Looking out towards 2010

How did it get to be NOVEMBER already!  It seems like just the other day I was writing articles about Embracing Change in 2009 and now, in just two short months, 2009 will be one for the record books. 

It’s still to be written what the final outcome of the health care debates in Congress will be, or how the year will wrap up from an economic perspective, but many will tell you they can’t wait for 2010 to make its arrival.

But there have been some bright spots in this recession that we have all struggled through.  Companies that are making great things happen in the world of social media, women’s health, green materials, and a host of other industries.  That’s why, as I prepare for the exciting things that I know will happen in 2010, I am getting ready today by attending the 4th Annual Arizona Entrepreneurship Conference on November 12th. 

As chairman of the board of OTEF, the Opportunity Through Entrepreneurship Foundation, November is always a busy time as we prepare for the conference.  Each year’s conference is vitally important since all of the proceeds go to fund OTEF’s efforts to provide entrepreneurial training and support to at-risk populations – giving them a better chance for future financial sustainability.

But, as an entrepreneur, I look forward to the conference for the many great ideas I know I will receive there each year.  This is the only place I know where, in one day, I can gain insights from national thought leaders like Tara Hunt and Michelle Robson (EmpowHer) , connect with fellow CEOs from TiE and EO to learn what’s working for them, and get the latest updates in technology and business trends from CEOs and thought leaders who are on the front lines.

I’m also excited this year that we have friends coming from far and near to share ideas.  Patti Dragland (@StrategicSense) is coming in from Calgary, Tara Hunt (@MissRogue), author of The Whuffie Factor,  from Montreal, Howard Lindzon (founder of StockTwits), Kevin Surace, of Serious Materials, is flying in from Sunnyvale, and my favorite entrepreneurial blogger, Marty Willing (@StartUpPro), will be there not to mention fellow conference team members and great friends like  Francine Hardaway (@Hardaway), Steven Groves (@StevenGroves), Ed Nusbaum (@EdAZ), Merlin Ward (@MerlinWard) and many more!

November 12th is an important day for gathering new ideas, making connections, and to just get that extra dose of inspiration that will come in real handy in 2010.  I know where I will be on November 12th.  How about you?

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay Tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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The ICK Factor

Millions of articles and blogs have been written on the topic of branding.  Google the word  ‘branding’ and you will get over 33 million hits! 

Unfortunately too often, businesses spend lots of money creating and protecting their marketing message and not enough time protecting the value of their brand. 

Too often we forget that there is a  difference between our marketing message and our brand.  Put simply, our marketing message is what we say about our company, product or services; but, the true measure of our brand is what OTHERS think about us when they hear our name.  So in a real sense, our true brand value is our company’s image as reflected by Customer Knowledge.    Customers form impressions of what our company truly is based on what we say – our marketing message – and what we do – our actions. When they do not match up you get ICK – Incongruent Customer Knowledge.

When what you do and what you say are congruent, customers believe in what you say  and you.  This adds to your company’s value.  At other times the message and actions are not congruent and no matter how much time and money you spend touting your product or service, your ICK factor is a BIG negative thus detracting from your company’s value.

Making Promises to employees, partners, customers, and investors.

Promises can take many forms.  They may reflect what the company does directly, or they may be the promises shared in the marketing message, the Annual Report, or  employee communications.  But however the message is delivered,  when you promise a specific result, people expect to get it.

+ Keeping the promise = a strong POSITIVE brand reaction.

- Breaking the promise = a weakened brand perspective – just ICK!

Did you know that Your Marketing Message itself can create a negative feeling of ICK and deplete your brand?

Here are a few examples of mistakes I see too often when I log on to Twitter:

• Messages or Mentions offering to “Grow my Twitter” following from ‘experts’ who have less followers than I do.  (If the whole point of a quality following is to understand who you are talking to, you’d think they’d look.)
• Branded corporate sites that only talk about their products and never share or engage with the community to add value.
• People who send ‘conversational’ welcome messages via a DM but are not following you.  If you take the time to respond back – only to find that they are not following you – the message is highly incongruent.  Not only are you not really welcome – they can not even hear you!  Major ICK!

