It’s No Mystery—the Best Way to Attract Customers is with a Mystery
We love a mystery. We’re told there is a bizarre creature in the woods, a treasure buried in the earth, something in the night sky that we can’t identify—and we yearn to discover what these things are. Here’s how three businesses used mystery to grow and get...
The Art and Magic of Mercury Mosaics
Today the works of Mercury Mosaics can be seen in thousands of homes and in big businesses such as Google, Disney, Starbucks and Whole Foods. But it wasn’t always this way. It all started in a studio apartment with a woman who had a purpose to prove to herself and...
Employee Coordination
Running a company is virtually like the inner working pieces of a good-sized machine. There are cogs, wheels and all sorts of things that spin, move or turn, while pistons crank up and down, with the simultaneous distribution of oil to keep the parts from grinding...
Creating a Paper Trail Supports Employee Discipline and Discharge
Firing an employee who does not expect it is often the impetus for that employee filing a discrimination lawsuit against his or her former employer. When the employee does not see it coming, he or she can think the termination is discriminatory. Clear and blunt...
Letting Experts Help You With Your Business
Very often entrepreneurs try to go it on their own—after all, the business was their idea and they have the know-how necessary to delivery their product or service. However, letting experts help you with areas where they have the necessary know-how can save you time,...
You Wouldn’t Drive Through A Red Light—Would You?
Chances are you stop at red lights, signal before turning and know when to yield. Motor vehicle laws are generally clear and specific and we all need to pass a test to get our drivers’ license. Before you hired your first employee, however, nobody tested you on the...
Letting Professionals Help You With Your Business
Very often entrepreneurs try to go it on their own—after all, the business was their idea and they have the know-how necessary to deliver their product or service. However, letting professionals help you with areas where they have the necessary know-how can save you...
Have You Hired the Right Person?
You’ve got a great product or service to sell. You’ve identified your target audience and are creating a market niche for yourself. But, you can’t do everything yourself, so you begin to hire employees to help you. Following that stage, many entrepreneurs find...
At-Will Employment
I recently mentioned to a colleague that I wished clients would call me before they fired the pregnant employee. No disrespect intended to pregnant ladies here (having been one myself—twice). However, one of my goals in life seems to be to get employers to understand...
Employee Limbo
“To have a boom, you have to keep your nose clean legally…” —L. Ron Hubbard1 _______________________ Mr. Hubbard defined a “cycle of action” in this way: “Control may be subdivided into three separate parts. These parts are: “START-CHANGE-and-STOP....
Create a Paper Trail
“To have a boom, you have to keep your nose clean legally…”1 —L. Ron Hubbard Firing an employee who does not expect it is often the impetus for that employee filing a discrimination lawsuit against his or her former employer. When the employee does not see it coming,...
Using Gender-Inclusive Language at the Workplace
“To have a boom, you have to keep your nose clean legally…”1 —L. Ron HubbardWe live and work in a diversely populated world. With no harm intended, people often inadvertently include sexist language in their writing and speech (i.e., language that tends to evoke a...
Using Conditions Formulas with Your Employees
If you are familiar with Mr. Hubbard’s management system, you know that he recognized that conditions in a business can be improved by applying certain specific and identified condition formulas. In an article entitled THE CONDITIONS, STATES OF OPERATION, he said:...
Hubbard Administrative Technology, Way Down Deep
I entered the business world in 1976 though a dark deep tunnel. The shaft was 2.5 miles deep. The tunnels were an interwoven tapestry that made up hundreds of miles. It was dark, very hot and extremely dangerous. The environment was designed to kill you and the...
Personnel Expertise
In my thirty years of experience as a management consultant, what is the biggest issue I have found with regard to hiring new staff? In speaking with hundreds of business professionals over the years, I've found they have no real tools for hiring and no real method of...
Training—The Path To Success
Over the last quarter of a century as the CEO of Sterling Management Systems, I have seen hundreds of thousands of people introduced to the Hubbard Administrative Technology. I’ve even proudly received an award from WISE International for my work over the decades....
