Worldwide Accomodation Biz

Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Co (KKR) was founded in the mid 70’s and to begin with their specialization was in highly leveraged transactions. But going further, aiming to make their acquisitions have less of an ecological impact, KKR have set up a unique enterprise which has completely transformed the method by which businesses and environmental agencies work. When Henry Kravis from KKR and the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) joined forces only a year ago green issues all of a sudden became a mainstream concern. Their objectives include encouraging firms in opposing environmental menaces e.g. climate change as well as any lavish water consumption.

To follow through with these goals, they utilize a procedure labeled eco-efficiency, this uses practical techniques such as recycling programs, fuel economy, and improving fuel economy through vehicle fleet maintenance. Simple and effective, but the KKR and EDF didn’t even realize the full advantages of the program until the head of the program and global public affairs, Ken Mehlman, reviewed the project after a full year in operation.

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Only at that point did Ken discover that the project wasn’t solely helping to protect the environment, but additionally it was helping to save a colossal range of businesses a large sum of money. Almost all of the firms affiliated to Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Co and Ken Mehlman at present are involved in eco-efficiency. If you consider that this group of business organizations is worth $86 billion, you can be certain that this was no easy achievement.

The original Green Portfolio project now includes new and groundbreaking enterprises. To illustrate, Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Co got together with the Environmental Defense Fund’s Climate Corps Program which teaches MBA students how to introduce cost effective, green principles. KKR and Ken Mehlman have been developing a package of systems that manage various resources. Programs like these can measure an organization’s ecological impact and identify any underlying problems. Henry Kravis, the KKC, and the Environmental Defense Fund have encouraged all sorts of businesses to go green. In summary, the work of these organizations has made environmentally friendly business techniques not only viable, but commercially desirable, and their revolutionary ideas are setting a new standard in the competitive business world of today.

Have you heard of Trilegiant? In its specialty, the organization of club and customer loyalty services, the firm is one of the most prominent in the United States. The firm and Nathaniel Lipman, its President, work with a great many retail and service names chosen from the large travel, dental, shopping, entertainment, health, and protection organizations to improve the purchasing experience. You’d have to admit that Trilegiant has experience aplenty. Having over thirty five years of expertise within an expanding area — now up to six states — and 3000 employees, the Norwalk, Connecticut company has more than proven itself. As of this moment, they service more than twenty five million clients across North America. The renown of this business comes from risk free solutions, enabling consumers to make savings and buy high value services and products. Just as an example, inexpensive insurance for long term warranties, guaranteed returns, and repair costs that can be purchased using the Buyers Advantage service. Alternative projects like HealthSaver make quality healthcare affordable, and these are just a couple of the great programs that the firm administrates.

You might find that it’s when it turns its attention to the home neighborhood that Trilegiant shows its true colours. One-off events organized inside the business by even limited collections of staff regularly generate donations of thirty thousand dollars in a mere five days — an accomplishment you have to admire.

One way they set out to be of service is by distributing research analysis. As you ought to know, each year privately owned businesses and the federal government compile an incredible body of hard data. Trilegiant combs these statistics with diligence to be sure of concerns and then debates ways of changing them for the better. As an example, the number of car collisions in America every year is over six million. No one intends for their own automobile to become part of these statistics, particularly on the more serious side, and for the past two years subscribers to the Autovantage car club have been sent the firm’s yearly “road rage” information. In this data, Autovantage reveals useful and carefully compiled summaries aimed at raising public awareness regarding these serious issues.

Trilegiant is an ideal example of a firm that realizes the standing of its clients. Mr. Lipman’s staff members merge devotion to important goals and their drive to inform the general public with their projects to benefit subscribers’ buying experiences. They’re just what you’d hope from a community oriented company.

