I think that Billy Joel is one of the greatest songwriters in modern American pop music. Joel stands along with Stevie Wonder, James Taylor, Carole King, Jackson Brown, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Smokey Robinson, and Bruce Springsteen. Of course your list may vary. My favorite Billy Joel song? Summer Highland Falls, from his Turnstiles album ...
Recently all of these storied brands have come under protest and scrutiny for being offensive: Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben’s, Mrs. Butterworth’s, Eskimo Pie, Barbie, GI Joe, the Washington Redskins, the Cleveland Indians, the Atlanta Braves. How about all of those Disney movies you grew up with? Jungle Book, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Or ...
Back in 1996 I was browsing the shelves of a bookstore (remember them?) when I happened across Caleb Carr’s novel The Alienist. I was already a big fan of historical fiction, especially concerning the Victorian age, and the book became an instant favor of mine. My memory of it was so strong that when I ...
What is an interrobang? Go ahead, I’ll give you a minute to rummage around in the dusty, musty recesses of your brain. Need a clue? Here’s what it’s not… An interrobang is not a new military interrogation technique. It’s not the definition of the whole process of an explosion. And it’s most definitely not a ...
We’ve all heard the old saying, “If you build a better mousetrap the world will build a path to your door.” Trouble is, that’s not true. If you build a better mousetrap, the world WON’T beat a path to your door. You will just wind up with a bunch of dead mice. The history of ...
Berry Gordy Jr., founder of Motown Records, was a notoriously mercurial and mercenary businessman. Although Gordy was responsible for some of the most powerful, popular, and passionate R&B and soul music ever created, the stories of him making musical decisions based on finances instead of aesthetics are legion. What’s more, Gordy insisted on ironclad creative ...
Don’t Race What You Can’t Replace. When I was in my early 30s, I was finally able to buy my first Porsche Carrera. Before you think I’m showing off, it was a used 911 and the culmination of a lifelong obsession I inherited from my father. And before you think it was a mid-life crises, ...
It’s time to be honest with yourself. You know all the things you’ve been meaning to do but just didn’t have the time? Organize your closets maybe, weed the garden or write that book you’ve always been meaning to write? Here’s a newsflash – if you haven’t started these things during the three months of ...
Joni Mitchell summed up today’s zeitgeist in her 1970’s release, “Big Yellow Taxi.” “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone?” 25 years later when she was being interviewed by journalist Robert Hilburn, Mitchell explained it this way: “I wrote ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ on my first trip ...
The Serenity Prayer and The Coronavirus. American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr composed his famous Serenity Prayer in 1923. Throughout the 1930s and 40s the prayer spread throughout church groups and was adapted by Alcoholics Anonymous and other 12-step programs without attribution to the original author. According to Wikipedia, Niebuhr used it in a 1943 sermon in ...
Surprises From The MasterMind About ten years ago I heard about a MasterMind that was being created for what I’m calling the “superstar speakers.” It was put together by the top seven or eight money-makers in my industry. I wanted into that club. Badly. Or so I thought. So I signed up for the three-day ...
My father was an innovative and very successful real estate developer. The Miami Herald called my dad “The Father of Florida Condominiums.” That was because he built the first residential condo in the United States – and the first office condo in the world. As a kid growing up on Miami Beach, I used to ...
When my kids were little and we’d go on road trips, sooner or later the whining would begin. “Are we there yet?” “I’m hungry.” “She touched me.” “I have to go to the bathroom.” No matter what I tried, I couldn’t get them to stop. Until one day we hit on an alternative solution. Instead ...
My friend Cathy Berkowitz ran a risk-management consulting firm. She and her business partner would tour factories and recommend the steps needed to protect companies against potential calamities. Cathy soon discovered that the problem with her business concept wasn’t that her services weren’t needed, but that prevention is the most difficult thing to sell. Why? ...
Each of us is coping with our reactions to the Coronavirus Crisis in different ways. Our opinions and reactions are based on our own circumstances — how our health and businesses are faring, how much money we have in the bank, where we are sheltering-in-place and whom we are sheltering with, how our loved ones ...
Coronavirus and the Tyranny of Seamlessness. Ironically enough, one of the most important aspects to shooting good video is the audio. I’ve learned that viewers will put up with fuzzy shots or shaky images, but if the sound is bad or hard to hear, they’ll sign off almost immediately. Because of that, I’m always fretting ...
25 Things I’ve Discovered by Sheltering-In-Place I’ve discovered that practice does not make perfect. Proof: I’ve played so much guitar in the past six weeks that I’ve developed those little round calluses on the tips of my fingers. Playing doesn’t hurt anymore, but I haven’t gotten any better either. I’ve discovered how important motion is. ...
What Will Coronavirus Change? What Will Coronavirus Not Change? People who look ahead to let us know what’s going to happen call themselves futurists or prophets. The more cynical amongst us call them crystal ball gazers or witch doctors. After all, if fortune tellers are so good at their craft, why do they labor in ...
Don’t Watch That, Watch This. Marketing in the Days of Coronavirus. We think the movie Babe did it. Because when our daughter Ali was only eight-years old she announced that she wouldn’t eat anything if it meant killing animals. And at sixteen she became a committed vegan and upped the ante. Ali hasn’t violated her ...
Healing the Coronavirus’ Effect on Small Business 25 or so years ago, a prestigious design magazine held a competition; They asked famous graphic designers to create a poster about themselves. Needless to say, most of the winning responses were beautifully designed examples of the designers’ egos run amuck. All but one. My friend Michael Bierut’s ...
Love In The Time of Choler… Coronavirus One of the fun things I do when I’m up on stage is play the harmonica. I often open my talks by performing Minuet in G by Johann Sebastian Bach followed by a blues number written by Sonnyboy Williamson. Why? Because I want to show my audiences that ...
Business as Usual Will Now be Business as Unusual. How many times do you hear pundits and personalities talking about “when things get back to normal?” Seems like it’s the next thing people say after they list the crazy changes they’ve experienced during the Coronavirus crisis. In case no one’s told you yet, listen up: ...
Chances are you’ve seen these next couple paragraphs. In fact, I’ll bet you’ve seen comments just like these sent to you from your cable company, your bank, your credit card company, and maybe even one or two of the online services you subscribe to: “Our top priority is always the health, safety, and well-being of ...
People To Help You Cope With the Coronavirus Crises. The Coronavirus outbreak has given new meaning to the term, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” And thanks to Coronavirus we’re all dealing with the “new normal.” But pretty soon we’ll just call it “normal.” This new global pandemic affects all of us ...
Since the outbreak of Coronavirus we’ve all learned a bunch of new terms: Flattening the curve, COVID-19, silent transmission. Heck, truth is I’d never even heard the term Coronavirus until just a few months ago even though it’s been around since I was in high school. Of course, I’m not a medical professional so I ...
It was Winston Churchill who first said: “Never let a good crisis go to waste.” Churchill’s words are perfectly appropriate considering what’s going on today with the Coronavirus and Covid-19. This could very well be the crises he was talking about. According to The Harvard Business Review (HBR), “in studying the marketing successes and failures ...
