Everyone is a customer

If you can only focus on one thing in your business, make it customer service. Not just to the paying customers--though treating them nice is a good thing--but to the internal customers as well. Who are the "internal customers?" Everyone. Every employee, driver to Director, is a customer.



Customer service is the key performance indicator. It shows (among other things) whether your company processes are running efficiently and links each job to the paying customer. Good things to know.

Tom Peters says:

we urge participants to make the level of customer satisfaction the primary basis for incentive compensation and annual performance evaluation for virtually every person at every level in every function throughout the organization. We also urge every organizational unit in every function to develop key quality measures. Progress should be posted on charts in every work space, and a quantitative goal report should be the first item of business at every staff meeting, regardless of topic.

The video explains how and why each person in the company is a customer, and a supplier. And a worker too, dang it. Each job has three phases: receive input, do work on the input then send the output to someone else. You are a customer when you receive and a supplier when you send, and a worker in between.

Measurement = Results

At the end of a frustrating--I hate technology, or it hates me--day all I have to show for it is a short video. But heck, the best things come in small packages, or that is what De Beers wants you to think.

The video is a brief introduction to measurement, the first tiny step in a series of videos, webinars, articles, podcasts, Web 2.0 gone wild. We will go from measurement to performance management to Balanced Scorecard. Why? Because if you can't measure you can't improve.

Brain Beats Brawn ... Usually

Taking a mental break from putting together a video series on performance management -- up soon, tomorrow me hopes -- I read Brains vs. Brawn by Geoff Colvin in the Sep 15 issue of dead tree Fortune (paper still beats digital for reading on the sofa, in the loo or horizontal anywhere).

Fascinating, all about the relative worth per pound of commodities and intellectual capital products. Not so much which is worth more: one expects small, high-ticket items cost more per pound than bulky, sold-by-the-boat-load (literally) commodities. The size of the contrast is still amazing though, that in 2000 hot rolled steel sold for 19 cents a pound and an Intel Pentium III 800mz chip sold for $42,893 on the hoof. Wow.

With all the attention recently paid to commodity prices, trending very high even with a recent softening, Colvin

suspected we were missing a countertrend: the even stronger rise in value of brands, technology, copyrights, and other purely human products.

Not so. Comparing the year 2000 baseline with today's prices, he discovered that "the true commodities, steel and gold, have risen hugely, about 170% each." Yet brain-heavy, intellectual-capital products haven't faired as well, with Viagra up the most at a 150% rise (puns intended). Most don't even come close: the chip test is stark. The far-advanced Core 2 Duo Extreme Edition chip has increased a mere 18%. Huh?

The closer a product is to the dirt from which it came, the more its price has risen, while if it has been upgraded and sweated over by hundreds of Ph.D. engineers, it is lucky just to have help steady. What on earth is happening?

First, obvious to anyone aware of what's happening outside the West, is there has been a huge increase in the amount of brainpower available, that as demand for brainy products have certainly increased, this increase has been dwarfed (snd made possible actually) by the 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of Chinese, Indian and non-OECD country engineers produced yearly. Throw a stone in Shenzen, Hsin Chu or Bangalore and you're likely to hit an engineer, 50:50 one with an advanced degree.

Thus the increase of demand and the increase of brain power--and the low capital needed in areas like brand building--have led to better and better design to meet the challenge of more and more competitors. This has depressed unit costs, or prices anyway.

Not so in commodities. The demand in the past decade for from-the-dirt products has far outstripped the supply. It takes time and money to even get permission for a new mine, let alone the time needed to start up, build the refinery and other infrastructure then ship the iron, copper, coal or gold.

Colvin contends that this is still just a cycle, that big demand/low supply high prices will slowly change, an equilibrium will be reached and prices will stabilize if not fall. Calling it a "once-a-generation" opportunity to cash in from commodities, he ends with the money quoye, that

A smart businessperson can always innovate, create a new brand, build a better prodcut. The game never stands still, but neither does it lead to an inevitable conclusion. That's why I'm still betting on brainpower.

Me too. I live in one of the world's commodity powerhouses, Canada, self-described "hewers of wood and drawers of water." Life is sure good in many parts of Canada, potash from Saskatchewan, oil from Alberta (Oilberta to the rest of Canada), coal and other minerals from BC make for happy budgets. But the writing is on the wall, if we take the time to see it anyway.

