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Why LearnersLive.com, I offer the following…

William Attardi on April 29, 2025

Maybe you noticed but we expanded EnergyWatch into LearnersLive.com this year, to offer information you may not know.  I have a passion for teaching, for learning……been doing it most of my life and for the past 20+ years at Monmouth University. Want to continue doing it as long as God allows.  Here’s the plan:

  • LearnersLive Objective: to learn something you do not know; to confirm what you already know!
  • To post something for you to learn…a continuing learning experience.
  • Focus will be on topics of learning…..I have a dozen courses we can add to the curriculum right away…..all virtual……from 10 minute to 30 minute sessions. Completed five so far…
  1. Effective Sales Presentation Skills – Learning Session #1, #2, #3
  1. Selling in the Executive Suite
  2. SWOT Analysis and Generative AI
  3. Customer-Centric in the Digital Age
  4. Coming in June: Innovation in the digital Age

What I’ve Learned Over Many Years Trying to Do the Right Thing

  1. I have to start with what some say is the first commandment of success: Get a good education / develop a skill in something you really love to do and work hard at it. It really is that simple. Competency leads to confidency!
  2. Never worry about your next job……work hard at the job you have and the promotions will come. A sports lesson: athletes understand that the best are playing in the playoff games. They just cannot worry about the next team they may play if they want to beat the team they are playing.
  3. If you have a manager title, your primary responsibility is to develop the people who report to you…….don’t just manage, teach
  4. Critical: develop both your oral and written communications skills at the highest level of your capability. No matter your job or position, your ability to communicate effectively will determine your relationships and your success in those relationships.
  5. When you are asked to present / teach what you know and give to others. Be sure to entertain as well as inform. In today’s electronic information age, it’s the only way they will listen.
  6. If everyone agrees with you then you are doing all the thinking. Encourage others to debate the issues and make decisions based on divergent intelligent thoughts.  Education happens when you learn from others.
  7. Love your family and your friends and don’t hate your enemies. Hate gets in the way of doing a good job as a parent, as a loyal friend, as a successful person.
  8. Never stop learning. It should never be final.  I’m learning something new every day, learning more and more as we go through lifMake time to read for information and for pleasure too. It really helps to escape the pressures of everyday living.
  9. Go to church or your chosen house of worship and give just one hour a week to God to thank him for your blessings. It may not have to be more than that.  It can be that one hour when you can pray and meditate and feel a sense of calm that refreshes your thoughts and better prepares you for life’s struggles.
  10.  Never retire! Why would you want to stop what you love to do and are good at it?

Customer-Centric in the Digital Age

William Attardi on April 13, 2025

Customer-Centric Marketing in the Digital Age.mp4

What’s your CENTRIC?  What drivers your business? What makes you different than everyone else in the market?……why do customers buy from you rather than the other guy?……… do your people know what makes you unique?…..do your customers know?  Below is what AI believes is their CENTRIC!  What do you think?

Sponsored by Amerlux. AVISTA by Amerlux

Amerlux – Commercial Lighting Manufacturer | SPEC-Grade Lighting

 Next month – Innovation in the Digital Age Sponsored by naturaLED:

  1. Disruptive
  2. Sustaining
  3. Efficiency

Effective Sales Presentation Skills by Bill Attardi – All three recorded sessions posted on LearnersLive.com:

William Attardi on March 27, 2025

 

Effective Sales Presentation Skills – Learning Session #1, #2, #3

 

March Madness and Baseball in March every year…As Mr. Gleason used to say, “How sweet it is!” Who do you like this year?  Do I hear GO YANKEES!  In my house I do, well I may be the only one as my lovely Linda is a Phillies fan, well, she was born and raised in Philadelphia so what choice does she have.  She bought me a book all about the history of that team… maybe I will read it someday if I know where I put it.

But I digress……..this is about giving an effective sales presentation to a group of customers, and closing that sale.  Not as easy as it sounds.  As many of you know, I teach at Monmouth University, for over 25 years, and my message to the academians is develop your oral and written communications skills to the best of your capability.  How you communicate will determine your success with your chosen career and your success in your relationships, personal and in the work place.