But incongruence and ICK are not unique to social media.

Very often we share statements of our company’s values on websites, in our annual report, or even in our advertising.  But do our actions reflect those values? 

Here is an example of a corporate statement by Halliburton Corporation.  Did you read it?  Sounds great!  Now read this article from ABC news: Victim: Gang-Rape Cover-Up by U.S., Halliburton/KBR (KBR Told Victim She Could Lose Her Job If She Sought Help After Being Raped, She Says.)  Do the actions of Halliburton/KBR match their words? 

But it is not just Halliburton (the company everyone seems to love to hate these days) that falls into the ICK.  Check the marketing message of almost any company and you will find statements talking about how important their customers are and how well they serve them.  Yet, as you can see in the image at right, some well respected national brands have made the Customer Service Hall of Shame as reflected in this article from MSN Money.  Whether it’s due to internal processes, lack of resources, declining quality, or just a general lack of customer sensitivity, these are firms that need to really pay close attention to their ICK factor.

So how do you avoid ICK?

Avoiding ICK, should be the goal of any company that places any level of value on its brand.  Here are some basic common sense guides to follow:

• Don’t make promises you can’t keep. EVER.
• Establish Corporate Values that are shared across your company and base your processes, decisions, and actions on keeping true to those values.
• When you make a mistake – or something unexpected happens – and it will sooner or later- don’t place blame – just own up to it and FIX it.  Taking responsibility and working to fix the problem is a great way to minimize the ICK Factor when the unavoidable happens.

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay Tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

ICK Factor, Incongruent Customer Knowledge (TM)  2009 – CorePurpose, Inc.

Copyright – Joan Koerber-Walker/CorePurpose, Inc. 2009

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Valuing a Company

From time to time, I get involved in answering a tricky question.  “What is this company worth?”  Sometimes the question comes up when speaking to a business owner or executive who is truly trying to increase the value of their organization.  At other times the question is raised from someone looking for investors or buyers.  And then most importantly – I ask it myself when the buyer or investor might be me.

Years ago, in business school, I had great professors at the W.P. Carey School of Business.  They taught me the science of financial valuation and how to look at the opportunities  and systematic business risks that lie buried behind the balance sheet.  There where times in the learning process when I might have cursed my teachers for being so exacting, but the lessons they taught combined with the insights I gained from my fellow students were worth more than a pot of gold.

Measuring a company’s value falls into 3 categories

What it has – it’s assets

Assets can be real and tangible.  We all know about these: property, plants, and equipment plus firm contracts and money in the bank.  We can see it, touch it, count it up.  Other assets are intangible.  We know that there is some level of value, but measurement is often subtle, involving an estimation of the worth.  This can be a patent, a trademark, or a customer or prospect list that in and of it self has no hard value, but when put to good use can be converted to tangible assets in the future, 

What it lacks or  owes – It’s liabilities

On the other side of the equation are the liabilities.  Some are easy to measure and take the form of debt, contractual obligations, or other factors that reduce the company’s assets.  But there are other more intangible liabilities to factor in like adverse economic conditions, holes in the team, or a lack in organizational bandwidth – you know – too much to do and not enough resources to do it with.

What It promises – Its brand as an organization

And most important of all, I look at what the company promises to its people, its customers, its partners and its investors through its brand as an organization, PLUS  its ABILITY to keep those promises.

We all make promises, and most up us do everything in our power to keep them.  The question I focus on most closely is can the company turn promise into reality with its unique combination of assets and liabilities. 

• Does it have a clear and simple plan that the team can follow to keep the promises it makes? Are there clearly defined goals, strategies, tactics? Are there clear measurement milestones along the way?
• Does it have a culture that supports its team in achieving shared objectives.  It’s sad but true.  Objectives and goals that are not shared by the team are rarely achieved.
• Does it have the resources to give to that team so that they can execute on the plan? And if not – does it have the ability to get them?
• Does it use its assets wisely?  Is it investing in its people and its product to take and hold a leadership position in its markets  in the future?
• Does it look at its customers, supply chain, and investors as collaborative partners and treat them accordingly?
• Is leadership committed to keeping the promises it makes to the team, the partners, the customers, and the investors.
• Does every member of the team share that commitment?

