Given the events of the last few years it’s easy to say we are living in a new economy. If I have heard it once from the “experts” I have heard it a thousand times. They might as well be saying even more obvious statements, “Hey I think that internet thing is here to stay.”  Thanks for the tip.

However, when you ask, “what does it mean we are living in the new economy?” You will in variable receive a million different responses. Go to

the department of Labor Statistics and you can find the following data on American spending habits:

These are almost identical to the previous year. It’s not that Americans are changing where they are spending, but that they are just spending less over all.

Let’s start with the obvious American’s are spending less. Partly due to an increased emphasis on savings, but the real issue is that over 55% of Americans have experienced work related hardships and with the recession the average American family has lost over 20% of their wealth. Over half of America has made saving a priority.

Now, let’s focus that question a bit more. The question may be, “How is the new economy going to affect my business?” Ok focus a little tighter, “How are consumers going to be buying products/services in the New Economy?” Great question!  Let’s look a t a few more statistics that may help provide some insight:

More people clipping coupons. Last year, the number of coupons redeemed rose 27%, to 3.3 billion from 2.6 billion in 2008. What this tells you is that we are looking for value and bargains. T But where are they looking? Ever heard of the internet? What about the mobile phone?

Let’s explore this coupon thing a little deeper:

• 43% of US online adults search online for and use coupons
• 30% of US mobile owners are interest in receiving a promotion on their cell phone
• 44% of 18-24 years olds are interested in receiving a promotion on their cell phones
• 39% interested in mobile app to download coupons
• 31% interested in mobile app to alert them to discounts and offers
• 33% interested in mobile website to find coupon codes for use in-store

Forrester Research Inc. analyst Julie Ask predicts that retail sales through mobile phones will hit $1.5 billion in 2010. That is to say people are reviewing menus of restaurants, products for sale, searching for services, etc. and then making their purchase via mobile phone. In fact EBay Inc. alone sold $600 million worth of goods in 2009 via the mobile channel.

We know people are spending less, using the internet and mobile phones to not just look for deals, but to actually make purchases. Let’s go even further into the consumer mind into another trend that’s been building, Social Networking. If you are on Facebook try posting a simple question about a product e.g. “What diapers are the best for my 2 year old?” You will receive a plethora of responses. Consumers now have a real time method to ask all their closest friends on what the right product or service to buy. How does that affect your business?

Ok, you’re on information overload. I’ll stop with stories and statistics. The point is everyone knows we are in a new economy? We can see consumers are spending differently, getting their purchasing information differently, and purchasing through different mediums. That’s a whole lot of different. I leave you with one final question; Considering all the “different” who is helping you navigate the New Consumer Economy?

The Divine Business model is made up of three parts:

1. The ultimate goal for all of us is to have work that feeds us physically, mentally and spiritually.
2. Our work should let us contribute to our community and meet our needs by either using our gifts, talents and skills or doing things that help us grow in those areas.
3. The ultimate Business success is both profitable and fulfilling by employing people that primarily work in the areas of their gifts, talents and skills.

The premises behind the Divine Business Model are:

• God created us
• God created work
• There are two kinds of work labor and toil
• Labor is good
• Toil is Bad
• God gave each one of us a unique set of talents and gifts that ultimately complement each other.
• We have the opportunity to develop skills that work with our gifts and talents.
• Business is an honor that lets us meet our own needs by meeting someone else’s needs.
• Labor is work that lets us contribute to our community and gives us satisfaction.

In the Divine Business model we would all be doing those things that we are gifted and talented at as well as things that complement and build up those natural abilities.

What would life be like if we all had an opportunity to have a job that let us use our gifts talents and skills to make a living and contribute to our community.

This seems to me like the Divine Business.

A Gap is what happens when people forget to bring together and include vital parts of the whole.  Companies get gaps when they fail to recognize and integrate key parts of running their organizations.  This can happen with Vision, Strategy and Tactics.

