Angus Carroll's resume provides his professional experience but does not fully capture who he is as a person. He has exceptionally diverse interests and hobbies outside of work, including collecting rare Darwin books and discovering dinosaurs. These interests have led him to meet interesting people and pursue opportunities like co-authoring a book, which shows the importance of pursuing outside passions. His humor and ability to form personal connections have also served him well in business.
This document provides biographical information about Emily Dickinson, including that she was a great American poet from Amherst, Massachusetts who wrote almost 1800 poems but refused to publish them during her lifetime. It notes she experienced sadness from the death of her mother, father, and close friends. Many of her poems expressed romantic feelings for friends and family or responded gloomily to friends. While she did not publish, family and friends encouraged her to and over 1700 poems were found after her death, showing the major impact of love, death, and relationships on her writing.
The document outlines the goals of presenting information on the FTC's Red Flag Rules for identity theft prevention and compliance. It aims to provide an overview of the rules' requirements (the WHAT), demonstrate how the idBUSINESS compliance module can help meet them (the HOW), and explain the importance of compliance (the WHY). Specifically, it discusses the rules' application to businesses that hold covered accounts, the necessary elements of a compliance program, and penalties for noncompliance. It then demonstrates the idBUSINESS module's tools for conducting risk assessments, training employees, and responding to incidents to help organizations achieve and maintain Red Flag compliance.
This book provides a basic overview of e-learning strategies and practices for those new to the field or seeking to keep projects simple. It covers defining an e-learning strategy, identifying appropriate technologies, and managing initiatives. While it could cover more topics in greater depth, the book achieves its goal of giving guidance to new practitioners or managers of e-learning projects. It focuses on asynchronous course-based e-learning and converting existing classroom content to a web format. The most useful sections provide strategic decisions for course design and components of an effective online course. However, readers should be aware of potential issues converting content without a systematic instructional design approach.
Angus Carroll has accomplished much in his career as shown on his resume, but there is far more to him as a person not shown. He has exceptionally diverse interests like collecting rare Darwin books and discovering dinosaurs. He co-authored a book with famous paleontologist Paul Sereno after discovering animals on digs. His father may have had a relationship with Marilyn Monroe after photographing her on a movie set. Angus finds that pursuing outside interests has helped him make valuable connections and form stronger personal relationships that are important for business.
The document discusses the origins and growth of Delivering Happiness, which began as a book by Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh and became a movement and company focused on building corporate culture and happiness. It describes how the book led to a bus tour across the country and the founding of Delivering Happiness to inspire, connect, educate, and experience building happiness in both workplaces and communities through sustainable business practices. The overall message promotes focusing on higher purpose, relationships, and culture to achieve happiness rather than short-term financial goals.
The document summarizes two books on communication skills: Skill with People by Les Giblin and Made to Stick by Chip Heath. Skill with People provides actionable advice to help improve interactions with others. Made to Stick explains how to create ideas that are understandable, memorable, and effective at changing behavior using the principles of simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional and stories. The document also outlines the author's process for learning and sharing communication skills using the LAST model of learn, apply, share and train.
Jenn Lim, CEO of Zappos, discusses how pursuing happiness can be a successful business model. She explains how Zappos prioritizes company culture and core values such as delivering wow customer service. Research shows culture and higher purpose lead to more engaged employees and better business outcomes. Lim advocates applying lessons from Zappos, like transparency and building relationships, to create happier communities and companies where employees and customers both thrive.
This document provides biographical information about Emily Dickinson, including that she was a great American poet from Amherst, Massachusetts who wrote almost 1800 poems but refused to publish them during her lifetime. It notes she experienced sadness from the death of her mother, father, and close friends. Many of her poems expressed romantic feelings for friends and family or responded gloomily to friends. While she did not publish, family and friends encouraged her to and over 1700 poems were found after her death, showing the major impact of love, death, and relationships on her writing.