The Value of the COMPANY

When I am done with the measuring, I add it all up.  What I then have is a valuation of the company in a form that they rarely teach in business school.  A clearer picture of whether the company can keep its organizational promise and create value as well as what it may to make that happen, and what I can do to help along the way.

Because, at the end of the day, the true value of any company is in the promises it makes, and its ability to keep them.

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay Tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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Times They are a Changing – A day of GM Goodbyes

This morning – October 1, 2009, a reminder popped up on my calendar.  Today was the day my brother Rick retired officially from General Motors after 30 years.  He started in the Newark, Delaware plant at the age of 18, the day after his birthday.  Over the past three decades, he saw many changes, slow downs, strikes, and lay offs; but, he also saw innovations in manufacturing and new automotive technologies evolve. 

He started at GM in a time when working as a GM employee was a safe bet for the future and retires in a time when many have to wonder what comes next.  But, through it all, he was a hard working and dedicated employee, who delivered value, and through his working years at GM, bought a home, raised a family, and now in his ‘retirement’ years plans to focus his energies on building another business – his own. 

I’m proud of him.  He’s a great example of what it means to grow up in a GM Family.  And I know that his own business will prosper because he brings to it a dedication to customer service and quality  that will make his customers keep coming back and even more important – tell their friends about him.

Also today, I saw an article pop up from AdAge with another footnote to the GM Story.  This one too was another goodbye – After Talks to Sell Fall Through, GM Says Goodbye to Saturn.  The story chronicles Saturn’s story through it’s ads.  It’s dedication to innovation and service, the commitment it had to its customers and in many ways the feeling of engagement it’s employees, dealers and customers had in turn with Saturn.     Now with the Penske deal falling through, soon Saturn will be no more.

Saturn was once the shining star of General Motors, yet through years of corporate in-fighting and internal politics between the GM car divisions and the resulting challenges created for Sayurn, the fledgling brand could not grow to fulfill its promise.  Now Saturn is becoming ‘GM’s orphaned child’ – with no opportunity for a new homecoming on the horizon. 

Saturn employees and dealers put together a valiant fight to save something they believed in – a quality product, a new way of doing business, and commitment to giving the customer what they want through partnerships as shown in this – one of the last Saturn commercials.  Unfortunately, it looks like this time, they could not win the battle.

In kind of an odd twist -

the last car my brother ever built at the GM Newark Delaware plant,

was a Saturn SKY. 

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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What would you do if your friends all disappeared?

Have you ever had a dream where you were surrounded by people and then in an instant you were all alone? As if a wizard waved a magic wand and all of your friends disappeared? 

Hopefully in the waking world, there are no powerful wizards to wave a magic wand and make your true friends evaporate, but in today’s wonderful world of technology, it can seem like everything is fine and then… Poof – your Twitter account is gone, or you have lost your email and phone contact list, or worse you have lost EVERYTHING on your computer! 

Suddenly you are looking around saying “Hey – Where did everybody go?!”

It would be great if this too only happened in fairy tales; but, I have heard too many real life stories from friends who have it happen to them.

Perhaps the information was on a work computer and they lost their job.  Or, their Twitter account got taken away for a reason only Twitter knows – and good luck getting someone to tell you why any time soon.  And even if they do the damage is already done.  Oh no,  those little green meanies attacked – a computer virus infects your computer and your phone all at the same time and a lifetime worth of contacts disappear in a puff of smoke.  Now this is the stuff that any business person’s nightmares are made of.

It can happen to anybody and happen it does – frequently.  Every one of these scenarios happened to friends of mine in the last few weeks.  So it helps to add a little redundancy to your life.  Here are a few tips…

For Twitter

1.  If you are on Twitter and your Twitter ID is linked to your job, start a personal Twitter account that is not work related and ask you real friends on Twitter to follow you there too.  That way, if you change jobs, you have not lost all your friends across the twitterverse,  You know, the ones you spent all that time developing relationships with.

