Unique, Insightful and Useful Guide to Business and Civil Politics reveals human political strategies through the eyes of a primatologist studying a chimpanzee community. It lays bare most of the behavior people use “to get ahead” in business and politics by explaining the evolutionary underpinnings of these behaviors, so we can appreciate them at a new level.
Have you ever heard someone say, “I’m not political!”? S/He may mean well, but this book shows that one cannot be human without being “political”; moreover, it explains political behavior in hilarious, poignant ways that help the reader in multiple ways as I detail here. It is immensely entertaining to read while being scientific in its assertions.
[…]

[UPDATED] The Future of the Retail Store in the Omni-Channel Age is third in CSRA’s retail & omni-channel series, and it is especially relevant to Chief Digital Officers, who orchestrate profound organization change using digital technologies and processes. It also offers rare opportunity to high-stakes CMOs. Part1 of The Future of the Retail Store outlines several aspects of market disruption that are affecting retailers as a group, albeit by varying degrees. Part2 features examples of “reimagining retail” for mobile, banking, grocery, hardware and apparel “stores.”
As I read Jill Konrath’s excellent post on how to ask for “referrals” and mistakes that most salespeople make, it occurred to me that salespeople could do even better by breaking that model completely. Jill’s excellent point is that salespeople are uncomfortable with asking for referrals, so they cop out and do it badly by using a throwaway “Do you know anyone..” But I would tweak her suggested, “Whom should I meet” even further by focusing on client, not [salesperson’s] company.
Facebook Pages and Groups are rapidly becoming like websites or phone numbers—overwhelmingly banal. Last year, it was still novel for many companies and governments to launch Pages or Groups, but 2010-2011 is proving to be the inflection point: people merely expect Facebook presence because every organization has one. In step with this, the competition for Fans’ (now “Likes”) attention on Facebook is high and will continue to get higher. That said, as difficult as it is, launching and growing a powerful Facebook presence is eminently doable with the right strategy and execution. Here I will share some of my notes with a current engagement for how to grow a quality Fan base by building and leveraging a network around your presence. By the Way, Pages and Groups share similarities but they are distinct in their functionality. This post will focus mostly on Pages, but many of its techniques will work with Groups as well.