of people who perform a similar function, such as sales managers or plant managers. Can be useful for senior managers as a way of getting quick insights into the perceptions of key employee constituencies. Analysis of critical past decisions Illuminating decision-making patterns and sources of power and influence. Select an important recent decision, and look into how it was made. Who exerted influence at each stage? Talk with the people involved, probe their perceptions, and note what is and is not said. Most useful for higher-level managers of business units or project groups. Process analysis Examining interactions among departments or functions and assessing the efficiency of a process. Select an important process, such as delivery of products to customers or distributors, and assign a cross-functional group to chart the process and identify bottlenecks and problems. Most useful for managers of units or groups in which the work of multiple functional specialties must be integrated. Can be useful for lower-level managers as a way of understanding how their groups fit into larger processes. Plant and market tours Learning firsthand from people close to the product. Plant tours let you meet production personnel informally and listen to their concerns. Meetings with sales and production staff help you assess technical capabilities. Market tours can introduce you to customers, whose comments can reveal problems and opportunities. Most useful for managers of business units. Pilot projects Gaining deep insight into technical capabilities, culture, and politics. Although these insights are not the primary purpose of pilot projects, you can learn a lot from how the organization or group responds to your pilot initiatives. Useful for managers at all levels. The size of the pilot projects and their impact will increase as you rise through the organization.

Called by the fattoria committee, the unemployed braccianti arrive in force on the lands that the owners refuse to improve. In spite of the presence of the owners, the superintendents, or their agents, the workers carry out the work; they then demand their salary (pay ble to the legal investment fund). In the backwards strike, the workers work against the wishes of the boss, and their work increases the productivity of the soil. This is doubly paradoxical when compared to the conventional notion of the strike. Thus, at Empoli, between Florence and Sienna, 70,000 cubic meters of grading, ditches, and other work has been carried out by the "strikers" under the direction of the fattorie committees. The latter paid the workers directly, withdrawing 4% from the money deposited by them into the bank and representing the sale of farm products. in all the areas of Tuscany where the committees are active, they have organized the planting of vines, the work of drainage or irrigation, the repair of buildings, and whatever else might be required. They even established, in individual locations, nascent production cooperatives for clearing the land and improving uncultivated or poorly cultivated soil, which assumes their presence on these lands notwithstanding the will of the owner.

As I was to learn, the process for creating the digital media business would be quite different because there was so much more to creating a great digital media customer experience than simply adding the next retail category to the Amazon website. The first part of the process went as normal. Our team of three or four people developed plans using the tried-and-true MBA-style methods of the time. We gathered data about the size of the market opportunity. We constructed financial models projecting our annual sales in each category, assuming, of course, an ever-increasing share of digital sales. We calculated gross margin assuming a certain cost of goods from our suppliers. We projected an operating margin based on the size of the team we would need to support the business. We outlined the deals we would make with media companies. We sketched out pricing parameters. We described how the service would work for customers. We put it all together in crisp-looking PowerPoint slides (this was still several months before the switch to narratives) and comprehensive Excel spreadsheets.

A business with sales of $10 million that grows at 3 per cent a year - roughly the rate the economy grows - will increase by 34 per cent over a decade, to just over $13 million. What will a business that grows at 30 per cent a year - ten times 3 per cent - grow by in the same time? You might assume is it ten times 34 per cent, which is 340 per cent, and add a bit for the effect of compounding, to take the growth to perhaps 500 per cent. If this were true the sales after ten years would have grown to $50 million. But the correct answer is nearly $138 million. Such is the magic of compound interest, which Albert Einstein called ‘the most powerful force in the universe’.