What Is Your Competitive Edge?

What Is Your Competitive Advantage?

Bank of America is repaying the U.S. Treasury its $45 billion TARP loan.
What does TARP stand for? A recent survey found only 5% could define
the Acronym (word from first letters of words) – Troubled Asset Relief Program.

So what? Who cares? Is the ability to learn a power skill in our Knowledge Economy? Maybe more so than the 1920s when 50% of the U.S. economy was based
on agriculture?

B of A went to the equity market and raised $19.29 billion for this government
payoff, the rest they had in their piggy bank. CEO Kenneth Lewis is resigning after first saving Bank of America. Who will the board of directors choose for the new CEO?

Law of Liking

Some folks are more likeable than others; it is a personality thing, right?
Promotions at Fortune 100 companies often hang on having influence, persuasion
and the ability to convince your board of director members.

How do we decide if we want to do business with a company salesperson, choose to hire a law firm, donate money to a particular college?

1. The law of reciprocity: give before you expect to receive. Give what?
Respect, praise, and body language all influence our likeability. Listen carefully when other speak to discover what you like about them and
compliment them on it. If you sound insincere, you are judged a phony.

2. Discover what folks are proud of in their lives – and admire them.
Sports is a universal transfer of likeability. Football fans, golf or tennis
buffs like each other because they have-in-common a team.

3. We are nonconsciously influenced by one’s tone of voice, posture, facial
expression (smiling), and universal body language. If you are a habitual smiler, even if it is a PanAm Smile (phony as a $3 bill), folks are persuaded you do not kick puppy dogs or drown kittens.

Best is a Duchenne Smile, raising the sides of the mouth, and making crow’s feet on the sides of your eyes. That is a genuine, real, authentic
smile.

Memory is a Winning Asset

Tell Me The 44 Presidents in Order

Can you decipher this code? Why bother?

You will learn how to create long-term memory to improve your brains
Cognitive Reserve. Why? You are exercising your brain to avoid Alz and other
forms of dementia, and improve your longevity.

Google: Dr. Yaacov Stern, Columbia University Medical Center; and Dr. David Snowdon, University of Kentucky – The Nuns Research report.

1. Washington: running.
2. Adams: throwing.
3. Jefferson: peeing.
4. Madison: scoring.
5. Monroe: fighting.

6. J.Q. Adams: striking.
7. Jackson: sleeping.
8. Van Buren: mating.
9. W.H. Harrison: swineing in the mud.
10. Tyler: is a hen.

11. Polk: the running hen
12. Taylor: throws the hen.
13. Filmore: has a peeing hen.
14. Pierce: his hen scored.
15. Buchanan: fighting a hen,

16. Lincoln: struck the hen.
17. Johnson: sleeping with a hen.
18. Grant: mating with a hen.
19. Hays: swined with a hen in the mud.
20. Garfield: in Virginia.

21. Arthur in Virginia: running.
22. Cleveland in Virginia: throwing.
23. B. Harrison in Virginia: peeing.
24. Cleveland in Virgina: scoring.
25. McKinley in Virginia: fighting.

26. T. Roosevelt in Virginia: strike each other.
27. Taft in Virginia: sleeping.
28. Wilson in Virginia: mating.
29. Harding in Virginia: swineing in the mud.
30. Coolidge: has a Trio.

31. Hoover: and his Trio running.
32. F. Roosevelt: and his Trio throwing.
33. Truman: and his Trio peeing.
34. Eisenhower: and his Trio scoring.
35. Kennedy: and his Trio fighting.

36. Johnson: and his Trio striking.

37. Nixon: and his Trio sleeping.
38. Ford: and his Trio mating.
39. Carter: and his Trio swineing in the mud.
40. Reagan: has a Quartet.

41. Bush G.H.W.: and his Quartet running.
42. Clinton: and his Quartet throwing.
43. Bush G.W.: and his Quartet peeing.
44. Obama: and his Quartet scoring.
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Question: What is the code for the twenties?
Answer: Virginia

Question: What are the codes for the thirties, and forties?
Answer: Thirties is Trio; forties is Quartet.

Question: Explain why McKinley and Virginia were fighting?
Answer: Virginia = 20 plus “fighting or fight, or fought” stands for #5.
McKinley was the 25th President of the U.S.

Can You Learn The English Alphabet – Backwards in Five-Minutes?

It is baby-easy and goes permanently into long-term memory.

1. Chunking is grouping letters together and dividing the 26 into groups of three or so.
2. Make up a ridiculous story to Associate (link) letters together using a
Acronym (initial letters from unrelated words).

Start with the last three letters – (Z-Y-X) + add the initials for the States of West Virginia (WV) and Utah (UT); remember this phrase: “Some Reporters Quickly Pee On Milk, & do a Jig” That spells: (SRQP-ON-MLK-JIHG). Now send a FED-ex for (FED) + CBA (Cost-Benefit-Analysis). You are done!

Write the Alphabet backwards to engage your tactile, haptic, and kinesthetic sense of touch in learning. Say the alphabet backwards ALOUD – three-times.

ZYX-WV-UT-SRQP-ON-MLK-JIHG-FED-CBA = 26 letters, right?

See ya,

Author's Bio:

Author of Speed Reading For Professionals, published by Barron's.
Business partner of Evelyn Wood, creator of speed reading,
graduating 2 million, including the White House staffs of four
U.S. Presidents: Kennedy-Johnson-Nixon-Carter