He LOVES riding!
I firmly believe that one of the most important jobs of a parent is to help their child discover what their gifts are. The following is a video of My son Wyatt (only 4 years old) finding one of his gifts I believe.
The video is a bit long, I edited it for Wyatt, but check it out, I was amazed at his ability. This is only his 3rd time on the bike WOW!!
Clearly we will be doing more of this.
I am a very proud Dad : )
I am having some work done on my old 240Z a car I restored about a decade ago virtually everything on this car has been rebuilt or replaced With one exception the carbs. The reason that the carbs were not done is that they are dual side draft twin SU carbs, it takes a combination of artist/heart surgeon to set them up properly and almost no mechanic wants to take on the job of rebuilding them. They are simply a complex pain in the ass!
So my 240 starts running very rough and as everything else is new or rebuilt it comes down to the carbs. The first quote on the carb rebuild is $1500, that is a fair chunk of $$ for a car that when brand new sold for only slightly more that and being rebuilt by a mechanic that has not done one in years. So I do an bit of home work and find
This company only does carbs like these on obscure old sports cars and does an exceptional job! (for about 1/2 the money!)
What I love about this business is that they have carved out a niche…a valuable niche, they know exactly who their avatar is and they provide a solution that frankly is cheap!! Particularly is you have ever had an incompetent mechanic “set up” the carbs. In general you pay 3 hours for them to be set up and then 4 hours for them to be fixed by someone who knows. The bill usually about $700, the same amount as they charge for new carbs and a guarantee that it will take no longer than an hour or so to set the carbs up properly!!
It is a great example of knowing your market, delivering great value and I for one cannot wait to get the new carbs installed and the car running like it did when it left the factory.
I will keep you posted.
Hey all my new site is coming along well and my restoration of my 1963 Porsche 356 Cabriolet is coming along nicely as well.
Slow but sure, my hope is to have it back home this winter for final assembly. I think it will be close.
Here is the latest picture.
If you want to see where we started check out this link.
http://gallery.me.com/jfiset/100069
I will keep you posted.
Jay
Here is VERSION 2.0 of the 10 Commandments for Entrepreneurs. Please note it is a work in progress. I am open to any and all suggestions.
Next week I will start fleshing out each of the commandments and will keep you all posted.
If you want to keep up to date with the writing be sure to click the RSS feed on my main page.
Here are some of the suggestions that I received for the final Commandment for my book thank you to all who shared their opinions!
Linda Bidulka The very 1st thing that came straight out of my gut on this was :: Thou shall be a leader of ” Freedom of Choice” to all.
April Martin-Tranter Thou shalt always feel free to ask for and ACCEPT support
Jackie Dumaine Thou shall shut the hell up and just freekin’ GO FOR IT??
karen holmes Thou shall do what you say your going to do…when you say you will do it. customers appreciate integrity!
Manon Mitchell Related to Karen’s: Thou shalt live in integrity now and forever … amen!
Amy Lafleche #10 – Though shall dream BIG!!
The FIRST draft of the 10 Commandments of Entrepreneurship
1) Thou shall create value
2) Thou shall be sustainable in all endeavours
3) Thou shall build to scale
4) Thou shall become addicted to education
5) Thou shall release your limiting beliefs
6) Thou shall give, you will become a new breed of Philanthropreneur
7) Thou shall not create false economies
8) Thou shall create more than you consume
9) Thou shall focus exclusively on that which only YOU can do
10) What do you think it should be???
The SECOND draft
I have been thinking that the second commandment actually encompasses my first draft commandments 7 and 8. It is the same theme just stated differently.
1) Thou shall dream big and be crazy enough to go for it!
2) Thou shall create value
3) Thou shall ask for and accept support
4) Thou shall focus exclusively on that which only YOU can do
5) Thou shall be sustainable in all endeavours
Thou shall not create false economies
Thou shall create more than you consume
6) Thou shall build to scale
7) Thou shall become addicted to education
8) Thou shall discover and release your limiting beliefs
9) Thou shall give, you will become a new breed of Philanthropreneur
10) Thou shall create freedom for self, family, community and the world
I hope that all of you have a great Easter with your family and friends.
