Via the tidbits newsgroup an Aussie (amacbell) succinctly points out the problem with Telco pricing: I know of no other industry where you need to prepurchase on the basis of a best guestimate of the volume of units required for the month ahead. If you guess wrong and don’t use all the units you bought …
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Some good progress on the saga of the Berl report on Costs of Harmful Alcohol and Other Drug Use. Berl have posted a response to criticism, including a letter of apology from Treasury. They note that the request for tender stated “You shall complete a cost analysis using an accepted framework and deliver a report …
Continue reading “Fixing the Berl report – some progress made”
Drinks are on the house, but only when in the house Buy staff beer and wine for Friday afternoons – but don’t put credit cards down at bars Cash in staff carparks – give them 50% share of the savings and encourage them to walk, use public transport, cycle or motorcycle Get everyone using IM …
Continue reading “Tuesday Three: 3 ways to improve your business”
The Costs of Harmful Alcohol and Other Drug Use report commissioned by the Ministry of Health and ACC has been the subject of some controversy. It was written by five authors from Business and Economic Research Limited (BERL), and they got support from a range of people, including 9 people from ACC or Ministry of …
Spend like you spend, not like a corporate Stop buying refundable air fares – get the cheapest ones for 1/4 the price and throw them away when unused. It ends up being much cheaper Set your printers to print default black and white, double sided. Open up the internet – get rid of the expensive …
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I’ve been getting an increasing number of ideas over the transom over the last few weeks. It started before the radio interview last week, accelerated because of that, and tomorrow it seems I’m in the latest issue of Idealog. It’s really good to receive them, and I enjoy helping out and even starting some businesses. …
It’s the most commented article on The Economist right now, and it’s a fractious topic. Indian students have recently taken to the streets in protest against some of the worst ethnic-based attacks Australia has seen The violence sprang to public notice when two Indian men were attacked with screwdrivers in Melbourne last month. One was …
Continue reading “Better culture, better people, better economy”
<I pulled this post after posting as I wanted to expand it, but it was already commented on externally – so here it is again.> Get out there Use OpenOffice.org as the default office application. Give Microsoft Office only to those that really need extra bells, whistles and TLC. Meet your customers every day – …
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I’m just back from an entertaining interview with Kathryn Ryan on the Nine to Noon program. You can listen to it at Radio NZ: How Businesses Can Survive The Recession (and more) Links to some things we talked about: Social Innovation Camp NZ SICampNZ site Great article by Idealog Electricity microgeneration Refit educating New Zealanders …
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I’ll be on Kathryn Ryan’s Nine to Noon program on Radio NZ at about 9:20am Monday 22nd. There are a few potential topics to cover – including why NZ is a good place to be right now, what businesses can do to manage through the recession and the Social Innovation camp next steps. We’ll see …
Continue reading “5 Recent posts that I like – and a new page”
There are two jobs sites in NZ with critical mass – Seek and Trade Me Jobs. It’s a tough road to get to the top, and when Seek and Trade Me themselves have lost thousands of listings it’s even tougher to make things pay. During these recession days employers are realising that they don’t need …
The front pages of both Stuff and NZHerald today are a sad indictment of both media in NZ and of what readers want to read. Let’s look at them article by article – and to do so I’ve helpfully colour coded the homepages for each. I’ve sampled each page this morning above the fold on …
Harry Simperingham, Ben Kornfield and Tessa Smith – remember these names. They are the three New Zealanders that will be part of the new class of 2012 at Yale University in Spetember. That’s a fantastic achievement – so well done to all. I briefly met both Tessa and Ben at the Whiffenpoofs event in Auckland …
Continue reading “Congratulations to three new kiwi Yale students”
Know what everybody does Know how many staff, contractors, temps and so forth that you have. Count everyone in and out each day, divide them into logical groups, assign an owner to each group then use appropriate strategies to reduce. Each person that walks in the door needs to be there for a business reason. …
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While I was at Webstock I signed up online for the 23andme service – which takes a saliva sample, analyzes your DNA and tells you all about yourself. I got the results very rapidly, went into the system and determined that I don’t have too many dread diseases risks linked with my genotype. Then I …
Lance Wiggs 