As you know, donating your time as a volunteer allows you to strengthen the bonds of your community and at the same time assist those in need. The obvious problem is that freeing up the time to volunteer can waste very same time that could be put to better use. Obviously, when you volunteer as part of a team effort with colleagues, it will be far more fun. The obvious step is for other companies to follow the lead of firms like Adaptive Marketing LLC. As well as shopping programs including Todays Escapes designed for the benefit of consumers, Adaptive Marketing organizes local volunteer activity so that its employees have more time to help the local community.

If you think about company supported charitable effort, you probably think of giving blood, perhaps a Christmas call for donations, nothing more, but this is no longer the case in the modern day. Looking at just one company, Adaptive Marketing has provided its employees with opportunities to help with anything from tennis shoe recycling efforts to local tree-planting events. Through central organization individual initiatives grew into events, with specific locations, times and dates publicized in advance to make time management easy for volunteers. The volunteers will want a opportunity to select projects. Employees of Adaptive Marketing choose from among a great many activities. You’ll find so much to be done, after all; working with children, lending a hand to environmental programs, or supporting the community through artistic projects among others. Adaptive Marketing’s staff members are presented with such a choice that they’re sure to choose a project they’ll enjoy taking part in, making their time enjoyable as well as useful.

A regular addition to their schedule or a one-off event – this is how a company tends to organize volunteer initiatives like these, possibly at a local school or the homeless shelter in town. So if you can only find the time to assist at a Saturday morning park clean-up or the public library’s sale of used books, it’s still possible to contribute.

We’re sure that by now you know a number of tales of organizations finding ways to help the citizens of their hometown. Adaptive Marketing maintains volunteer initiatives to help others and to spread positive feeling through its home community as a result of the efforts of its staff members. The real bonus is, the benefits of volunteer work include a sense of generosity and accomplishment – an upbeat feeling that leaves not just the staffer but the whole workforce in a better mood.

Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Co (KKR) was set up in the 70’s and orginally the firm’s main business was in leveraged buyouts. But they have set up an exceptional green project that centers not just on ramping up ROI, but additionally on how environmentally friendly each of their companies are. When Henry Kravis from KKR and the independent Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) joined forces a year ago environmental issues went mainstream. The coalition aims to tackle critical green matters, for example depletion of the ozone layer, climate change, excessive water consumption, and water pollution.

Eco-efficiency (a term initially propagated by the WBCSD) dictates the framework for their mission, by using techniques such as fuel economy, reducing the intensity of materials and optimizing data centers for efficiency. Simple and effective, however the companies who were involved didn’t even understand the totality of the program’s benefits until Ken Mehlman, the head of the project and global public affairs, reviewed the program following its first year in operation.

Much to everyone’s surprise, Ken saw that this program not only assisted in proctecting the local environment, but also increased the profits from every last business as well. Well-nigh all of the companies associated with Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Co and Ken Mehlman today take part in the Green Portfolio Project. Still, when you consider that the group has a 2009 business portfolio estimated at $86 billion, you may be certain this wasn’t an easy see what a massive achievement this is.

The initial Green Portfolio project has grown beyond its initial purpose and these days includes new and groundbreaking initiatives. The Climate Corps Program set up by the Environmental Defense Fund is an example of this, it promotes earth friendly business techniques to students studying for an MBA.

KKR and Ken Mehlman have been developing a series of metrics and other related products which administer resources. Systems like these can evaluate a company’s progress and identify any underlying issues.

Henry Kravis, the KKR, and the Environmental Defense Fund are pioneers in the business world. In summary, these systems have made ecologically friendly business techniques not only viable, but commercially desirable, and their revolutionary ideas are setting a new standard in the business world of today.

You have in all probability seen Mr. Naveen Jain in connection with him being the CEO as well as co-founder of Intelius, Inc. the acclaimed information commerce company. Beyond making the Forbes list “400 Richest in America” 2000, this enterprising entrepreneur has received various notable awards, foremost the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, the Albert Einstein Technology Medal, and the WSA Industry Achievement Award. But that is positively not where it ends. That’s because Jain and his family are by the same token as zealous about philanthropy and will try to lend a helping hand as often as they are able to.

