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Change is unsettling. We grow comfortable with things the way they are. When they shift an inch, we feel the movement as if it were a mile. Regular listeners will have noticed changes in the podcast this week. The intro, the tone, the focus. That's a lot to take in. If you've listened to the podcast already, we hope you understand why we've tinkered with the formula. If you haven't yet. Here's a quick overview. While we know Paul will return, we don't know when. All we know is that it will be a while yet. When he does, you'll hear three voices host the podcast – Jane is staying on. With that in mind, it was appropriate to change the intro to include the three of us. The second change is that we are weaning ourselves off Chris Brogan . He was our genesis, our original inspiration, and won't be forgotten, but there are other great thought leaders in business to look at as well. Besides, who can speak in detail better about what Chris Brogan is thinking – u...

There are Kevins, and there are O’Sheas.   But there is only one Kevin O’Shea.   At least there is only one that we know of.   I mean the odds are good that there is someone else that has both the name “Kevin” and the name “O’Shea”, but that guy (or rather unfortunate girl) would never be the Kevin O’Shea that Kevin O’Shea is.    This week, we all Kevin to the O’Shea beat. Established in 1984 following the mergers of Steven and Cathy O’Shea, Kevin O’Shea has been one of San Francisco’s leading manufactures of mirth, laughter, hilarity and all around good times! Kevin has been commonly described as clever, absurd, awkward but in a funny way and too smart for his own good. He has been seen on the Independent Film Chanel and ComedyCentral.com. He is a favorite of comedy festivals such as: The SF Sketch Fest and the Bridgetown Comedy Festival. Go see him now as his 4 th quarter productivity has never been higher! And more KEVIN! Kevin Camia will join us this week...

One of the best things you can do in business is release your grip over your customers and clients – invite them to leave you. This is a healthy move for both sides. For you, it brings a dose of reality. The grip you have on your customers is never as strong as you think it is. Your customers always have alternatives, even if nobody else does what you do or builds what you build. Your client can simply decide to do without your unique product or service. That's a choice too. By inviting people to break the bond with you, you'll remove the weaker links in your client base – the people who weren't that into you to begin with, or who have started to feel less excited by you. What remains is a core of dedicated customers. In this week's episode, Roger  and  Jane  look at an email in which  Chris Brogan  invites everyone on his mailing list to unsubscribe. During the podcast, Roger does – only to find that the sky didn't collapse in on him. You can listen to this wee...

My parents do not know the idea of passive income, but they save whatever they can and deposit the extra money into a fixed deposit account.  They do not know other options then. The good old days when I was young, the banks have high interest rates on fixed deposit accounts.  The interest rate was closed to 10% per annum then. My parent's FD account matured on early November and they used the interest for the children's school books and clothing for the new year.  The interest collected was like bonus for our family. The bank did not have FD auto-renewal then, and they didn't care if you did not come to the bank to collect interest and renew your FD account.  If you come late to renew your FD, the bank will just stop your FD and will not pay you interest for the lapsed days.  Due to work and other commitment over the years, the mature date for the FD account slowly moved from early November to mid-November. Later the bank implemented au...

Alex Koll.  Original Business Man.  Air Guitar Demigod. General All Around Incredible Human Being. San Francisco has been lucky to have him, but it's time to let the Koll Diamond shine somewhere new.  New York!  He's moving to the Big Apple, but not before The Business sends him off in style. Joining us for the big Bon Voyage will be Sam Tallent.  Out all the way from Denver, Sam has been described as 'the Black Flag of comedy' and a zine in Denmark said 'Sam is the surreal voice of an earnestly silly generation'. Reggie Watts, TJ Miller, Kyle Kinane, Sean Patton and other quality gigglesmiths have worked with Sam and not complained to management. We are also pleased to announce the return of Bobby Joe Ebola and the Children MacNuggits!  Difficult to categorize, awkward on a flyer, and impossible to forget, the “pretty songs about terrible things” of Bobby Joe Ebola have become the soundtrack of the “Great Recession” & civilization’s “Slow Apocalypse”. ...

Kentucky Fried Chicken is owned, by a company with a distinctively “uncorporate” name – Yum! Brands, complete with the exclamation mark.   This blogger is a vegetarian and therefore has not really sampled its wares. But I am reliably told that its fried chicken, is fairly delicious.   But these days, alas, KFC is not sounding very yummy. The problem is in China. KFC is everywhere in China. I mean everywhere. Sometimes I wonder if the icon of Americanism in China is not McDonald’s or Coca Cola, but KFC. Every street corner seems to have one.   The Chinese were happily munching or chewing or licking, or whatever you do with fried chicken. All that changed in December of last year. CCTV, that great bastion of broadcasting   and China’s answer to Doordarshan,   aired a program that claimed that local suppliers to KFC had given its chicken excessive amounts of antibiotics.   CCTV is more renowned for informing the world that Xi Jinping had a good nig...

Joseph Ratzinger has resigned. Joseph who ? you may ask. And what's in a resignation - after all somebody is resigning from something all the time.  Ah well; its not just anybody. It's Pope Benedict who resigned about a week ago. Popes rarely resign - its one of the few "jobs" for life. The last Pope to resign was Pope Gregory in 1415 to end the Western Schism - a complete mess when there were two competing claimants as Pope.   Pope Benedict stated that he was getting on in years (he is 85 after all) and that the leader of a billion catholics around the world needed "strength of body and mind".  While he cited the lack of strength of his body, I dare say his real reason was the strength of the mind.   It has been a period of great tumult for the Catholic Church. It was during his papacy that the child molestation scandals in Europe and America burst into the open. Leaked papers from the Pope's butler showed the Vatican in very poor light - messy politic...

