Steve Jobs speech :: how to live before you die

[Steven Paul Jobs, the iconic co-founder, chairman and former CEO of Apple Inc., died on October 5 after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 56 years old]

Special: The must-read Steve Jobs speech that will change your life

This is the "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish" address delivered by Steve Jobs in 2005 at Stanford University:

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky - I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation - the Macintosh - a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me - I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

World War II shipwreck full of silver discovered

It was a stormy Second World War night when, on February 17, 1941, three lifeboats abandoned the SS Gairsoppa, a 412 foot-long British cargo ship en route from India to Liverpool, England. In service of the Ministry of War Transport, the Gairsoppa was laden with tea, iron and tons of silver. Because of bad weather and insufficient coal, she was forced to break away from the military convoy off the coast of Ireland.

Now, 70 years after the dramatic sinking, treasure hunters have announced the discovery of the Gairsoppa's intact wreck about 300 miles off the coast of Ireland, at a depth of 4,700 meters.

According to U.S. underwater archaeology and salvage company Odyssey Marine Exploration Inc, up to 240 tons of silver, valued at more than $200 million, could be retrieved by next spring.

Apple Co-Founder Steve Jobs fans & artist

Steve Jobs art: fans, artists and designers pay tribute to the Apple co-founder

Fans, artists and designers have found creative ways to pay tribute to Apple co-founder and former CEO, Steve Jobs, who has died at the age of 56 after a long and highly public battle with cancer.

This digital mosaic, made out of Apple gadgets, was created by Greek designer Charis Tsevis.

This idea of incorporating Steve Jobs' silhouette into the bite of the Apple logo, symbolising both Jobs' departure and lingering presence at the core of the company, was released by nineteen-year-old Jonathan Mak, a student at Hong Kong's Polytechnic University School of Design. However, it has since emerged that an almost identical logo was designed by Chris Thornley for Creative Review earlier this year.

Here's a portrait of Steve Jobs made out of parts of a Macbook Pro, issued by web design company Mint Digital. They say: "It seemed fitting to create a tribute to him using the spare components of the old Mac book pro. Every component has been broken down to its most basic form and reassembled into a portrait of Steve Jobs."

Tom Gaffney, 21, carved a portrait of Steve Jobs into an apple, before laying his tribute outside the Apple store in Birmingham. Tom, from Burton, Staffordshire, worked into the early hours on his tribute. He said: "I'm a big fan of his work. He's a genius and an influence to so many people."

Bluewater Productions and Paperless Publishing have decided to publish a comic book biography of Steve Jobs. It will be available as an e-book this week on the NOOK and Kindle. The 32-page issue is drawn by Chris Schmidt (with cover art supplied by DC artist Joe Phillips). The standard edition will be available in comic shops, bookstores and online retailers including Amazon from October 27.

Here's another mosaic created by Charis Tsevis, using images of iPhones, MacBooks and iPods, as well as various types of Apple software.

A restaurant worker shows off an apple-shaped pizza as a tribute to Steve Jobs in Naples

A man displays a paper cut portrait of Steve Jobs in Jinan, Shandong province, China

Fans have found ways of paying tribute to Steve Jobs outside Apple stores around the world. A man places an iPad displaying a picture of Steve Jobs around candles forming the logo of Apple, in Chengdu in southwestern China's Sichuan province

Many people have chosen to pay tribute in a simple, yet fitting, way - by leaving an apple with a bite taken out of it outside an Apple Store. These one were seen outside an Apple Store in London.

steve jobs gretest contribution of the world

How Steve Jobs's biological mother doesn't know he is dead as care home nurses believe dementia sufferer is too ill to be told

By Paul Bentley

Last updated at 7:45 AM on 15th October 2011

His death was one of the most widely publicised in recent history, filling newspapers and television schedules for days as fans worldwide united in grief. Among the few people in the Western world, however, who will not have heard of Steve Jobs's passing, is perhaps the most important - his own mother.

Joanne Simpson, who reluctantly gave her son up for adoption after falling pregnant when she was a student, is seriously unwell in a nursing home in Los Angeles and has no idea her son has died, MailOnline can reveal.

