I read this and the following posts on Bnet.com – I encourage all connected to Enigin to read each one of these:

The Lawsuit Winner

PROFILE: Name: Marv Doniger Age: 65 Location: Laguna Niguel, Calif. Source of wealth: After a bout with cancer, Doniger won $3.3 million in a medical malpractice lawsuit. How did you get rich? I was forced to retire as a result of my longtime physician failing to recognize that I had cancer. After three months at UCLA Hospital and having lost my bladder, I was released — unable to walk. I have regained the ability to walk but was unable to resume my career as a management consultant to Fortune 500 companies. After years of litigation and two trials, I was awarded $3.3 million. What did you buy? I have acquired a car and two poodles, Will & Grace, who are my constant companions. I also set up a trust fund for my grandchildren. Smartest thing you spent it on? Investments that I made in accordance with my previously developed financial plan. Dumbest thing you spent it on? I did not make any dumb financial decisions because I had a financial strategy and plan to cover the financial needs of my wife and myself. I have always looked at windfalls as something to be saved not squandered. Since I am no longer able to function as a management consultant, I chose to deploy the funds so as to ensure my wife’s and my financial future. What are you doing now? Based on my experience and reflection on my own personal financial plans, I have written books on managing finances. Advice to others? A sudden influx of money presents one with a set of choices. You can use it to satisfy near-term desires, or use it to ensure your financial future. Develop a strategy for dealing with unforeseen financial needs. And beware of those who present you with investment ideas you don’t understand and don’t need to achieve your financial goals.

I read this and the following posts on Bnet.com – I encourage all connected to Enigin to read each one of these:

The Entrepreneur

PROFILE: Name: Tracy Howe Age: 40 Location: Frenchtown, N.J. Source of wealth: In 2007, Howe and her husband, Peter Kraft, sold their college-recruiting software company for a multimillion-dollar sum. How did you get rich? First of all … “rich” means different things to different people. To us it doesn’t just mean money, it means a house full of people, animals and activity. It means a “rich” life full of things to do. We made our by money building a technology company, Goalquest, in higher education. We built it from scratch and sold it eight years later. What did you buy? We bought a house in the Hamptons as an investment property, but we haven’t gotten our money out of it yet. Fortunately, the Hamptons is as near a recession-proof location as you can get, so we’re optimistic about this investment. We also bought a horse farm in Florida — we’re equestrians and show “jumpers,” and we participate at the Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington, Fla. That area, unfortunately, isn’t as recession-proof as the Hamptons. Not only didn’t we get our money out of that investment yet, but we’ll probably lose money on that one. The market in Florida is terrible. We also bought a few horses for us. Smartest thing you spent it on? Our kids’ private education. It’s incredible how much we can see the positive impact the school is having on their development, maturity and confidence. Dumbest thing you spent it on? A very expensive grand prix show jumper [horse] for our trainer to ride and then resell. That definitely did not work out the way we had hoped it would. What are you doing now? We started a new business in social philanthropy called SequentialT. We sell sequentially numbered shirts to people around the world. Each shirt raises money for charity and counts people in to a united effort to make the world a better place. Advice to others? Take the time to think through want you really want for the next stage of your life, and don’t rush into things too quickly. With unlimited amounts of money can come impulsive behavior. I think it’s important to reward yourself for your success, but then you need proper planning for creating long-lasting assets so that you never [again] have to feel financial pressures.

It’s everyone’s dream: Win the lottery! Sell your company for millions! Invent Beanie Babies and move to Fiji! In truth, though, instant millionaires don’t quite get the joy ride they are hoping for. There may be a giddy rush of success, but the new money can also cause an enormous amount of anxiety.

In fact, when we interviewed some of the suddenly wealthy — a former flight attendant whose side business took off, a cancer survivor who won a medical malpractice judgment, a factory worker who won the lottery — we found a thread of caution running through all their responses.

Read on to see their stories over the next few weeks:

The Inventor

PROFILE: Name: Sandy Stein Age: 59 Location: West Hills, Calif. Source of wealth: The former flight attendant created a product that helps people find their lost keys How did you get rich? I invented Finders Key Purse about 6 years ago. In our first year of business we sold over 1 million items, bringing in more than $4 million! It’s six years later and each year our numbers go up a little bit. What did you buy? I bought a new Lexus convertible and paid cash for it and didn’t even get a deal! I just took it right off the lot. I went on many trips and enjoyed plays, musicals, and concerts — as many as I wanted to see without feeling guilty. I even took my staff to Las Vegas for the weekend to celebrate our fifth anniversary. Smartest thing you spent it on? A team of lawyers who have been protecting my patent from all the copycats who think it’s OK to steal my idea. Dumbest thing you spent it on? Paying full retail for my car. I have never done that before, nor will I ever do it again! What are you doing now? I quit in 2005, after 35 years [as a flight attendant]. Now I am in the office five days a week, going to trade shows, and figuring out how to make more sales and solidify a spot in the marketplace. Advice to others? It is fun to share your wealth with your community and friends. It is fun to spend the money on things you normally would not have spent it on, when you had limited funds. But it is even more fun to invest it wisely so that you don’t have to worry what home your son is going to put you in as you get older.

