MarquisParker.com // Business Strategist, Speaker, Advisor, and Coach

20 essential Six Sigma blogs

Published on August 29, 2011 by Marquis in Business, Business concepts, interesting articles, operations, other blogs, other sites

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A few months back, I received an email from Rose King, who manages content for Bschool.com, to pass along a link to one of their articles listing the top 20 blogs with information about Six Sigma.

For those of you who have never heard of the Six Sigma concept, here’s a definition from Wikipedia:

Six Sigma seeks to improve the quality of process outputs by identifying and removing the causes of defects (errors) and minimizing variability in manufacturing and business processes. It uses a set of quality management methods, including statistical methods, and creates a special infrastructure of

… Read the rest

Milkshakes & Product Failures: A Lesson on Segmentation

Published on May 9, 2011 by Marquis in Business, Business concepts, guest bloggers, interesting articles, Marketing, other blogs, other sites, strategy

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Recently, my friend Eric Sforza, who some of you may remember from my video interview of him, reached out to share an article that he thought would be interesting to my readers. Eric studies a range of business topics, but one of his biggest areas of focus is at the intersection of customer orientation and strategy. In this article, he analyzes a case study of how customer segmentation helped to drive sales of milkshakes and shows how a lighthearted topic can lead to useful business insights.

If you enjoy the guest article below, please check out Eric’s blog at … Read the rest

Inspirational True Stories – Perseverance Triumphs Initial Failure

Published on December 13, 2010 by Marquis in Business, guest bloggers, interesting articles, other sites, professional advice, Uncategorized

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A couple of months ago, I started to become interested in the wide range of journeys that people had taken in their careers, particularly in the business world. I’m sure that we’ve all heard that there is a “right way” to be successful in business and I find it cool when people don’t go the “right way” and still do well. In response to this interest, I posted a few entries about some of the non-standard paths that well-known people had taken and received some good feedback on those postings.

After that, this notion continued to dwell in my mind … Read the rest

14 surprising first careers of famous people

Published on November 4, 2010 by Marquis in career, career path, interesting articles, other sites, transition

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In some of my recent issues, I’ve tried to share the lesson that people can come from a variety of backgrounds and still have successful business careers. Many visitors to this site are aiming for drastic career transitions into business, but conventional wisdom often leaves people thinking that it isn’t possible. Before I applied to business school, I remember hearing that people needed to major in Business Administration in undergrad and do either investment banking or management consulting afterward to have a shot at being a successful businessperson in the long-term. I’m so glad that I didn’t listen too intently… Read the rest

15 Famous CEOs Who Didn’t Major in Business

Published on October 3, 2010 by Marquis in Business, career, Corporate executives, interesting articles, organization, other blogs, other sites

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Back when I was applying to business school, I thought that I didn’t have a legitimate shot because I had no background in business. Until then, my professional career had consisted of several years’ worth of plugging away at Java code and an academic background focused on Technology. According to what I’d heard from other applicants at info sessions and on online message boards, business schools would never consider someone like me to be a viable candidate for admission to business school. I now know that those people were likely trying to pysch me out and throw me off my… Read the rest

Interesting notion…”Why an MBA Is a Waste of Time and Money”

Published on September 11, 2010 by Marquis in Bschool experience, Business, Business School, career, career path, interesting articles, mba, professional advice

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OK, I know what you might be thinking after seeing the title of this entry…”What the hell is Marquis thinking in saying that an MBA is a waste of time and money”. Before running too hard on that line of thought, let’s slow down and take a step back. I think it’s obvious that I don’t agree with that statement because I wouldn’t have spent two years and a lot of loan money to get a Stanford MBA if I did. Rather, that line is the title of an article that I recently came across that piqued my interest because… Read the rest

MBA Pay: Top B-Schools, Top Dollar

Published on September 7, 2010 by Marquis in Business, Business School, business school rankings, career, Financing the MBA, interesting articles, mba, professional advice

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The article below is about a topic that will likely interest most readers of this site: post-MBA salaries. Specifically, the article focuses on research that reveals a high correlation between attending top business schools and earning high post-MBA salaries. This idea isn’t exactly a new one, but I can’t remember ever having seen any analysis comparing total 20-year post-MBA earnings between schools. That said, the analysis isn’t perfect. The article does describe some potential issues with the source data set, but I still found the outcomes of the analysis to be interesting, especially as it relates to international students who… Read the rest

How to Plan Your Resume Content

Published on August 25, 2010 by Marquis in career, interesting articles, job search resources, other blogs, professional advice, resume

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Recently, I came across a blog produced by a young lady named Karen Flowers, who calls herself “The Resume Chick” and provides resume writing services for clients. After reading some of her entries, I’ve become a big fan of her site. I know that she’s technically a competitor of mine because we both offer resume review and advisory services, but game recognizes game… Read the rest and her resume advice game is strong. She’s providing her readers with some great tips and, as my long-time readers know, I care more about passing along useful information to my readers than holding that info back