Category Archives: Relationships

December 19, 2013 · 2:46 am

TALENT HIDES

TechBash – Part 1

By Loop Lonagan,

as told to John Jonelis –

I feel the bite of Christmas in the air. It’s the season o’ giving. I’m here at TechBash coverin’ fer Da May Report but I never seen an event like this before. Right away, I get hit with pounding music, flashing lights and maybe a couple thousand er more people. Place is fulla bigshots. So many C-level execs at one party—mosta them CIOs o’ big corporations. And the food and open flowing bar. I mean, this is a HUGE party that puts Dennis Koslowski and Tyco to shame—but this one’s legit. Lemme tell you about it: Continue reading →

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Filed under Characters, Education, Entrepreneur, Entrepreneurship, Giving, High Tech, Poverty, Relationships, Startup Companies, Startups

Tagged as community leaders, finding talent, giving back, helping people, high tech, Inner city, IT jobs, job training, Jobs, nurturing leaders, nurturing talent, self-sustaining social enterprise, slums, Social Enterprise

November 21, 2013 · 10:44 pm

TEAM – A CASE STUDY

by Terry Flanagan

Your next opportunity may be right under your nose. When people with common values and objectives—coachable individuals with unique expertise come together, they can deliver value in a very short timeframe. Continue reading →

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Filed under Entrepreneur, High Tech, Low Tech, Relationships, Startup Companies, Startups

Tagged as building a strong team, building your team, business consultant, business consulting, consultants, consutantX consutancy, growing your business, team

November 13, 2013 · 2:51 pm

FEAR OF FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION

by Tom Lemanski

From the SMART Leadership Archives

With the aid of the film, Apollo 13, let’s briefly consider the concept of failure and its role in innovation, problem solving and decision-making.

The Apollo 13 movie documents the heroic efforts of the NASA flight team in successfully returning their crew of three astronauts to earth in their ill-fated, aborted, mission to land on the moon. There’s a compelling scene where the flight engineers discuss the crippled space craft’s desperate power situation that concludes with Flight Director Gene Kranz’s (portrayed by Ed Harris as pictured at left) determined declaration:

“Failure is not an option.”

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Tagged as fail fast, failure, failure is not an option, fear of failure, fear of failure is not an option, innovation, invention, motivating success, motivation, success, success and failure, the key to creativity

August 26, 2013 · 4:00 am

HEART OF GOLD

John Jonelis – I knew something outstanding was going on, but when a friend raved about it, I had to stop procrastinating and find out more. Continue reading →

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Filed under Biography, Education, Entrepreneur, Giving, Influence, Poverty, Relationships

Tagged as busy, Do for others as you would have them do for you, finding jobs, Generosity, hard work, helping people, kind, learning skills, perseverance, selfless

July 2, 2013 · 4:00 am

MY KRAKEN ENCOUNTER

John Jonelis

I am sitting with the audience at the Funding Feeding Frenzy in Chicago—a big event for startup companies like mine that need investors to make things happen. I wipe sweaty palms against my suit pants—my turn to present—my turn to make a fool of myself is coming up fast. Continue reading →

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Tagged as Entrepreneur, fundable, go fund yourself, keep fishing, pitch, startup

June 24, 2013 · 11:00 pm

MAY IS GONE

We lost Ron May. There’re those that are bitter and those that’ll weep. There’s those that always revere him and swear by his widely circulated May Report—and then there’s the others that still feel the sting. Everybody has a powerful opinion, but I got more than one reason for liking the guy. Continue reading →

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Filed under Biography, Characters, Conflict, Death, Entrepreneur, Influence, Relationships

Tagged as Blog, Blogger, Death, Investigative Reporter, Obituary, Ron May, The May Report

June 17, 2013 · 4:00 am

WHO DO YOU TRUST?

John Jonelis—Verbatim from special correspondent, Donatas Ludditis

Welcome—welcome to Ludditis Shots & Beer! Glad you come in.

Got question for you.