The document outlines the goals of presenting information on the FTC's Red Flag Rules for identity theft prevention and compliance. It aims to provide an overview of the rules' requirements (the WHAT), demonstrate how the idBUSINESS compliance module can help meet them (the HOW), and explain the importance of compliance (the WHY). Specifically, it discusses the rules' application to businesses that hold covered accounts, the necessary elements of a compliance program, and penalties for noncompliance. It then demonstrates the idBUSINESS module's tools for conducting risk assessments, training employees, and responding to incidents to help organizations achieve and maintain Red Flag compliance.
This book provides a basic overview of e-learning strategies and practices for those new to the field or seeking to keep projects simple. It covers defining an e-learning strategy, identifying appropriate technologies, and managing initiatives. While it could cover more topics in greater depth, the book achieves its goal of giving guidance to new practitioners or managers of e-learning projects. It focuses on asynchronous course-based e-learning and converting existing classroom content to a web format. The most useful sections provide strategic decisions for course design and components of an effective online course. However, readers should be aware of potential issues converting content without a systematic instructional design approach.
Angus Carroll has accomplished much in his career as shown on his resume, but there is far more to him as a person not shown. He has exceptionally diverse interests like collecting rare Darwin books and discovering dinosaurs. He co-authored a book with famous paleontologist Paul Sereno after discovering animals on digs. His father may have had a relationship with Marilyn Monroe after photographing her on a movie set. Angus finds that pursuing outside interests has helped him make valuable connections and form stronger personal relationships that are important for business.
The document discusses the origins and growth of Delivering Happiness, which began as a book by Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh and became a movement and company focused on building corporate culture and happiness. It describes how the book led to a bus tour across the country and the founding of Delivering Happiness to inspire, connect, educate, and experience building happiness in both workplaces and communities through sustainable business practices. The overall message promotes focusing on higher purpose, relationships, and culture to achieve happiness rather than short-term financial goals.
The document summarizes two books on communication skills: Skill with People by Les Giblin and Made to Stick by Chip Heath. Skill with People provides actionable advice to help improve interactions with others. Made to Stick explains how to create ideas that are understandable, memorable, and effective at changing behavior using the principles of simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional and stories. The document also outlines the author's process for learning and sharing communication skills using the LAST model of learn, apply, share and train.
Jenn Lim, CEO of Zappos, discusses how pursuing happiness can be a successful business model. She explains how Zappos prioritizes company culture and core values such as delivering wow customer service. Research shows culture and higher purpose lead to more engaged employees and better business outcomes. Lim advocates applying lessons from Zappos, like transparency and building relationships, to create happier communities and companies where employees and customers both thrive.
The document discusses how to build your personal brand. It explains that in today's competitive job market, your qualifications alone may not be enough to stand out. It then outlines five steps - referred to as the 5 P's - to develop a strong personal brand: having a clear purpose, proposition, packaging, networking with others, and perseverance. The document emphasizes that by taking control of how you present yourself and your skills to potential employers, you can improve your chances of landing your dream career.
Superstar CEOs and Hollywood actors know that generating visibility is critical to success. Putting your leaders out as the public face for your organization can help you too. Here's how to get started
This document is a slideshow resume created by Jesse Desjardins to showcase his work experience and background in a more visual and engaging format than a traditional text resume. It includes highlights of his education and work history from 2000-2011, showing his experience in marketing, consulting, public speaking, and travel/social media projects. The slideshow emphasizes standing out from other applicants and telling one's story in a unique way online through platforms like SlideShare to get noticed for new opportunities.
This document provides an overview of an advertising and creative writing class. It outlines expectations such as attending weekly, checking the online course site regularly, and doing assigned readings and writings. Students will learn about verbal identity, storytelling, and developing their portfolio. They will study great writers and observe people to inform their work. The first assignments are to write about observations from people watching and to select a portfolio campaign to further develop or a new beverage brief to work on.
Richard Branson is a highly successful British entrepreneur and founder of Virgin Group. Some key facts about Branson include:
- He was born in 1950 in London and founded Virgin Records in 1972, which grew to become one of the world's largest record companies.
