Seems like LinkedIn is benefiting from the recent financial industries crisis.  According to a post at Cheezhead they have had significant increases in registrations and in recommendations:

The site has reported a 17 percent increase in registrations in the last two weeks. They are now claiming to reach 28 million users, up one million from last quarter.

Reports show that memberships from people representing the financial sector have also doubled after thousands of people have been laid off or threatened with termination as closures and mergers usurp industry leaders and rattle the core of the sector.

The site also claims to have seen a 14 percent increase in recommendations, most likely a result of users scrambling to attach praise to their resume in order to find stable jobs in a worsening economy.

I’m sure that other sites are seeing an increase in activity from the financial sector as well (i.e. Monster, CareerBuilder, Plaxo, Facebook, etc.)  Understatement—-I have a feeling you can find many financial industry candidates on these boards/sites right now.

Comments(0)

We often tell sales managers to allow salespeople to make mistakes, to stumble through a low value opportunity.  These “bloody nose” lessons (as my father calls them) are just as valuable as huge successes.

I often learn more from mistakes than successes.  In that spirit, I stumbled across this article thanks to the JustSell.com guys.  The article details different products that literally came about via mistakes.  Some examples – Coca-Cola, Scotchgard, Silly Putty, car tires and many more.

This one caught my attention:

Yellow sticky notes, officially known as Post-it Notes, got their start in 1968 when a 3M researcher tried to improve adhesive tape. What he got was a semisticky adhesive–not exactly what you want out of tape. Even so, he knew he had something cool–he just didn’t know what to do with it.

Four years later, another 3M scientist was getting frustrated. This scientist was a member of his church choir, and he kept dropping the bookmarks stuck in his hymnal. What he needed was something that would stick without being too sticky–something just like that weak glue his colleague had accidentally created. In 1980 the Post-it Note became an official product and a huge hit.

A mistake that eventually became an everyday office staple.  As a sales manager, only fear mistakes from your salespeople if they don’t learn from them.

Comments(2)