In two weeks, Joe Biden will fulfil a lifetime ambition as he is inaugurated as the 46th president of the United States of America. This election has been historic for many reasons. Firstly, there was the long slog and blistering battle between more than a dozen candidates in the run up to and during the primaries. Secondly, this was a hotly contested election between Donald Trump fighting to retain incumbency, and a lifelong political operative, Joe Biden. Thirdly, this election was fought against the backdrop of a once in a generation global pandemic which fundamentally reshaped almost every facet of…

Abraham Lincoln was quoted as saying, “give me 6 hours to chop down a tree and I’ll spend the first 4 sharpening the axe”. So, if it’s good enough for honest Abe to spend a good chunk of time preparing, it’s good enough for you and me, too.

I’m not a terribly organized person, but I do have a few habits (or cheats) that help me overcome that — and one of those is planning. On a daily and weekly basis, this takes the form of planning each day (I use Michael Hyatt & Co. Full Focus Planner) by listing…

All the leading polls are indicating that Biden is going to win in November. But, as we’ve learned before (painfully so, for some) the polls aren’t always right. Aside from the fact that the polls aren’t always right there are, of course, statistical models that show Trump as the winner. I’m sure his campaign managers are paying close attention to those models.

Here’s the thing though, whilst Biden is ahead in the polls he’s at risk of spreading himself too thinly in the run up to the election. …

In February 2007 Netflix delivered it’s billionth DVD — that’s right, billion. This was a mere 7 years after they offered themselves for sale to Blockbuster for $50million. At this stage, Netflix and Blockbuster had their horns locked in a serious war to win in the DVD rental business. Blockbuster, bolstered with incumbency, a massive retail operation, and a history of understanding the market. Netflix was emboldened with newcomer status, serious marketing chops, and an impressive logistics operation.

It seemed like what would play out would be a race for market dominance. But, instead what happened was that Netflix began…

In the early months of this year many companies faced the prospect of going ‘remote first’ overnight. It wasn’t a choice — many were thrust into this world with no guardrails and no precedent to guide them. The optimists thought it might last a few weeks and sent staff home with a note of “we’re shutting the office for a little while”. Others were a bit more cautious and were issuing guidance to their staff that they were “following the science and would return when it was safe to do so”.

As a consequence of the pandemic some people, myself…

Are you noticing what I’m noticing over the last few weeks?

I’m not talking about the endless health-related news cycle, hot takes on working from home, or thoughts on whether or not we’re slipping into an economic meltdown — I’m talking about the hundreds of emails flooding inboxes about how every company is responding to the threat of the novel coronavirus.

Honestly, I think the only time the unsubscribe button gets the same levels of attention is around Black Friday.

I’ve received hundreds of emails over the past few days from all sorts of companies updating me on their response…

Global financial markets are facing extreme volatility — swinging plus or minus 10% over the course of a trading day. In times like this, it’s natural that you’ll be worried about how your business can weather the storm of uncertainty.

There are proactive steps that you can take to ensure that your working capital remains as high as possible. Considering these steps will be particularly important if you’ve been investing in growth a lot over the last number of years or your business is not yet profitable.

More proactive debtor management

Firstly, let’s look at how you are managing your debtors. Those who owe…

Here’s something that not many people will want to admit to…less competent people get ahead all the time. One of the best ways you can get ahead is simply being responsive.

I get it. Your inbox is crazy. Slack is blowing up. Asana is crammed with tasks that you need to and people asking for updates. Your Twitter DMs are out of control. Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, Snapchat, LinkedIn and on and on and on. It’s the same story everywhere. You have too many incoming communications.

Here’s the thing though, most people are in similar positions. They might not be all…