- He later expanded Virgin into airlines, railways, mobile phones, broadband internet, and more under the Virgin brand across dozens of countries.
- Virgin Group now employs over 55,000 people across more than 360 companies worldwide, with an annual turnover of £11 billion.
- Branson's success is attributed to his entrepreneurial mindset, willingness to take risks and think outside the box, focus on customer experience
Jenn Lim discusses her passion for happiness and how it led her to her role as CEO of Zappos, where she implemented a culture of happiness. Some key points:
- Happiness is difficult to predict and sustain but is influenced by meaningful relationships, vision, and purpose beyond money or profits.
- At Zappos, culture and core values like delivering wow through service are the top priority and guide hiring, training, and operations.
- Studies show happier employees leads to higher sales, productivity, retention and profits for companies. Zappos experienced these benefits through their culture.
- Jenn hopes to spread these lessons to other companies and communities through her movement called Delivering Happiness. The
Persuasive Essay - 5 Examples, Format, Pdf Examples. 18 Persuasive Essay Examples for Students. 31 Persuasive Essay Topics JournalBuddies.com. 50 Free Persuasive Essay Examples BEST Topics ᐅ TemplateLab. Narrative Essay: Persuasive text examples for highschool students. Writing paper: Essay persuasive. Persuasive Essays For High School. How to Write a Persuasive Essay - A Complete Guide. 50 ejemplos de ensayos persuasivos gratuitos MEJORES temas - Mundo ...
Jenn Lim is the CEO and co-founder of Delivering Happiness, which promotes happiness as a business model. She discusses how her passion for happiness developed after experiencing personal and professional setbacks. She explains lessons learned from Zappos' successful culture-focused business model, including committing to core values, transparency, vision, relationships and hiring the right team. Lim advocates applying these lessons to build happier companies, communities and people through Delivering Happiness' People, Companies, Communities approach. The presentation encourages attendees to prioritize happiness and live according to their values to create positive change.
This document provides tips for entrepreneurs on how to think like journalists in order to tell their business vision and story. It recommends entrepreneurs define their own story by focusing on their history, passion, inspiration for founding the business, social issues addressed, and what makes them different. A framework is presented for crafting key messages about the business, operating philosophy, achievements to date, products/services, and role in society. Interview tips include preparing key messages and an ideal headline, driving the conversation, and avoiding jargon or fake stories. The goal is for entrepreneurs to share their bigger vision beyond just products or services.
Jenn Lim, CEO of Verizon Telematics, discusses happiness as a business model based on her experience with Zappos. She argues that sustainable brands are built on culture and higher purpose. Key lessons from Zappos include committing to happiness, defining core values, transparency, vision, relationships, and hiring the right team who share the values. The goal is to spread happiness through happier communities, companies and people by prioritizing culture, purpose and sustainable well-being.
Jenn Lim, CEO of Scape, discusses how happiness can be a successful business model based on her experience with Zappos. She outlines six key lessons learned: 1) commitment to building a sustainable brand, 2) defining core values, 3) transparency, 4) establishing a clear vision, 5) building meaningful relationships, and 6) hiring the right team based on cultural fit. Research shows focusing on culture, vision, and purpose can increase employee engagement and satisfaction, leading to better business outcomes like increased sales, productivity and profits.
Learn how to apply the fundamentals of storytelling and their brand counterparts to your business strategy. Telling a story is the only effective way to connect your brand with consumers. Don’t fall into the trap of posting to social media as one-way dialogue or merely broadcasting promotions. Create compelling stories that hook your audience. This presentation goes through the fundamentals of storytelling and identifies brand parallels.
You can also watch the recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSDlAvDG4_0&feature=emb_logo
The document is a presentation by Jenn Lim on happiness as a business model. It discusses how Zappos prioritized company culture and customer service to become a $2 billion company. It also outlines frameworks for happiness, including factors within and outside of one's control. Lim argues vision, meaning and higher purpose can lead to happiness and asks how this applies to businesses. She shares lessons from Zappos including commitment to core values and transparency.