Biological parents: Father John Jandali never met Jobs while it is thought mother Joanne Simpson does not know he has died

Sources close to the family said the Apple founder's biological mother, Joanne Simpson, 79, is tragically battling advanced dementia. She has very limited mental capacity and is said barely to know who she is, let alone what has become of the son she gave away. Jobs was adopted in 1955 after being born to Abdulfattah John Jandali, a Syrian man, and Joanne Schieble, who was a graduate student at the time.

The couple were not married and keeping him would have been deemed shameful by their communities. Brought up by Paul and Clara Jobs, Steve is thought to have reconciled with his mother but never to have made contact with his biological father.

Genius: The Apple founder completely revolutionised the way we communicate

In his renowned 2005 commencement address at Stanford University, Jobs described how his mother signed the adoption papers reluctantly, wanting to give him away to a well-educated couple.

Paul Jobs was a high-school drop-out who became a machinist and his wife Clara never graduated from college. Joanne Simpson eventually married Jandali and the couple had another child, Mona Simpson, who went on to become a famous novelist, before getting divorced. She later remarried.

'My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student,' Jobs said in his speech.

Deteriorating: The Berkley East Convalescent Hospital in Los Angeles, where Steve Jobs's birth mother, who has dementia, is being looked after

'She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates.' When he grew up, Jobs found his mother and the two kept in touch. He also forged a relationship with his biological sister. Despite the reconciliation, Simpson's dementia is so serious she has no idea about her son's death. Her condition has so far deteriorated she is said briefly to have been admitted to a mental hospital after neighbours reported seeing her wandering the streets half naked.

Frail: Jobs was photographed in August looking very unwell

A source said: 'Steve was one of the richest men in the world, but his wealth couldn’t save him and it couldn’t save his mother. 'We used to find her wondering the streets wearing only a house coat with nothing underneath and sometimes we would find her wearing barely anything climbing trees in her bare feet.

'In the end someone dropped her at a mental hospital as they were so concerned for her wellbeing and then when her daughter found out they eventually moved her to a nursing home. 'She was a lovely woman so it was very hard to see her demise. Now she is locked in her own body and barely knows who she is let alone Steve anymore.' Jobs knew about his birth mother's mental condition and is said secretly to have helped her financially.

'They had reconnected in later life and it must have been so sad for Steve watching his mum lose her mind , knowing there was nothing he could do about it,' the source added. 'It was like a double heartache as there was nothing he could do about his condition either in the end. 'While we never saw him round her house before they moved her, what we do know is that her rent was paid for as if by magic every month.

'And now she is in one of the best care homes, so it doesn’t take a fool to work out who is paying for it.'

Royal Wedding of the year 2011

The King of Bhutan Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck and the newly-crowned Queen of Bhutan Jetsun Pema, pose for the media after their marriage ceremony at the Dzong Monastery in Punakha, Bhutan on October 13, 2011.

Pema, who wore a yellow jacket and a skirt according to tradition, was proclaimed the 'Queen of the Kingdom of Bhutan' as the King bestowed

the crown on her after a series of ceremonies.

The wedding was attended by 300 guests, including the Indian Ambassador to Bhutan, Pavan K Varma, the West Bengal Governor M K Narayanan and members of the Royal Family.

The newly-crowned Queen of Bhutan Jetsun Pema and the King of Bhutan Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck greet the crowd after their marriage ceremony.

more selling of product advertising and marketing tips

how to write a strategic marketing plan or business strategy, marketing and advertising tips, internet and website marketing tips

A simple guide to marketing, strategic business planning, advertising and promotion and sales lead generation, for small UK businesses especially. With tips and techniques for advertising and PR, for non-marketing managers, and for marketing and advertising professionals too; this is marketing and advertising made simple. Also some easy tips on website design, internet advertising and marketing.

While much of this marketing theory page was written a while ago generally the principles apply just the same, if fact many of these basic pointers are good reminders of some of the simple things that are easy to overlook in these modern distracting times.
Incidentally, where references are made to the UK there will commonly be equivalent methods and processes and suppliers that are applicable in other countries.

hierarchy of marketing and business planning stages

Start at the foundations (point 1 below) and work upwards.

