Russ: This is the BusinessMakers Show heard hear and seen online at theBusinessMakers.com. This is that show about capitalism, free enterprise, about entrepreneurship.
John: And those three items you just mentioned are what distinguishes us I think from the rest of the pack.
Russ: You bet.
John: Most of the other shows out there that say they're business are really financial advice shows.
Russ: That's right.
John: We're the ones and the only ones as far as I know who consistently talk about what makes companies grow, what makes them grow and what makes the economy so important to these people.
Russ: You bet. Consistently and exclusively.
John: That's right.
Russ: And here's our lineup for today. First up, Ravi Kathuria, author of Coherent Strategy and Execution. Then that's gonna be followed by a BusinessMakers Flashback where we roll back just a couple of weeks ago when we had a special guest on the BusinessMakers Small Business Network Show. J.D. Gershbein of Owlish Communications. J.D. specializes in branding consulting using LinkedIn, but first. That's right. It's time for the BusinessMakers School of Business and this is our specially selected curriculum that is not business as usual school.
John: It's not business as usual as far as any school I've ever been around. Course I never went to a business school. I graduated in journalism. I did have a business minor, but I gotta tell ya', the school that I went to didn't even come close in curriculum, in real world, ground level, boots on the ground type information and knowledge that we impart on our unsuspecting public.
Russ: There ya' go. Alright. We kick off the School of Business each day with a quote of the day.
John: Quote of the day.
Russ: And I'm gonna continue down the path that I started last week with P.J. O'Rourke's new book called Don't Vote; It just Encourages the Bastards.
John: That's right.
Russ: And this is one of his quotes in there. He's trying to shake the United States into understanding the tremendous demand for energy across the world and how we can't solve it with just solar collectors and windmills.
John: Right.
Russ: And here's the quote. "There are 1.3 billion people in China and they all want a Buick."
John: That's right.
Russ: It's true, too.
John: That's right. It is growing and it is a concern and you're not gonna be able to solve it with wind turbines.
Russ: No; that's true.
John: No. Okay.
Russ: Alright. That brings us to This Week in Business History. So what happened during this January week in business history, John?
John: Okay. This week in business history in 1880 the first U.S. sewage disposal system separate from storm drains is started in Memphis, Tennessee. Now before that it was all in one which is why you had so much disease.
Russ: Sure; yeah.
John: And rampant dysentery and things like that because they all got collected together and it just was a mess.
Russ: Yes, it was.
John: The first time they actually separated them and -
Russ: So that was a huge step forward.
John: Because before that it all went into the rivers.
Russ: There ya' go.
John: And people would drink out of the rivers and they didn't have water purification abilities or anything. So anyway. Big step. Very big step.
Russ: You bet.
John: This week in business history in 1883 the first electric lighting system employing overhead wires was built by Thomas Edison as part of an experiment to demonstrate the entire community could be lit by electricity.
Russ: Wow.
John: Now I guess that's just as important as the sewage thing.
Russ: Yeah. Then we got lighted towns and cities and safe sewage all in the same lesson not too far apart in history.
John: Yeah; it's too bad he invented the incandescent light bulb, which is considered as a pariah among environmentalists -
Russ: We're not gonna be able to use them beyond what is it? 2012 or something like that?
John: I know.
Russ: And I love incandescent. I like the kind of light they give out. Gees.
John: I know. The LEDs fortunately though look like they're gonna be overtaking this curly-Q neon lights -
Russ: Yes.
John: There's some saving grace in all this.
Russ: There ya' go. Alright.
John: This week in business history in 1899 the birth of Al Capone. You talk about an entrepreneur.
Russ: Yes.
John: I mean, a very competitive entrepreneur.
Russ: Very competitive.
John: And had a very I'd say unique way of handling any competition that came his way.
Russ: You didn't wanna compete against him did ya'?
John: But what I think some people don't realize when he was at his height of power in Chicago he was in his late 20s.
Russ: Wow.
John: I mean this is a young man.
Russ: Yeah.
John: Okay. Now he died of syphilis way later I think. It was probably in like the late 40s or something, but for awhile there he was the toast of the town. No two ways about that.
Russ: There ya' go.
John: This week in business history that same day in 1899 the birth of Nevil Schut, a London novelist who wrote this book called On the Beach, which is kinda' these end of the world novels due to a nuclear holocaust and it was made into a movie and a very best selling apocalyptic book which really helped spur on I think the anti-war anti-nuc movement.
Russ: Probably did. Yeah; it was a required reading in my high school.
John: I know. It was a good movie as I recall.
Russ: Yeah.