There’s no doubting the fact that our young ones are veritably our world’s number one resource and its future. They are moreover a main motivation for this entrepreneur and he uses any chance he gets to aid them. This, too, is the main reason why he is always persistently using every chance available to him to lend a helping hand wherever it seems even remotely doable. So, Naveen Jain, his relations and his staff at Intelius, Inc. pledge their time to a whole range of charities e.g. the Indian American Education Foundation, the Bellevue Boys and Girls Club, and the University of Washington. As is to be expected, they hand out plenty of material aid, but most importantly they devote plenty of time and attention to those youth who require it the most. Furthermore, Naveen Jain helps sponsor the Children’s Hospital in an effort to restore children’s health, too. And since Jain is a graduate of XLRI Jamshedpur and the Indian Institute of Technology, it comes as no wonder that schooling holds a very significant preference within his humanitarian worldview. This incorporates movements and charitable foundations that are local, state, and nationwide. Therefore, Intelius and its co-founder are actively helping fund charitable entities and establishments such as Child Rights and You (CRY), the Vedic Cultural Center and United Way.

Getting foodstuffs to the hungry of the world is another fundamental goal for Naveen Jain and those around him and to him, it makes not one iota of difference. Although he is conscious that the task of locating food for all the planet’s famished is a titanic one, he is also aware that the impossible can really be reachable assuming that everybody exerts themselves towards a united end. If this entrepreneur really gets his way, the final curtain will definitely come down on famine and neediness everywhere at some point.

People may believe that as the man in control of a spectacularly flourishing enterprise as well as being a devoted family man would leave him no free time for charitable engagements. All the same, Naveen Jain makes certain that each of of his charitable undertakings is given all the assistance he can realistically donate. In summary, this altruistic man is certainly way more than a simple (though admittedly most successful) leader of Internet commerce. He is actually an exceptional person and a remarkable community benefactor.

You are almost certain to have encountered Mr. Naveen Jain’s name as the co-founder & CEO of Intelius, Inc. a market leader in background checks, identity theft protection and public records services. As well as achieving to a position on the Forbes list “400 Richest in America” in 2000, this highly successful businessman has collected a number of choice awards, notably the Albert Einstein Technology Medal, the WSA Industry Achievement Award, and the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award. But it certainly does not end here. Because Jain and his family are every bit as ardent about their charity endeavors and will endeavor to help out as often as they can.

All our hopes for the years to come are carried in today’s youth. They are moreover an all-important inspiration for this enterprising man, and he uses any occasion he encounters to help them. This is why he is always unfailingly taking advantage of every chance he can to lend a helping hand whenever at all possible. Therefore, Naveen Jain, his family and his employees at Intelius, Inc. have decided to truly push ahead in earnest: they give their time to philanthropical associations such as United Way, the University of Washington, and Child Rights and You (CRY). Obviously they hand out ample material assistance, but even more importantly they devote plenty of time and care to those youth who need it the most. Beyond this, he helps the Children’s Hospital striving to advance child health.

With Jain being a graduate of the Indian Institute of Technology and XLRI Jamshedpur, it is hardly astonishing that schooling is also a vital pivot point in his benevolent works. This embraces campaigns and charities local, state, and nationwide. Thus Intelius and its head are actively helping deserving causes and foundations such as the Indian American Education Foundation, Hopelink and TreeHouse. Getting foodstuffs over to the malnourished of the planet is another fundamental goal for Naveen Jain and those around him and it makes no difference in the least to him whether it is a child in Darfur or Paris, or an old destitute woman from Bangkok or Washington D.C. needing support. Although he is conscious that the project of locating food for all the planet’s unnourished is a titanic one, he is also cognizant that the unachievable can really be achieved when the whole world labors towards a unified end. If this CEO actually gets his way, there will come a certain conclusion to hardship and malnourishment everywhere in the future. You could reason that being the boss of a very successful market leading company and a dedicated husband and family man to boot would leave no resources for volunteering and support. Regardless he ensures that all of his altruistic projects may rely on as much aid as he can conceivably contribute. This high spirited man is certainly very much more than a simple (though very successful) steersman of electronic commerce. He is actually an outstanding citizen and a veritable community patron.