First of all, you owe your audience a good performance and that is directly related to your preparation.  Maybe some of you remember Sam Huff, who more or less defined the middle linebacker position.  Hall of Famer for the NY Giants. Quote: When I turned pro, I told the owners that I will play the games on Sunday for free because I love playing the game of football but you have to pay me a lot of money for the practices during the week!  Presentation day is Sunday…. Enjoy it, give it your best, but be sure you work hard at practice.  So let me start with PREPARATION: 

  1. Preparation Strategy – The Will to Prepare to Win
  • Come fully prepared…
  • Always start with knowing your audience / your customer
  • Why You? Why should they listen to you?
  • What is Your Objective
  • The Power of PowerPoint: Verbal & Visuals working together
  • Fundamentals of Effective Visuals – Visual Esperanto
  • Effective use of color to connect with your audience
  • Creative Opening / Meaningful Content / Compelling Close
  • Create closing slide first – all roads lead to your destination (GPS model)

 

  1. Presentation Strategy – Bring to the meeting something no one else knows…
  • It’s always a Selling Situation
  • Connect with your audience – cognitive / affective / conative
  • What is your Call to Action / What’s in it for them?
  • Rationale to take that action / Is it Reasonable
  • Project the attitude of your audience – pro & con

 

  1. Organizing the Presentation – FFAB (Features / Functions / Advantages / Benefits)
  • Creative Opening – your first impression
  • Create clear / thought starter slides – six by six rule
  • Meaningful Content – relevant to your audience
  • Compelling Close – lasting impression
  • Say it with color – applicable to the topic
  • Create a climate for learning

 

  1. Techniques in Presenting – When you stop getting better, you stop being good
  • Eye contact – you are talking to individuals that happen to be in a group
  • Plan & Promote Interaction – connect with your audience
  • Be clear on the process and Get Confirmation
  • Confirm understanding on a continuing basis
  • Re-enforce the need to continue the process
  • Project Acceptance and Handle Resistance

 

  1. Personal Delivery – Mechanics of Communicating Effectively Orally
  • The Audience – maintain control
  • Your Body – commanding positioning / look like you are in charge
  • Your Voice – clear / articulate / no verbal distractions
  • Room set-up…..proper lighting and 45° angle to your audience
  • We reads left to right – so stand on their left; slides on their right

 

Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good.  It’s the thing you do that makes you good.

Malcolm Gladwell

You owe your audience a good performance!

Launch of LearnersLive.com in 2025 – A Passion for Learning by Bill Attardi

William Attardi on December 31, 2024

Live as if you were to die tomorrow.
Learn as if you were to live forever.
Mahatma Gandhi

In every environment, in every company, in every department, in every office, in every classroom, on every team, there are inequities.  Men and women come in all sizes, all levels of acumen, all degrees of competency and talent. In management, many times, not of your choosing, you get a diversity of high achievers, good performers, weak contributors, and those that do not contribute a dime to the performance of the team.  I call them the deadbeats!

College students are there to learn, to prepare for a life of success in a leadership role with an organization of their instigation or rather, maybe one of their choosing, and that may happen a few times.  In my undergraduate classes, especially when they are mostly seniors, and certainly in my graduate classes at Monmouth University, I congratulate them for the progress they have made so far in their collegiate work and no matter the future, each and every one of them has earned the right to be called highly competent individual…..…as long as they nourish the learning process. But I explain, that’s only the start of a successful career, do they have the talent and dedication to learning, all the time, to move on…

Learners possess certain attributes that distinguish them from the Learned. They anticipate rather than react to change.  Some call that vision. They become essential facilitators of change within their altered environment. They can skillfully communicate the new and technically esoteric with a clarity that leads to understanding and advocacy. Organizations that don’t value learning and the change that springs from learning will struggle to stay relevant in this fast-paced ever-changing marketplace.

The world is changing rapidly.   

For the timid, change is frightening; for the comfortable, change is threatening;                            

for the confident, change is opportunity…….and confidence comes from competency.       

Nido Qubein, President of High Point University

 There’s that word competency again. That’s why most individuals even go to college, to develop their competency. Learners are just highly competent individuals that influence change in an organization and, in turn, as leaders, allow others to adapt to that change.  As an Educator, my ambition here is to express my view that education, the learning process, is not a one-time event but rather, something you do right all the time.  Sounds a lot like Vince Lombardi when he talked about doing things right, not once in a while but all the time……remember that? I believe learning is something you do all the time!

