Almost every small to medium sized has focused a great deal of energy lately on just staying in business. Recessions, layoffs and health care seem to dominate every discussion. However, things are changing. Smart companies are rebuilding and upgrading their work forces with the wealth of talent that is currently available. So how do you [...]

I work in a small town in Montana that has struggled for years to solve the problem of “economic development.” It seems like everyone wants to talk about the issue as if it is something you can magically solve with more meetings, focus groups or quasi-governmental agencies. I disagree. It is the jobs, stupid. Create [...]

Last week we installed the single biggest and most complex systems change in the history of PrintingForLess.com, revamping some of the very core of our internal systems.  The change represented well over 10,000 hours of work from a number of team members and the change went very smoothly, thankfully.
 
But that success wasn’t luck.  It was [...]

As an online print provider you would think we wouldn’t have a ton of interaction with our customers, but we do—countless phone calls and emails are the norm here.  PrintingForLess.com started out basically as a vending machine for printing.  As time went on we realized that something was missing—to truly satisfy customers, we needed to interact [...]

How many times have you heard someone say “this job would be so easy if it weren’t for the people”?  How many times have you said or thought it yourself?  One thing I’ve found during my career is that if your team isn’t giving you what you want, its probably because you’re not giving them [...]

While we print and mail a ton of postcards for our customers, we typically don’t get to see the results our customers generate from their marketing efforts. So it was especially good to hear back from one of our local print customers – The Community Closet – about a campaign they recently ran.
 But first, a [...]

I am of the opinion that when it comes to highlighting what your company does and why someone should work with you, video often speaks louder than words. Here at PFL, we use multimedia in many different ways, but our favorite thing to do is showcase our remarkable small business customers by giving them a [...]

The Lesson List – What I’ve learned
I’ve spent more than 20 years working in rapid growth small businesses and recently had a MBA student ask me one of the most interesting questions I’ve had in some time. What have been the 3 most important lessons I’ve learned? It is a great question and harder to [...]

I remember a job from years ago where the training consisted of me filling out some paperwork, skimming a manual, a quick pep-talk from the boss and then getting thrown in, to “learn as I go.” That was not a great experience, and I learned things sporadically, got frustrated, and frustrated my employer. Many of [...]

I’m a teamwork kind of guy. I’ll readily admit that I really have to work hard to stay focused and on task if I have to work completely alone on a project. Having a group I can trust and seek out to bounce ideas off of keeps my energy up, allows for greater creativity and, [...]