These days intelligent philanthropism is inarguably more important than ever. Like most people, you’ll have heard mention of Mr. Naveen Jain’s name as being the co-founder and CEO of Intelius, Inc. the predictive intelligence market leader. In addition to having made the Forbes 400 Richest in America list in 2000, this maverick business leader has gained several notable awards, foremost the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, the WSA Industry Achievement Award, and the Albert Einstein Technology Medal. Nevertheless things definitely expand out from there. For Mr. Naveen Jain and his family are in the same way as zealous about philanthropy and will strive to assist people in need when they can.

The young of today are positively humanity’s greatest hope or the future. They are also a central motivation for this enterprising man, and he takes every occasion he happens to encounter to help them. This is the chief reason why he is always thoroughly exploiting every opening he can to help children who are needy wherever at all possible. Thus, Naveen Jain, his kin and the staff at Intelius have decided to really walk the talk: they donate plenty of time and effort to philanthropical institutions such as the University Preparatory Academy, Child Rights and You (CRY), and the Vedic Cultural Center. Expectably, they assign plenty of financial assistance, but most importantly, they dedicate their time and energies to the most disadvantaged and susceptible children. Mr. Jain also helps the Children’s Hospital in an attempt to restore children’s health, as well.

With Jain being a graduate of XLRI Jamshedpur and the Indian Institute of Technology, it is hardly astonishing that professional training constitutes a vital pivot point in his benevolent endeavors. This also incorporates campaigns and deserving cause that range from the local to the global. In doing this, Intelius and its CEO are sponsoring deserving interest groups and charities e.g. TreeHouse, the Children’s Hospital and Hopelink. Providing for the world’s famished qualifies for another essential litmus test for Naveen Jain and his relations and to him, it makes not one speck of difference. Although Naveen is cognizant that the enterprise of finding food for all the planet’s hungry is a herculean one, he also believes that the unattainable can truly become realizable assuming everybody labors together. If this entrepreneur really gets his way, there will be a decisive conclusion to poverty and hunger in the world one day.

Observers may believe that as the head of a highly prosperous market leading company as well as being a committed husband and family man would allow him no spare scope for charity and helping others. Yet Naveen sees to it that every one of his charitable ventures may rely on all the aid he can possibly contribute. To wrap it up, this industrious man is indisputably more than a mere albeit admittedly very successful captain of industry. He is an outstanding individual and a remarkable community champion.

Not all dot-com dreams died when the Internet stock bubble burst.

Amazon.com, the king of the dot-com era, is keeping some of them alive in 2005 inside a small office on Capitol Hill.

Light floods into a sparse whitewashed room above a yoga studio, where former Amazon director Josh Petersen and his cohorts sit around a large table plugging away on laptops. This is home to the Robot Co-op, a tiny company owned by the online retail giant.

The seven-member group has created a Web community based on sharing personal goals and dreams with a worldwide audience.

Its Web site, 43 Things.com (www.43things.com), invites people to list their goals and get information from other people who have done those things or want to. The free service has attracted a global following of 12,000 people in two months.

43 Things is part of growing wave of online social networking, encompassing Web logs, as well as Friendster, LinkedIn and other sites that form virtual communities. Go online to find a date, a plumber or someone halfway around the world who shares the same passion for belly-dancing.

Like their dot-com predecessors, the social-networking companies have generated plenty of hype and millions of dollars in venture capital. The field is getting crowded with services vying for attention, from Friendster and Google’s Orkut to MySpace, tribe.net, craigslist and local startup Judy’s Book. As people spend more time online, developers are inventing new ways for them to connect with each other.

