Archives for March 2012

The Apple, The Tree And JCP

03/15/2012 By Jayme Soulati

About a month ago, I had a blog post written in long hand to post here and never got around to it. I’m glad I waited; there’s so much more proof that my admiration of all things Apple isn’t just a passing fancy.

Awhile back, I also wrote a little series on creativity. In that series, I wrote about Nest, the new thermostat innovated by former Apple executives. The website was fresh, clean, and sparkling. The product, Nest, is still on my wish list — a thermostat with a brain that programs the temperature in your home for you once you’ve entered a few settings.

Today’s post is about another former Apple executive taking the reins as CEO over at Jacque Pennier or J.C. Penney, Inc. or JCP, as it’s now commonly called in marketing campaigns.

If you’ve not seen the new JCP direct mail campaigns sashaying in your door via snail mail, you’re living under a rock. As soon as I got the first one, I couldn’t put it down; I was so impressed. Inside, within the ads for apparel and other goods, were the typical storytelling snippets introducing sections oriented to demographics.

The major thrust and branding adjustment, though, was how Ron Johnson turned the image of dowdy JC Penney into something fresh; can I almost say sophisticated feeling?

Each mini catalog I get appeals to my sense of color, makes me smile at the vibrant energy coming off the pages, and it has people talking, too. My personal trainer asked me if I knew that JCP has sale dates on the third Friday of the month now and not every day with coupons.

The point to all this is simply, the Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Innovation, creativity, making customers excited about mundane products, and turning brands upside down and inside out to rescue them from the horse’s trough is brilliant.

And, the critics had some ho-hum to say, but the company’s stock soared to $38 buoyed by a rosier outlook. I’d say when a former Apple somebody or ‘nother decides to take a job somewhere…uhmm, that’s a trading tip to run and buy some stock, wouldn’t you say?

Millennials In The Generational Workplace

03/06/2012 By Jayme Soulati

In anticipation of a guest post tomorrow from none other than Beatriz Alemar, founder of Breakthru Life and member of this community, I’m going to recap an opinion column in Ad Age Feb. 20, 2012 that inspired my invite to Beatriz to post on the topic of millennials.

I’ve always been fascinated with demographics and their nomenclature. Now, more than ever, I wonder about the corporations seeing the blending of extreme youth with the profession’s elders. Teams are being cast with a a senior mentor and a young professional sharing some ropes, too.

This opinion piece I paraphrase today is from Beth Ann Kaminkow, president and CEO of TracyLocke. I love this first paragraph I’m going to repeat exactly, “We’re seeing a progression in the quality of young professionals. This isn’t a group ready to stay in the background and learn the way things are done. This is a talent dynamic that I foresee shaping the way we work and interact, and they’ll present challenges.”

Think about your teenagers at home or those in your family. Have you ever seen the devour a device and never look up? How about that texting? The superficial social skills with a blip interaction create horrifying habits for the workplace. Fast forward to the college grads who maintain those habits and also think Facebook is their playground for laughs and giggles.

Does your company need to hire young people from college? There may be a respite as so many more seasoned Americans are out of work, but companies can’t avoid hiring millennials.

Kaminkow suggests the solutions are training that builds habits with a push to dig deeper instead of skim the surface. Teachable moments should be cherished whenever they pop up, too.

In the piece she wrote, Kaminkow gives five tips on how to incorporate millennials into the workplace:

Loyalty is fleeting. Companies need to give these youth a reason to stick around. With digital skills that abound, the “babies of the recession” (as Kaminkow states) want to use those skills.

Engagement inside the company and with clients (coming from an agency perspective) are what matter. There are many coaching opportunities to teach hierarchy; something many young people are not glomming on to.

Less respect for process. Online research being always available to millennials sets off common systems and processes in the workplace. When a manager “has always done it this way,” and a newbie rolls in and sidesteps the steps…imagine the sparks!

Whites of the Eyes. Facebook never meant face time. The in-person meeting is less preferred by youth due to the comfort with texting and social media postings. That has to change as body language, facial expressions, and contextual understanding are critical in business (and especially teams).

Coffeehouse. I love this tip Kaminkow provides most of all. She suggests each company make a coffeehouse area with comfy couches for everyone to get supine and brainstorm. Millennials with their devices gathered up with a Starbucks green tea respond better to this than to sterile cubicles.

In her close, Kaminkow puts the onus on a new style of management and leadership to integrate the generations. She draws a comparison to the blending of new tools as to the blending of new talent “into a thoughtfully reimagined environment.”

Honor All Women This International Women’s Day

03/05/2012 By Jayme Soulati

In my view, every day is women’s day; we rock in families, in workplaces, as mothers, and partners. I’m fortunate to feel this way because I’ve been raised in the land of opportunity.

Other women have not, do not and do not have.

March 8, 2012 is International Women’s Day.

Some moms have not had the luxuries my parents gave me; they don’t have the ability to provide for their children the way I do mine. They’re among the one in seven people who go to bed hungry every night. And this isn’t because there isn’t enough food to go around. It’s because there are deep imbalances in access to resources like fertile lands and water. In fact, more than 40 percent of the world’s population – 2.5 billion people – live in poverty, and many of them are women.