2.  Use a free service like TweetTake to down load a CSV file in Excel once each month.  I do this regularly after my monthly clean up process.  Another free service, Tweet Back will soon have this process automated so you can do  it every day.  That way if you do have a problem you have list to try and restore your friends list from.

For your personal and business contacts

1.  Connect with friends on multiple platforms like Facebook, Plaxo and LinkedIn.  That way if your personal computer systems fail or your job goes away, you have not lost all your key contacts. An added plus to these systems is that as your friends move around – you get the updated information too.

2.  GMAIL is a great free back up plan, even if you do not use it as your main email address or client.  Simply export your address book from MS Outlook or other program to a CSV file and upload it to GMAIL.  Now you have a free back up on the Google network of servers.

Like it or not – your life is linked to your computer

1.  Have multiple computer back ups!  Back up your computer regularly and have more than one back up file so that if one gets corrupted the other one works.  (This is also critically important if you also keep key personal or financial information on your home or laptop computer not to mention all your pictures and other priceless digital keepsakes.)

2.  Remote Back Ups are like Fire and Casualty Insurance – just common sense.  For your home or for your office and especially if your home IS your office, having everything in one location can be a problem.  Fires, floods and break ins can and do happen.  A remote back up system can be a life saver.  There are a number of systems out there, one that is very reasonably priced (<$5/month) is Mozy by Decho, for larger systems, like an office, I have had also had great results with Data Preserve.  There are lots of services out there, but which ever one you ultimately choose, having a remote backup is not something to WISH you had the day AFTER you have a problem.

Yes, your digital life can change like that – Poof!  It never hurts to be prepared with a little magic of your own.

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay Tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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Small Business…BIG Impact

When you are talking about economic impact, small business is a BIG deal.  For two years I had the opportunity to serve as the CEO of the Arizona Small Business Association and and on the Board of Trustees of the National Small Business Association.  During that time.  I sat and talked with many small business owners, toured their offices and factories, listened to their stories,  and then traveled to the Arizona Capitol and to Washington D.C. to share those stories with Senators and Representatives. 

Retreats at the Edward Lowe Foundation in Cassopolis, Michigan and visits to the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation in Kansas City where times to exchange ideas with economic developers from around the country on how to make a difference in our local communities as well as at the national level.

What I learned, I shared in the pages of BizAZ Magazine, on our blog, and with ANY audience that would listen.  To paraphrase Bob Dylan, the times, they were a changing.  Here are some clips from one of those talks from October of 2007…

Joan Koerber-Walker on Small Busness and Economic Recovery

Let’s look at the facts from the most recent

SBA Office of Advocacy Report

In the United States, small firms with less that 500 employees:

• Represent 99.7 percent of all employer firms.
• Employ just over half of all private sector employees.
• Pay 44 percent of total U.S. private payroll.
• Have generated 64 percent of net new jobs over the past 15 years. 
• Create more than half of the nonfarm private gross domestic
  product (GDP). 
• Hire 40 percent of high tech workers (such as scientists, engineers, and computer programmers). 
• Are 52 percent home-based and 2 percent franchises. 
• Made up 97.3 percent of all identified exporters and produced  30.2 percent of the known export value in FY 2007.
• Produce 13 times more patents per employee than large patenting firms; these patents are twice as likely as large firm patents to be among the one percent most cited.

Source: SBA office of Advocacy,  U.S. Dept. of Commerce, Bureau of the Census and International Trade Admin.; Advocacy-funded research by Kathryn Kobe, 2007  and CHI Research, 2003 ; U.S. Dept. of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Where will recovery REALLY come from?

Today, economists and business experts are saying that “the recession is over and we are beginning our gradual climb out.”  Assuming that Wall Street and the financial markets don’t implode again, they are probably right.  But if we want to speed up the recovery process, we need  to shift our thinking and economic support more to what can we do DIRECTLY to give small businesses the resources that they need to grow.  That is where the real net job growth will come from.  Until  we get our unemployment problem solved, we don’t get our consumer confidence problem resolved.  If no one is buying – there is no recovery.   It’s that simple.