Big companies’ interest

No one can say for sure where this trend is heading, but Internet giants like Google, Amazon and Yahoo! are taking a keen interest.

One factor lending support to the business model is the sea change in advertising. Printed ads aimed at a general audience are being replaced by online ads targeted down to the smallest personal detail. If a company like Amazon knows that Julie in Tacoma wants to learn to make Greek food, it can send her cookbook recommendations or an ad for a local cooking class.

The technology is constantly evolving, too. Compared with earlier sites such as Friendster or LinkedIn, what’s different about 43 Things is that you don’t need to search for people with the same interests. The software finds them for you.

The same concept is behind the photo-sharing service Flickr and Web bookmark-sharing site del.icio.us.

People are matched based on the same key words or tags they use to express a goal, such as “lose 10 pounds.” After the first person posts a new goal on the site, every other person with that goal is added to the group, creating instant networks.

Advertising on the site also works through matching key words, so that it can be automatically targeted to specific goals. A company might buy a Google ad to promote its teeth-whitening formula, and that ad appears on all the 43 Things Web pages where someone has listed a goal of “whiten my teeth.”

The process means most of the site’s 44,000 pages feature targeted ads, all without a single sales representative. 43 Things had paid advertisements from the first day it appeared, Jan. 1.

A similar process serves up Google text ads based on key words in Google searches.

“If we make the site useful to people, that model will work out just like it does for Google,” Petersen said.

12,000 registered

Since the site went live, more than 12,000 people in 900 cities have registered and shared their goals, from the most mundane to the most bizarre. Among the throngs seeking to lose weight or visit foreign lands are three who want to take a bath in champagne and six hoping to learn how to raise just one eyebrow.

Some Seattle residents have started a bike-riding club and organized a gathering of neighbors in the Central District, while the site linked two people in Quebec and Beijing who decided to practice English together using Internet telephony.

John Hornbaker of Seattle has used the site to share his experiences using the iPod and climbing Mount Rainier.

“It was interesting and fun, seeing what all these other people wanted to do,” he said. But he didn’t receive much in the way of feedback. After a while, his interest started to diminish as he became busy with other activities. Hornbaker’s not sure how much time and effort it takes to get something worthwhile out of it.

Social-networking sites need a certain critical mass to realize potential benefits and generate significant revenue, said Mark Mahaney, an analyst with American Technology Research.

“Whoever has the largest network has a real advantage over other players,” he said. “It tells me if there really is a business opportunity here, you better build it quick and fast.”

Amazon roots

The idea behind 43 Things has roots in Amazon’s personalization feature, automatically suggesting new products based on what customers order. Petersen, the Robot Co-op’s chief executive, and others helped create that feature at Amazon in the late 1990s.

Five sobering years since those halcyon days of the Internet boom, their new company retains some of that time’s Utopian ideals.

But while the creators of 43 Things proclaim a desire to change the world, they don’t want to live like robots to do it. Typical office hours are from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and employees have salaries that pay the mortgage, generous health benefits and unlimited time off for personal goals, which is the whole point of their new venture.

“A lot of startups have a very rough path before they succeed,” said Petersen, 33. “We wanted to have a humane work environment from the start. We didn’t want to ask our families to take on risk or take on partners who push for a return on investment in two years.”

Unlike many startups today, this one faces no particular pressure to make money just yet.

“A lot of people came up with some lousy ideas because they were trying to make money and left a lot of good ideas behind,” Petersen said.

Petersen said he and partner Daniel Spils, 36, began working on the project in Spils’ basement last summer, after Petersen took a paternity leave from his search-technology job at Microsoft. Petersen had left Amazon in 2002, and Spils left later the same year to focus on playing music as the keyboardist for Seattle band Maktub. They made pitches to several other investors before settling on Amazon in the fall.

Petersen had worked with Amazon Chief Executive Jeff Bezos while creating the personalization technology, and a verbal agreement with Bezos in September set the Robot Co-op deal in motion.