On International Women’s Day, stop and think a moment about the women in poverty who comprise half the population on earth. Here are some sad but true factoids:

Sixty-six percent of the world’s work falls on women’s shoulders, yet they earn only 10% of the world’s income
If women were given the same level of access to resources that men have, they could increase yields on their farms by 20 percent to 30 percent
Hunger and poverty are about power and inequality, and women and girls face the biggest inequalities of all.

This International Women’s Day, Oxfam America is suggesting several ways to celebrate women while at the same time honoring those we’ve never met:

1. Send an International Women’s Day eCard to women you know around the world. All it takes is their email address to say thanks for her contributions.

2. For bloggers who really want to recognize a woman who is making a difference, Oxfam America has the International Women’s Day 2012 award. It can be shared via social media and/or handed directly to an influential woman.

Programs like this are always a good reminder to stop a moment from our every day grinds and reflect on our standing. When we look at the women in poverty trying to do what we mothers and business women do with their limited resources, we owe it to ourselves and them to share a kindness. Please do.

10 Things That Disturb From News Of The Day

03/01/2012 By Jayme Soulati

You know how sometimes you don’t have any mojo to write for your blog? You might comb Google Reader and others’ blog posts looking for inspiration. Or, you might cut tear sheets out of your fave ‘zines and bookmark other pages online. For naught…something is amiss…life’s malarkey is happening, and the positive ‘tude (this is Soulati-‘TUDE! after all) isn’t there.

I’m talking about myself…haven’t felt it, been crushing it for clients, and my time to write is spent just trying to breathe. This post is one of those where I have to clear the cobwebs of annoyances from my brain matter to yours. If you want to clear your head in comments and add what’s bugging you, too, feel free! We can all get some clarity heading into the weekend.

1. . A man in Troy, Ohio adopted three boys (and was on his way to adopting a fourth) and he sexually abused each. He also gave them to his friends (three men) to do the same to these innocent children (I don’t know their ages; I can’t fathom knowing this). News today says FBI is looking into this case. Who is helping the children, damaged for life?

2. Also in Ohio, a young teen boy picked up a gun and randomly shot kids inside the school. Three teens are dead. My heart for the families who lost their child. I have to stop writing this because I’m going to break down.

3. Bogus Subscription Offers. On a lighter note, the Wall Street Journal sent me two subscription offers the same day – one addressed to me and the other to my company. The former cost $231.72 for a year, and the latter costs $374.40 per year. And, I’ve received a call from a telemarketer to renew with an entirely different annual fee. Can you cough and say “bullshit?”

4. . Big news in the WSJ yesterday, “Doctor Accused of Big Medicare Scam.” This jamoke bilked us (because our insurance premiums pay for crap like this) of $350 million over a five-year period in Dallas. It is considered to be “the largest Medicare fraud scheme by dollar value linked to a single physician.” Home health agencies and the office manager were involved, too.

5. Who isn’t perturbed by this? I read the U.S. is exporting gas because demand is down; meanwhile, pump prices are at highest levels in awhile and who’s getting rich off people who are just flippin’ tapped out with every business’s higher prices for gas getting paid by consumers?

6. . I know someone who took herself off statin drugs; she was having incredible and crippling pain in her legs. After speaking at length with her physician (she fired that MD) who didn’t care to listen, mom decided to stop taking the drug one day. Her range of motion has improved, she has more energy, and she’s so angry she lost two years to pain. Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal had a story, “FDA Warns on Statin Drugs,” but “the concerns aren’t expected to prompt doctors to stop prescribing statins.” I’m so concerned for our aging population; PHARMACEUTICAL DRUGS ARE NOT THE ANSWER.

7. I tried to take advantage of low mortgage rates, but because the property appraiser decided my home was worth shit, my deal fell through. My credit is higher than required; the financial are not the issue. It’s the loan to value ratio on all of our homes; we’re all stuck. The Wall Street Journal yesterday (are you seeing the pattern here?) had this story, “Home Prices Hit New Depths.”

8. Banks Suck. is going to pass along a new consumer charge. If those who have a checking account with this second-largest financial institution don’t opt-in for online banking, then a charge will be assessed. That’s today’s top story in the Wall Street Journal.

9. Customer Satisfaction Surveys. Any worker on the frontlines of corporations who engages directly with customers is forced to act overly polite and unnatural just so they can get top scores on customer satisfaction surveys. When a bad survey rolls in, that employee is blacklisted regardless of the demeanor of the customer during the transaction. Maybe that customer is in a bad mood and always completes surveys with a negative score? Everywhere we turn, we’re asked to go online and complete a survey about our customer service and you can win a shopping spree or iPad! Employees should not be scored on a customer satisfaction survey alone; employees should not get a 1 percent raise due to a permanent bad survey in his or her file. (I know someone at Allstate with this exact experience.)

10. What’s #10, dear readers? I’m getting agitated anew writing through these top nine. Add yours below and clear your head of gobbledygook.

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Archives for March 2012