Steve Jobs stepped down as CEO of Apple yesterday. The evening news, blogs, news sites, and radio were all struggling in some way to make sense of the change happening at Apple. For many, it was a time of reflection on Steve's illustrious, amazing and yet disruptive career. He was one of the key players in launching the PC era at the beginning of his time with Apple. He built one of the world's most successful movie production studios with Pixar. And he returned to Apple culminating with launching the post-PC era before he resigned as CEO. An amazing story by all accounts. Now, it's no secret that I've been a big supporter of Apple for more than a decade. Ask anyone around BuildDirect and they will emphatically agree with that statement. Some people may think I’m even a bit crazy. But that’s how great brands and great companies affect people. They turn customers, business associates, family, friends and anyone else they come into contact with into passionate evangelists. In fact, … [Read more...]
The Business of Politics
While I am reluctant to post political views on my blog, I've found the provincial leadership race for the New Democratic Party of BC Liberal Party to be quite fascinating this year. It is very rare that a party, in this case the Liberals, get's to select the next premier. Because of Gordon Campbell's resignation, members of the BC Liberal caucus get to vote in the next premier. Let me start by saying that I am a big proponent of a healthy economy first which drives government revenues which allow more spending on healthcare, education, infrastructure and social programs. I also believe that there are strengths and weaknesses of each party. I always believe that government can do better but, much like a number of managers in the NHL, a large number of politicians realize that their careers may be short lived and therefor ram through changes that result in a quick win to help get re-elected but are detrimental to the long term benefits of the people. From a very high level perspective, … [Read more...]
Alignment and Execution
At BuildDirect, there are many things we do that are strategically right. Our culture pervades the atmosphere here in our office not only making it one of the top, most sought after places to work but making it a place you "love" to work. The team is built of "A" players actively helping the company capture market share in one of the worst markets in the past hundred years. Our culture and values, our goals, in fact, the essence of who we are as a company has never been more aligned than now. Alignment is important because execution matters. Some things you choose to execute on will fail. That's a fact of life. Taking bold action and executing with precision is better than not taking action at all. However, taking action with poor execution can lead to the same or worse results as doing nothing. I was reflecting today on an article in the New Yorker written by Jose Antonio Vargas about Facebook. In the article, Chris Cox, Facebook’s vice-president of product, said “Getting … [Read more...]
How TV Will Change the World
More so than in any other time over the last 4 decades of my life have I seen technology moving at such a rapid pace. As head of our amazing IT team at BuildDirect, I get to sample and test some great cutting-edge technology. This technology is generally related to our ecommerce site, our supply chain and distribution technology, our order fulfillment systems, VoIP, mobile devices and applications, sales/marketing/finance advancements or improvements, and many more areas. With so many new and exciting things being developed and implemented, it's often easy to get lost in such a diverse and rapidly changing technological landscape. Part of my job is to ensure our executive team also remains up-to-date with the latest and greatest technology. To that extent, I try to provide them with tools that not only make them familiar with new technology but the technology needs to seamlessly integrate with their work flow and productivity. In many ways it often changes their work flow directly. More … [Read more...]
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