The Dead Company Club

The Company is Gone But We Live On.

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Have You Found Your Silver Lining?

February 4th, 2010 · Coping, Losing a job

Actual silver liningYes, there is a silver lining.

So your company closed. When this happened to me, I felt despondent, betrayed, victimized and generally worthless, angry and shattered.

Yet, I had to admit there was a silver lining. I didn’t want to acknowledge it because I wanted to be mad, but it was there. Maybe not one that gave me my economic stability and self-confidence back, but still…

Let’s face it. Have you ever been at work and:

  • Wore out your watch by staring at it?
  • Spiked your anxiety-ridden manager’s coffee with Valium?
  • Kept your fingers crossed that the moron wouldn’t speak up and drag the meeting out purposelessly for another hour?
  • Worried that the job would outlive you?

It’s a bummer to lose your job and your company with no chance of being hired back. But it gives you the opportunity that lets you get a new start, find new opportunities, even explore new careers. Admit it. There’s a silver lining there.

Have you found your silver lining yet?

Laurie Phillips is an expert at working for companies that vanish. She is the President of Sundance Research and no longer worries about the job outliving her.

Muchas gracias to flikr.com/tanakawho for the photo.

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The New Global Currency?

January 30th, 2010 · Series, Solutions

Carbon Credits Same as Cash!

its the eC0nomy, stupid

“Law firm accepts carbon credits as fees”

EcoSeed reports:

“Law firm clients may now pay legal fees with carbon credits under a scheme launched by a Miami, Florida-based law firm.

The Cueto Law Group has started the first initiative of its kind in the professional services industry, allowing clients to pay up to 20 percent of their legal fees with carbon credits.

Carbon credits represent permits to emit climate-warming greenhouse gases. One carbon credit unit is commonly equal to one ton of carbon dioxide emissions.

Under the law firm’s program called “CO Too,” its clients can pay with carbon credits which the company can then trade in the international carbon markets.”

Carbon Credits for/by Dummies

After I let that short, innocuous announcement soak in, a few things became obvious.

Observation #1: I can now buy and sell permission to pollute. This seems ludicrous, but it leads me to…

Observation #2: I have the right to pollute if I have carbon credits. It’s no longer something I shouldn’t do (but do anyway).

Observation #3: It’s going to be a seller’s market. Companies that can’t reduce their pollution further and stay profitable will need a good supply of carbon credits no matter what the price.

Observation #4: Carbon credits can be exchanged for currency if you have access to a marketplace for carbon credits.  This law firm isn’t taking lower fees: they’re just receiving part of their payment through a financial market that few know exists.

Observation #5: He who holds the most carbon credits wins. Power and wealth will belong to the credit holders for as long as companies pollute. Which countries and companies have a minimal carbon footprint right now? They have an invisible asset.

Opportunity or just more hot air?

Is this a big new opportunity or just a teaser? If you’re dusting yourself off from a company collapse, you’d be silly to ignore a developing market. For that matter, the economy is certainly encouraging us to get creative about finding and making new jobs. Is there something here?

Santiago Cueto poses the question, “Are Carbon Credits the New Global Currency?” I ask: Is this an economic opportunity, an environmental disaster or the emperor’s new clothes?

Want more? Here are the abbreviated, summarized, abridged “Cliffs Notes” to global business trends as identified by Laurie Phillips, who hates pollution, whether physical or digital.

photo courtesy of flikr.com/net_efekt

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Manufacturing Your New Job

January 30th, 2010 · Finding a job, Series, Solutions

U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Alton Jefferson and Sgts. Ronald Williams and Jeremy Squires, all from Bravo Company, 173rd Special Troops Battalion, conduct final checks on a Shadow Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) on Forward Operating Base Fenty in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, March 17, 2008, prior to its launch. A UAV is used to track enemy activity. (U.S. Army photo by Staff Sgt. Tyffani L. Davis) (www.army.mil)

Manufacturing experts wanted

5th in a series about What Matters Now

Looking for a job in manufacturing or design?  Hold up. Make sure you understand the stampeding herd that is threatening the industry.  But first, let’s talk about your hobbies.

Break time

Let’s say you love planes and want to resume flying lessons as soon as you have a secure paycheck. In the meantime, you kill time online with other airplane nuts and post some design questions for a remote-control plane.

The engineer types and experienced fliers give you plenty of advice on your design, send you links to inexpensive electronics and tweet a rousing brainstorm to come up with new things you can do with your plane. They also tell you where you can get a prototype made, dirt cheap.

The job market still stinks and you’re getting tired of spending all day at the screen, so you order the prototype and add the electronics when it arrives from China a week later. You take it out to the dusty field nearby and let it loose. With the camera and GPS onboard, your little drone flies over the countryside taking snapshots and filming the flight while you control your recon mission with your iPhone. Fun, huh? Who needs Northrop Grumman?

Back to work

OK, back to that manufacturing job. Here are a few facts you need to know:

1. You no longer need a big employer to do design and manufacturing. Collaborative design, open-source components and micro-manufacturing put control in your hands, if you want it.

2. That big company becomes more vulnerable every day as barriers to entry keep falling, and they can’t staunch the tide. Do your homework before you sign on.

More about that UAV

Chris Andersen, Editor in Chief of Wired Magazine, is a firm believer that the web is transforming manufacturing. He should know. He founded DIY Drones and has been spreading the message about DIY manufacturing. Here’s a short video about his experiment building drones and interacting with the U.S. Government – unintentionally – as a result.

The longer video of the entire presentation by Chris is fascinating. It includes the tale of his tangle with the U.S. Government at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and a gleeful story about how he busted Google. Great stuff and well worth the 20+ minutes to watch.

