A potpourri of ideas for the holidays:
Gifts for your ego. Did you know that you should buy your partner perfume that you like – not that you think he or she will like, or that some random fellow shopper in the store likes. Please see this illuminating essay from The Economist for the secrets behind what perfumes mean to us – and what services they perform for us.
Gifts for your colleagues. Please be sure to visit this must-see list of perfect office gifts assembled by Molly DiBianca, at The Delaware Employment Law Blog. You’ll probably wind up buying most of them for yourself – enjoy!
Gifts for your employees. Here’s one that will truly spread good cheer well into the New Year. Please see Michael Wade‘s list of management gifts for employees. Did you know that when you give gifts such as these, you will find yourself happily among the recipients?
Gifts from the government. This one isn’t so cheery, but it’s the right time of year, given current circumstances, to be made aware of what may be coming down the chimney at us. Please be sure to see this WSJ piece, by Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., about why bad times don’t produce good policy.
Gifts for gorillas. Well, not for gorillas, as it happens, but for orangutans – from other orangutans. You will want to view this fascinating piece from BBC News about another primate that engages in carefully calculated reciprocal gift-giving.
Gifts for geeks. Not anymore. Everyone is buying e-book readers these days – just about as many women, it turns out, as men. Amazon’s Kindle is the best-known, but others are entering the market. Please see this NY Times piece about who they are and how they’re doing. As an American living overseas and without access to English-language bookstores, I’ve been reading e-books for years using MS Reader and Mobipocket on my HP iPAC – there’s a version of Mobipocket for my Nokia E71, as well. Books can be purchased via download, and read in snippets of time that become available anywhere during travel or waiting periods, and they are conveniently at hand anyway, since you always have your PDA or phone with you, right? I have about 100 books in my PDA, and that’s without scratching the carrying capacity. You should give it a try – why not this holiday season?
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of you! Have a great weekend – see you on Monday.
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(By the way, did you know that Managing Leadership is available in the e-book formats referred to above? Here are the Kindle, Mobipocket and Adobe Reader versions.)
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Merry Christmas, Jim, to you and your family. Thanks for another great year of great reading and great thoughts. Cheers.
Thanks for the guide, and thanks for all of your posts. You’ve helped make some sense out of a year that has often seemed senseless.
Happy holidays.
Thanks for the great list and the consistently great posts! Have a safe and happy holiday!
Jim,
That’s a fun post and may actually cost me a few bucks–but enjoyably.
I echo the others in thanking you for a good year of reading and send best wishes for a Merry Christmas.
Thank you all for your visits, your too-kind comments, and for your own wonderful work and writing – Happy Holiday wishes for all of you and those important to you, and for a brilliant and rewarding New Year as well.