Watch the Earthday A.M. Exchange on Youtube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1e7gOlhIqU
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NOW, Discover Your Strengths
Now, Discover Your Strengths is a great book.  This book, and its integrated Internet based StrengthsFinder Profile, helps identify what your 5 dominant themes/strengths are and helps you figure out how they can be best translated into personal and career success.
The premise of the book is that we spend most of our time trying to become more competent in areas that, on a scale of 1 – 10, we will never become more than a 5 or 6. We should be concentrating on those 5 dominant strengths that are identified for us through the Profile program. I found the book and profile very helpful for myself and also for my staff (it was required reading for every current employee and every new hire for my staff is required to read the book, each provides to me their profile). It gives me an immediate read on their strengths and also gives them something new to contemplate and work on. For while we might have a sense of what our strengths are, this brings them to “top of mind” status. In almost every instance everyone who receives their Profile says, “Yes, those are my strengths”. I have each staff member’s strengths mapped out on a grid for easy reference.
As a tool it allows me to know which account executive, if I know the culture of the company, may be right to sell into specific accounts.
I recommend it to all people interested in indentifying and building on their own strengths, and their staff’s strengths. I would like to think that this effort helps with Thermocopy’s endeavor to provide the best possible experience for our employees and our clients.
Knoxville Chamber Earth Day AM Exchange
The Earth Day event was very well attended this morning. That is always a good thing when you are paying for an event as a sponsor. I really like the new format as the “Business in the Green” contest has evolved into the GoGreentET.com Green Business Recognition event. It is more inclusive and gives a greater number of businesses the chance to showcase the programs they already have put into place. Kudos to Amy Nolan for steering the program in this direction.
Attendees at this morning's Earth Day a.m. Exchange
Yours truly spoke this morning and what follows are my comments.
“On behalf of Thermocopy I welcome you to the Earth Day a.m. Exchange. It is great to see such a good turnout this morning. I would like to thank the Knoxville Chamber for the opportunity to sponsor this event and have a forum in which to bring attention to the environmental issues that face us all, and to tell you about Thermocopy. Also, thanks to Patrick Birmingham and the News-Sentinel for the use of their facilities.
Now I’d like to tell you a little about Thermocopy. We are East Tennessee’s largest and most experienced business technology company. We provide the infrastructure, whether hardware or software, to move information through your organization whether it is paper to paper, paper to digital, digital to paper, or digital to digital. And we allow you to do that in the most economical and environmentally friendly way.
I am proud that Thermocopy and its employees decided to meet the challenge of becoming more environmentally friendly several years ago. Since the inception of our Thermocopy Greenworks program in 2008 our organization has recycled over 343,000 pounds of paper products and e-scrap. I expect that number to jump significantly over the next several months as we install over 500 pieces of equipment into the Covenant Health system. We have been recognized on the state level with the Tennessee Department of Transportation’s “Award of Excellence for Public Education†for our internal Thermocopy Greenworks program and for the founding of GoGreenET.com.
We are being recognized this year at Ricoh Corporation’s Dealer Convention for our environmental initiatives. They are very impressed with GoGreenET.com and our Printworks Managed Document Services program, a program which helps our clients become more environmentally friendly. Printworks provides an environmental impact assessment that illustrates the favorable impact of implementing our solutions. Over 800 dealers from across the nation will be presented white papers concerning our programs and how they have helped our clients right here in Knoxville TN with their own environmental initiatives.
That being said, you should contact us for any of your information delivery system requirements.
Enough about Thermocopy, we are here today to recognize the GoGreentET.com Outstanding Achievers and spotlight their programs to improve the environment. Thanks again for your attendance.”
Posted in GoGreenET.com, Ideas + Observations, Knoxville Chamber, Thermocopy Tagged Earth Day, Events, GoGreenET.com, Green business Leave a comment
Billions of Tax Dollars Going Uncollected
I don’t know about you, but I get irritated when I see those advertisements about the IRS settling for $0.10 on the dollar for tax debt owed. I realize that most of that settlement is due to penalties being written off, but it still irritates me. Why should they be allowed to settle the debt for less when I am paying my taxes in a timely manner and having to foot the bill for their non-compliance?
I just read an article in the Tennessee CPA Journal that seems to corroborate what we see on the commercials. It was written by Al Kolak and he cites a number of statistics. some of them are:
You need to read the article to really get a feel for how much of a problem this is (I’d provide you the link to the article, but it is not posted yet). I know that some of you may be cheering these people who are seemingly working the system. However, they raise the cost of the whole system for all of us who are responsible citizens and I resent that.
It seems to me that there would be more of an ROI for the US taxpayer if the IRS re-allocated resources to more aggressively go after these deadbeats over the next few years and clear these cases than to worry so much about audits. I believe that 99.9% of the taxpayers that are filing and paying on a timely basis are still going to do just that and be as honest on their tax returns as they always have.
OK, I’ve had my rant for the day. Have a great one!