Imagine you are taking a trip. Vision is the action of dreaming so clearly that you know exactly where you’re going, say San Fransisco, and recognize it clearly when you get there.  Strategy plans out the big picture of how you want to get there, which highways and which bridges, and tactics deal with the actual process of getting to the destination, driving, potty breaks and getting gas.  These three activities must work together for a company to live out its greatest potential and get to the final destination in a timely manner and yet are rarely used together, but why?  I believe that there are three reasons for this. 

The first is that Vision, Strategy and Tactical are extremely different from each other and most people gravitate towards one style or the other.  Since people start companies and typically hire similar people around them that think like they do you get a company that leans primarily to one style. 

The second reason is that learning to move back and forth between Vision, Strategy and Tactics is difficult.  It requires learned skills and a lot of work.  It also helps if you understand the purpose and language of all three types.

The Third reason is that most people understand the complexities of the way they think but believe that there isn’t much to the other two.  In reality, all three are complex and sophisticated in there own right.  One of the biggest mistakes to avoid is to over simplify a process.  We also simplify the consequences.  It either works or it doesn’t, we say.  We believe that if we do a little vision or a little strategy then we have accomplished all we need.

The Questions:

What type of person do you tend to be?   Most people are gifted towards one of the three, are you?  Finally, what are your GAPS in this area and what will you do to strengthen them?

All my life I have had a natural tendency to dream about the future, about what could be.  I also like to strategize about what it would take to get there and most of my life growing up I was told to get my head out of the clouds and get to work.  It happened in school, at home and as a teen it even happened at work.  Now I know this sounds bad and maybe you can here the, “Poor is me” fiddle playing but it’s not.  The truth was that I didn’t perform well as a kid growing up.  I didn’t get my homework done, I didn’t get my chores done and I didn’t always do well at my job early in life, unless it meant talking to people.  That was always something I had no trouble in producing.

The problem was that well meaning people around me tried to motivate me to be productive and do what I needed to do by inferring that my dreaming and planning wasn’t productive or valuable.  They didn’t see the benefit to what was going on in my head and consequently neither did I. 

While I was maturing in life I was naturally drawn to dreaming and building things.  It was a hobby, an outlet and often a distraction.  I continued to here the message, “get your head out of the clouds and get your feet on the ground” until I was about 30 years old when a friend heard someone say it to me and stopped us all dead in our tracks.

What he said to me that day is at the core of who I am and how I look at the world, “Keep your head in the clouds but keep your feet on the ground.”  That’s right, it seems like a paradox but that paradox gave me a since of freedom that day but I didn’t understand how to make it happen.  I just knew that it was important and that was the day I was introduced to the idea that BOTH dreaming and the practical are both valuable. Today I have learned that I can see from the vantage point of the clouds while getting things done on the ground.

Do you know the importance of both?  Can you hold this paradox?

How can two things that appear to be opposites or at least apposed both be true?  I don’t know… but when they are we call it a paradox and if you want to be successful in business and in life you need to be able to live with Paradox’s. 

We see Paradoxes all around us, here are a few examples:

• Grace and Truth
• Free will and Destiny
• Old ideas and new ideas

A paradox is something that really troubles us.  We look at it and say, “They both can’t be true”, but they are.  The most common problem we find ourselves in is we think we have to choose between two concepts and many times we don’t.  It’s not “either” but “both”.  The mother is being kind when she disciplines her child for doing something wrong but the child doesn’t think so.  To an adult discipline and kindness can both be true but the child says it’s either one or the other.  You’re either being kind or you’re disciplining me.

When the Tech Boom happened in the late 90′s everyone was saying that the OLD Business Rules were gone and the New Business Rules were here, Either/Or.  Then the Tech Crash Happened and the business world said that the old business rules still worked and Tech companies were bad.  Well business is business and we still must create customers and innovate, bring in more money than we spend, etc.  We still have business rules that are really old but we have new expressions of business that are definitely new.

So here is why I think it is important.  If you don’t know how to hold a paradox then you can get swept away and tossed from here to there in your business because the crowed is changing there mind every few moments.  If you can hold a paradox then maybe the waves won’t get you.

Can you hold a Paradox and do you understand the value?