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The Working Supervisor's Support Kit is a collection of information and tools to help working supervisors do a better job. It's based on what Wally's learned in over twenty years of supervisory skills training.

For weekly tips and resources pointers, check Wally's Three Star Leadership Letter

Find out more about having Wally speak to your company or convention.

Find out more about Wally's coaching services.

Every week, reporters around the country write great business stories that don't make it onto your screen or into your local paper. And every week I scour newspapers around the country to identify five of those great stories to enrich your weekend reading. This week I'm pointing you to stories about a long-lived family firm, a steady management style, Wal-Mart, home control systems, and virtual worlds in business.

From the Jackson Clarion-Ledger: 70-year-old firm stays in the family
"For more than 60 years, Marty Davidson has done what he can to make sure the family business is thriving. But this family business isn't a shop on a street corner. It's a multistate operation based in Meridian that employs about 800 people.

Wally's Comment: I'm fascinated with successful privately held firms, from giants like Koch Industries and Mars to companies like Southern Pipe, the subject of this story. They give you an idea of what you can do as a company if you can really consider the long term without pressures for constant growth in revenues and profit.

From the Charlotte Observer: Smith wins praise for leadership style
"Ten years ago, Precision Fabrics Group struggled as imports claimed its apparel fabric business and demand disappeared for its typewriter ribbon fabric. Today, the Greensboro firm has about 800 workers and is a rarity: a profitable domestic textile company. The turnaround showcases how Precision Fabrics' owner, Lanty Smith, operated in troubled times. Now he's being tapped to do more of the same as Wachovia's new chairman."

Wally's Comment: This is a look at how one person has applied a style described as "steady calm and strategic thinking" to different kinds of businesses and situations.

From the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: Wal-Mart improving its image, an expert finds
"Wal-Mart may be evolving into a model corporate citizen, says a retired dean of the Twin Cities business community. Chuck Denny is a well-regarded "servant leader" who led ADC Telecommunications over two decades until his 1991 retirement. He analyzed America's largest and sometimes-controversial retailer as part of a yearlong research fellowship at the Humphrey Institute at the University of Minnesota. In his 49-page analysis, he also concludes that business should focus on business and not health insurance.

Wally's Comment: This piece will have you thinking about many business issues and what they mean for you. It will also get you thinking about how businesses contribute to other stakeholders besides shareholders.

From the Houston Chronicle: Click sweet click
"When Kyle Barker forgets to turn off the kitchen lights before leaving town on business, he can pull out his laptop, click the mouse a few times and do it from anywhere in the world."

Wally's Comment: Home control systems that are tied to the net are starting to move from the "someday" category into "today."

From the Los Angeles Times: A Second Life for corporate America
"Strait-laced in the real world, workers do business as animals or blue-skinned hipsters in a parallel reality on the Web."

Wally's Comment: In this generation of business we're going to learn new lessons about how diverse and dispersed teams work and should be managed. The use of virtual worlds is going to be one part of where and how we learn. What's important here is not the basic concept which William Gibson described in Neuromancer. It's not Second Life, either, which is one kind of virtual world. The important things have to do with how people work together in virtual worlds and what lessons there might be for the physical world.

For more on this, check out the Business Week podcast titled "Virtual Worlds at Work."

Wally's Working Supervisor's Support Kit is a collection of information and tools to help working supervisors do a better job. It's based on what Wally's learned in over twenty years of supervisory skills training. Click here to check it out.

Request your free copy of "Meeting the Challenges of the Boomer Brain Drain: An integrated approach."

Wally Bock has helped people learn to be great bosses for more than a quarter century. His latest book, Performance Talk: The One-on-One Part of Leadership, makes learning key leadership principles almost effortless by teaching through a story and providing lists of resources for further growth.

Click here to find out more about Wally's coaching services.

For weekly tips and resources pointers, check our Wally Bock's Three Star Leadership Letter.

Click here to find out more about having Wally speak to your company or convention.