The document is a presentation by Jenn Lim on happiness as a business model. It discusses how Zappos prioritized company culture and customer service to become a $2 billion company. It also outlines frameworks for happiness, including factors within and outside of one's control. Lim argues vision, meaning and higher purpose can lead to happiness and asks how this applies to businesses. She shares lessons from Zappos including commitment to core values and transparency.
This introduction provides context for why business situations often seem absurd. The author develops a theory that people are idiots, including himself, and slip in and out of idiocy throughout the day due to the complexity of modern life. While intelligence played a role in human evolution, technology and complexity have increased much faster than human brains have evolved, leaving most people struggling to keep up with a world designed by a small percentage of "deviant smart people." The author aims to show that expecting rational behavior is futile and it is best to find humor in our shared human idiocy.
Eo amsterdam university – delivering happiness – jenn lim 09.16.01Delivering Happiness
Jenn Lim is the CEO of Delivering Happiness, a company focused on using happiness as a business model. She discusses research showing people are poor at predicting what will make them happy. While at Zappos, she helped establish a strong culture-focused business model that has led to the company's success. Delivering Happiness seeks to spread this idea that committing to core values, purpose, and relationships can lead to sustainable happiness in both business and life.
This document summarizes a story about a young man named Monty Roberts who had a dream of owning a horse ranch. In high school, he wrote a paper detailing his goal of owning a 200-acre horse ranch. However, his teacher gave him an F and said it was unrealistic. Monty refused to change his paper. He went on to achieve his dream and own a 4,000 square foot house on a 200-acre horse ranch, inspiring others with his approach to life and horse training. The document warns that people's doubts can unintentionally steal our dreams, and we shouldn't let others' doubts discourage us from pursuing our goals.
Slides for talk at Forefront, Leeds, on Wednesday 26 November 2014 on considering the work of marketers in the 1930s to help us create more meaningful 'users' to create products round, by observing real people.
The document discusses happiness and culture as a business model. It describes how Zappos prioritized culture and happiness, which led to their success. Some key points:
- Zappos hired for culture fit and provided extensive training focused on their 10 core values.
- Their culture book documented the culture annually and became a brand book as well.
- Research shows purpose and meaningful relationships lead to long-term happiness and sustainable brands.
- Zappos' commitment to culture and happiness resulted in increased sales, engagement, and profits over time.
The document discusses how to build your personal brand. It explains that in today's competitive job market, your qualifications alone may not be enough to stand out. It then outlines five steps - referred to as the 5 P's - to develop a strong personal brand: having a clear purpose, proposition, packaging, networking with others, and perseverance. The document emphasizes that by taking control of how you present yourself and your skills to potential employers, you can improve your chances of landing your dream career.
Superstar CEOs and Hollywood actors know that generating visibility is critical to success. Putting your leaders out as the public face for your organization can help you too. Here's how to get started
This document is a slideshow resume created by Jesse Desjardins to showcase his work experience and background in a more visual and engaging format than a traditional text resume. It includes highlights of his education and work history from 2000-2011, showing his experience in marketing, consulting, public speaking, and travel/social media projects. The slideshow emphasizes standing out from other applicants and telling one's story in a unique way online through platforms like SlideShare to get noticed for new opportunities.
This document provides an overview of an advertising and creative writing class. It outlines expectations such as attending weekly, checking the online course site regularly, and doing assigned readings and writings. Students will learn about verbal identity, storytelling, and developing their portfolio. They will study great writers and observe people to inform their work. The first assignments are to write about observations from people watching and to select a portfolio campaign to further develop or a new beverage brief to work on.
Richard Branson is a highly successful British entrepreneur and founder of Virgin Group. Some key facts about Branson include:
- He was born in 1950 in London and founded Virgin Records in 1972, which grew to become one of the world's largest record companies.
- He later expanded Virgin into airlines, railways, mobile phones, broadband internet, and more under the Virgin brand across dozens of countries.
