Author: Scott Westerman

Remember when “reinventing the wheel” was a bad thing?We currently live smack dab in the middle of an era that requires reinvention. Those tried and true patterns that used to guide us don’t necessarily work anymore and the new stars will be those creative people who can look at the immense challenges we face and…

Almost 20 years to the day after our first visit, we found ourselves in Disney World this week. We purposely returned to the Disney Caribbean Beach Resort. The first time our kids were 8 and 10. Now they are grown and gone, so Colleen and I could experience the resort as empty-nesters.The rooms were the…

When Colleen and I visited Hawaii, one of the first places we explored was the famed Waimea Bay. The Beach Boys sang about it in Surfin USA and I wanted to see, up close, how those boys and girls “with their feet full of tar and their full of sand” attacked the rollers.They make it…

I got a call from a co-worker the other day. “Full disclosure,” he said. “I wanted you to know that we’re both competing for the same promotion.”We’re friends. He said he didn’t want me to hear about it from someone else. I thought that was a classy thing to do.Then I got a crazy idea.…

Once upon a time, there was a place where poets and composers gathered to create true magic. If you stepped inside the Brill Building during the 60s, you were likely to hear a half dozen pianos playing at once. If you were a time traveler from the future, you would instantly recognize artists who would…

That’s a true story. I had a terrific director on my team who, in addition to her many leadership gifts, had a distinct fashion sense. The sheer dimensions of her wardrobe must have required a closet the size of our master bedroom. I discovered the extent of her passion one morning when I noticed that…

July in Michigan represents all that’s appealing about the Great Lakes State. The 7th Month is the zenith of organized Summer activities.As the decade rolled from the 70s to the 80s in Ann Arbor, baseball, swim team, camp and summer band kept us focused and out of trouble. If we were lucky, we might spend…

I’ve had the good fortune to give a number of talks about social media lately. Being a beta geek since the days when I got my Internet through a dial-up SLIP connection at Pipeline (coupled with my current gig at Comcast) seems to attract attention. A common question is “When did you start blogging?” For…

From the time I first saw Buddy Rich behind a trap set, I wanted to be a drummer. I paid my dues with the required piano lessons, God’s way of weeding out the un-worthy, and even did a year on the trumpet when my Eberwhite band director told me there could only be two drummers…