 Launch of LearnersLive.com in 2025

I have a passion for teaching, for learning……been doing it most of my life and for the past 20+ years at Monmouth University. Want to continue doing it as long as God allows.

Here’s the plan:

  • LearnersLive Objective: to learn something you do not know; to confirm / change what you already know!
  • To post something for you to learn, every single day…a continuing learning experience.
  • Focus will be on topics of learning…..I have a dozen courses we can add to the curriculum right away…..all virtual……from 5 minute to 30 minute sessions.
  • Marketing & management sessions I teach at Monmouth University….
  • Will invite other educators………already talked to Jim Benya, Deb Burnett, Mark Rea, Chris Brown, Bernie Erickson, others ………
  • Interviews with industry leaders…
  • Also access to industry training websites and videos
  • DISC assessments

 Will keep some of EnergyWatch……..2025 will be a celebration for your humble correspondent: 60 years in the lighting business.  Whoooooah! Will continue to post on LearnersLive.com:

  • The monthly blog on a variety of subjects
  • The monthly newsletter recap
  • Industry news and new product information but only if you learn something
  • Published articles that focus on teaching something, not just about lighting…
  • Industry research………including other training courses offered by the industry

 What do you think?  Need your help with any suggestions you may have to make this effort meaningful as an ongoing contributor to your personal learning activities.

The Whole Customer Value-Added Proposition by Bill Attardi

William Attardi on December 31, 2024

Let me define what I mean before I relate it to the lighting industry. Much has been written about the value proposition, the almost holy value proposition.  It’s a simple question: tell me what value you bring to the market; what makes you better than your competition?  We have to teach it at the under-graduate and graduate level in any marketing course and I have often wondered that maybe we place too much emphasis on it.  Well, we don’t.  A compelling value proposition is the essence of all our selling efforts.  In its simplest terms, a value proposition is a positioning statement that explains what benefit your product or service provides for your customers and how you do it uniquely better than your competition. It’s what you actually provide that is tangible and/or intangible and everything else your customer needs to make it acceptable to them as a solution (solving a pain point).  Well, that does sound like VALUE!  Warren Buffet tells us that we sell on price while customers buy on value.

 

With that said, let me justify why we must sell on the Whole Customer Value-Added Proposition, with emphasis on value-added.  In the high-tech digital world that we now find ourselves, my view is that we must expand the concept and must address three (3) distinct / essential offerings and they must all work together in a uniqueness that you own:

  1. The Product
  2. The Solution
  3. The Service

 

Now let’s look at the transition happening in the lighting industry…..and the Whole Customer Value-Added Proposition necessary if you intend to play in this new game. Yes, NEW GAME! “It’s a whole new world out there, with new playing fields, rules, and players. Your choice is to either learn this new game, or continue to be the very best player in a game that is no longer being played.” Larry Wilson

 

Let’s first deal with THE PRODUCT…..tangible lighting products.  Back in 1879, we experienced a disruptive innovation called the Edison light bulb.  Disruptive innovation because it would eventually replace every kerosene lamp in the marketplace, and lead to the life changing electric power industry.  For the first 50 years, it was all about quantity of light, then and who really knows when, quality of light became a focus.  Quantity and quality of light for over 100 years was the value proposition. Then innovation took the form of longer life; then energy efficiency.  All contributing to the evolution of a vibrant lighting industry.  Disruptive innovation is happening again, right now, as every lighting source commercially available will be replaced by solid state lighting.  Think about it…….most of us grew up with seven (7) major lighting categories: you know, incandescent, fluorescent, HID, etc.  We are now moving to one (1): LED: ONE MAJOR LIGHTING CATEGORY FOR EVERYTHING! The value-added value proposition is back to quantity and quality of light.  Long-life and energy efficiency are off the table as it is intrinsic with SSL.  When the possibilities are 300 lm/W efficacy and 100K hours of long life, let the innovators do their work on quality of light and we get the benefit.

