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Never Wrestle with a PIG

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The business books at the library and book stores fill many shelves. Some authors tend to run a little long at the keyboard. There is one voice that stands out from the crowd, Mark McCormack.

Mark McCormack is the founder of the International Management Group (IMG) and was the guy who became Arnold Palmer’s agent in 1959. At the time, although enormously successful and popular, Palmer had only one endorsement deal - with Heinz for $500 a year (and as much ketchup as he wanted).

Mark and Arnie’s simple handshake agreement changed the world of sports forever. Stick with me, this is NOT about sports.

It wasn’t long before McCormack had signed two other rising stars Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus. McCormack didn’t limit himself to golf. In 1968, he signed his first tennis player, Australia’s Rod Laver as well as representing athletes from football, rugby, cricket, motor racing and a host of other sports.

McCormack’s company, International Management Group or IMG, became the biggest name in corporate sport and moved beyond sports, managing former Presidents and Prime Ministers, Pope John Paul II and even represented the Nobel Peace Prize.

There is more to the sports business than knowing how to swing a golf club or how tight to string a tennis racket. Mark McCormack began sharing his common sense approach to business in 1984, when he wrote "What They Don't Teach You at Harvard Business School" a book that spent twenty-one weeks at the top of the New York Times bestseller list.

He followed it with "What They STILL Don't Teach You at Harvard Business School" and recorded both of them on audio cassette.

These are not sports books but essential, down to earth, common sense, get-a-grip business advice books. Reading them is great, but listening to them on audio cassette, read by Mark himself is an even bigger treat. McCormack is one of the most plain-speaking and credible business teachers we have, and he comes across especially well in this relaxed studio recording.

Though Mark’s principles are powerful, he's a humble teacher for someone at his level. His delivery is so understated you will discover the value of his ideas naturally rather than having to work around an overzealous sales pitch. Listening to Mark’s unassuming voice, with no airs, is like having an understanding business partner in the seat next to you as you drive down the road.

Mark died in May of 2003 but his words and ideas will help generations to come. You can find his stuff in almost any library and many libraries have the audio books, too. A quick look at Half.com will find most of his audios in like new condition for a fraction of the cost.

Many times you will be given a choice of Mark’s audio books, abridged or unabridged. For years I didn’t much care one way or another until I listened to Stephen King on CD telling me why I should only choose unabridged. Sure it takes longer, but you get the drift of the author’s thoughts entirely, not just some of them chosen by an unseen editor. Chose unabridged and go the extra mile is possible.

Here is a partial list of audio books and CD’s by Mark McCormack that I highly recommend

What They Don’t Tech You at the Harvard Business School

What They STILL Don’t Tech You at the Harvard Business School

On Selling
On Communicating
On Managing
On Getting Organized
On Negotiating

The 110% Solution

The Terrible Truth About Lawyers: How Lawyers Really Work and How to Deal With Them Successfully

Hit the Ground Running: The Insider's Guide to Executive Travel

Staying Street Smart in the Internet Age

Never Wrestle with a Pig: And Ninety Other Ideas to Build Your Business

For more BIG ideas on business get my article "Voice Mail Can Be Your Buddy" Send a blank eMail to the MailTo:VoiceMail@BigIdeasGroup.com

If you take my advice and listen to Mark McCormack for the first time, I would like to hear your opinion and reaction. MailTo:Mike@BIGIdeasGroup.com

My colleagues and I get asked a lot about licensing. Frankly, Microsoft doesn’t have a great reputation for keeping it simple. And to be totally transparent – I, like many of my colleagues, would usually rather stick a fork in my eye that talk about it because it can get complicated. And confusing. And just…ugh.

So you can imagine my joy when I was asked to write a newsletter editorial about simplifying licensing. Exactly.

Then I had a very enlightening conversation with Terry Choquette, Licensing Marketing Manager at Microsoft and she pointed me to a few resources that got back to the basics and laid it all out very simply. I like simple. And I decided that this simple information was as blog worthy as it was newsletter worthy. While details about software licensing is not everybody’s favourite reading material, stick with me on this.

Ways to buy a license

First of all, there are 3 ways to buy a license as illustrated in the slide below: a full packaged product from a retail store, an OEM product on a new computer or a volume agreement from a reseller.

Volume licensing agreements

While you could simply walk into the nearest Best Buy or Future Shop and make your purchase, most organizations that need 5 or more licenses can benefit best from volume licensing agreements. Why? Well, there are some pricing advantages, there are more flexible options based on size and type of business, payment structure, ownership of software, etc., there are additional use rights for cross-language and reimaging machines, and there are use rights to new product versions, support, training, tools, etc., with Software Assurance (more about this below). 

For this post, I’m going to limit my discourse to those organizations who want to license less than 250 devices or users, which I would hazard a guess applies to most of you reading this blog. If you need help with licensing options for 250 devices/users or more, lemme know and I’ll put you in touch with people who can help you or you can check out these online resources.

Below is a great 3.5 minute video that lays out the volume licensing options that are part of the Microsoft Open License program for small and medium sized businesses:

(Please visit the site to view this video)

 

Basically, there are 3 volume licensing agreement options: Open License, Open Value and Open Value Subscription. Now if you want more detail than the video gives (you did watch it right? C’mon it’s only 3.5 minutes long and it’s pretty entertaining!), you’ll want to take a look at the Open License Program Guide. It has a very useful chart on page 8 which compares what you get with an Open License agreement compared to an Open Value agreement.

Software Assurance

Software Assurance is something that can be added to your volume license agreement which provides 24x7 support, deployment planning services, training, and the latest software releases. Although once viewed as simply an insurance policy for free software upgrades, Software Assurance has now been recognized by analysts as an essential tool for getting the most out of your licensing purchase.

Below is a screen shot from an interactive PDF listing the benefits of Software Assurance with each type of licensing agreement.

For more information about Software Assurance and what it can do for your organization, check out the Software Assurance site.

Let me know if this was helpful!

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