Central Canada, Ontario and Quebec, are suffering: our manufacturing heartland, jobs are disappearing and ... no one quite knows. I live in Sooke Harbour, on the west coast of Vancouver Island, a rugged community built on logging and fishing. But there are few logs left, and, by all accounts, fewer fish. It's a beautiful spot, and tourism will help, but B&Bs and diners pay little wages, certainly not enough to replace a logger paycheck.

We, like the rest of Canada, have to shift, from digging in the figurative dirt to innovating in the intellectual marketplace. Like Colville, I think we have no choice but to bet on brainpower.

No substitute for flying.

Along with a "paper less office," IT improvements were supposed to eliminate (okay, reduce) the need for most business travel. Why suffer through airports, cattle-car seating, taxis and hotels to meet someone? In the new, broadband, Web 2.0 paradigm, business travel was to be passe; instead just fire up the video conferencing set up and wham, travel to the next floor rather than the next city or country to hold your meeting.

Heck, it is (supposedly) easier than that! No need to move from your desk or cubicle: just boot Skype or ooVoo or some other VOIP program and there, right there on your computer screen, was the one you wanted to meet with. So close you could almost swear you were in the same room.

Almost. Well, not almost, more like never. At least internationally--maybe New York to Cleveland VOIP offers crystal clear picture and sound, but in my experience Western city to Chinese/Indian city does not. When the connection works you get jerky, time-lapse video, and the sound, well, it's okay of you like talking to people at the bottom of a well, with echo, echo, echo.

Instead of a face-to-face conversation where you use both verbal and facial clues to make the back and forth flow smoothly, in VOIP you are constantly stepping on the other person's sentence. Or reverting back to a simpler time and archaic jargon: over.

Much as I like seeing the other person my choice is the regular telephone ... or flying. The moral is that if the meeting is critical, and getting all points aired and mutual understanding achieved, either get access (at both ends) to some professional, expensive video conference set up ... or fly.

The Daily Dick No.1

Today I introduce a new feature, The Daily Dick. An ongoing (but daily?) conversation between Dick, myself and the blog, a chance to chronicle the trouble, travels and travails (and triumphs, right Dick?) Dick lives through. Interesting times (meant not as a curse) too, weaving multiple time zones and multiple cultures into a profitable gig.

You will like Dick. I do. But then I have a thing for smart, intellectually curious, best-idea-wins, results-count-but-people-matter-too people. Don't meet enough of them.

Dick 1 finds Dick in well-known-city, India, hiring new and getting to know (month) old staff, both as individuals and examples of Indian culture. He's been away from home close to two weeks and he's tired. But still observant:

Daily Dick No.1
It can be very stressful running a start-up, and there are times when I wonder what I got myself into setting up this company. Fortunately, this doesn’t happen very often, but when it does all I have to do is look outside

and watch the workers who have been demolishing the building next door to our office to get a proper sense of perspective.

These guys are doing grueling and dangerous physical labor for less than US$2 per day without any real job security or safety net in the form of insurance. Most of them are working hundreds of miles from home, and rarely to get to see the families that they are working so hard to support.

Worse still, they don’t have any choice but to sell their physical labor because they lack the necessary education and skills for finding other work, and most of them will spend their lives grafting away on building sites.

Unlike these laborers, I was lucky enough to have the choice to create this company, and now I have made this choice I have the responsibility not only to make it successful but also to provide an environment in which the people who have chosen to join me can grow and develop themselves and their careers.

This is a huge responsibility, and it is one that I need to remain constantly aware of. Having chosen to go along this path and persuaded others to follow me on it, there’s no turning back.

Dick describes the always grueling and often gruesome reality of developing India and China, waves of menials selling physical and emotional hardship in a desire for a better life for their family. Selling it to the physical and emotional desires of the new middle class for a better life for themselves. What Dick is watching is the death of one way of life and the birth of another, the changing of a culture.

Birth can be pretty but is always messy, and death can be noble but is always disturbing.

And starting a company can be exhilarating but is always tiring. Good on'ya Dick. Welcome to the blog.