We need jobs to get the economy growing again and that means we need to supply the resources SMALL Businesses need to create jobs.  Current programs to provide training and loans for ‘bankable’ businesses are being provided at a variety of levels.  But the sad truth is that many high growth potential small businesses are not not bankable by today’s standards.  The economic conditions of the last year have hit their balance sheets too hard. 

The graph below shows where job growth actually came from in the period from 2005 to 2007.  Stage One firms are those with less than 10 employees.  Stage Two is 10- 99 employees, Stage Three is 100 – 499, and Stage Four is BIG Business 500+ employees.  What you are looking at is a national snapshot, but you can look at your state, country or MSA also at YourEconomy.org.

It’s time for something new

If we want to jump start the economy and get on the road to real recovery, maybe its time for a new type of economic stimulus.  Instead of investing in programs to train small business on how to grow – lets create new programs to allow them the access to capital they need to actually do it.  The old ways are not working very well – and in the words of the last election – IT’S TIME FOR CHANGE. 

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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Riding the Entrepreneurial Roller Coaster

Have you ever wondered about our fascination with roller coasters ? People from all over the world have been flocking to ride these engineering  marvels since as far back as the 17th century, although the earliest ‘thrill’ ride did not have rollers or wheels at all but rather flew on tracks of ice. 

Roller coasters, as we know them today, have come a long way from the ‘ice mountains’ in the time of the Russian Czars, but some things still hold true.  They fascinate us, they can make us nauseous, and often have us screaming as we fly up to the peak and rush headlong down into the valley.  Step right up to the roller coaster.  It is guaranteed to provide a rush of adrenaline and a wild ride. (History of the Roller Coaster – Wikipedia)

As I sat working on business plans and reviewing financing packages today, I suddenly struck me how much in common the roller coaster and the entrepreneurial journey really do have in common.

Think about it, entrepreneurs fascinate us, we watch successful ones like they are rock stars, and look away with a gulp at the poor guy who is losing his lunch – or his business – as he staggers away.  Any entrepreneur will tell you,  THAT can happen to anybody.

Like roller coasters, most entrepreneurial ventures labor rung by rung up that first great grade to reach that first big win, opportunity, or investor.   And  then reality hits, and there is so much WORK to do, and you are sliding down, before you begin the next great climb.  It’s a wonder more of us are not throwing up our arms and screaming!  If you stay the entrepreneurial circuit long enough, you are sure to hit its highs and lows. Even the legendary entrepreneurial success stories like Microsoft and Cisco have had their fair share of peaks and valleys along the way.

Like roller coasters, that struggled financially and almost disappeared completely during the Great Depression, entrepreneurs have faced times when economic conditions where almost too much to take.  But then a spark of innovation, or a new idea gets them fired up all over again.

That’s the thing about veteran entrepreneurs, just like veteran roller coaster riders, as soon as the ride is over, they often get right back in line to take the journey again. 

I wonder if a study has ever been done on what percent of entrepreneurs LIKE to ride roller coasters.   Or, if serial entrepreneurs are especially addicted?  It might make for interesting reading.

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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The greatest message will have no impact…

The greatest message in the world will have no impact if no one is listening.  This is not exactly a new concept.  But if you forget it, you can get into BIG trouble.

You may have heard the famous riddle:

“If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?“

While often attributed to Irish Philosopher George Berkeley, this is more likely a paraphrase of Berkeley’s writings from his musings in A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, that delved into knowledge and perception.

From Berkeley’s perspective,

“To be is to be perceived” .

In the language of the great philosophers if his day, the maxim was “Esse est percipi“.

In the language of today’s business we might say …

If you are not perceived to exist, you do not exist.

But what does this have to do with business and messaging?

Actually quite a bit.  Berkeley may have been writing in a time before any of our businesses where even a glimmer, but when you apply his words to the goal of growing a business, they are profound.

“If you have a great MESSAGE and no one is around to hear it – does your message matter?