This is from the blog at Crowdspring and is a GREAT summary of one of my favourite books about business “The Goal†by Ellyahu Goldratt. Visit http://www.crowdspring.com
In his book “The Goal,†Eliyahu Goldratt tells the story of a Boy Scout troop out for a hike. The goal of the hike is to cover 10 miles in 5 hours, in other words to keep the troop moving at an average speed of 2 miles per hour. As the troop works its way up the trail, gaps begin to appear between the scouts, and the slower hikers find that periodically they must go double-time to shrink the gaps. The scout leader observes how the gaps between the kids are magnified the further down the line he looks, and it becomes clear that the fluctuations in each individual hiker’s pace are impacting those behind. As the hike proceeds, the process gets less efficient, because the hikers must expend more energy to close the gaps, and by the time the group reaches the half way mark, they have fallen behind by almost 2 hours.
One scout, Herbie, is the slowest of the hikers and so his speed governs that of the entire group. Putting Herbie at the end of the line does nothing to speed the group’s overall progress, but instead further limits the group’s speed by effectively reducing the pace for everyone. It is only after the scout leader comes to a key realization, that he finds the way to improve the overall speed of the troop. The insight? If the efficiency of an entire process is governed by it’s most inefficient operation (Herbie), then, to reduce the fluctuations (along with the extra “energy†expended), change the order of operations by putting that one before the others. Next, improve that least efficient operation (Herbie) to increase the overall speed of the entire process.
So what does the scout leader do with this new realization? First he moves Herbie to the front of the pack. This has the effect of removing much of the variation in each hiker’s speed (eliminating the gaps between the hikers) and with the fluctuation reduced, the hikers don’t have to struggle so much to “catch up†when they fall behind, nor must they expend as much energy as they perform their individual roles. Next, the troop leader decides that he needs to find a way to help Herbie speed up, and by doing that, speed up the entire hike. How? He asks Herbie for his backpack, empties it and divides all of the heavy equipment between the other (faster and stronger) hikers. By lightening his load the scout leader has given Herbie the ability to walk faster. The result? Herbie is still the slowest hiker, but he is faster than he was before and so then is the rest of the troop. Bingo!
Goldratt’s metaphor is applicable to small business of all kinds, whether a restaurant trying to serve more customers faster; a factory trying to improve productivity and reduce inventory; or a web design/development firm trying to improve overall efficiency and increase capacity. Here are some specific thoughts:
1. Find the bottleneck. I wrote about this a few months ago and suggested some simple ways a business could identify bottlenecks in their own process. In the case of a factory, this could be represented by the work station where inventory tends to back up and analyzing its capacity. In any case, identifying this problem is the first step in improving the process overall.
2. Determine throughput. This is the speed at which a process performs, and is effectively governed by the bottleneck or the slowest operation (as illustrated so nicely by Herbie). There are a number of simple formulas that can help to determine this; in the case of a restaurant could it be one of the kitchen positions, that keeps the others waiting? Perhaps the fry cook doesn’t have a large enough surface to work on and can not push the orders through fast enough to keep up.
3. Explore changing the order of operations. Where does the bottleneck occur in the process? Can changing this improve the overall speed or efficiency? What if the fry cook did her work before the others and limited the wait time each of the kitchen stations experienced? Answering this question can go a long way towards improving overall efficiency.
4. Lighten “Herbie’s†load. Can the bottleneck be relieved through simplification or (in the case of an individual) by reducing responsibilities? If the speed of this operation can be improved, the overall speed of the entire process can, too. In the case of the web development firm this could be represented by a tricky part of the process or by an individual employee with too large a workload. Look at different ways to divide the work among the team, or even consider increasing or adjusting capacity with new hires.
5. Bring the entire team into the process. The scout troop agreed to have Herbie take the lead, understanding that they would all benefit from the change. It is critical to have buy-in when making changes to a process and much can be learned by everyone involved.