- Virgin Group now employs over 55,000 people across more than 360 companies worldwide, with an annual turnover of £11 billion.
- Branson's success is attributed to his entrepreneurial mindset, willingness to take risks and think outside the box, focus on customer experience
Jenn Lim discusses her passion for happiness and how it led her to her role as CEO of Zappos, where she implemented a culture of happiness. Some key points:
- Happiness is difficult to predict and sustain but is influenced by meaningful relationships, vision, and purpose beyond money or profits.
- At Zappos, culture and core values like delivering wow through service are the top priority and guide hiring, training, and operations.
- Studies show happier employees leads to higher sales, productivity, retention and profits for companies. Zappos experienced these benefits through their culture.
- Jenn hopes to spread these lessons to other companies and communities through her movement called Delivering Happiness. The
Persuasive Essay - 5 Examples, Format, Pdf Examples. 18 Persuasive Essay Examples for Students. 31 Persuasive Essay Topics JournalBuddies.com. 50 Free Persuasive Essay Examples BEST Topics ᐅ TemplateLab. Narrative Essay: Persuasive text examples for highschool students. Writing paper: Essay persuasive. Persuasive Essays For High School. How to Write a Persuasive Essay - A Complete Guide. 50 ejemplos de ensayos persuasivos gratuitos MEJORES temas - Mundo ...
Jenn Lim is the CEO and co-founder of Delivering Happiness, which promotes happiness as a business model. She discusses how her passion for happiness developed after experiencing personal and professional setbacks. She explains lessons learned from Zappos' successful culture-focused business model, including committing to core values, transparency, vision, relationships and hiring the right team. Lim advocates applying these lessons to build happier companies, communities and people through Delivering Happiness' People, Companies, Communities approach. The presentation encourages attendees to prioritize happiness and live according to their values to create positive change.
This document provides tips for entrepreneurs on how to think like journalists in order to tell their business vision and story. It recommends entrepreneurs define their own story by focusing on their history, passion, inspiration for founding the business, social issues addressed, and what makes them different. A framework is presented for crafting key messages about the business, operating philosophy, achievements to date, products/services, and role in society. Interview tips include preparing key messages and an ideal headline, driving the conversation, and avoiding jargon or fake stories. The goal is for entrepreneurs to share their bigger vision beyond just products or services.
Jenn Lim, CEO of Verizon Telematics, discusses happiness as a business model based on her experience with Zappos. She argues that sustainable brands are built on culture and higher purpose. Key lessons from Zappos include committing to happiness, defining core values, transparency, vision, relationships, and hiring the right team who share the values. The goal is to spread happiness through happier communities, companies and people by prioritizing culture, purpose and sustainable well-being.
Jenn Lim, CEO of Scape, discusses how happiness can be a successful business model based on her experience with Zappos. She outlines six key lessons learned: 1) commitment to building a sustainable brand, 2) defining core values, 3) transparency, 4) establishing a clear vision, 5) building meaningful relationships, and 6) hiring the right team based on cultural fit. Research shows focusing on culture, vision, and purpose can increase employee engagement and satisfaction, leading to better business outcomes like increased sales, productivity and profits.
Learn how to apply the fundamentals of storytelling and their brand counterparts to your business strategy. Telling a story is the only effective way to connect your brand with consumers. Don’t fall into the trap of posting to social media as one-way dialogue or merely broadcasting promotions. Create compelling stories that hook your audience. This presentation goes through the fundamentals of storytelling and identifies brand parallels.
You can also watch the recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSDlAvDG4_0&feature=emb_logo
The document is a presentation by Jenn Lim on happiness as a business model. It discusses how Zappos prioritized company culture and customer service to become a $2 billion company. It also outlines frameworks for happiness, including factors within and outside of one's control. Lim argues vision, meaning and higher purpose can lead to happiness and asks how this applies to businesses. She shares lessons from Zappos including commitment to core values and transparency.