The answer is Probably Not.  Too often I have seen companies fail.  It was not because they did not have a great product or service – they did.  They failed for the simple reason that the right audience NEVER GOT THE MESSAGE.  Since the message never reached the customer. employee, partner, or investor, the perception of value was not created – and the company did not get what they needed – more sales, more productive employees, better partnerships, or investment dollars.  Eventually, the companies failed to achieve their goals or in some cases disappeared completely.

In business, perception IS reality

Equally important is how your target audience perceives your message or business.  You may have the best service or widget in the  world, but if aren’t aware of it and perceive the value to THEM, you are just whistling into the wind.

So if Audience and Perception are that important …

Here are some tips for finding an audience and helping to shape perception.

1. Know who your audience is. Unless you have universal product – EVERYONE is not your market.  Define them first!
2. Understand where they hang out. This is the first rule of both messaging and networking.  If you are singing like a bird in an empty forest.  You will have very little impact.  No one will hear you. Use media – both social and traditional wisely.  Unless you have unlimited funds, look at the demographics of the audience BEFORE you invest your time and money there.
3. Share a message that provides value to the listener. Do your homework on what your target audience is hoping to learn, to solve, to fix.  Build your message around how your product or service will do just that.
4. Never forget – the perceptions AND words of others will always be more powerful than your own. You can spend millions and have your reputation destroyed when unhappy customers, employees, or partners raise their voice, just as your fame can be assured when enthusiastic customers, employees, or partners spread the word.

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay Tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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The Power of Building a Community

There are few things as powerful in this world as when people come together as a community to make something happen.

In it’s simplest form, a community is defined as a unified body of individuals.  In it’s most powerful, it is a force that can accomplish  almost any goal.

In the world of business, our professional communities are where we go to exchange ideas, to study, to learn, and  to bond together to address major issues.

Our customer communities can give us insight into how our products work,or how they should.  If we take the time to listen, user communities can light the way along the path to innovation.

Without community there can be no innovation.  It is our community that accepts our invention, validates it, accepts it and adopts it.  Then and only then is innovation truly real.

But the power of community is not limited to business – it is around us in every corner of our lives.  Community can be family. For many it is the congregation of those who share beliefs and faith in something greater than themselves.

And today, in our evolving technology world, we are seeing new communities emerge across social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, connecting people – many who have never met or may never meet in real life -but yet hold common interests, form bonds, and support each other in a myriad of ways.

Sometimes community relationships last a life time, and in others they form and disband quickly after the need or project has has passed.  But while the community exists, it can be a powerful force and a source of inspiration.

For me, great examples of the power of what communities can do are all around.  Here are just a few:

The Opportunity Through Entrepreneurship Foundation

OTEF started when Francine Hardaway set out on a mission to help at risk populations find self-sufficiency through entrepreneurship.  She reached out to her community of friends and to the greater community of entrepreneurs for help.  Projects like this need funding – so in the true spirit of entrepreneurs – they created a product and took it to the marketplace.  In this case that product was the Arizona Entrepreneurship Conferences.  Each year entrepreneurs gather to hear ideas from others on what it takes to build a community, to launch businesses, and to realize goals.  ALL of the speakers donate  their time and talents, and ALL of the conference proceeds go to support OTEF’s mission.  Now going into it’s fourth year, entrepreneurial leaders like Michael Gerber, Pat Sullivan, Gary Vaynerchuck, Robert Scoble, and Matt Mullenwig have shared the stage with over 100 local CEOS, all sharing ideas while supporting OTEF in making a difference.

#BeOriginal

Some late night musings, evolved into a blog post on how to be original.  With an  idea that it would be fun to share original ideas with friends in a place where we could all find them,  I blogged it as Why #BeOriginal to let my friends know.  Over time a community formed across the broader Twitter community made up of people who love to share their own ideas with others.  Just look at all the insights that have been shared to date and with more and more coming every day.  Another friend helped set up a TWUB so we could make the sharing even easier.

