You know those funny blobs you first encountered in high school, weird black on white blotches which you were asked to label. “I think that looks like a crow,” you might say, while your best friend would reply, “Don’t be silly, it looks exactly like Abraham Lincoln!” Hermann Rorschach didn’t likely invent the notion of…
Guest article by Lewis S. Eisen If you run a business that has employees or customers, you actually produce a lot of rules. Whether you call them “policies,” “terms and conditions” or simply “instructions,” essentially they are rules for other people to follow, for example, you might send out instructions for preparation or information explaining…
My Dad was an amazing horticulturist, even developing a variety of gladiolus which has been registered. But I am living proof that a green thumb is NOT hereditary. I can kill plants just by looking at them. Nevertheless, when we had to yank out some overgrown, straggly cedar bushes at our front step, I decided…
Before you conclude that this time Norm has really lost it, bear with me for a fun lesson in history, geography, business, and life. It has to do with the unique style of pizza served up in Pictou County, Nova Scotia. Now, it’s well known that Nova Scotia has unique ways of doing a lot…
My friend and speaking colleague Mark Gasparotto, former Canadian army colonel, puts it bluntly: “Leadership training is an investment, not an expense.” Having led troops “outside the wire” in Afghanistan, he knows whereof he speaks. He could not be more correct about leadership training, in fact about any developmental exercise which enhances the value and…
In all the literature on communication, there’s not much said about the poker face. Pity. All of us engage in negotiating and in persuasion. Lawyers in particular spend huge amounts of time discussing with counsel opposite potential resolutions to contentious issues, and those engaged in sales (or purchasers) play out their lives in face to…
No, not the literal “garden variety”, but tax butterflies. Tax lawyers and accountants know exactly what I’m talking about, the rest of you will take this as confirmation of your long-term suspicion that I’ve lost my mind. The word “butterfly” is not actually found in the Income Tax Act, but every practitioner knows exactly what…
Premier Leslie Frost loved to tell the story about a young Toronto lawyer who drove up to Killaloe, back in the day, to argue a case which despite being small potatoes was very important to a wealthy client. Prepared to the hilt, the young fellow strode into magistrate’s court with a trolley full of books,…
At some or other second-hand store I picked up a print of the old Ottawa Union Station. It caught my eye because this was the old Union Station where I disembarked in September, 1965 to begin training at Ottawa Teachers’ College. Given that the station in the picture appeared very much in use, and also…
All summer long we puzzled over the strange bird-call coming from somewhere around our back deck, or possibly the adjoining garden or shrubs. Kind of a raspy note, much like the sound of a rusty door hinge. Just couldn’t put a finger on it, and even Merlin the magic bird-song-identifier app couldn’t tell us what…