Ian's Messy Desk

Office Depot Online has a number of business resources listed under the Business Tools section of their web-site.

How To Use Wikis For Business

Content management systems will always have their place in the publishing world, but they've never been the best tools for business collaboration. A simple open-source app called the wiki may soon rule the knowledge management roost.

From Michael Hyatt:

"Tom Peters has a nifty little slide show called 56 Ideas/Suggestions for Presentation Excellence. The content is great. The slides themselves are pretty weak. Ironically, he violates his own rules (e.g., “Only one point per slide”). Nevertheless, the content is great and well worth downloading."

Tom Peters on Presentation Excellence

“In my older years I have decided to ‘give away as much as I can’. My online library is filled with articles, columns, interviews and videos. As time passes, I will try to add lots more! If anything on this site is useful to you or someone you know, please feel free to download, duplicate, send and share with others as you wish. If you or someone you know benefits from this material, I will feel great!”

“Please feel free to send any of these resources to anyone in your corporation. Even better, please share with anyone in your favorite charity, church or nonprofit organization.”

“Some very nice people and companies are helping me provide these materials for you. They have been kind enough to make the donations that make this site possible. I like working with them. Along with being nice people, they have some great products. Any help that you can give them would be greatly appreciated.”

The last of the posts on customer service are up at business thoughts. Today it’s a two-part look from husband and wife Dave and Rosemary Rothacker. Rosemary posts Customer Service: Jim and Dave The Voluptuous Princess.

Incidentally, if you want to see the HVAC business “kicked up a notch” (or two), check out Dave’s Area 51 HVAC.

Yesterday I pointed to the Beatitudes of Customer Service posted at Business Thoughts. This was part two of a five-part series called Customer Service: How Can it Improve? Part one was Customer Service: How to Fix it? Part three was posted today, and is an excerpt from the book “Managing with Aloha” by Rosa Say. Make sure to check back tomorrow and Friday for parts four and five.

Update: Part four is here.

Tags: customer service

Brendon Connelly has posted some useful thoughts on customer service over at Business Thoughts. Using the Beatitudes as a lens through which to view the customer and oneself. This exercise is not merely to improve the transaction, but to develop a deeper understanding of people.

The heaviest element known to science was recently discovered by physicists at Yale's Research Center. The element, tentatively named administratium, has no protons or electrons and thus has an atomic number of 0. However, it does have one neutron, 125 assistant neutrons 75 vice- neutrons and 11 assistant vice-neutrons. This gives it an atomic mass of 312. These 312 particles are held together in a nucleus by a force that involves the continuous exchange of meson-like particles called morons.

Since it has no electrons, administratium is inert. However, it can be detected chemically as it impedes every reaction it comes in contact with. According to the discoverers, a minute amount of administratium caused a reaction to take over four days to complete, when it would normally occur in less than one second.

Administratium has a normal life of approximately three years, at which time it does not actually decay but, instead, undergoes a reorganization in which assistant neutrons, vice-neutrons and assistant vice-neutrons exchange places. Studies have shown that the atomic weight usually increases after each reorganization.

Research at other laboratories indicates that administratium occurs naturally in the atmosphere. It tends to concentrate at certain points such as government agencies, large corporations, universities and hospitals and can actually be found in the newest, best maintained buildings.

Scientists point out that administratium is known to be toxic at any level of concentration and can easily destroy any productive reactions where it is allowed to accumulate. Attempts are being made to determine how administratium can be controlled to prevent irreversible damage, but results to date are not promising.