If you are an Enigin Distributor running your energy saving business, or any other manager or businessman, you must ask yourself why an employee is off sick, is it genuine? Are they really ill or swinging the lead?

Well, a group of Swedish researchers have discovered that some employees are facing extreme workplace stress, having trouble in their relationship with their boss, or having trouble getting along with  fellow workers  and hence are more likely to take sick leave.

The researchers analysed 546 instances of sick leaves taken by 432 Swedish workers at six different workplaces.  In the first day or two of sick leave, the researchers telephoned the people who had called in sick and asked them about several different aspects of their work situation.

The study revealed:

• People who called in sick were more likely to have experienced psycho-social problems at work in the past few days than people who did not.
• The most common psycho-social problem reported by the people who had called in sick was a ‘very stressful work situation, indicated by more tasks, fewer staff, or a larger field of responsibility than usual.’
• Problems in one’s relationships with colleagues and bosses were also associated with a higher incidence of sick leave.
• Other stressors, such as harassment, discrimination, and being assigned ‘unpleasant tasks’ were not associated with an increased incidence of sick leave.

Are these workers physically sick or just trying to cope?

One explanation for the findings is that employees, when faced with a very stressful work situation, either consciously or unconsciously used the sick time for a ‘mental health day’ so they could face their jobs relatively refreshed after sick leave. It could be that stressors such as harassment and being assigned unpleasant tasks did not encourage people to call in sick because a few days’ reprieve might not make much difference-the tasks or the discrimination would still be there when the worker returned.

Another explanation is that those in highly stressful jobs are more likely to get sick. This wouldn’t be the first study to find a correlation between stress, the immune system, and illness. The most common reasons workers called in sick were colds, flu, and headaches.

Has stress from your job made you sick?

(Source Bnet.com)

At Enigin we have a great range of energy saving and efficiency products, but being cutting edge and very high quality, they can be more expensive than inferior products. Hence, Enigin Distributors are skilled at presenting the benefits of Enigin products, but can still suffer.

We train Enigin Distributors to overcome this problem, which involves a substantial changes to their sales approach.

The problem is that similar equipment (or claims to be similar) to what they sell is available cheaper from another source.

To solve the problem, you must change the way that you charge for your products.  You must stop selling the “Equipment” and instead sell a “Energy and Cost Saving” solution. This is an important distinction.

When you sell the equipment, you are devaluing the important part, which is making the equipment run reliably, consistently, save them energy and costs. Furthermore, you get involved in a price war with another channel for that physical object.

From here on, when you present, you sell the equipment as just a part of a whole package, bundled with all the advice and ongoing support, possibly with a contract for training and maintenance, and make it clear that they can’t get those if they don’t buy from you.

You could also build a comparison, showing the competitor’s breakage rates and the cost of those outages, as they balloon through the entire operation. You present this data along with a story about a real customer who got burnt.

None of this is terribly difficult, but it does require Enigin Distributors to rethink your business model and how you present your offering.

Here are 20 common-sense things NOT to do on a sales call:

• Flirt with the admin. It may seem tempting, but unless you’ve got soap-opera-quality looks, chances are you’re only going to annoy (or even alarm) the admin, who will tell the boss.  Instead: Stay polite, friendly and respectful.
• Talk more than you listen. Initial sales calls are all about relationship building and gathering information, which you can’t do if your mouth is moving.  Instead: Get curious about the customer and ask questions.
• Comment on the memento. The last 372 people who came into that office remarked about the signed baseball on the desk.  Ho-hum…  Instead: Research the prospect and ask about the prospect’s job.
• Pretend to drop by. Who are you kidding?  Do you think that it’s going to cushion the rejection if you pretend that it’s not a sales call?  Instead: Have something important to say or sell that justifies your presence.
• Answer your cell phone. Ouch! Ouch!  What were you thinking?  How could any telephone call be more important than a real live prospect?  Instead: Turn it off and leave it in your briefcase.
• Overstay your welcome. Your prospect has hundreds of other things that he or she could be doing, rather than spending time with you.  Instead: Set a time limit for the call.
• Let the meeting meander. This isn’t the time for a wandering conversation that slowly gets to the point or a long series of complicated questions.  Instead: Provide brief agenda of how you expect the call to proceed.
• Argue with the customer. If the customer doesn’t agree with an important point, arguing is only going to set that opinion in stone.  Instead: ask the customer why he holds that opinion; then listen.
• Discuss politics or religion. Such subjects are almost always a trap into opinionated quicksand that’s hard or impossible to get out of.  Instead: keep the discussion on business or neutral ground.
• Dive into your product pitch. Sure you’ve got something to sell, but if you pitch too soon, you’ll get pitched out the door. Instead: Ask questions to understand needs, before you pitch.
• Arrive late to the call. If you don’t arrive on time it tell the customer clearly that you don’t give a damn about them or their time.  Instead: Always arrive 15 minutes ahead of time.  If you drive to calls, get a GPS.
• Appear flippant or sarcastic. A good-natured laugh at a joke might be taken personally by someone watching out the window, without hearing the context.  Instead: Watch your demeanor at all times.
• Lack requisite product knowledge. The prospect doesn’t want to hear “I need to get back to you about that”…over and over. Instead: make sure you’re trained on your current products and policies…before the call.
• Fail to plan the call. Sounds simple, but trying to close when should be qualifying (for example) is a lost sale.  Instead: Never enter a door without first thinking about what you plan to accomplish.
• Be too business-like at first. Remember you’re building bridges with another human being, not just a notch in your sales gun.  Instead: Smile and be friendly… but don’t get too gushy.
• Show up with a crowd. If you bring too many people, it will draw customer’s comments about why your costs so high  Instead: Use webconferencing when you need to include additional resources.
• Fail to check your appearance. Don’t show up with something amiss that a quick stop in the client’s bathroom could head off.  Instead: Make a quick pit stop – with a look-over – before the call.
• Forget the customers’ names. What could be more embarrassing than actually forgetting whom you’re talking with?  Instead: Write down the names down of everyone in the room with a small table diagram.
• Be rude to the admin. No flirting, of course, but if you act all arrogant and superior, you’ll just antagonize the help.  Instead: Be friendly and respectful of the staff – admin and otherwise.
• Ask personal questions. You may think that the customer is your friend, but you can easily screw up if it gets too personal.  Instead: Keep the conversation focused on business issues, especially the customer’s needs.

The title is from Bruce Springsteen song from the 1992 album Human Touch. The song was about the availability of channels on cable/satellite television, 57, yet despite this range of choice the song bemoans the lack of quality available, hence the title.

Now at Enigin we all enjoy our share of television – and often discuss it amongst the Enigin colleagues; who likes what; did you see that last night?; do you see what is on next week?; and so on.

Now almost 20 years since Bruce’s song have things improved?

A Google search tells me their are 480 TV channels in the UK, top of the list of European Countries making up 6500 TV channels, and there are1800 TV channels in the US.

All that choice – but is there much to choose from?

There will be the specialised channels and programmes that will appeal to a small audience, but generally nothing has changed since the release of Springsteen’s song – all those channels and most of it is not what we would choose to watch.

It underlines the truth of Cathy Ilani’s quote: “But it’s about quality, not quantity.” Well, at least it should be.

When I flick through all the listings on our telly I am amazed at the number of channels I have never watched, mainly because I do not want to. There is quality but not all the time, often the choice is between poor quality tekevision, or high quality re-runs which we have probably watched 10 times or more already.

Now, there is plenty of high quality TV shows out there, much very current or recent. In fact I would say there is far more quality television now than previously, it is often lost in the morass of listings and also tends to be show at the same time as other quality programmes – often meaning a choice and deciding to watch the re-run, some times just a day or a few days later.

I guess choice is the key – but I must admit I think it has got a bit daft – “1000s of Channels (And Nothin’ On)”

Being eco-friendly doesn’t have to come stapled with having long hair with flowers in it, singing songs about peace and utopia, or being a conservationist maniac. No It just means that you care about the planet you live on, basically. And that its health is important to you, as it also impacts on the health of all living things on Earth.

So, when governmental campaigns urge you to do your bit for the environment to prevent atrocious amounts of carbon emissions, record high levels of air pollution, and save animal species from becoming extinct, you probably feel empowered by good resolutions to help as much as possible, right?