8. Our Performance Indicators	How do our Targets and Objectives translate into the essential measurable aspects of performance and activity? Are these expectations, standards, 'Key Performance Indicators' (KPI's), 'Service Level Agreements' (SLA's), etc., agreed with the recipients and people responsible for delivery?
7. Our Targets and Objectives	How are our strategies comprised? How are these responsibilities and activities allocated cross our functions and departments and teams? Who does what, where, when, how, for what cost and with what required effect and result? What are the timescales and measures for all the actions within our strategies, and who owns those responsibilities?
6. Our Strategies	How will we achieve our goal(s)? What needs to happen in order to achieve the things we plan? What are the effects on us and from where? Like planning a game of chess, what moves do we plan to make, why, and with what effects? How will we measure and monitor and communicate our performance? What are the criteria for measuring our performance and execution of our strategies?
5. Our Goal (or several goals in large or divisionalised businesses)	What is our principal goal? When do we plan to achieve it? How will we measure that we have achieved it? At what point will we have succeeded in what we set out to do? Goals can change of course, and new ones necessarily are developed as old ones are achieved - but at any time we need to know what our organisation's main goal is, when we aim to achieve it, and how its achievement will be measured. And again all this needs to be agreed with our people - including our customers if we are very good indeed.
4. Our Mission (or Missions if there are separate businesses within the whole)	How do we describe what we aim to do and be and achieve? What is special about what we are and do compared to any other organisation or business unit? Do our people understand and agree with this? Do our customers agree that it's what they want?
3. Our Vision - dependent on values and philosophy.	Where are we going? What difference will we make? How do we want to be remembered? In what ways will we change things for the better? Is this vision relevant and good and desired by the customers and staff and stakeholders? Is it realistic and achievable? Have we involved staff and customers in defining our vision? Is it written down and published and understood? The Vision is the stage of planning when the organisation states its relationship with its market-place, customers, or users. The Vision can also include references to staff, suppliers, 'stakeholders' and all others affected by the organisation.
2. Our Values - enabled by and dependent on philosophy and leadership.	Ethics, integrity, care and compassion, quality, standards of behaviour - whatever the values are - are they stated and understood and agreed by the staff? Do the values resonate with the customers and owners or stakeholders? Are they right and good, and things that we feel proud to be associated with? See the section on ethical organisations for help with this fundamental area of planning.
1. Our Philosophy - fundamentally defined by the leadership. When things go wrong in an organisation people commonly point to causes, problems or mistakes closer to the point of delivery - or typically in operational management. Generally however, major operational or strategic failings can always be traced back to a questionable philosophy, or a philosophical purpose which is not fitting for the activities of the organisation.	How does the organisation relate to the world? This is deeper than values. What is the organisation's purpose? If it is exclusively to make money for the shareholders, or to make a few million for the management buyout team when the business is floated, perhaps have a little re-think. Customers and staff are not daft. They will not be comfortable buying into an organisation whose deepest foundation is greed and profit. Profit's fine to an extent, but where does it fit in the wider scheme of things? Is it more important than taking care of our people and our customers and the world we live in? Does the organisation have a stated philosophy that might inspire people at a deeper level? Dare we aspire to build organisations of truly great worth and value to the world? The stronger our philosophy, the easier it is to build and run a great organisation. See the section on ethical organisations and the Psychological Contract for help with this fundamental area of planning. If you are an entrepreneur or leader, or anyone contributing to the planning process, think about what you want to leave behind you; what you'd want to be remembered for. This helps focus on philosophical issues, before attending to processes and profit. Whatever your philosophy, ensure it is consistent with and appropriate for your organisational activities and aims. Your philosophical foundations must fit with what is built onto them, and vice-versa.

