Articles

Dr. Mel Pender is a decorated war combat veteran and retired military officer. He is also an Olympic gold medalist, entrepreneur, community leader and public speaker who has impacted lives and inspired young people the world over. Including me.

Community banks know better than most that small businesses are the foundation of any community. You know their value from an economic standpoint, from a jobs outlook, and from your own customer and business perspective. You can also identify because in your Georgia community, you are one of them.

After learning how Perfect Image manages sales development activity, one of my colleagues in the marketing and creative industry exclaimed, "You are a beast!" He was stunned by our vigorous process of tracking and measuring phone sales calls, client visits, written correspondence and the quotes we submit. For me personally, this involves five phone calls daily to existing and prospective clients, and a similar number of weekly face-to-face meetings.

In 1925, Ted Giesel went to Oxford to pursue a Ph.D. in English. Giesel's biography states that while his notebooks include notes on lectures, they reveal a much greater propensity for doodling. One day a classmate looked over at Giesel's notebook and said, "You're crazy to be a professor. What you really want to do is draw. That's a very fine flying cow!"

It might be this time of year, or perhaps this year in particular, that calls for a renewed message of hope for our country, our families, friends and colleagues. And yes, our four-legged companions, too. I recently received this festive photo from my daughter Ryan, who completed her internship at the White House last Friday. These bigger-than-life replicas of Bo and Sunny are on point to welcome all to the House this holiday season.