Sutter Communications

We’re wild about words!

Register for SCORE’s free biz seminars, meet lenders and yes, lunch!

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I don’t know of any business-oriented organization that offers such great quality content and advice for free better than SCORE does.

I’ve been a member of the Greater Rochester Chapter of SCORE for about two years and the level of expertise of our volunteers is amazing.  They are men and women with impressive careers with both big name companies and smaller enterprises.

The “Gear up to Grow Your Business” event on Wednesday, May 3, will put that business expertise on full display. Attendees can choose from two of four seminars to attend in the morning:

  • Growth Through Leaps and Bounds: Joint Venture, Merger, Acquisition

  • Business Protection and Continuity.

  • Be Prepared: The Changing Landscape of Government Regulations, Policies and Procedures.

  • Personality Profiles: It’s No Longer About You. It’s About the Person You’re Selling To. 

Descriptions of each session are here.

Then there will be lunch at which two local business people will be honored as “Client of the Year.”

In the afternoon, from 1:30 to 4 p.m. there will be a “bank matchmaker” event, which will give business owners and entrepreneurs the opportunity to meet one-on-one with local lenders — banks, Kiva, credit unions, etc.

And in case you missed the word “free” in the headline, this event is all free on May 3. It starts with registration, networking and continental breakfast from 8:15 a.m. to 9 a.m. The workshops start at 9. The event will be at Oak Hill Country Club, 145 Kilbourn Road, in Pittsford.

When you register here, you can let us know which workshops you want to attend. And you don’t need to attend the entire day. Our registration form allows for you to check off whether you plan to attend just some or all events.

I’ll be there helping with registration, and then attending two sessions so I, too, can keep learning. Questions? Let me know.

Jimmy Buffett’s philosophy works well in business

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“If we couldn’t laugh, we would all go insane” — Jimmy Buffett. Photo by Kent Russell.

I’m a big fan of Jimmy Buffett’s music. Some of his song lyrics speak to my soul and offer a philosophy that has helped me in the business world since I started listening to him when I moved to Bradenton, Florida, in 1997.

I was 28, knew no one, and in my first management job, as features editor of The Bradenton Herald. I felt a bit unsure of myself as I began to lead a staff of eight journalists, most of whom were older than me.

To get into the Florida mode (having moved from Chicagoland), I bought a few Jimmy Buffett cassette tapes. One of them had a song called “It’s my job,” written by Mac McAnally. I used to listen to this song as I drove to the newsroom each day, to get my head into the work mode.

In the middle of late last night I was sittin’ on a curb
I didn’t know what about, but I was feelin’ quite disturbed
A street sweeper came whistlin’ by, he was bouncin’ every step
It seemed strange how good he felt, so I asked him while he swept.

He said, “It’s my job to be cleaning up this mess
And that’s enough reason to go for me
It’s my job to be better than the rest
And that makes a day for me.”

What’s the business lesson? Whether you’re a street sweeper or an exec, strive to be the best.

After I heard one of Buffett’s more famous songs, “Changes in Attitudes, Changes in Latitudes,” I adopted one line as my personal philosophy. “If we couldn’t laugh, we would all go insane.” It served me well working for so many years in often stressful newsrooms.  I must have thought of that thousands of times over the years.

It’s those changes in latitudes,
changes in attitudes, nothing remains quite the same.
With all of our running and all of our cunning,
If we couldn’t laugh, we would all go insane.

What’s the business lesson? Laughter can offer great stress relief. In appropriate situations, keeping it light helps to keep the problem du jour in perspective.

Finally, lyrics from the Buffett and Matt Betton song “Breathe in, Breathe out, Move on,” written in response to Hurricane Katrina.

If a hurricane doesn’t leave you dead
It will make you strong
Don’t try to explain it just nod your head
Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On …

According to my watch the time is now
Past is dead and gone
Don’t try to shake it, just nod your head
Breathe In, Breathe Out, Move On.

What’s the business lesson? No matter how devastating the storm, it will make you stronger; don’t dwell too long on it, keep breathing and move on.

What song lyrics run through your mind in the course of a business day?

3 lessons for your business from the Wright Brothers

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This sculpture at Kill Devil Hill, N.C., commemorates the historic 1903 flight by the Wright Brothers.

We all know that the Wright Brothers are the forefathers of modern aviation, inventing and flying the first machine-powered airplane to carry a man.

In anticipation of visiting both the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and the Wright Brothers National Memorial at Kill Devil Hill, N.C., I recently finished reading (for the second time) The Wright Brothers by that expert storyteller David McCullough. I was struck by how much I learned about the entire Wright family that could be applied to modern business. Here are three lessons that stand out for me.

Be curious and read voraciously.

If Wilbur and Orville hadn’t both possessed a deep well of curiosity from a young age, they might never have built airplanes. According to McCullough, their father, Bishop Milton Wright, believed in the educational value of toys. Bishop Wright gave his young sons a tiny toy helicopter made of wood. Orville’s first-grade teacher recalled him playing with pieces of wood and telling her that he was making a machine that he and his brother would fly some day. Neither of the Wright Brothers went to college but that didn’t stop them from being voracious readers and observers. Remember there was no Internet back then. Wilbur spent hours watching birds fly to glean insights. On Decoration Day in 1899 he wrote to the Smithsonian Institution to ask them to mail to him in Dayton, Ohio, all the pamphlets on aviation it had published and a list of any books written in English on the subject.

Work hard to be financially independent.

The Wrights deliberately never sought investors in the early years as they developed and tested their various planes. Instead, they founded and ran a bicycle shop, where they built bicycles and sold them. This was in the late 1800s/early 1900s when bicycles became a popular mode of transportation. The profits from running the shop went into paying for the materials for their flying machines. Both men lived frugally, remained single, and lived at home with their father and sister. I’m not advocating that people shun marriage and having their own families, but there is something to be said for turning away from our materialistic yearnings in order to reach loftier goals.

Keep Sundays sacred.

The Wright Brothers’ father was a minister, so perhaps it’s not surprising that the brothers, no matter where they were (testing planes in North Carolina or France for instance), never worked on Sundays. For many of us, our work life has intruded onto our Sundays for years. I’m old enough to remember when most stores were closed on Sunday and our day evolved around Mass followed by family dinner. (Just like on the TV show Blue Bloods.) The compulsion to check and respond to emails, or spend hours on social media on Sundays has been a strong one for me. But in recent months, I’ve tried to deliberately tune all that out or at  least cut back. I find myself feeling much more relaxed as I focus on being present and slowing down my compulsion to cram too much into a Sunday.

There’s much more to be learned from McCullough’s book. It’s a fast, entertaining and inspiring read.

Let me know what you think of it.