A Fine Line

Collaboration and Compromise

February 24, 2024

The Eight Secrets of a Successful Small Community The birth, growth and dying of small towns. Heavy sighs of old-timers holding back tear-causing memories of better times, carefree children, now generations grown trying to understand what happened and why. Did it really happen so quickly? Wasn’t there a warning, a…

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The Baby Boomer Effect

January 16, 2024

Legacies follow generations affecting others that follow. Some are created by a single event, others built over a lifetime, some overlap one lifetime over another. How will we be remembered? How will I? Do we have any way of controlling what the legacy may be? Can we have more than…

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Have We Become Better at Leading and Following?

December 14, 2023

The Leaning Tower of Pisa was constructed 1100 years ago. Its fame is that it is leaning, and tourists like to see it with their cameras in hand. That’s too bad, really. The natural message is that we can be interested in a potential collapse of a poorly planned building…

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Guarded Optimism 

November 19, 2023

If history is a teacher, what have we learned?  When the world around us seems to be coming completely unraveled is it courageous or unwise to hold tightly to beliefs that somehow the chaos will be corralled and tamed to a level we always hope it will be? I’m inclined…

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The Responsible Middle 

October 11, 2023

Several years ago, we started hearing the term “dumpster fire” to describe a situation that is out-of- control. It’s a good thing we have the phrase today because every source of new information, true or not – important or trivial – makes full use of the handy description. From national…

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The Last Groundhog’s Day

August 13, 2023

We waste our lives by seconds and minutes, not days and years  Up early, like yesterday. Two cups of coffee, black, as always. Time to start the day.  They run together, the days. How did Johnny get so tall? He was an over-charged, darting little squirrel just yesterday. Five, I…

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Radical Change – Saving Small Towns and Businesses from Extinction

July 16, 2023

In the first place, why was the town built here and not somewhere else? There must have been a reason to start it here. Isn’t there also a reason to keep it here? The original reason, or reasons, for the location of a community changes as the needs of its…

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Insufficient Training

June 10, 2023

When was the last time you read a book? The weather report says it’s going to rain – snow – freeze and we are preparing for it. Grab an umbrella, bundle up, stay indoors by the heater. Now learn from the experience. Observation. Just plain paying attention to what is…

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Is This Heaven? 

May 11, 2023

No, It’s Rural Oregon.  It’s okay, you’re not the first one to make that mistake. I wouldn’t live anyplace else.  In an attempt to engage a business Emergency Resuscitation Plan the thought of attracting tourism dollars to small towns is high on the list. Here in Oregon many small towns…

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Pyramids, Concrete Walls, and Excellence

April 9, 2023

A Fine Line by Greg Henderson 50 years before Columbus discovered America – at an incredible altitude of nearly 8,000 feet – Machu Picchu was constructed by unlicensed Peruvians. The stone construction project, with several walls, still stands built without concrete. Over 500 years ago! The concrete blocks that form…

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Are We Overworking and Underthinking?

March 8, 2023

Or just underthinking?  Fifty years, maybe 25, is enough to realize a need to replace or repair most everything. The problem is not our plans, it’s the execution of them. New Year resolutions often fail before the end of January. Good resolutions, bad execution.  Advice I received from a coworker…

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Going Digital

February 11, 2023

The flies were most annoying. Each of us had our own swarm… “For the shade”, we teased. Aside from a cup of water, a bit of shade where the heat would climb above 110 degrees was the second most precious thing. The Australian Outback in the Nullarbor Plain of South…

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