John: This week in business history in 1903 a new bicycle race called the Tour de France. Ya' ever heard of that?
Russ: Yes, I have.
John: Okay. The idea for the race came from a journalist, a 26-year old cyclist and he and his editors and I have these names here, but I can't pronounce them.
Russ: It's okay.
John: But they discussed it while they were having lunch one day and later on they ran into some guy that had this idea for steroids and the whole -
Russ: Put the thing together. And what an event it's turned out to be.
John: That's right. Man, people really high on this event. This week in business history in 1915 the neon tube sign is patented by George Claude.
Russ: Goodness gracious.
John: Now neon tubes. You think these neon lights are great for the environment. Well wait till you break one of them, folks, 'cause there's gas in there that'll kill ya'.
Russ: Yeah; there is.
John: It'll kill ya' I tell ya'. It'll kill ya'. Alright. This week in business history in 1922 the geological survey says the U.S. oil supply would be depleted in 20 years. Now that's just one of a long line of doom and gloom -
Russ: Right.
John: -- inaccurate predictions that have been going on in this country and I see no end to it because I've talked to some people who really know things about oil who says the earth is replenishing the oil supply. I mean the earth didn't stop making oil a billion years ago. It keeps making it.
Russ: Plus we've got all this shale oil and gas now a days. My goodness. There are huge supplies there. Thank goodness, too, because there's 1.3 billion Chinese that want a Buick.
John: I know.
Russ: Alright.
John: I know. It's a scary thought. This week in business history in 1939 Hitler proclaims to the German Parliament to exterminate all European Jews.
Russ: Goodness.
John: Now this thing is the persecution against the Jewish people in Nazi Germany, it didn't happen overnight. It was an incremental slow drip, drip, drip of denying these people their rights until finally in 1939 -
Russ: On this date; yeah.
John: And people were allowing it to happen in such a way that there was no push back.
Russ: Wow.
John: And then it came -
Russ: So _________ says we're just gonna have to exterminate.
John: Yeah; Hitler in 1939 there was nothing left to do but exterminate them because they took everything else away from them.
Russ: Right.
John: Okay. This week in business history in 1943 the birth date of Janis Joplin. What a singer. What a voice.
Russ: So she would be 67 -
John: What a drug habit either 'cause that's what killed her unfortunately.
Russ: Absolutely.
John: This week in business history in 1953 the birth date of Paul Allen, classic American entrepreneur, the co-founder of Microsoft.
Russ: Right.
John: This week in business history in 1968 the Houston Cougars defeat the UCLA Bruins 71 to 69 to win the game of the century. They played that game in the Astrodome which is still standing.
Russ: Right.
John: Nothing in it. Place is going to hell in a handbag, but back then it was the show palace of pro sports and college sports -
Russ: A lot of history and particularly that game because that was one of the first games to be played in a huge -
John: That's right.
Russ: 60,000 plus seat stadium.
John: That's right and the Cougars had Alvin Hayes and the Bruins had Lew Alcindor, later become Karim Abdul-Jabbar. If you were a UCLA Bruins fan you could point to the fact that Alcindor had his eye. He had a bandage over his one eye or had something wrong with -
Russ: But he had another eye.
John: He had another eye, but of course you need a little depth perception to play basketball. So he was injured throughout the whole game.
Russ: Yes, he was.
John: This week in business history in 1971 Roe v. Wade. U.S. Supreme Court legalizes some abortions.
Russ: Mm-hmm.
John: This week in business history in 1985 Born in the USA by Bruce Springsteen peaked at number nine.
Russ: Mm-hmm.
John: Now when that song first came out everybody thought it would be a patriotic type song, but really it's pretty negative.
Russ: Yes, it is.
John: Course he's happy he's born in the USA because he's a multimillionaire if not a billionaire so -
Russ: Yeah; it worked out well for him.
John: So what the hell does he got to complain about.
Russ: Right.
John: That's the trouble. A lot of these singers, especially these rap singers, they're all angry all the time and these guys are making millions. So you can't buy happiness.
Russ: That you can't.
John: Okay. This week in business history in 1991 Eastern Airlines goes out of business after 62 years. I like this. Citing financial problems. Why else would you go out of business?
Russ: Just tired. We were tired of work -
John: I think I'm sick of flying ya' know -
Russ: We shut it down.
John: That's right. If they just would have thought about charging for luggage.
Russ: That's right. They would have been doing well.
John: That's right. Yeah. This week in business history in 1991 Operation Desert Storm begins and the U.S. led allies were fighting Iraq. Iraq had invaded Kuwait.
Russ: Right.
John: And the battle, the majority of the battle, except maybe for some air strikes or something like that were actually fought in Kuwait and not Iraq.