When you've satisfied yourself that the fundamental organisational framework is in place - and that you have gone as far as you can in creating a strong foundation - then you can begin your marketing planning.

marketing planning

Carry out your market research, including competitor activity.
Market information should include anything you need to know in order to formulate strategy and make business decisions. Information is available in the form of statistical economic and demographic data from libraries, research companies and professional associations (the Institute of Directors is excellent if you are a member). This is called secondary research and will require some interpretation or manipulation for your own purposes. Additionally you can carry out your own research through customer feed-back, surveys, questionnaires and focus groups (obtaining indicators to wider views through discussion among a few representative people in a controlled situation). This is called primary research, and is tailored to your precise needs. It requires less manipulation, but all types of research need careful analysis. Be careful when extrapolating or projecting. If the starting point is inaccurate the resulting analysis will not be reliable. The main elements you typically need to understand and quantify are:

• customer profile and mix
• product mix
• demographic issues and trends
• future regulatory and legal effects
• prices and values, and customer perceptions in these areas
• competitor activities
• competitor strengths and weaknesses
• customer service perceptions, priorities and needs

Primary research is recommended for local and niche services. Keep the subjects simple and the range narrow. Formulate questions that give clear yes or no indicators (ie avoid three and five options in multi-choices) always understand how you will analyse and measure the data produced. Try to convert data to numerical format and manipulate on a spreadsheet. Use focus groups for more detailed work. Be wary of using market research organisations as this can become extremely expensive. If you do the most important thing to do is get the brief right.
Establish your corporate aims.
Business strategy is partly dictated by what makes good business sense, and partly by the subjective, personal wishes of the owners. There is no point in developing and implementing a magnificent business growth plan if the owners wish the business to maintain its current scale.
State your business objectives - short, medium and long term.
Mindful of the trading environment (external factors) and the corporate aims (internal factors), there should be stated the business's objectives. What is the business aiming to do over the next one, three and five years? These objectives must be quantified and prioritised wherever possible.
Define your 'Mission Statement'.
All the best businesses have a 'mission statement'. It announces clearly and succinctly to your staff, shareholders and customers what you are in business to do. Your mission statement may build upon a general 'service charter' relevant to your industry. The act of producing and announcing the Mission Statement is an excellent process for focusing attention on the business's priorities, and particularly the emphasis on customer service. If your business is modern and good you will be able also to reference your organisational 'Philosophy' and set of organisational 'Values', both of which are really helpful in providing fundamental referencing or 'anchoring' points, by which to clarify aspects of what the organisation or business unit aims to do, what its purpose is, and how the organisation behaves and conducts itself.

marketing is more than selling and advertising

Marketing provides the means by which the organisation or business projects itself to its audience, and also how it behaves and interacts in its market. It is essential therefore that the organisation's philosophy and values are referenced and reinforced by every aspect of marketing. In practical terms here are some of the areas and implications:
There are staffing and training implications especially in selling and marketing, because people are such a crucial aspect.
Your people are unlikely to have all the skills they need to help you implement a marketing plan. You may not have all the people that you need so you have to consider justifying and obtaining extra. Customer service is acutely sensitive to staffing and training. Are all your people aware of what your aims are? Do they know what their responsibilities are? How will you measure their performance? Many of these issues feed back into the business plan under human resources and training, where budgets need to be available to support the investment in these areas. People are the most important part of your organisation, and the success of your marketing activity will stand or fall dependent on how committed and capable your people are in performing their responsibilities. Invest in your people's development, and ensure that they understand and agree with where the organisation is aiming to go. If they do not, then you might want to reconsider where you are going.
Create a Customer Service Charter.
You should formulate a detailed Customer Service Charter, extending both your mission statement and your service offer, so as to inform staff and customers what your standards are. These standards can cover quite detailed aspects of your service, such as how many times the telephone will be permitted to ring until the caller is gets an answer. Other issues might include for example: How many days between receipt and response for written correspondence. These expectations must also be developed into agreed standards of performance for certain customers or customer groups - often called Service Level Agreements (SLA's). Increasingly, customers are interested to know more about the organisations' values and philosophy, which until recent times never featured in customer service charters or customer decision-making criteria. They do now.
Establish a complaints procedure and timescales for each stage.
This charter sets customer expectations, so be sure you can meet them. Customers get disappointed particularly when their expectations are not met, and when so many standards can be set at arbitrary levels, think of each one as a promise that you should keep.
Remember an important rule about customer service: It's not so much the failure to meet standards that causes major dissatisfaction among customers - everyone can make a mistake - the most upset is due to not being told in advance, not receiving any apology, not getting any explanation why, and not hearing what's going to be done to put things right.
Establish systems to measure customer service and staff performance.
These standards need to be absolutely measurable. You must keep measuring your performance against them, and preferably publishing the results, internally and externally.
Customer complaints handling is a key element.
Measuring customer complaints is crucial because they are a service provider's barometer. You need to have a scheme which encourages, not discourages, customers to complain. Some surveys have found that nine out of ten people do not complain to the provider when they feel dissatisfied. But every one of them will tell at least a couple of their friends or relations. It is imperative that you capture these complaints in order to:

