{"id":476,"date":"2010-02-18T15:37:11","date_gmt":"2010-02-18T13:37:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/?p=476"},"modified":"2015-04-27T21:39:04","modified_gmt":"2015-04-27T19:39:04","slug":"make-an-investment-in-knowledge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/make-an-investment-in-knowledge\/","title":{"rendered":"Make an investment in knowledge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Half a lifetime had passed since I’d seen these people. The year was 2003, and the event was our high-school reunion<\/span>.<\/p>\n

Of the 620 students in my class, about 20 percent were there. Half of the rest could not be found. The others, I suppose, weren’t interested, or perhaps they felt their stories wouldn’t impress anyone.<\/p>\n

The people we thought would be successful pretty much were \u2014 the couple, married right after high school, who’d both become medical doctors; the guy who’s an engineer for NASA; the salespeople<\/span> who spend all week traveling back and forth across the country; and a certain magazine editor in Germany.<\/p>\n

Many stories told around the buffet were not happy ones, though.<\/b> Some in the IT<\/span> business had barely<\/span> survived the collapse of the Internet bubble<\/span> in the late ’90s and the recession that had followed it. After being laid off<\/span> or leaving voluntarily<\/span>, a number had gone into business for themselves.<\/p>\n

Unlike in Germany, it’s rude<\/span> to ask whether someone’s business is profitable. You either have to wait for that person to tell his or her story, or you have to listen for clues<\/span>. The clue I heard most often was: “I’m a consultant<\/span>.” To me, this was code for: “I have valuable experience, but not a full-time job. Still, people pay to hear my advice.”<\/p>\n

Good advice is worth it<\/h2>\n

Calling yourself a consultant is a dignified<\/span>, though difficult, way of coping<\/span> in hard times. Capitalism is a stern<\/span> taskmaster<\/span>, and one is reminded of this every time the German media refer to amerikanische Verh\u00e4ltnisse<\/i> (American-style conditions) as the probable consequence of not being cautious in business. Sure, you can hire and fire people on short notice<\/span>, and you can keep their noses to the grindstone<\/span> by giving them only two or sometimes three weeks’ vacation a year. You can make a vast<\/span> fortune<\/span> if you know what you’re doing; but if you don’t, the market, the shareholders<\/span>, and the customers can be brutal.<\/p>\n

That’s why consultants do so much business in the US.<\/b> They look at a company’s overall strategy and can tell business leaders what they’re doing wrong, what they haven’t thought of, and what they may have forgotten. Here are some of their golden rules<\/b> \u2014 actually wisdom that’s been around for centuries.<\/p>\n