Lessons from a Marketing Pioneer

Graham Birkenhead, July 10 2024

I recently visited Fulford Place in Brockville, Ontario. Fulford Place was built in the early 1900s by George Fulford as his rather grand family residence, and was situated in 10 acres on the shores of the St Lawrence River.  It is now a museum - and very much worth a visit if you are in the

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The Elephant in the Echo Chamber

Graham Birkenhead, June 25 2024

Consider the story of the blind men and the elephant. Each man touches a different part of the elephant and describes it based on his limited experience. One feels the trunk and thinks it’s a snake, another touches the leg and believes it’s a tree, while another feels the side and describes it as a wall, the fourth holds its tail and thinks it's...

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The Tao of Mosquitoes

Graham Birkenhead, June 4 2024

This reminded me of the way we deal with many issues or problems in business.  Issues such as market fluctuations, regulatory changes, customer complaints, operational inefficiencies, competitor actions, or overlooked details are inevitable to some degree, and often they are individually slight.   It is often easier to 'tolerate' them and push...

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The Peril of Weak Values

Graham Birkenhead, April 30 2024

There have been several cases recently where companies have truly demonstrated the strength - or weakness - of their values; 2 in particular provide an interesting contrast: In general, a majority of consumers buy or advocate for brands that stand up for what they believe in.  The specific values your company holds are less important than how...

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So, you think you are a Strategic Thinker?

Graham Birkenhead, March 26 2024

you'd be right Strategy can be considered the process of achieving your goals (like the vision of dinner) using available resources (what I have in the cupboard) and  within constraints (guests arrive in a few hours).   Of course, I could go and increase my available resources by buying more ingredients.   So, while we all can and do think...

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The Case for Building Resiliency

Graham Birkenhead, March 19 2024

The accelerating pace of globalization, technological advancements, regulatory changes, and shifting consumer expectations is indeed contributing to a more intricate business environment; while businesses have always faced challenges and complexities, it is the rate of acceleration here that is crucial.   And let's not forget that it's us humans...

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What has Behavioural Economics ever done for us?

Graham Birkenhead, March 12 2024

As a life-long observer of human nature, I am fascinated by how we make decisions. And all too often, I see people (including business owners) making the same sorts of decisions in the same sorts of situations often counter to what they are trying to achieve - business success. And this despite years of experience and evolution in business...

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The Answers are out there ...

Graham Birkenhead, February 27 2024

And while we can look at the legacy of human endeavour for many answers to today's questions, there is a much richer and older source of inspiration and ideas that could help us solve many of our more tactical and systemic challenges. And that is the natural world around us. Over millions or billions of years of evolution, living organisms...

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Look Differently

Graham Birkenhead, January 30 2024

But if we look with even greater curiosity - then something quite amazing comes into sight.  An individual bird, when seen with bright light, suddenly displays a spectrum of colours including blues, greens, purples, and browns - and an array of bright dots.    And that is only what we humans can see; bird-vision extends into the ultraviolet...

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Welcome to the Edge of Chaos

Graham Birkenhead, January 16 2024

You don't build a business – you build people – and then people build the business. Zig Ziglar

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