Don’s lookalike

I hear about this guy: Nikhil Sethi his name. No, don’t ask me—I never say it right. He got easy way to advertise on social web. His outfit called Adaptly. Got three slick platforms that work as if by magic. And his company, it grow like crazy! This I want to know more about. Continue reading →

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Tagged as creative destruction, Donatas Ludditis, easy social media advertising, how do I advertise on social media?, measuring social media advertising, Social Media, social media advertising

March 29, 2013 · 11:13 pm

ANOTHER DROWNING MAN

Again at this season, the haunting words of a favorite song come back to me:

“You don’t ask a drowning man if he wants to be saved,

When you know he’s sinking down—down beneath the crashing waves.” Continue reading →

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Filed under Death, Faith, Relationships

Tagged as atonement, christ, Christian, Christianity, easter, Forgiveness, God, grace messiah, resurrection day, savior, saviour, substitution

December 22, 2012 · 12:25 am

THE BUM IN ME

Funding Feeding Frenzy – Part 2

John Jonelis

VERBATIM transcript of a recording by Loop Lonagan—investor and man about town.

Loop Lonagan here. I’m headin’ out to this year’s Funding Feeding Frenzy. It’s the big event if ya wanna see all o’ Chicago’s best startups in one place. This time the FFF is happenin’ at a place called the Chopin Theater northwest o’ downtown and I wanna see how that’s gonna work out. Will there be a string quartet? They yusta hold it at a huge automobile showroom which seems weird but worked out. It had about half the floor space of McCormick Place and plenty o’ room fer hordes o’ people to roam. But this is gonna be a lot different. Continue reading →

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Filed under Characters, Conflict, Entrepreneur, Politics, Relationships, The Economy

Tagged as alcholics, angel, angel capital, angel investor, Big Money, Bums, Chicago, chopin theater, Christmas, city, clybourn station, Derelicts, drug addicts, fff, funding feeding frenzy, gentrification of the city, hobbits, Homeless, investor, Jobs, Loop Lonagan, new companies, pitch, public servants, sherlock holmes, sleeping on a sidewalk, the chicago machine, the machine, the man with the twisted lip, vc, venture capital, Whack jobs

November 12, 2012 · 5:00 am

CHICAGO’S NEW SOUTH SIDE

The City of Broad Shoulders is looking to the south. South of 119th street. South of Springfield. South of Mexico. Way south. Continue reading →

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Tagged as brazil, Chicago, commerce, export, free trade, IERG, import, international executives resource group, international trade, investment, open markets

September 3, 2012 · 4:00 am

THE RIGHT WAY TO FAIL

The Story of Ray Markman – Part 6

by John Jonelis

Friday, 3:30 pm

The hour of the duel is closing fast. Can I get the information I want out of these two hotheads before they beat each other senseless? If I prove one or the other right, will that snuff out the fuse? At this point, I can’t be sure of anything.

Continue reading →

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Filed under Biography, Characters, Conflict, Entrepreneur, Relationships

Tagged as Boxing, contacts, Duel, I never worked a day in my life, If you nver lost money you never did anything, losing, losing money, never fall in love with a trade, new product, risk capital, taking a loss, venture

August 20, 2012 · 4:00 am

THE SECRET PROTÉGÉ

The Story of Ray Markman – Part 4

by John Jonelis

Friday, 2:30 pm

We’re sitting across my battered WWII Air Force desk digging out the history of Ray Markman. Alexander Harbinger’s argument that Ray isn’t a pure entrepreneur seems pretty well shot to pieces. Loop Lonagan told some amazing stories about risk ventures and I think Alex is squirming a bit, but I want to hear what he’s turned up before these two beat each other senseless at the duel scheduled for five o’clock today. So I put it to him.

“Yess,” he says. “I did find quite ze important story about Mr. Markman. To me, it iss poignant und highly significant. It illustrates not only his personality but ze way he affected people around him.”
Continue reading →

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Tagged as Advertising, boss, Boxing, brand management, cosmetics, Duel, Entrepreneur, German accent, I never worked a day in my life, Leo Burnett, P&G, protege, university