Archive for May 14th, 2008

Jen’s back at work, so that means the cellar is getting re-stocked for the return of Wine Wednesdays.

Last night Jen was telling me a story about a tasting they had at work earlier in the week. Jen’s company reps Gabbiano. It’s a winery from Italy with a great heritage, and an absolutely horrible label.

And that’s the problem. The wine inside is perfectly brilliant, but in this world where few of us are wine connoisseurs, but all of us are wine lovers - we have to judge the juice by it’s bottle. Gabbiano’s Pinot Grigio is an excellent selection for this smokin hot weekend we’ve got coming up. Floral, crisp and just right for the heat while the kids run through the sprinkler. It’s just $10.99 at the liquor store, but when placed up against Voga, another Italian Pinot Grigio that’s $4 more expensive, it’s getting killed at the till.

Do a blind tasting and you’ll probably pick Gabbiano. Voga isn’t bad, it’s just the Gabbiano is better. However, we don’t do our buying by taking a blind taste test. We taste with our eyes before we taste with our tongue, and just one look at the Voga bottle will have you whipping out $15 faster than you can say “Hey, it looks a lot like the Voss water bottle, doesn’t it?”

So if you’re rocking the bbq this weekend, or just chilling in the backyard and watching the petals fall off the tulips, pick up the Gabbiano, and decant it in an empty Voss bottle. Your friends won’t know the difference.

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Sometimes the best perspective doesn’t come from the most qualified candidate, it can come from someone who is actually very under qualified.

It’s happened in hockey a lot.

Wayne Gretzky is the greatest hockey player in the history of the game, but when he was hired as Coach of the Phoenix Coyotes, he had never stood behind a bench or run a practice in his life. Sure, he had been to lots of practices, and he had sat on lots of benches in front of coaches, so he understood the job, but he had no experience doing the job.

Same for Garth Snow. One day he was the 3rd string goalie for the New York Islanders, the next day he was the General Manager because the owner “”knew what he could do.” Garth had no managerial experience, but by all accounts, has done a bang up job since getting the gig.

More recently the Vancouver Canucks ownership set out to search for an experienced hockey man to be General Manager of their team. Instead of hiring any of the available and experienced GMs currently out of work, the team went the other way and hired someone from across the table - an agent. Mike Gillis had never been a GM before, but like Gretzky, he had seen how others did the job and he was involved in assessing talent from his own side of the business.

Sometimes hiring someone with no direct experience for your job opening gives you a chance to bring in fresh perspectives and ideas to your work place. If the Coyotes had hired an experienced coach, or the Islanders or Canucks an experienced GM, they would simply be re-trying tactics that, in the past, had gotten the person fired. It would be simply recycling old ideas in a new workplace.

Doing things the way they’ve always been done, or accepted to be done in an industry is not always acceptable.

When you’re trying to rebuild or reimagine a business often you’re told to “think outside the box,” perhaps hiring outside that box goes right along with it.

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DONATED: $2 330
GOAL: $10 000
REMAINING: $7 670

A couple cheques just landed in my lap and immediately went in to the Team Diabetes donation jar.

The big one is for a voice session I did for Western Financial, the smaller one is for the Links for a Cause in my sidebar courtesy of TextLinkAds. Next month I’ll be getting a cheque for my Google AdSense that I run with each post.

I’ve committed to Freelancing for Charity as I get ready for the Easter Island Marathon in June 09 with Team Diabetes. I need to get to $10 000 and these latest cheques will nearly double the fund raising efforts.

If you have need for an emcee, spokesperson, voice talent or anything along those lines, I’d appreciate you hiring me. I will do the work for you in exchange for a donation of the usual fees to my Team Diabetes jar. You get a professional product AND a tax receipt, I get closer to my goal.

This week, now that Z has started daycare, I’ve had some time to start running again. I’ve been lazy. I’m only running about 3k and huffing and puffing the whole way - a far cry from the 42k I will do in a year.

Team Diabetes sets out fundraising benchmarks to hit as you get ready for a marathon. My first one is for $2500 in October, I’m well on my way to making that milestone!

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