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Fruity flavors: Nicotine & tobacco in a smoke-free state
26 July 2010 7:55 PM | No CommentsI hadn’t realized how jarring it is to see people smoking indoors until I watched two DVDs this month. Barbra Streisand, as Katy in 1973’s “The Way We Were” smoked throughout the movie, including during her pregnancy. And from the land of television, Tim Robbins...
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Angels in Minnesota
26 July 2010 7:03 AM | No CommentsAngels are coming to Minnesota — at least that is the hope. The legislature is betting on the old Field of Dreams saying “If you build it, they will come” and hoping it will apply to angel investors and venture capital dollars over the next...
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Gathering ’round the Campfire
22 July 2010 12:29 PM | No CommentsLast Monday I became a parody of myself. I took to the woods with my ten-year-old son, accompanying six of his friends, and some of their parents to Scout Camp in Wisconsin. Our kids are Webelos, going into fifth grade. We joined around 100 other...
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Archive for September, 2009
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Substance — Gaining momentum daily!
Posted on September 30, 2009 | 1 CommentBuilding community and offering leadership opportunities can be a challenging undertaking for newer organizations but one organization, Substance, is making great progress on both fronts. Substance has encouraged members to create countless subgroups, has moved from a single location to multi-site and has engaged thousands... -
Could You Be the Match?
Posted on September 28, 2009 | 4 CommentsHow often do you get a chance to say “thank you” to someone who saved your life? My wife, Betsy, got that chance one year ago when she first met Tobias, the young man from Germany who donated stem cells to help her beat an... -
Dora Knows: Neighborhoods are the Lifeline for Community
Posted on September 23, 2009 | 5 CommentsCommunity is a word that is used regularly and has many contextual meanings and definitions—an online community, a professional organization, a place where people look out for one another. While I was in college, I experienced, for the first time, a true sense of community.... -
What kind of shoes walk into your meetings?
Posted on September 21, 2009 | 9 CommentsAs director of the Leadership Twin Cities program I enjoy all sorts of presentations on our region. Some focus on community issues, others on our business culture and our economic vitality. Curt Johnson, co-founder of CitiStates Group, is a perennial speaker to this group. He... -
The Impact of Dysfunctional Teams
Posted on September 16, 2009 | No Comments“…and no one – not rock stars, not professional athletes, not software billionaires, and not even geniuses – ever makes it alone,” excerpt from Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. In order to accomplish something significant, you can’t do it alone. Often times this means you are... -
The Importance of History to Community
Posted on September 14, 2009 | 1 CommentHistory, especially oral history, is an important building blocks to culture and community. Until now, disability culture and community didn’t have a lot of history. Recently, I took part in an impressive interview project called “It’s Our Story,” a collaborative effort to record the histories of 1,000... -
Great Books for Leadership
Posted on September 9, 2009 | 3 CommentsI read a front page article in a recent Sunday New York Times about a classroom teaching method for literacy called the Reading Workshop Approach. The teacher encourages students to pick their own books to read based upon their passions and interests. Students then respond... -
Betting the “Hard Eight” on Health Care
Posted on September 7, 2009 | 5 CommentsOne of the best mangers I ever worked for was at a local wine shop. He knew how to motivate, he always knew profit margin and he provided even the lowest peon (me) with health insurance. I learned a lot from Steve; the difference between... -
TEDxTC: Ideas Worth Spreading
Posted on September 3, 2009 | 1 CommentWednesday night kicked off the inaugural TEDxTC event and in my opinion it was outstanding. The event epitomized what it means to bring communities together to meet and learn from each other. The audience filled the auditorium at the Science Museum of Minnesota with over...