How easy do you make it for people to buy from you? Do people even know that they can buy from you? And do they know what they can buy from you?   In this week's episode, Roger  and  Jane Boyd  look at idea's  Chris Brogan  has about "touchpoints of opportunity" – places where the customer can interact with you or your business. He uses the metaphor of the sidewalk, the storefront and the back room. Roger and Jane end up talking about the Soup Nazi and AJ Leon . You can listen to this week's podcast using the player at the top of the post or download it directly here: Business Jazz – 16th February, 2013 . We're also in iTunes . We'd love it if you subscribed or left some feedback. If you'd like to hear an audio version of the email we're discussing this week, you can listen to it on his blog . See Chris Brogan's Sidewalk 
If you'd like to see Chris's sidewalk, and learn about humanizing your business in general, why not subscribe to C...

This week, The Business welcomes guests from sorta near and pretty far! Visiting us from the capital city of our glorious state are two golden boys. John Ross was born to be a comedian. In that he was born addicted to drugs. Geez John, way to be born with a silver spoon… IN YOUR PARENTS' HANDS (I know, that was a little strong. I just wanted to prepare you for the subject matter of the evening’s event, which may include junkie parents, spoons and needles. Coincidentally, John Ross played bass for both Junkie Parents and Spoons and Needles). Nick Aragon has the funny bone of the Fellowship of the Ring in his DNA. The comedy is strong with this one. He really beams up the funny. I’m just gonna keep mixing nerdy metaphors until the hate mail really starts flowing). And all the way from London, we are always happy to have the stellar Scott Capurro on the bill. Described by San Francisco Weekly (free press, edited by lesbians and designed by trannies with large hands and hidden ag...

I am in trouble because my KRA with CDSL consequent to having submitted some change of KYC, is apparently pending, which I have no recollection of. Therefore I am stuck with my DP who is quoting arcane SEBI rules to make my life miserable.   If you don't understand one word of all this, welcome to the club. I don't understand it either ! And I am supposed to know something of finance !!   This perfectly sums up the status of how consumer unfriendly the financial sector in India has become. Try doing anything - opening a bank account, or buying a mutual fund  or even changing your address. You will tear your hair in frustration. Such is the state of affairs.   This is all because Ramamritham and his political masters have , over the last five years, exclusively been framing rules for catching Kasab.  The starting assumption is that everybody is a Kasab unless they prove otherwise. Rules and procedures have become so complex that an honest simple  m...

Have you heard of this really powerful sales tool? Don't sell. At least, don't sell until the buyer is ready – until you have earned the right to sell. Getting to that point takes time. Too often, we jump straight in. Particularly when we are trying to sell ourselves. Instead of getting permission to talk about ourselves, we just do it. There are better ways.   In this week's episode, Roger is joined by Jane Boyd again to talk about ways in which to introduce yourself to prospective clients in a way that won't bring down the shutters on you. They try to answer questions raised by Chris Brogan in a recent email newsletter, and give suggestions about how to introduce yourself gently to new people. You can listen to this week's podcast using the player at the top of the post or download it directly here: Business Jazz – 10th February, 2013 . We're also in iTunes . We'd love it if you subscribed or left some feedback. If you'd like to hear an audio versio...

The best time of year is here once more! Christmas? Heck no, we drank our way right through though the holidays (Bucky was drowning in Cherry Coke Zero). Summer time? Nope, too sticky. Also, The Business has core competencies, not competent cores, so bikini season is right out for us. Valentine’s Day? Gross. Who are you, anyway? Ug. It’s Sketchfest time! The best time of all! When comics from all over the country come to San Francisco for three weeks full of incredible shows!! The Business is very happy to be a part of this annual cavalcade of comedy once more, and we have some of our favorite guests on for the FESTivities. Chris Knutson is joining us, he is the winner of ACME's Funniest Person in the Twin Cities award in  2010. Plus Joe Tobin, a comedian, writer and Flyers fan based in our own back yard! We are also happy to have SF star turned LA sensation, Drennon Davis. From his elaborate characters and sketches, to his provocative songs and ani...

There is something about the world of business that dehumanises relationships. The other is seen usually as a competitor to be trampled, or a boss to be hated, or a subordinate to be kicked or a peer to be beaten. We often gripe at everybody and anybody around the water cooler/coffee machine/whatever. Office parties are largely gossip sessions where everybody trashes everybody.   I met her not so very long ago. She is a confident, consummate professional, very competent in her job. She is poised, articulate, easy to work with and with a ready smile. So it was easy to picture the typical upwardly mobile, confident business executive and deal with her exactly in that manner.   Quite by accident, I came to know of the tragedies she had been, and is, going  through.  Tragedies you would not wish on your worst enemy. But you could never ever guess from any of the professional interactions. She is, as I said, poised, articulate, easy to work with. But now that I know,...

Being neighbourly isn't a concept taught at many business schools – or at least, we don't think so. But if your intention is to generate business through your online activities, it is a very important one. Helping others is a great way to build your community. It establishes and deepens relationships. And once the relationship is in place, business will follow – often in very surprising ways. Paul is unavailable for the next couple of weeks, so in this episode Roger is joined by Jane Boyd to discuss an email by Chris Brogan in which he looks at how to be neighbourly online. You can listen to this week's podcast using the player at the top of the post or download it directly here: Business Jazz – 2nd February, 2013 . We're also in iTunes . We'd love it if you subscribed or left some feedback. If you'd like to hear an audio version of the email we're discussing this week, you can listen to it on his blog . Be Chris Brogan's Neighbour 
If you'd like...