Communities lend a hand

Not long ago, a friend  experienced one of the deepest of tragedies – the loss of his son at a time when on top of the emotional burden, the financial one was more that he could handle.   Members of his community came together – not just to offer friendship -  but to offer dollars to help with the funeral expenses.  The call went out across Twitter and Facebook, and the community responded.

But it is not just in times of sorrow.  Communities can gather to celebrate wonderful events, the birth of a child, an anniversary, or a wedding.

It was a converging of communities that inspired this blog post.

I read a story, written by a young Mom, that I had come to know through our exchanges on BloggersBase.  Her name is Kathryn and she writes as Kaytii or RMS Snowdrop.  On   9/11 she shared a story – Open Your Hearts to a Stranger. In it she told the story of a young couple who were planning to get married.    They had two other special people in their lives – their best man and maid of honor.  The couple wanted to share their joy and special day with these two important people.

Then came the news that the best man would be deploying to Afghanistan.  To have him at the wedding, they would have to move up the date by almost a year!  Financially, they were not ready.  Good friends decided to help.  Through online communities, people have come together to offer little things, small donations of money, a topper for the wedding cake, help with flowers, and simple things to help make the young couple’s dream come true.  The wonder of it is that many of these people have never met each other, and maybe never will.

But together they are a community – people bonding together at a place in time – to make a  difference.

I think I like that definition of community best of all.

Thanks for stopping by. Stay tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

Author’s Note:  After reading’s Kaytii’s story about Shauna and Derrick, I sent her a tweet with my phone number and suggested we talk.  We got together on the phone and shared ideas on how we could help make a dream come true.  One of the ideas was to share her message with my community – adding it to hers.  And that is what I just did.

Oh, and I also DID make a contribution to the wedding fund.  If you would like to share in a little piece of the community that is trying to grant a very simple wish – here is the link.

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Curing Healthcare – you have to start somewhere

As a leader, one of the most damaging things that you can do in times of crisis is to do NOTHING.  As I have been listening to and reading about the ongoing national healthcare debate, one question keeps running through my mind.

When are we going to stop talking about it …

and start doing something about it?

At one point in my career, from December of 2006 to December of 2008, I had the honor of serving as the CEO of ASBA, the Arizona Small Business Association, and on the Board of Trustees at NSBA, the National Small Business Association.

As the owner of a small business myself, I had seen the challenges faced by small business owners when it came to the accessibility and affordability of healthcare insurance.  At  the time, it was a personal issue I dealt with and not a major focus of my attention.

Then came my role at ASBA  and a day when solving the healthcare problem, at least for small businesses in the State of Arizona, became MY problem.  This video is a clip from a talk I gave on the topic of Healthcare when ASBA  launched its solution for Arizona Small Businesses in 2008.  It started like this…

Putting the health back into healthcare in the United States is not a simple problem.  In fact it’s complexity is staggering.  Here are just a few of it’s components – I know I will miss many more.  Don’t pillory me for it.  Instead I encourage you to add to the list in the comments section of this post. (For more information, click the links to articles in each description.)

Structural issues

Right or wrong, our current system is is supported as an insurance based system.  Healthcare is paid for by Medicare/Medicaid (public insurance) or private insurance in most cases.  For those without adequate coverage, the costs can be financially crippling and their unpaid bills get paid by everyone else in the form of higher premiums as explained in this article from Arizona State University’s Knowledge@WPCarey.

Ethical Issues

What should we do?  Who should we help?  What should we pay for?  What should we not?  The answers to these questions reach into much deeper ethical, moral, and legal discussions on highly volatile issues including aging, illegal immigration, abortion, euthanasia, stem cell research, and the quality and accessibility of care.  An that’s just the tip of the iceberg! The study of BioEthics now even has it’s own Presidential Commission.

Financial Issues

If you think this is all about health, think again.  The healthcare crisis in the US is a major economic issue as illustrated in this article from Forbes on July 3, 2009.  In this report from the Congressional Budget Office total spending on health care in the economy has doubled over the last 30 years to a current level of about 16% of GDP. CBO estimates that this percentage will double again over the next 25 years to 31% of GDP.  Today, it is estimated that as much as 60% of personal bankruptcies in the US are tied to healthcare related issues.  But if we do not get the costs,  and the resultant Federal deficits under control the fall out could be the greatest financial mess the world has ever seen.