Russ: It was really a clean, fast victory.
John: That's right, but the problem was we could have completed the whole thing, but General Colin Powell along with George Bush the first decided not to invade Iraq. So there was an armistice declared, which really didn't do any good 'cause we ended up invading that country almost 10-15 years later.
Russ: Right.
John: This week in business history in 1992 IBM announces nearly a $5 billion loss in the year of 1991.
Russ: Yeah; that was the beginning of the end of the old big blue. Things changed after that. I was no longer with IBM, but it was so obvious that their commitment to full employment was just crippling them.
John: I know.
Russ: So they brought in an outsider CEO who turned the company around. They're doing great these days.
John: But that just proves you can't be all things to all people. IBM had that mindset. Why would you wanna buy anything else from anybody other than what we're producing.
Russ: And it also proves you probably don't need anti-trust laws because eventually everybody that's big and successful kinda' starts falling apart at the seams.
John: Yeah; or some little guy comes in with a better idea and then we end up interviewing him on the show.
Russ: Absolutely. Alright. That wraps up this morning's history lesson. Okay. Good job as usual.
John: Thank you. Alright.
Russ: Alright. And that brings us to the jargon challenge round.
John: Ah yes.
Russ: This is our -
John: Contest.
Russ: Our vocabulary lesson where I get to go out and select a brand new word -
John: Oh yeah. I've got the chills.
Russ: It might be so new that I've just made it up or -
John: Just made it up.
Russ: Or it might be out there on the street and the way we present it is that John, the word is kept away from him. I spring it on him and he is challenged to try to come up with the meaning and if he does he wins and if he doesn't he loses.
John: Alright. Okay.
Russ: Alright. Are you ready?
John: Yeah.
Russ: This morning's word is civilog.
John: Civilog.
Russ: Yeah.
John: Ya' know that sounds like - you ever see these spy movies?
Russ: Yeah.
John: It all starts with an innocent thing like what we're doing. Really that word civilog is a key to a big government secret. I can see it. Like Three Days of the Condor and the government comes in here and kills us all.
Russ: Is that your guess?
John: Yeah.
Russ: You're wrong. Civilog -
John: That's not a secret word?
Russ: No.
John: We're not gonna -
Russ: No.
John: No one's gonna come storming in here.
Russ: No.
John: Bursting in here with machine gun fire.
Russ: No. In fact, it's kind of a sort of a common discussion these days. It stands for a civil dialogue. Particularly one in which the participants avoid insults, personal attacks and negative generalizations.
John: Well then what fun is it?
Russ: Well it's not. It doesn't say anything -
John: Civilog.
Russ: -- about being fun. It's a civilog. It's not being -
John: That's the most idiotic word you've ever come up with you numb skull -
Russ: What are you talking about? We don't believe in civilogs here on the BusinessMakers Show.
John: You knucklehead. Can't you come in here with a better word than that? Wait. Who are those people with the machine guns?
Russ: Alright. And that brings us to dumb moments. Do you have a dumb moment?
John: Alright. Yeah; there's a county called Prince George's County. It's in suburban Washington. It's actually east of the D.C., the District of Columbia.
Russ: Okay.
John: And like many other counties and governmental entities, they're facing a big shortfall. In Prince George's County it's $77 million, but unlike a lot of county governments, the county council is actually gonna spend some time trying to figure out how to get out of this hole.
Russ: Well that's good.
John: Okay. And they're gonna do some planning. So they decide to go to this swanky hotel on the eastern shore and spend about $10-15,000.00 for a 2 night retreat to solve the $77 million shortfall.
Russ: You can have a big, expensive retreat.
John: Yeah; expensive retreat.
Russ: To just brainstorm and come up with a solution.
John: That's right. Yes. So that's -
Russ: That qualifies.
John: Your tax dollars at work. Those of you listening to the show live in the Washington, D.C. area, ya' know, take heed.
Russ: There ya' go. Alright. And before we wrap up this morning's School of Business, it's time for the very popular PKF Texas Entrepreneur's Playbook.
John: That's right and the ever popular Greg Price who's always on time, always looking fit as a fiddle and rarin' to go.
Russ: On the piano. A one and a two and a.
John: A one and a two and a.
[PKF Entrepreneur's Playbook]
Russ: Alright. And that wraps up this morning's School of Business. Stay tuned in for Ravi Kathuria, the author of Coherent Strategies and Execution. Then that's gonna be followed by a BusinessMakers Flashback with J.D. Gershbein of Owlish Communications. You're listening to the BusinessMakers Show heard here and online at theBusinessMakers.com.
