When you own a business you generally believe that nobody knows more about your business than you. But there are times in the lives of many businesses that growth or success complicates things. At these points specialist consultants outside of your company can have greater insight than you about what you need to do to achieve…

Here in Acadiana we take the term “Southern Hospitality” seriously. We’re proud of how we welcome people into our homes, and into our businesses. And for some of us, hospitality is our business. On this edition of Out to Lunch, Peter Ricchiuto introduces two people at very different ends of the hospitality industry: Herb Schilling and…

We often talk about business and creativity as if they are polar opposites. In fact, business is a creative enterprise. Every great business, from Apple to Wal-Mart, stems from a great idea. As with other creative endeavors, like movies and music, the execution of an idea takes a team of collaborators. But the undertaking only…

There are a number of terms people use to try and make talking about business as exciting as talking about football. You’re probably familiar with the football clichés, “We’re going to go out there and play our own game.” “Our plan is to play hard till the final buzzer.” And all-time favorite, “It’s mental.” In business…

If you live in Acadiana there’s a pretty good chance you’re connected in some way with the oil industry. Most of us know somebody who works offshore. These men and women are gone for days and weeks, ferried out to massive oil rigs in the Gulf. So massive that they often refer to them as…

William Shakespeare famously wrote in his play As You Like It – “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many parts.” Like much of Shakespeare’s work, you can look at this on many levels. One interpretation is, although…

Business today is increasingly about information, technology, and service. Before this era, business wasn’t so much people making things happen, it was simply about making things. Today on Out to Lunch Peter Ricchiuti is talking about people who make things. With robots. And steam. At the beginning of the 21st Century Missy Rogers and her husband Scott…

When we talk about “manufacturing” in the United States it’s usually in the context of how many big ticket items like cars are no longer made in Middle America. Louisiana is practically never mentioned in discussions about manufacturing. But there’s a surprisingly active manufacturing community here in Acadiana. A lot of it is based on making…

In 1964, Bob Dylan wrote, “The Times They Are A changin’.”  Perhaps nothing illustrates that the times are still changing better than the fact that Dylan now has the Nobel Prize in literature for that and other observations. There are countless Ph.D dissertations and pages of press punditry examining all the various social forces at…

There are very few things that can we all agree on. Employers, employees, politicians, and parents have a range of divergent views on most subjects. Except one. Education. Everybody agrees that education is the fundamental driver of a healthy economy and a healthy society. We attribute a good education system to everything from full employment…