Business Owners ‘Make a Difference,’ Says Chick-fil-A Exec

From the Noblesville Ledger via IndyStar.com:

Dan Cathy has a bigger message than “Eat Mor Chikin.”

“What you’re doing really makes a difference,” the 54-year-old president and chief operating officer of Chick-fil-A restaurants told the 200 business people at today’s Noblesville Chamber of Commerce luncheon.

Take advantage of unexpected opportunities, start with what you have, keep up with the challenges and changing expectations, never lose your sense of relevancy, and continue to grow, Cathy encouraged.

He operates the 40-year-old Atlanta-based chain of 1,356 restaurants, which in 2007 reported sales of $2.6 billion, a 16.09 percent increase of the chain’s 2006 performance and a same-store sales increase of 8.47 percent.

COM 110 Announcement

Just a reminder, because our course is an elective, we may have to move around the building (as we found last week). The room we met in for the first two workshops is now occupied by a core group. Last week we met upstairs in room 200. Make sure before you go to class to check with the front desk to make sure you have the correct room assignment.

Tonight should be an interesting class with a lot of speaking and make-up speeches. There will be a lot of opportunities to try different techniques “on-the-fly” as we did last week. I’m looking forward to seeing the progression throughout the night.

Additionally, here is a question to think about before class: do you think it would be effective to be videotaped so that you can see your performance as demonstrated in the Speaking Effectively video? I know that it might seem incredibly embarassing and potentially vulnerable, but I think that there could also be a great opportunity to see yourself as your audience sees you. We won’t incorporate it into this class, but it’s a technique I would like to use in the future for course development.