 

Next, THE SOLUTION: it’s not just about light anymore, right?  Light has always had ancillary benefits but now, we are talking about allowing us to manipulate the timing / intensity / tuning of light leading to incalculable benefits in our living and working activities. To explore how lighting products can solve a pain point……  We are in the evolution stages of light becoming a value-added solution to many industry problems, dealing with improved productivity and increased performance in this “new” normal, even as a disinfectant solution…..thank you COVID.  Indoor farming is happening all over the world thanks to LED lighting.  We are finding lighting solutions wherever lighting is found and it’s everywhere:

 

  • Office
  • Retail
  • Healthcare
  • Human Centric
  • Education / Institutional
  • Horticulture
  • Automotive
  • Outdoor / Streetlighting
  • Sports
  • Specialty
  • Many other market segments: home, hospitality, commercial, industrial, on and on……
  • Where there is light, there will be a value-added solution, maybe for the first time.

 

THE SERVICE: if it’s not about light anymore then what is it about? It’s about AI, IoT / IoE / PoE / VLC / Li-Fi / VoIP / SAE / Big Data / Big Networking / LaaS and much much more… It’s the LaaS, I want to address now.  Lighting as a Service! If lighting has the potential to be the core connector to every electronic / digital device you own, we are not talking about traditional customer service: having the right product; in the right place; at the right price. That’s so yesteryear….If we believe the solution to today’s lighting systems must be a managed solution, dependent upon correctly designing / building quantity and quality of light, that requires intelligent specifications, competent installation, ongoing accurate measurement and monitoring, then we have no choice…… expanding services will play a more significant role, value-added and ongoing.  It will include a financial service as well that offers intelligent control, connectivity and data collection.  We will be asked to guarantee both the savings and performance for the entire design life of the solution, beyond providing just illumination. LaaS is a game-changer, a chance to create new user services.  All aboard… the value train is leaving the station.

 

pain point + targeted solution = loyal, happy customer

What I’ve Learned Over Many Years Trying to Do the Right Thing by Bill Attardi

William Attardi on December 31, 2024

As a follow-up to my inquiry about creating LearnersLive.com, I offer the following

  

  1. I have to start with what some say is the first commandment of success: Get a good education / develop a skill in something you really love to do and work hard at it. It really is that simple.

 

  1. Never worry about your next job……work hard at the job you have and the promotions will come. A sports lesson: athletes understand that the best are playing in the playoff games. They just cannot worry about the next team they may play if they want to beat the team they are playing.

 

  1. If you have a manager title, your primary responsibility is to develop the people who report to you…….don’t just manage, teach.

 

  1. Critical: develop both your oral and written communications skills at the highest level of your capability. No matter your job or position, your ability to communicate effectively will determine your relationships and your success in those relationships.

 

  1. When you are asked to present / teach what you know and give to others. Be sure to entertain as well as inform. In today’s electronic information age, it’s the only way they will listen.

 

  1. If everyone agrees with you then you are doing all the thinking. Encourage others to debate the issues and make decisions based on divergent intelligent thoughts.  Education happens when you learn from others.

 

  1. Love your family and your friends and don’t hate your enemies. Hate gets in the way of doing a good job as a parent, as a loyal friend, as a successful person.

 

  1. Never stop learning. It should never be final.  I’m learning something new every day, learning more and more as we go through life.

 

  1. Make time to read for information and for pleasure too. It really helps to escape the pressures of everyday living.

 

  1. Go to church or your chosen house of worship and give just one hour a week to God to thank him for your blessings. It may not have to be more than that.  It can be that one hour when you can pray and meditate and feel a sense of calm that refreshes your thoughts and better prepares you for life’s struggles.

 

  1. Never retire! Why would you want to stop what you love to do and are good at it?

 

Key Themes of Washington’s Farewell Address 

Crafted with the assistance of his close advisors, including Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, President George Washington’s Farewell Address was intended to offer guidance and warnings to the American people as they faced the challenges of the future. Among the most significant themes were:

  1. Neutrality in Foreign Affairs – advising that the United States should avoid becoming involved in the conflicts and political machinations of foreign powers. He argued that such alliances could lead to unnecessary entanglements and could jeopardize American interests and independence.
  2. The Dangers of Political Parties – Washington expressed concern that political factions could lead to divisions within the country and weaken the unity of the nation. He believed that political parties could become sources of discord and could prioritize their own interests over the common good. He encouraged Americans to work together for the benefit of the nation as a whole.
  3. The Importance of National Unity – He emphasized that the strength of the United States depended on the unity of its people and the coherence of its government. Washington urged Americans to set aside regional and political differences and to work together to build a strong and prosperous nation. Source: Day in History