Management by Statistics
Although I’ve delivered hundreds of management seminars through Sterling’s1 30+year history, I am always amazed that no matter what the theme of my seminar, I invariably end up answering questions about managing staff. Managing personnel can be, by far, the most...
How to Be the CEO in Your Small Business
Getting some small business owners to be CEOs is almost an impossible task. Why? Because often they are vital to production and operations. They are often in the back examining and working on the patients, fixing cars, or making surfboards. How would you supervise...
The Mind Of The Leader
After nearly 30 years as a management consultant, I have learned that to make any real difference to an organization you must start with the top person. You can deliver seminars and training to employees. You can work one-on-one with the senior executives. You can do...
Tips On Public Speaking
One of the most effective ways to “get the word out” about your service, profession, or product is through the use of public speaking. Public Speaking is a tool, and used appropriately may produce some very rewarding results. Many clients I work with that have done...
Employee Coordination — Making the “Machine” Work
Running a company is virtually like the inner working pieces of a good-sized machine. There are cogs, wheels and all sorts of things that spin, move or turn while pistons crank up and down. Simultaneously, the distribution of oil keeps the parts from grinding with...
Taking On New Employees
When hiring a new employee you will most likely encounter two things: 1) They take time to groove into the group, unknowingly causing confusion and added work for those who train them. 2) Without enough proper training and apprenticeship they either won't last or...
Organizing for Expansion
I’m now into my 4th decade as a Hubbard Management Consultant. Over the years I’ve analyzed over 1,000 businesses to pinpoint areas that could be improved organizationally. While there is a great deal of technology on how to do this, there are vital fundamentals to...
Staff Education In Business
My profession as a management consultant involves the education of business owners and their staff. Having been at this for 30 years, I wanted to pass on something I’ve learned along the way. When I was a young man, I had an opportunity to learn to play music with...
Another Type of Marketing
Do you work hard to make your company stand out from the competition? Over the years you’ve probably been given several tools on the subject of marketing, but let’s take a different look—some “DO NOT’s” of marketing that maybe you’ve overlooked. There are many ways to...
Your 24-Hour Sales Rep
After having designed and gotten online over 2,000 websites, including sites for Fortune 500 companies and federal government agencies, I’ve seen just about everything that can be done, both good and bad. And while the errors may be glaring to someone who knows all...
Wrong Solution? Maybe It’s the Wrong Problem!
So your sales have been dwindling and you’re on your third sales manager and a couple of new salespeople and no matter how much you have pleaded and pressured or scolded and threatened, sales continues its frightening trend and lackluster range. You’ve racked your...
Are You Getting Things Done In A Proper Sequence?
In the 30 plus years I have spent as a management consultant, using only the training I received as a young man in the Hubbard Management System, I have stepped into a wide variety of companies of all shapes and sizes and in all parts of the world. And I continue to...
Three Ways To Get It All Wrong
A multinational software company with headquarters outside the US had an office in Los Angeles to manage its US operations. The US operations had been insolvent for the vast majority of 8 years and the company had won barely any market share during this time. Its top...
The Power of Positioning
My first car was a ’53 Chevy which a friend of mine unceremoniously totaled on New Year’s Eve a couple of weeks after my 16th birthday. Not an auspicious start. The ’53 Chevy was followed by a ’54, which stood me in good stead until I took down a telephone pole with...
The Name Game
I was in mid-town Manhattan a couple of weeks ago. The place is so full of energy it almost lifts you off your feet. It’s a little frenetic for me as a steady diet, as I am of the Chromosomes California. But walking down 7th Avenue around Time Square is a sensory...
The One Hundred Billion Dollar Marketing Mistake
One hundred billion dollars is serious money. If you received $1,000 a day, seven days a week, how long would it take you to collect 1 billion dollars? The answer is 2,737 years. And that’s 1 billion. Add a couple of zeros for 100 billion. It’s a big number. So how is...
The 3 Seeds behind Apple’s Staggering Success
Apple Inc. almost collapsed in the early nineties. Steve Jobs returned to the company and grew it to stellar heights, from which it is still growing today. We explore how Apple has maintained its Affluence, and how you may do the same for your business. The goal of...