“No one can say we know exactly where this is going,” Petersen said. “That’s a path they were comfortable with.”

Amazon won’t disclose the size of its investment or what it might demand of the robots later.

“We’re not discussing the details around the strategy there or speculating on the future of the company,” said Amazon.com public-relations manager Drew Herdener. “We don’t discuss our investment strategies.”

Company potential

Clearly, social networking has the potential to be a game-changing phenomenon, and Amazon wants a hand in it. As sole owner of the Robot Co-op, Amazon owns any technology the team develops, Petersen said. Although Amazon does have seats on the company’s board, the co-op has autonomy in its daily operations, he said.

“We built it,” Petersen said. “We’re in charge.”

The Amazon investment caused a bit of a stir when it was reported last month in Salon.com, the online magazine. Some users said the co-op should have notified people earlier. But traffic to the 43 Things Web site tripled in three days as a result of the publicity.

Petersen and Spils, the chief operating officer, said they have no specific obligation to share information with Amazon and wouldn’t compromise their users’ trust.

“The worst conspiracy theories bother us,” Petersen said. “You can’t make a site like this by abusing your users.”

43 Things’ privacy policy states that the company may collect and share with partners the information that users provide, including names, e-mail addresses, physical addresses, phone numbers, ages and genders.

So far, users don’t seem to mind sharing personal information with the world, and many post their photos and links to their own blogs.

Such information could be a marketer’s dream. Because the goals are so specific, the ads are better targeted, Spils said. About three-fourths of the 44,000 goals listed on the site feature text ads automatically generated by Google on the side of the page.

The group that wanted to learn how to raise one eyebrow, for example, is shown an ad for “shaping perfect eyebrows” from an online beauty guide.

The robots share their own lives through links to their personal blogs, and the Web site gets plenty of help from visitors. When Petersen wants some suggestions from users, he posts a goal such as “explore how 43 Things can promote online learning.” Soon people as far away as Quebec, Australia and New Zealand chime in with ideas.

The goal-obsessed robots use index cards to scrawl ideas or features they want to work on and sort them by priority. Each week, goals are taped to the wall with the time estimated to finish and the actual time each task took. A stack of 50 index cards lists features they are considering, including adding a link on 43 Things pages to Amazon’s Wish Lists.

For now, Amazon is giving the robots the luxury of time. “We’re totally free right now,” Spils said. “We don’t check in.”

Howard Winwood

Goto http://www.directmatches.com/hwinwood and look at the first of it’s kind social networking company with a pay plan attached to it.

Have you ever been to a community fund raising event and were under whelmed by the number of people that showed up and you consider that perhaps people don’t care? I think people do care, however they need to be invited to these events and that means you need to do a little extra networking to get them there.

Net working for community fund raising event is not so difficult and if you have a committee with 10 people and want to organize a community fundraising event you may find that you can need to use your networking skills from the group to reach out and touch other people who indeed will reach out and touch others on top of that.

If your community fund raising event also has a silent auction and other types of things you can get people to donate their items for the silent auction and then give them a free ticket to the event. Once they are there are you might be able to sell the other things and get them to participate in the silent auction and perhaps buy something.

So what you have is someone who did donated a gift or a prize to be auctioned off who also brings their money to buy someone else’s gift that cost you nothing to get. All this can be done through networking in your community.

Consider if you will all the neighborhood watch groups, the service clubs, the chamber of commerce, the PTA, and all the clubs in your community. Invite them all and have them invite all their friends to. Please consider this in 2006 and vote for Lance.

“Lance Winslow” – Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

One of the main reasons connecting with new people at a ‘networking function’ is so tough for so many is FEAR. We are at times paralyzed by internal questions:

What will people think when I walk across a room and approach them to start a conversation? Will they think I am stupid, boring, pushy? How’s my breath?