If you want to catch up on the trends affecting the working world and society, read the eBook, What Matters Now. It might just be the smartest thing you can do for yourself this year as a survivor of corporate destruction.

Laurie Phillips is a snow-bound freelance writer with cabin fever.

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Are You Sure You Understand “Global”?

January 20th, 2010 · Motivation, Series, Solutions

global business in the 21st century








 

“Globalization is forcing companies to think in new ways.”                                            — Bill Gates

“No duh, but how?”                    — Apprehensive Businessperson

 

What Matters Now: Global Business in the 21st Century

4th in a series

Does the phrase “global business” bring to mind using off-shore contractors? Having an office in a shiny, new, nosebleed-high building in Singapore? Scheduling conference calls at odd hours to accommodate far-away time zones? If so, you are stuck in the last century.

Americans are way behind in understanding global dynamics. Why should you care? Because these trends are changing how businesses start up, staff and compete. The nature of work is changing. The workforce is changing. Barriers to entry are collapsing. Your next job will unquestionably be affected, even if your new employer isn′t willing to admit it yet.

Why are we still so naive? It′s not just because you had a job that didn′t give you the time – or the need – to learn about all this stuff. In the eBook, “What Matters Now,” Alisa Miller says:

“Too often American commercial news is myopic and inwardly focused.

This leads to a severe lack of global news. And increasingly, a shortage of “enterprise journalism” – journalistic depth built over time through original sources – that provides the context and enables thoughtful response.” (emphasis mine)

She continues:

“It’s difficult to understand the world if you haven’t heard much about it. But we also know many Americans want to know more.”


The solution

So what should you do? Get informed. Plug into world news and follow these topics:

  1. Capitalism in developing countries: Margins are going to fall and keep falling as the balance of consumers shifts from high- to low-income markets. Ignore this and you′ll be working for another dead company.

  2. Micro-factories and DIY design: Today you can place an order on the web for a prototype and an industry-agnostic micro-factory in China can build it in 24 hours. Barriers to entry in manufacturing are going “poof.” One person with an idea and a computer can now do what used to require a ton of capital and lots of industrial square footage.

  3. Educating the poor. Efforts such as Room to Read are teaching the world’s poor to read. There are almost three quarters of a billion of them and when the newly educated start working, they won′t know anything about the “old way” of doing things. They′re going to question everything. Ignorance is going to foster innovation.

  4. Cultural prejudices: Exclusion – by race, culture or gender – is breaking down. Work force demographics are changing and employers will become more accommodating.

As Hugh MacLeod wrote, “The world is changing.” Maybe this should be on the back of everyone′s business card.

Alisa Miller and Hugh MacLeod are contributors to the new eBook, What Matters Now. Alisa is the President and CEO of Public Radio International and blogs at Global Matters Post. Hugh blogs at Gaping Void and is the author of Ignore Everybody.

This is the fourth article in a series about global trends and how they are affecting business. The source of wisdom for these posts comes from the eBook, What Matters Now. Previous posts include “Important Trends You Missed While You Were Employed“, “What Matters Now: Advertise by giving it away” and “What Matters Now: Be fearless“.

Laurie Phillips is the editor of The Dead Company Club blog. She is also the passionate founder of the No Businessperson Left Behind campaign.

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What Matters Now: Be fearless

January 8th, 2010 · Coping, Finding a job, Motivation, Series, Solutions

stuntrider


“What Matters Now” is what matters

Second of a series

I want to be fearless. Apparently I’m not the only one. In the new eBook, “What Matters Now,” there are plenty of mini-essays that talk about stepping out of your comfort zone and taking a new direction. And what better time to consider it than when you’ve been involuntarily canned?

In a short article appropriately titled, “Fear,” Anne Jackson writes:

“We’re often impressed by those who appear to be fearless. The people who fly to the moon. Chase tornadoes. Enter dangerous war zones. Skydive. Speak in front of thousands of people.”

I bet you’re also impressed by people who start a business that becomes successful, ferret out an unbelievable new job with a whopping promotion or ditch their former career in favor of something they’ve always wanted to do.

Do you ever think, “I could do it too,” but your Inner Censor wakes up and kicks your dreams down the sewer?

Maybe you’re short on savings or have no household income. Or you don’t have expert qualifications. Maybe you’re highly qualified but still feel the sting of your company’s collapse and are afraid to go for it. The Censor says, “Be mature! You can’t risk spending money to go to that conference/take that class/buy that company in this economy,” or “You have too much to learn, you’ll never catch up.” It may just echo, “Oh, grow up!” The Censor always ends with, “Take the safe road.”

Stop right here. Reread Anne’s quote. Those people who fly to the moon, skydive or capture a immense following are just like you. Except they didn’t take the safe road. They were afraid. They knew they were taking a substantial risk, maybe even putting their lives on the line. They chose to walk through their fear.

Could our heros have ignored their passion and done something safer? Absolutely. Would they have been satisfied? Perhaps. But here’s what I’ve found: If you have a dream and ignore it – even for good reasons – it will haunt you. It will be that little voice that nags, “Is this what I really want to do?” with every job opportunity. That dream will demand attention, and you will spend a lot of energy suppressing it.

Anne ends her essay with this:

“Until Fear is gone, (and realize he may never completely leave) make the decision to be courageous. The world needs your story in order to be complete.”

You can swallow hard and become fearless. You can also decide to be afraid. What’s your choice today?


Laurie Phillips is a freelance writer and motorcyclist. She has done the motorcycle stunt above by accident while pursuing one of her passions. It was worth it.

Photo courtesy of flicker.com/pdbreen

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