Commentary
CEO Adviser: Life, Death and Legacy
The missing wealth in family businesses.
At the origin and center of every successful family-owned business are the founder(s) and elders. In their lives, we find the most valuable and often hidden assets: their expertise, business savvy, personal values and ethics, lessons learned and family stories. Two prominent family-business experts who recognize the importance of human assets to long-term success are…
Virgin on Business: C.S.I. Software
Given Volkswagen's deceit, how can we know when malicious code is being foisted upon us?
Tthe credibility of Volkswagen executives these days is about as low as that of a card sharp in an Old West poker game who has just deposited seven aces of varying suits onto the table. Wha … wha … how did those get there? They got there because he put them there, just as those…
Final Analysis: Change the Corporate Climate
Because wouldn't you rather live on a sexy planet?
Lets hear it for the Breakthrough Energy Coalition! Its rad. Its rockin. Its righteous. Its a bunch of rich guys pledging to invest billions to find a faster way to meet the energy needs of a growing planet without contributing to climate change. Bill Gates announced the coalition on the eve of the United Nations…
Letters to the Editor
CHALLENGING ARCHITECTUREi love john levesques column Boomtown Update in the December issue of Seattle magazine [published simultaneously as his Final Analysis column in Seattle Business]. Its a great article and I love the descriptions. We already were referring to the [apartment building] boxes in Ballard as architecturally challenged, but his addition of Bow-Wow-Haus is brilliant….
Commentary: Global Health
Will your business be the next one to join the regions fastest-growing sector? Coffee, airplanes, apples and software may dominate the economy in Washington state, but we are witnessing the astonishingly rapid formation of a large and growing new sector focused on global health. In this space, two seemingly different companies are finding distinct and…
CEO Adviser: Are You Protected?
Nearly two of three Seattle area companies with online services that received venture capital funding in the past year have a big kick me sign on their backs when it comes to class-action risks. Only one in nine have written clauses in their terms of service to protect against these risks in a form with…
Virgin on Business: Dealing with Canal Zones
By the time people got around to building a serious industrial transportation system in the Pacific Northwest, canal building had largely dried up in the rest of the country. Railroads were faster and better equipped to handle rugged topography, so thats the way everyone went. The one notable exception was the canal dug to create…
Final Analysis: The Year in Business
Observations from Boomtown, U.S.A.
Please disregard the Chinese calendar. Turns out that 2015 was the year of the crane. At least in Seattle. Looks as if 2016 will be, too. And on and on until boom goes bust. You know it will. Go bust, that is. It always does. But for now, the business of Seattle is developing the…
Commentary: Taking Care of Business
You might not think the business experiences of two Microsoft executives could help alleviate illiteracy in the developing world or devise a better strategy for attacking hydrocephalus, a potentially devastating health condition. After all, what does business have to do with literacy and disease? As it turns out, a lot. David Risher, who had worked…
Virgin on Business: The Future Is Not Now
Among the many broken promises the future made to the present was the end of the commute. No longer would the working masses pack themselves into wheeled metal boxes twice a day, burning hours and fossil fuel to reach their places of employment in a centralized location. Instead, they could work from home, at whatever…
Final Analysis: Leading Questions…
Some years ago in this space, I wondered what it would be like if CEOs ran their companies according to Jesuit principles of leadership. The Jesuits call them Ignatian principles, after Ignatius Loyola, the soldier-turned-priest who founded the religious order 475 years ago. Jesuits operate a lot of universities, including several in Europe, and they…
Letters to the Editor
The Minimum WageJohn Levesques final analysis column on the $15 minimum wage in the September issue was a nice article, but I think it would be more powerful if he gave more space to the effects on our economy of lower-middle-class and poor workers having more money in their pockets versus having that same money…
Editor’s Note: Human Resources
On a brisk seattle morning, a couple dozen of us meet at Seattle Parks and Recreations Denny Park headquarters for a Civic Boot Camp. The goal is to prepare us for civic engagement, says Diane Douglas, executive director of Seattle CityClub and a 2014 honoree in the Community Impact Awards (see page 31 for the…