It can be intimidating to approach someone and start a conversation. Ralph Waldo Emerson knew the way around this universal fear, but most of all he knew the way through it: “Do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain.”

Progress Agents (TM) committed to cracking the networking code get all the butterflies in their stomach to fly in formation and then soar above their comfort zone to a new, more expansive comfort zone. Don’t make business networking more complicated than it needs to be. Develop strong networking skills so you can make connections without being rattled and intimidated. The more intimidated you are by the process, the less appealing you are in the process.

Emerson’s advice will help you overcome the fear of meeting new people. Use Nike’s formula and Just Do It! This is important stuff!! These new contacts may eventually become strategic partners, customers, employees, employers, or even best friends. Remember, most people enjoy offering assistance, information, and advice. No one is getting voted off the island at the end of the event.

Zig Ziglar often uses a popular acronym for fear. He says fear stands for: False Evidence Appearing Real. Right on, Zig. Resist the popular notion that networking is all fake sincerity and pushy behavior. That is just not so.

Networking is not about arm-twisting. It is not trying to get someone to do something that does not make sense for them to do. It is not scary old backslapping sales shenanigans. The simple fact is, most people are cool and want to meet you. You will not find Eeyore or Oscar the Grouch at most networking events.

I do need to mention, though, that no matter how cool, giving, and funny you are, there are going to be some folks who just don’t get it. They are not interested in anything or anybody, and are always bummed out.

My quick advice is: Move on. Do not let their flawed human thing rock you. Really, who can honestly say they enjoy talking to a negative blowhard? People like this expect the worst and that is exactly what they get. Somebody forgot to tell them that you create your own reality and if you expect bad stuff to happen, bad stuff happens.

You know the people I am talking about – the ones who look and act like they just ate a big steaming bowl of ” Catcher in the Rye.” They’re irritable, easily agitated, restless types who love a good argument. Chances are, they are not feeling too wonderful, either. They have no personal curb appeal.

They need a little Monty Python. They need to “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life.” Progress Agents have discovered that changing the way they look at things makes life easier in all aspects. Think of Oscar the Grouch types as just nice people who have not yet been taught how to cope with life’s stresses and challenging moments.

Progress Agents always set a good example for faultfinders to follow. We adopt the “live and help prosper” philosophy, and we are not quick to make judgments. It is vital to not take responsibility for these people or take their Holden Caulfield impression personally (Holden is the hilariously agitated protagonist and narrator of the JD Salinger novel, The Catcher in the Rye). They are probably bummed at the whole wide world. They may have been like this for most of their lives and they are probably not going to change just because you chatted with them for five to eight minutes at a business mixer.

But most people are cool, nice, enjoyable, and are there to connect. If they are not, they are making a far worse impression than you are. Shrug it off. Do not let these sad sacks curb your enthusiasm.

Have fun. Enjoy the process. Life is too short (for you and everyone else).

Crack the Networking CODE.

Be Progress (TM).

Recognized as a ‘Sales-and-networking guru’ by the Dallas Business Journal, Dean Lindsay is the founder of The Progress Agents LLC (http://www.ProgressAgents.com) – a seminar company dedicated to empowering progress in sales, service, and workplace performance.

Dean’s best selling book Cracking the Networking CODE: 4 Steps to Priceless Business Relationships has been endorsed by a who’s who of business leaders and performance experts including Ken Blanchard – author of The One Minute Manager, Brian Tracy and Frank Bracken, the President and COO of Haggar Clothing Co.

Jay Conrad Levinson – the author of Guerrilla Marketing, thought so much of Cracking the Networking CODE that he wrote the book’s foreword.

A cum laude graduate of the University of North Texas, Dean presently serves on the Executive Advisory Board for UNT’s Department of Marketing and Logistics. The Dallas Business Journal selected Mr. Lindsay as one of D-FW’s Rising Stars Under Forty in The Business World Today in their yearly Forty Under 40 list.

More info at: http://www.ProgressAgents.com or 1-877-479-5323