??Fast Company??: “The Man Who Said No to Wal-Mart”:http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/102/open_snapper.html?partner=rss. Snapper chooses to continue doing business with excellence, but not by selling out their brand and everything they stand for to Wal-Mart.
Indeed, the productivity of every factory worker is measured “every hour, every day, every month, every year,” says Snapper president Shane Sumners, who walks the 10.5-acre factory floor with comfort and familiarity. “And everybody’s performance is posted, publicly, every day for everyone to see.” It’s a lot like Wal-Mart–which measures the number of items every checkout clerk scans every hour. Some of Snapper’s dramatic productivity improvements, in fact, seem to come almost directly from the Wal-Mart playbook. These days, the Snapper factory operates in Wal-Mart time. It must, because it operates in Wal-Mart’s ecosystem.
??Rands??: “Subtlety, Subterfuge, and Silence”:http://www.randsinrepose.com/archives/2006/01/23/subtlety_subterfuge_and_silence.html
Herein lies the hard part of subterfuge. Depending on where you are standing, my plan could be viewed in any number of ways. The other engineering director would have called it, “Disobeying a direct order” whereas my boss, who got wind of the effort two days in, called it “a skunk works project” and told us to proceed. Phew.
??37signals??: “You still want meetings. Here’s how to make them useful.”:http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/you_still_want_meetings_heres_how_to_make_them_useful.php
Though meetings are harmful, you sometimes need to get together and work a problem out. Here are some tips to make sure nobody wastes their time.
And, in case you hadn’t seen it yet: “Apple’s Intel ad”:http://www.apple.com/intel/ads/. Love it.
New content from Ken Walker coming soon, promise.
