Brewed Fresh Daily

I got a great email yesterday from Tony. He subjected me to his 'sunday morning diatribe', for which I'm incredibly greatful. There's nothing better than starting off the week thinking about big things that we could accomplish in the Cleveland area! One interesting thing that I notice about his email is that it comes on the heels of my starting Al Ries book, "Focus: The Future of Your Company Depends on It". Here's how Tony puts it:

"My opinion is that we have a lot of work to do on the administration side. Not necessarily cutting down, but streamlining, merging, focusing. But that isn't our biggest job. As long as we lack a picture of how it all fits together to support a shared, coherent, energizing vision for our community, the creative energy that infuses growing regions will not emerge here. The mechanisms are there to steer the ship (and to bail it!), but those systems aren't much use unless we know where we want to sail." "What are we about here? What are we trying to create? Questions that even the most prosperous communities should continue to ask, and that communities like ours - ones at real inflection points in their histories - must answer."

I wholeheartedly agree! I don't think that anyone understands the 'shared, coherent, energizing vision'. I don't think too many people can articulate it. And we sure don't market it as such. One of the things that Ries does in his book is quote Peter Drucker. "A company must do two things, innovation and marketing". I don't think we're doing either.

One of the other question that Tony asked in his 'diatribe' was, "Where is the public debate on what we can create here in NEO?". I understand his frustration! I see it periodically at some of the events that I attend. One of the Jeffs from Giraffe said at the last one, "I getting sick of seeing the same 20 or so of these people at these events". l would challenge him and anyone else who attends these things to drag your friend next time! We've got to get other people involved. They're not going to get involved unless we invite them. For Cleveland's sake, we need to get everyone, tech people or not, to understand what's at stake and what we're trying to achieve.

And don't blame me for this monday morning rant, blame Tony, he started it! Good for you Tony!