Letters

Sure, we heard from readers on takeovers and generational marketing, but the biggest response was to " What Balance?" (April), Nancy K. Austin's column on the near impossibility of building a great business and a great family simultaneously. On the Verge...

Nancy K. Austin's observation that it's futile to hope for balance between work and family hit home with many readers:

" What Balance?" brought on feelings of nausea--make that sadness. I have chosen to take on no more management or business ownership for exactly the reasons discussed. How long will it take for people to know that a business or a success does not love you back?

Phil Taggart
Senior Technical Adviser
HBO & Co.
Eugene, Oreg.

I recall fondly a speech Austin presented last October in San Francisco. As I read " What Balance?" it occurred to me that it could have been our group she was talking about when she described that panel of "four high-powered women" who responded, "My business" when they were asked which they would choose if faced with a choice between their business and their families.

I know many women who have had to make that tough choice more than once. It's not easy. But Austin's right: given the choice, I realize I would still leap at the chance to build something great, namely, a business.

Susan Willett Bird
President
American Mediation Council
Greenwich, Conn.

Other readers took issue with Austin's take:

After 15 years in the corporate world, I took the plunge in January and incorporated my strategic-marketing practice. You can imagine, then, how shocked I was to find out from Austin that I will never be a success. I'm a man whose "terra firma" is his faith and his family, not his business (strike one); whose concept of building something great includes the character of his kids and the strength of his marriage (strike two); and who, despite the pressures involved in starting a business, still considers work to be a means to an end, not an end in itself (strike three, I'm out). I could write more, but I've got to prepare for tonight's baseball practice: 13 sixth-grade boys are counting on their coach's actually being there.

James B. Holthus
President
Strategic Discovery
Shawnee Mission, Kans.

Austin's contention that women in business face only a series of ridiculously cruel and grinding choices does not square with my experience. My partner (a woman, a wife, and a mother) and I have been in business for 20 years. We are, by our standards, very successful. By that I mean we did not choose growth as an objective. As a consequence, our organization today is no bigger than it was 20 years ago, even though our dollar volume has multiplied several times. From day one, my partner was determined not to sacrifice her family, a determination I agreed with wholeheartedly. Her rules were out front for everyone to see: no work or travel on weekends, no spending more than one night away from home at a time. It worked. Clients and potential clients knew and accepted that, and it did not in any way hurt us.

Arnold Brown
Chairman
Weiner, Edrich, Brown
New York City

I decided a long time ago that my family was the most important thing in my life. I have also made it very clear that if the company is successful but the family is dysfunctional, then I have failed. And I'm willing to get up at 4 a.m. to work, go into the office Saturday nights, and forgo business trips to be able to make it home for dinner and attend the elementary-school Christmas show.

Steve Wulchin
President
FreeWave Technologies
Boulder, Colo.

Trans-spotting

In " The Takeover" (April), Stephanie Gruner wrote about the founders of Transworld Teachers, a language school, who lost their company when the chief financial officer they'd hired persuaded shareholders to dump them. Readers took note:

As a graduate of the program and a friend of the couple, I knew them to be warm, trusting individuals focused on educating their students. Unfortunately, they didn't possess the cunning and guile required for success in today's business world.

LCDR James Mitsatsos, USN (Retired)
Naval Science Instructor
Santa Teresa High School
El Paso, Tex.

Love Struck

One reader found Dr. Susan Love's choice of words in " Is There an M.B.A. in the House?" (Inc. Query, April) particularly provocative:

Your interview with Susan Love reveals more about what's wrong with the business of medicine than about how it will improve. After years of running a private practice and a year of business school, Love still doesn't know that those people in her waiting room aren't "inventory." They're customers!

Terry Lancaster
Cofounder
The Results Team
Tupelo, Miss.

The Gap

One reader took issue with the way J. Walker Smith and Ann Clurman portrayed baby boomers in " Generational Marketing" (Further Reading, April):

The authors' description of baby boomers as having "little else to worry about" except a "sense of entitlement created by their presumption of economic growth" shows that the authors must have spent the 1960s at a country club. The growing-up years I remember as a baby boomer included a few things the authors forgot to mention: the Cold War, air-raid drills in school, bomb shelters, and Vietnam.

Donna G. Albrecht
Concord, Calif.

Carpetbaggers

In " An Olympic-Sized Letdown" (On the Road, February), Michael E. Kanell recounted the struggles of some businesses in a post-Olympic Atlanta neighborhood. One reader wondered if he had visited the same neighborhood she knew:

Did Kanell notice that there are several thriving eateries and other businesses in Atlanta's Fairlie-Poplar historic district that have been there for years and have successfully ridden out the ups and downs of the neighborhood before and after the great summer games? Did he talk to anybody at Rosa's Pizza, an Italian dine-in or take-out restaurant that has been there for years? Did he talk to anyone at Tasty Town Restaurant & Grill, a diner-style breakfast-and-lunch place that's always busy? (It has been a fixture at this location since 1948.) And let's not forget some of the places that are within two blocks of Highland Bagel Co. Many of them opened shortly before or during the Olympics. The successes include the Atlanta Bread Co., Murphy's Deli, KFC, and Calypso Cafe. Those of us who work in the Fairlie-Poplar neighborhood are really excited to see all these new businesses here. But we have little sympathy for those who swooped down just before the Olympics because of free rent, guaranteed tourist traffic, and quick profits. They should not blame poor sales on the neighborhood. Market-driven businesses are surviving.

Christine M. Colborne
Partner
Hollingsworth, Colborne & Associates
Atlanta

Focus: Are CPAs Out of Touch?

In " How Many Accountants Does It Take to Change an Industry?" (April), Jill Andresky Fraser reported that the accounting industry is headed for a shake-up. One certified public accountant agrees:

The CPAs of today, most of whom have received "old school" training--hard-core business education with little training in computers and marketing--are ill-equipped for the kind of entrepreneurial thinking that will be needed in the 21st century. Tomorrow's CPAs will need to be extroverted, marketing-oriented individuals who get training in specialties valued by clients. Will colleges and universities be able to work in concert with CPA firms to facilitate that transition?

Marc Rosenberg
CPA
The Rosenberg Associates
Northfield, Ill.

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