The document is a presentation by Jenn Lim on happiness as a business model. It discusses how Zappos prioritized company culture and customer service to become a $2 billion company. It also outlines frameworks for happiness, including factors within and outside of one's control. Lim argues vision, meaning and higher purpose can lead to happiness and asks how this applies to businesses. She shares lessons from Zappos including commitment to core values and transparency.
This introduction provides context for why business situations often seem absurd. The author develops a theory that people are idiots, including himself, and slip in and out of idiocy throughout the day due to the complexity of modern life. While intelligence played a role in human evolution, technology and complexity have increased much faster than human brains have evolved, leaving most people struggling to keep up with a world designed by a small percentage of "deviant smart people." The author aims to show that expecting rational behavior is futile and it is best to find humor in our shared human idiocy.
Eo amsterdam university – delivering happiness – jenn lim 09.16.01Delivering Happiness
Jenn Lim is the CEO of Delivering Happiness, a company focused on using happiness as a business model. She discusses research showing people are poor at predicting what will make them happy. While at Zappos, she helped establish a strong culture-focused business model that has led to the company's success. Delivering Happiness seeks to spread this idea that committing to core values, purpose, and relationships can lead to sustainable happiness in both business and life.
This document summarizes a story about a young man named Monty Roberts who had a dream of owning a horse ranch. In high school, he wrote a paper detailing his goal of owning a 200-acre horse ranch. However, his teacher gave him an F and said it was unrealistic. Monty refused to change his paper. He went on to achieve his dream and own a 4,000 square foot house on a 200-acre horse ranch, inspiring others with his approach to life and horse training. The document warns that people's doubts can unintentionally steal our dreams, and we shouldn't let others' doubts discourage us from pursuing our goals.
Slides for talk at Forefront, Leeds, on Wednesday 26 November 2014 on considering the work of marketers in the 1930s to help us create more meaningful 'users' to create products round, by observing real people.
The document discusses happiness and culture as a business model. It describes how Zappos prioritized culture and happiness, which led to their success. Some key points:
- Zappos hired for culture fit and provided extensive training focused on their 10 core values.
- Their culture book documented the culture annually and became a brand book as well.
- Research shows purpose and meaningful relationships lead to long-term happiness and sustainable brands.
- Zappos' commitment to culture and happiness resulted in increased sales, engagement, and profits over time.
1. The Person Not on the Resume
By Margot Finley-Aguilera
President, Avondale Search International, Inc.
Do you feel that your resume really captures who you are? Most people would say no.
It is just a wee slice of who a person is.
Thankfully, while a list of accomplishments is essential for matching experience with
job requirements, let's be honest: it is typically not the reason you are hired or not
hired. That happens because of you – your personality, how you present yourself,
how you connect with people, your ethics, your spirit, your wit, your empathy, your
interests, etc.
A good headhunter can convey the more esoteric aspects of you as a candidate, as
can good networking through people who really know and admire you. A good
interview process should draw these finer points out about who you really are - after
a strong resume gets you in the door.
So, can I please tell you what I see in people beyond the resume in our Talent
Management sector? There are an amazingly high number of very cool, truly
interesting people with exceptional lives and interests and passions.
I am an avid, insatiable reader, devouring books by the UPS truckload, but the stories
our industry professionals have to tell are second to none. You are Very Interesting
People, folks!! Yes -- you.
Why is this important? It is our humanity, how we have spent our lives, our personal
characteristics and qualities that ultimately lands or loses us the job. Would you like
just one example of how much is often NOT portrayed on a resume? It will be difficult
to select ONE example, as there so many of you I would love to profile. And I probably
will be knocking on your virtual door to do just that soon – you know who you are.
I did not have to look far for my first example of how much of a person is not
conveyed through a resume: Angus Carroll, former COO of MindLeaders.
