By Brant Mackey
About 30 years ago one of the most hotly debated questions was which was “better,” a Mac or a PC?
Back in the 80s it was all the rage to argue the advantages and shortcomings of each. Mac users were clearly in the minority and fiercely loyal while PC users simply thought the Mac-minions were crazy to spend so much money on a toy. Thankfully I think we are finally past that discussion.
Around year 2000, when I was working for IBM, I recall a heated squabble between my sales manager and one of the sales staff. The manager wholly believed Act!® was the best customer contact software solution while my colleague believed Goldmine® was the only way to go. Their disagreement was settled when another, and calmer, co-worker pointed out that the two solutions basically provided the same functionality and that is was really only a matter of personal preference.
For the last few years my business partner has steadfastly been encouraging us to make use of our Salesforce® subscription. By all accounts it is by far the most innovative CRM solution on the market.
Personally I have not been able to find anything that is as reliable, functional and easy-to-use as a calendar on my desk. That’s right. I still write down all of my appointments, events, meetings, etc. in my Staples® monthly planner. While I can almost hear the collective groan from the technology crowd, I will tell you that it works for me.
I will also admit a contributing factor to my using it is that it represents simplicity, at least in my own mind. For some unknown reason I believe if my schedule and life gets so complicated that I have to manage it electronically that I will have graduated to a higher level of business and stress that I do not wish to achieve.
By the way, I am one of very few people I know of that still uses a Blackberry® rather than a smartphone … another collective groan.
While it does not translate easily, I often think about how characteristics like quality, reliability, functionality and ease of use coverts to publishing a monthly community business publication. I suppose these are attributes that all business owners should consider in delivering their product.
Brant Mackey is publisher and editor of Springfield Business Journal.
