Community. A friend started a real estate brokerage a few years ago. By the time she'd added her second employee, she was a pillar of her 35,000-person community. No rule says that only the local banker or car dealer can organize the program to raise supplemental funds for the public library or send the high school band on a well-earned special trip. Participating in community affairs, with time more than dollars, is good business from day one. It gets your name around, adds to your distinctiveness, and, best of all, makes you an attractive employer (which is the key to sustained success).

The best leaders are the best notetakers, best askers, and best learners.

I believe in the age of the Internet, Facebook and Twitter, that relationships are everything.

I am confident that for the foreseeable future (barring some catastrophic event affecting economic, energy, electrical, and communications systems), many subpopulations that use information intensively (e.g., students, academics, library patrons, white collar workers) will be using some sort of portal information appliance.

Customers perceive service in their own unique, idiosyncratic, emotional, irrational, end-of-the-day, and totally human terms. Perception is all there is!

Test fast, fail fast, adjust fast.

OLD: Be No.1 or No.2 in Your Market. NEW: Find a Niche, Create Something New.