Our Expert is: Keith Frein
Qualification: Keith has successfully built a company from $5,000 to 44 million. Keith is now spending a wonderul time with his family and building another great business.
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Keith's Weekly Insights

Tip #2--Thank you Thursdays
January 8, 2008

When was the last time you received a handwritten thank you note? My gut tells me that outside of receiving that occasional forced thank you card that that a mother or father requires of their child (yes, I am one of those type parents) that you probably haven't had the pleasure of opening one in very long time. Writing a thank you note is one of the easiest, non time consuming, inexpensive ways to make some one's day. When I was running my previous company we instituted a policy called "Thank you Thursdays". Each employee (myself and all managers included) would be required to write one thank you note every Thursday to a customer, co-worker, or a vendor. The managers of each department would collect them, and bring them to me at the end of the day. (I am a big beleiver in having systems in place to hold people accountable). When I left my company we had around 120 home office employees. If we didn't hire another employee the rest of the year, that would be 6,240 thank you card that were sent out in a twelve month period.  That's a lot of unexpected smiles and good feelings created.What did it cost? Some stationary, a stamp and about sixty seconds a week.  On top of the fact it just plain feels good to write someone and tell them thank you (try it and let me know) you get the added satisfaction of knowing you are probably on some one's radar now for a positive reason.

Before I wrote this tip, I checked with the current CEO of my old company, (also my business partner) just to see if Thank You Thursdays were still in effect. His answer was a resounding..... Absolutely! Writing a personal note to someone to say thank you for "something" is now ingrained in the culture of the company.

Buy some stationary, set up a weekly appointment with yourself to send out a handwritten note and give it a go. Please share with me what happens.

Keith Frein recently retired as co-founder and co-CEO of PPR Travel. The company was ranked in 2002, 2003, and 2004 in Inc Magazines Fastest Growing Privately Held Companies in the United States. Keith is currently working on taking a new nutritional beverage to  market through network marketing. Keith can be reached at keith081@gmail.com.

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