The McDowell Memo

As my consistent readers know I have been not keeping up with my blogs well this past 2-3 months. It has been a very trying and stressful school semester and personally I had started to lose my ability to stay positive. Well I am back and I am going to cover a bunch of things here and hope you can hang on. Remember please comment and comment often. What is up with all this talk of racial differences being the cause of loss of life . I guess I must be old school stupid but I don't get the race part of it. First you have a young punk that strong arms a store and when confronted jumps the officer in the car. What difference is his color ( the suspect or the officer). It's a punk being arrested. If the officer went overboard judge it on the merits not the racial "issue". Then we have Cops in NYC trying to arrest someone for selling a single cigarette. Was the cigarette black? The cops were mixed from what I saw and what difference would it make if the defendant is white...

Where do you begin building a successful company? It is most times with the first and every hiring you do after that. Why is it so important to hire the right person? First , you are trusting your success, life, reputation, and finances to this person. They can not only impact you but every other employee and your family and their families. A bad hire can haunt you in several ways and we will discuss all of those and how to handle that later this month. A good hire can make your life easier , save you time, make you money and just make the world a better place. What goes into hiring a great person? You need a large pool of candidates with the appropriate education and experience You need a legally appropriate interviewing process and application You need a team of interviewers that stick to the process but ask the right questions and get the right answers You need a decision maker for each hire that will look at that person as a reflection of themselves You need a competitive wag...

Today's discussion is on the changes of asking the customer to do most of the work for customer service. http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/3750381507001/customer-service-morphing-into-customer-self-service/?intcmp=obnetwork#sp=show-clips\ Willis Report Fox Business The above news clip talks about how we are being forced to use these new self service call lines, etc. I have seen this in retail with self checkouts cropping up everywhere. What do you all think? Please comment below.

Every organization is set up in some style of hierarchy to allow for communication and decision making. In a small organization it is usually a very well defined organization that everyone knows who is in charge of what and who is the decision maker. But , as organizations grow in size this can be blurred and so a different type of management organization maybe needed. We will break them down as best we can below and help you to see the positive and negative sides of each. Vertical Organization with straight line decision making- this is an organization that the bottom level employee reports to one manager , that manager will along with several other manager report to one manager, this continues until the CEO level with each person only have to report to one person above them. This manager makes all decisions in relation to the level below employee. Advantage is that you know who you report to and you know who made the decision you are impacted by. Disadvantages are if your manager...

Today we will finish up our introduction to various types of business ownerships. Corporations - these are the main stay of business as most of us have seen it portrayed in news and other media. A corporation is strictly a business that has filed to be able to sell shares or portions of it's company in order to raise funds, or to get tax advantages, etc. They are incorporated in a specific state, this is because certain states are where the business is located or because the state has advantages for the business(many are filed in Delaware) . A corporation can be closely held or publicly held. If it is closely or privately held all the stock is owned by one person or a family. If it is publicly held the shares are owned by may different citizens. This is usually the case with most corps. listed on the stock markets. Corporations must file quarterly tax and other statements with the state and federal governments and are regulated by numerous restrictions Advantage is that you can ...

McDowell Memo:    Today we are going to discuss a breaking incident in the press. As you have seen Ferguson Missouri has had racial type riots and looting most of the weekend, I want you to think about what you would do if you were the regional or divisional manager of a company such as Family Dollar that has been attacked and partially looted or an adjoining national company to this location. Do you send in security and try to guard your property? If so should they be armed? Do you just write off what happens and claim the loss? Do you remove as much merchandise as possible, secure the building as well as possible?  Lets look at the message each sends to the community. First sending in security personnel does two things, it shows that you do not trust the local patronage to do the right thing. Plus it puts your employees at risk and should one be hurt could you justify the injury with any amount of merchandise.  Next, let's think about whether armed guards woul...

What  is your opinion on this type of strike . It is somewhat unique in that it is in support of a displaced CEO. It also is unique in that it is being driven by the workers themselves not so much the union movement. Do we have a way to let workers have input into our hiring and firing decisions for your company? I would suggest that most do not. Should we?  Looking forward to some interesting responses on this one.  Huge protests to save 'It's a Wonderful Life' grocery boss: Workers revolt and leave shelves empty in attempt to save job of beloved CEO who 'put people before profits' A workers' revolt at the Market Basket supermarket chain has led to empty shelves, angry customers and support for a boycott Workers want return of former CEO Arthur T. Demoulas, whom they credit with keeping prices low, treating them well and guiding the company's success It's been called a David vs. Goliath story, a 'Tale of Two Arthurs' and eve...