My favorite conference call service is offering an upgraded version of their service until the end of December.

If you have wanted to try out webcasting as a communication tool (selling, demonstrating, collaborating) then give this a try:

Freeconference.com

I've used this excellent teleconference service for several years and I value its reliability.  I'm sure their webcast service will be as good.  Give it a try

Have you ever e-mailed back and forth with multiple individuals trying to settle on a date and time for an e-meeting? You can easily generate 20 to 25 e-mails between a little as three individuals just to set up one meeting! Well all of that can now go away, thank you.

There are several new, easy to use and free tools that will allow you to send one e-mail to poll multiple attendees for the best time to meet. Most of these tools do the same thing, but with slightly different styles and interfaces.  Here are my recommendations:

Who is Fujio Cho and why would some guy in Japan have anything to do with residential homebuilding?

Fujio Cho is chairman of Toyota Motor Corporation, one of the most profitable automobile companies in the world. He is an advocate for environmentally friendly car building and the methodology called "lean".

Lean is really what makes Toyota (and Fujio Cho) unique. Fujio Cho was instrumental for promoting Lean at Toyota. No other company in the world does Lean better. Toyota does lean so well that other companies study and publish books on their methods.

When a company adopts Lean, here is what happens:

I love it when technology offers fantastic marketing tools for practically no money!

I just came across a new online application that can create mini-commercial for your products easily and quickly for $30 a year.

The application is called Voicethread. This application will hold essentially any type of media (images, documents and videos) and allows people to make comments in 5 different ways - using voice (with a microphone or telephone), text, audio file, or video (with a webcam) - and share them with anyone they wish

Here are some of the applications for voicethread:

I am an avid fan of LinkedIn , the business networking site. LinkedIn has a section where professionals share their expertise by asking and answering questions.

An important question about flexibility came up and I thought I would share my answer. I believe flexibility is an importnat management skill and it is not employed in the workplace as much as it should (could) be.

Question:

Can you share with me how you are practically thinking "flexibility" at work?
Do you need to accomodate a multi-generational workforce? How do you think “flexibility”? What are the strategies and tools involved in creating a more flexible approach to the multi-generational workforce? How do you make sure that you’re asking the right people the right questions? How, when and why do you choose different methods?

My Answer...

Welcome to the BTR Blog!

On a continuing basis, I'll be posting articles that focus on a variety of topics for the residential construction and land development industry. My primary focus will be on:

• Management
• Sales
• Quality
• Process
• Technology
• Career management
  

Depending on your input and comments, I'll expand on any additional topic that my readers find relevant.

I look forward to delivering useful and relevant information and getting your feedback on whats important to you in today's market.