2. Since Angus is seeking a new role in the
Employee Training and Talent Management
sector, he is an excellent example. The data
on his resume includes the following:
• SirsiDynix 2004–2007, Chief
Marketing Officer
• MindLeaders 2000–2003, COO &
Board Member
• Dialog Corporation 1999–2000, EVP
Worldwide Marketing
• Medicus, 1996-1998, VP Strategy
• Ceridian Corporation, 1993–1996,
VP, Business Development
But that’s only part of the story.
Q. Like Jerry Seinfeld, you have a keen
ability to summarize things up and elicit laughter and find sophisticated and
contagious humor on almost anything. Is that a result of making the most of walking
on earth with an IQ of something astronomical? (No, you cannot delete this question,
Angus!)
A. Humor is an important part of everything – work, family, friends. If you work hard
and spend half your waking hours hammering away at your job, you have to be able
to laugh – not just for yourself, but for everyone around you. I think it's especially
important for senior executives to show they have a good sense of humor because, if
they set an ultra-serious tone, that quickly gets adopted by everyone, and, let's face it
– no matter how good you are, no matter how hard you work, nothing ever goes
according to plan – and that's when you need humor the most.
Q. You have some exceptionally diverse interests and hobbies. Please tell me about
your Darwin collection...
A. I collect Darwin, which means mostly 1st editions of all his works – books and
papers. There are over 2,000 volumes in the collection now, including two copies of
the 1st edition of 'On the Origin of Species,' his most famous book. I also have
several hand-written letters by Darwin and a very detailed model of HMS Beagle, the
ship he sailed around the world on from 1831 to 1836. I started collecting Darwin
about 25 years ago, and now I have a very important collection from a bibliographic
standpoint – in fact, I have discovered several new items no one knew about before.
Beginning in April of this year, the collection will begin traveling to several museums.
The exhibit will include all his major works and will also tell the story of the voyage
3. and how he came up with the theory of natural selection. Darwin was born in 1809
and published the Origin in 1859, so 2009 is a big anniversary year for Darwin, and
many museums are featuring Darwin exhibits this year.
Q. Is it true that you unearthed a rare dinosaur during a dig and went on to write a
book with the famous Paul Sereno? How does this happen to a training industry
COO?!
A. Well, I have discovered several prehistoric animals, including a Triceratops and a
Mosasaur (which is a big marine reptile). After being involved in dinosaur digs all over
the U.S., I did meet Paul Sereno and co-author a small book on dinosaurs for kids.
Paul is one of the world's leading experts on dinosaurs and an Explorer in Residence
at National Geographic. He is also a great guy. How does this happen? It happens
when you pursue outside interests – you meet interesting people, which leads to
other things. I started going to Tucson every year in February for the Gem and Mineral
Show. It so happens all the dinosaur people go there, too. One year, I got invited out
a on a dig. I found a dinosaur, so then I got invited out every year. That led to meeting
Paul. That led to the book. It's the same in business: one thing leads to another, and,
before you know it, you've made the right connection.
Q. Is it true/possible/probable that your Dad had a relationship with Marilyn
Monroe? Or did he just photograph and interview her?
A. He did spend three weeks taking pictures of her when she was on the set of the
movie Niagara in 1952. My father, a photo-journalist, was on assignment for
Weekend Magazine, and the two of them hit it off. Did he have an affair with her? I
don't know. He flew out to California to see her again later, so there might have been
something to it. He never spoke about it, and it just was not the kind of question you
could ask my father. We'll never know for sure.
Q. Last but not least, did you ever find these interests and hobbies to be a plus in
your professional roles in any strange way?
A. Certainly. A big part of business is the personal relationships you develop, and you
can't talk business all the time – at least not over dinner or a round of golf. When
people realize there's more to you than just the work-you, it helps form a stronger
relationship. People like to get to know the people they are going to do business with,
and the more topics you can discuss, the better.
Did I mention why I did not have to look far for this example? Angus is my brother-in-
law, and we are all fortunate enough to be on top of a mountain, tucked in around a
holiday table counting our blessings. And I include you, tolerant reader, as one of
mine. Thank you.
margot@avondalesearch.com