Solving the problem will need to address how to find new cost efficiencies in healthcare delivery, behavioral changes among the US population to reduce health risk factors, new protocols for treatment and cost management, and many many more issues.

We will also need to redesign our reimbursement systems.  Today, the set payment schedules for Medicare and Medicaid are below the actual costs the doctors and hospitals incur.  The short fall is then passed along to the costs charged to private insured and private payers  – a practice called cost shifting.  But as we have seen, even this has not been enough to keep many medical centers and hospitals financially healthy – see this July 7, 2008 article from the Washington Post for a good explanation of the problem and since this was written the problem has only gotten worse.

Technology Issues

In recent years, we have looked to technology to solve other problems – it will work for healthcare too, right?  Unfortunately not.  While US healthcare, for those that can afford it, is some of the best in the world, each advancement has a price and contributes to the rising healthcare costs.

E-medical records, a popular topic earlier this year when major funding was allocated as part of the stimulus package by Congress will pay off over time, but not in the immediate future as it carries a high price for implementation.  This presentation by Michael H. Zaroukian, MD, PhD, FACP of Michigan State University helps break it down.

Break throughs in Pharma and Biotech will help us improve quality of life, aid in early detection, and treatment of chronic diseases.  (A major portion of today’s healthcare spend.) But, today’s legislation has little to do with funding support for these technologies at they level that will be required to really speed up the process.

State Sovereignty Issues

Many of the factors that are driving up the costs of the healthcare system are legislated on a state by state basis.  Congress will have a problem making any real change here without overriding or preempting many state laws.  These include the costs of defensive medicine and malpractice insurance costs that will continue to escalate until we reform our tort systems at the state level. In addition, mandates on a state by state level require that certain care or services be provided and covered.  Each and every one of these items has a cost.  Thus the cost of providing healthcare can fluctuate significantly from state to state.

Personal Responsibility Issues

If you have noticed, so far, the focus has been heavily on what ‘they’ have to do to fix the problem.  But there is another major issue that can not be overlooked – and that is our own personal behaviors.  It has been said that the US has a sick care system, not a health care system.  But the shift from sick care to a health focus is not in the government’s hands, it’s in ours.  It has been estimated that regular check ups can play a major role in early detection of chronic disease and that early detection leads to major cost savings – not to mention longer lives.  Yet at the same time, a large majority of those of us who have a wellness plan as part of our health insurance don’t even use it. Health in the US population did not get a great score on it’s report card in 2008 as you can read in this article from Time.

Uncertainty Issues.

And running through it all is  the issue of uncertainty.  None of us know what is going to happen at this point.  Businesses are putting off health insurance decisions and states are in a quandary as to what they should be doing – if they could even pay for it.

Hospitals, doctors, and insurance companies alike are delaying the launch of new programs that could help make a difference because they have yet to learn the new rules of the game.  Basically, progress has stopped!

The Ugly Truth

No one piece of Federal legislation will have the magic prescription to solve this problem.  And for all the shouting, the final bill that will be voted on by the House and the Senate does not even exist yet.  Then and if they can get it through Congress this session, it will be an ongoing process for years to structure all the regulations, set up systems, start a never ending process of revisions, and have any lasting effect.

No matter what we do or how the system changes, some will benefit more than others. Some people will pay more, and some will pay less.  New systems will emerge, and others will fail.

But we will never have any improvements if we do not take the first step.  And If we fail to make improvements, our healthcare structure will ultimately fail.  We already  know that the foundation is seriously damaged.

To wrap things up, there is an old fable about a man who claimed he could eat an elephant.  When other’s scoffed that it was impossible to do so, he simply shared his strategy…

You do it one bite at a time.

Well today, putting the health back into healthcare is our elephant – and it is well past time we took that first bite.

Thanks for stopping by.  Stay Tuned…

Joan Koerber-Walker

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