• Put at ease and give explanation or reassurance to the person complaining.
• Reduce the chances of them complaining to someone else.
• Monitor exactly how many dissatisfied customers you have and what the causes are, and that's even more important if you're failing to deliver your mission statement or service offer!
• Take appropriate corrective action to prevent a recurrence.

amazing Shadow art by hand

Gadafi:highlight of life

The former dictator of Libya Muammar al-Gaddafi was charismatic, controversial, eccentric and highly recognizable. Many consider him a despot though to some Arab Africans he was a nation-builder and a patriot. He was a source of constant trouble to Western powers with his sponsorship of terrorism and his zeal to unite the continent into a United States of Africa. Here’s a photographic overview of significant moments of his 40-year reign.

On September 27, 1969, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi overthrew King Idris of Libya in a military putsch. In 1963 Gaddafi formed the Free Officers Movement, a group of revolutionary army officers, which overthrew King Idris of Libya and proclaimed Libya, in the name of "freedom, socialism and unity," Socialist People's Jamahiriya. He was 28 years old. (AP Photo)

Gaddafi (right) and Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser in Suez, Egypt. Gaddafi was a great admirer of Nasser.(AP Photo/Farouk Ibrahim)

Gaddafi with Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat (right) in Cairo 1973 entered an agreement to unify Egypt and Libya. (AP Photo)

Colonel Gaddafi with Josip Broz Tito, the authoritarian leader of the erstwhile East European nation of Yugoslavia, in Belgrade. (AP Photo)

Gaddafi addresses the press on November 24, 1973 after meeting French President Georges Pompidou on the steps of the Elysee Palace in Paris. (AP Photo/Dardenas)

Gaddafi with Ugandan dictator Idi Amin (far left) and Algeria’s head of state Houari Boumedienne.(AP Photo)

Gaddafi waves to a crowd as he rides a horse during a ceremony marking the sixth anniversary of the eviction of Italians from Libya. (AP Photo)

Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Yasser Arafat, right, raises his hands in a salute to delegates, with Libyan leader Colonel Moammar Gadhafi, center, and PLO leader George Habash, at the Arab Nations Summit in Tripoli, Libya, on Dec. 4, 1977. Habash, whose radical PLO faction gained notoriety after the simultaneous hijackings of four Western airliners in 1970 and the seizure of an Air France flight to Entebbe

Safia Gaddafi greets her husband on his arrival at the airport in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, 1973. Gaddafi met Safia Farkash née el-Brasai (right), a former nurse, in 1969 while he was hospitalized with appendicitis during the revolt that brought him to power. (AP Photo/Harry Koundakjian)

Picture taken in Tripoli on December 2, 1997 of Libyan leader Moamar el-Gadhafi and his wife Safiya. (AP Photo/Dimitri Messinis)

Libyan Leader Moammar Gadhafi, making a speech at the opening of the Maghrebin summit in Marrakech Town Hill on Feb. 16, 1989. (AP Photo/Pierre Gleizes)

Colonel Muammar Gaddafi flanked by his female bodyguards, dubbed deridingly by the West as the “Amazonian Guard”.(AP photo/Riccardo De Luca

Gaddafi and Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, shake hands at the end of a two-day visit in Tripoli, April 17, 2008. Russia said it will write off US$4.5 billion in Libyan debt in exchange for multibillion dollar deals for its firms. (AP Photo/Abdel Magid Al Fergany)

April 21, 2009: Libya’s National Security Adviser Al-Mu'tasim-Billah al-Gaddafi (Gaddafi’s fifth son) in Washington, DC with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. He was killed along with his father on October 20, 2011. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

A portrait depicting Libya's former ruler Moammar Gadhafi is riddled with bullet marks and vandalized with paint on a wall in Tripoli, Libya. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)

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