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Goal Achieved
tom - 23rd September 2011
We’ve just put in a fire bunker at home. It’s been on my goal list for two years. Finally I picked up the phone and made it happen. Why did it take me two years? I just never got around to making that phone call.
Why a fire bunker? We have bush on two sides of our property. We have experienced two bushfires over the 27 years we have lived here. (more…)
Not Listening To The Customer
tom - 17th August 2011
My wife Christine and I are off to Italy with four of our close friends. We often do at least one trip together overseas each year. For this trip, Christine had the job of doing all the organisation for the six of us.
It was fairly involved, for it included a coach trip, the best of Italy, plus a few days in Rome. (I’m hoping to catch up with Tim Fischer, the former Deputy Prime Minister of Australia. Tim is now Australia’s ambassador to the Vatican.) Then the six of us are off on a cruise to Valencia etc. Then we’re off to London for a few days. All in all, a lot of money.
Now here comes the good part. Christine rang our travel agent in Melbourne to book it all. She had worked out all the dates for the tours, the hotels in Rome and in London, etc. Christine is very good at all of this. Well, the women on the phone at the travel agent insisted we come to Melbourne and have an appointment.
We live three hours from Melbourne, and Christine pointed out that we’ve booked over the phone many times before. The woman on the phone would not listen. Christine asked if we could speak to the owner, whom we personally know. But she was overseas. What about the manager? He was busy.
The woman kept on insisting we had to make an appointment. Now, my wife is very quiet and doesn’t cause a fuss. She sent an email to the owner and then just went off and booked with the travel agent in Albury. The next day we had the manager contact us from Melbourne, plus the owner from overseas, but it was too late. Christine had booked it and the agent in Albury did a terrific job. (more…)
A Bit Slow
tom - 2nd August 2011
Beechworth was written up in Slow Magazine. It was a great article. The one thing they got wrong was about Beechworth Bakery. They wrote, “Remarkably, there are no franchised businesses in Beechworth, apart from the Beechworth Bakery, which has become so successful it has franchises in Bendigo, Ballarat, Healesville, Echuca, and Albury.”
They got it wrong: we are not franchised. We’re a family-owned business. But our managers do treat and run the business like it’s their own, and all of our staff are empowered to make decisions. (more…)
Paid Speaking
tom - 28th July 2011
With my paid speaking, I use an agent (http://www.icmi.com.au) to look after all my bookings, which includes my fee, travel, accommodation, meals, etc. At times we get some groups not wanting to pay the full price for me to speak.
But here’s the thing, if they don’t think I’m going to help grow their business, they should not be looking at hiring me. (more…)