Well the good news is: you can! It’s not even complicated. And companies like Enigin PLC are great allies to us, who wish to make tomorrow a better world for our children and future generations. Enigin offer business owners the chance to really make a difference in how much energy they use to run their businesses, and the best thing is, it actually saves them a lot of money at the same time!

Enigin provide clever and highly technological products which reduce energy consumption drastically. How, I hear you ask? By measuring how much energy is being used by a certain appliance (lighting, refrigeration, air conditioning?), using smart easy-to-read metering devices, they are able to identify where energy savings are possible and target those areas. The products they then install are intended to remedy the wastage and hence save the consumer hard-earned money. The investment made to buy the products initially is turned into profit really quickly, which makes the whole process morally and financially worthwhile
Enigin are very concerned with preserving the world’s resources by being as energy efficient as possible, all while giving people the possibility to cut their energy costs. Here are a few tips that may come in handy:

• - Don’t overheat your premises. Install a thermostat to maintain a temperature of 16°C in bedrooms and 19°C in other rooms. Lowering the temperature of your home by just 1°C could save you 7% on your electricity bill.
• - Replace ordinary light bulbs with high-efficiency ones. They may be more expensive but last 12 times longer and use 5 times less electricity. And switch the light off when you leave a room. Enigin provide a lighting system that is infallible for saving energy and money simultaneously, called LESS.
• - Turn off your TV, hi-fi, PC and DVD player. Even while on standby, they consume 10% more electricity.
• - Defrost your freezer. A 4mm coat of ice can double its consumption of electricity.
• - Encourage your company to go green by using heating and air conditioning reasonably. Enigin are your ideal partner for this, as they can install a specific device for this that saves a lot of wasted energy and saves up to 30% costs.

See? Simple! So let’s all be busy little bees to save our planet

I wish it was that simplistic, but at least saving energy does contribute to achieving this pretty picture! Enigin give people the opportunity to make a difference by providing all types of businesses with cost-effective solutions that allow them to save money but also a lot of energy. And this in turn helps reduce the business’ carbon emissions and its impact on the world’s natural resources.

Enigin have met a worldwide success and continue to do so, especially at the moment because of the global obsession with climate change and with the Copenhagen conference momentum. It’s a great thing that, at last, the world is fully aware of what the dangers are and how real the consequences of rising temperatures will be on us and our children.

I’ve often wondered in the past few years when the world was finally going to wake up and actually do something constructive to help reduce pollution. To me, it’s been illogical and frightening to think that people could just ‘not care’. How is that possible? The most beautiful thing we have is our planet and destroying surely can’t come as a resounding great idea to anyone, can it? The air smelling smoky and toxic, the water supplies diminishing, and the ozone depleting… These things have always made me feel very sad because I have always witnessed people acting as though nothing was happening, as though pollution was normal… But now, this is slowly changing, behaviors are evolving and policies are being put in place to finally control all this and try to repair the damage that has been done.

Saving energy is one of the most effective ways of being proactive about tackling climate change and reducing the amount of pollution that is pumped into the atmosphere. Enigin know this and the products they offer are therefore highly demanded all over the world because it is in a businessman’s interest to invest in energy efficient technology. Doing your bit for the environment is gratifying in itself, but Enigin allow businesses to combine this with saving money, which is a valuable bonus they can’t turn down.

Have you ever considered a submarine journey? You can buy Red Letter days as gifts and presents for people. Days out such as Hot Air Balloon rides, river rapids, helicopter flying or driving fast cars! But what about a journey on a submarine.

As yet I have never seen this as an option but wouldn’t it be an experience!! Personally I have never even been onto a submarine as I imagine the majority of people haven’t. But perhaps they could offer it as a Red Letter Day. The option to go aboard a submarine, have a go taking it under the water which is quite fascinating. Perhaps make use of that little spy hole thing they use to look above the water! That always looks pretty cool in the films.

But then realistically would it be as exciting and different as it looks in all the films. When there is some crisis going on and the submarine suddenly comes into action, no one knowing it is there as it is hidden under water.

What other different and interesting options could there be for a Red Letter Day? How about doing “a day in the life” – that could potentially be pretty good. Or the opposite and be very boring depending on who it was.

You could do it within the workplace even, try a different job for a day. Here at Enigin we could have “a day in the life of” another member of staff, see how they do their job and the importance perhaps that has on the company in in comparison with our own role. Would be a good way to see how their role affects the job we at Enigin are working to achieve in helping businesses become energy efficient.

Could be quite an interesting and team building exercise! Clearly not as adventurous as a Red Letter Day but within the office, its something a little different maybe.