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When looking at ways to improve businesses, managers have resorted to many methodologies over the years. People around long enough remember Total Quality, Just In Time, Manufacturing Resource Planning and their modern counterparts: Six Sigma, Lean and Enterprise Resource Planning. While we have heard of the companies that have benefited greatly from these efforts, it’s more common to hear about firms implementing them with disappointing results. Why would these powerful techniques work for some but not others Read More

Most people don’t know Marcel Lacroix’s name, but anybody who watched our Canadian Speed Skating team at the Olympics saw him coaching our athletes. My kids are at the Olympic Oval in Calgary this week in a speed skating camp. He is giving talks to the kids about what it takes to get to the elite level of the sport. As I listened to his talk, I drew a lot of parallels to business and the challenges our clients face in getting to the top of their industries Read More

Franchises are attractive to the first time business owner. They are sort of like one of those home theatres in a box. The business owner doesn’t have to pick individual components and make sure they work together. The franchisor has already determined all of that. The franchisee has to take the training, follow the instructions and the business should operate successfully Read More

He's not your usual rocker! He's highly-educated, hosts TV and radio shows. And...he's a fully licensed airline pilot.

When the band tours, it is he to whom the band turns to as pilot. Enjoy the video Read More

Two weeks ago, my car was flooded in a flash rainstorm. It’s a 1998 Honda Accord with 280,000 km on it and I bought it new. That car is by far the best I ever owned and I was pretty sad to see it go. It was as inexpensive and reliable as it gets. Here’s my experience so far Read More

I’ve had an iPad for over a month now and I thought it would be helpful to relay my experience with it so that other business people can judge whether it would be useful in their workday. I tend to be an early adopter of technology and all things Apple, so I ordered the 64GB 3G version of the iPad as soon as it became available in Canada Read More

In his best-selling book, Moneyball, Michael Lewis got to the bottom of how Beane got his Oakland Athletics to not only hold their own, but to beat teams with vastly higher budgets. There are many lessons applicable to business and success in general from this book Read More

If you’re thinking of starting your own business, you might be doing some research online. Whether it’s in blogs like this one, forums or question and answer sites, they will all tell you to write a business plan. Unfortunately, that doesn’t do you much good if you don’t know what a business plan is. The definition of the term “business plan” might vary depending on who you ask. What I’ll try to do in this post is define the term business plan as we see it Read More

This post discusses an assortment of banking services that fall into a category loosely labeled “Cash Management”. These services are lessor known banking services that make it easier to make and receive payments. Read More

Equipment loans are used for financing a wide variety of equipment such as agricultural equipment, construction equipment, and even equipment working in a factory. This post will discuss equipment loans that fall outside of the Canadian Agricultural Loans Act (CALA) Read More