by david allan van nostrand | Apr 13, 2026 | Planning, Strategy, The iterative process
In the 1970s and 1980s, there was one question asked over and over again by men and women alike in every bar in town – from fern bars to discos, pubs, and dive bars. What’s your sign? It was a jumping-off point for mutual seduction that was so popular in the...
by david allan van nostrand | May 5, 2025 | Assumptions, Items in the News, Organizational Behavior, Strategy, Third places
The coffee houses of the seventeenth century were places to discuss politics, trade, and business. In England, coffee houses were referred to as Penny Universities. One penny was the price of admission to a place where people from all social classes could join in...
by david allan van nostrand | May 27, 2024 | Human Behavior, Strategy, The world around us
What is The Rule of 3? The Marx Brothers comedy act began on vaudeville stages in 1905, moved to Broadway, and then on to motion pictures. Theirs was a stage mother whose parents were a ventriloquist husband married to a yodeling harpist wife, said to be the source of...
by david allan van nostrand | Jan 8, 2024 | Human Behavior, Psychology, Strategy
What Are Defense Mechanisms? People who are disturbed by anxious thoughts and feelings act unconsciously to protect themselves from anything they don’t want to think about or deal with. Freud called all defense mechanisms windows to the subconscious. Self-deception...
by david allan van nostrand | Jul 24, 2023 | Case Study, Strategy, Using Information
When we click on a link to a product in a review, we are taken directly to a product page on a retailer’s website. No one is surprised to learn that the retailer with the most product links is Amazon. There will be product links to other sellers, of course, but Amazon...
by david allan van nostrand | Mar 8, 2021 | Items in the News, Leadership, Strategy
In 2015, McDonald’s was congratulating themselves on the success of their brand-new All-Day Breakfast because same-store sales had risen 5.7%. They deliberately avoided mentioning how the confluence of more than a dozen things contributed to that small increase. Only...