Start With The End

Building anything with software is hard, often frustrating, or is for me anyway. As it (program, website, whatever) does not exist and in the end is just zeros and ones well organized, it (the software project) can move, change, shift, endlessly.

Call it feature creep, defined by searchCIO.com as:

a tendency for product or project requirements to increase during development beyond those originally foreseen, leading to features that weren't originally planned and resulting risk to product quality or schedule. Feature creep may be driven by a client's growing "wish list" or by developers themselves as they see opportunity for improving the product.

Every time, I repeat, every time I worked with software developers, on client project teams I led or projects of my own, I suffered from, fought and, truth be told, caused feature creep. The ability to add this or tweak that is just too dang tempting to pass up.

What brings this on? The new website for this blog! What will it contain? Look like? How will video be treated? Photos? Templates? Webinars? What features will it have? Lots of unknowns for just this little project. How to decide the site design writ large then (the more important) how to control the process?

Start with strong leadership, Dick and the senior IT team he's assembled. Yet neither will be involved daily on such a small project, so the question remains: how to keep the project on the rails? Define the end before you start the job.

Received a document yesterday, a website development model, the "this is what we expect website projects to prepare before starting coding, and how we expect ."

We humans do what our managers (spouses, officials) pay attention to, what they reward us for doing and punish us for not doing. A necessary inital step though is measurement, for how else would the manager know what we've done/not done?

"What gets measured gets done," five simple words (from Tom Peters ... I think) that I have repeated ad nauseum (or at least ad headache) to clients. Yet before measuring one must know what the goal or end or objective is. Vastly simplified (yet still correct) the steps are:

Set Objective (the desired end)
Decide how/where/when/what to measure
Explain objectives and metrics to responsible person(s)
Measure
Analyze
Adjust
Repeat

This document goes a long way to achieving the software objective/specifications; it explains in detail what the site should look like, colors, fonts, layouts, and what features it should have, and the steps to follow to alter the specs. Once all parties sign off on it Dick and Acme now have a way to measure what gets done.

This is a kindergarten class in performance management, but hey, we all started in kindergarten. And heck, Robert Fulghum thinks kindergarten lessons are all one really needs to know. Maybe, but I still plan lots more on measurement (a squishy target I admit, but still one my future actions can be measured against).

Teaching is helping others surpass you

Nothing is more gratifying to a teacher than seeing students learn, to understand then use lessons taught to their benefit. True for managers teaching staff, professors teaching students and fathers teaching daughters. Yet one day the teacher must be prepared for the student becoming the master. Like what happened to me this morning.

Some background. I've talked writing and communication to my daughter since she was old enough to listen (and too small to escape). "Every day with you is a lesson," she recently told me. Somewhat chagrined, I asked her if she wanted me to stop. "No. No way," she answered, than with a little pause, "Well, maybe when my friends are around." I said I would (try).

Katya has talked about being on the school Yearbook Committee since she entered middle school (Grades 6-8), and now in Grade 8 she qualifies. Eager (something she must get from her Mom) she was first to put her name on the list, first to get the application form (this is Grade 8?) and hopes this morning to be first to submit a filled-in application form. If points were given for eagerness ...

Anyway, she showed me the form over breakfast, asking for my help. A firm believer in bullet points, I sketched some weasel sentence for her as way to introduce bullets, then went to shower. About 30 minutes later I saw the filled out form, read it and ... WOW! Here it is (click to expand):


This comes from a 12-year old? "Wonderful! Better than I could do," I told her. She demurred quite convincingly (another learned skill?) but I could tell she was pleased.

If you believe in progress the goal of teaching is helping students surpass your abilities. I must be a good teacher then.

So, if one day my writing improves, it could be my daughter ghosting for me. Now if only I could teach her to mow the lawn.

Poor Logic = Poor Decisons

I have this thing about poor logic. Arguments full of fallacies frustrate me. Every judgment, opinion and decision are but the conclusions of a set of premises, that I believe/think/suggest X because of these Y facts. The success or failure, the problems and solutions of individual lives, organizations, companies and countries depend upon the quality of the logic used to analyze the situation, whatever that might be.

Conclusions reached without any formal or systematic logical analysis can be good ("gut" decisions stem, after all, on an internal, below-the-radar logical process), and conclusions reached through vigorous use of logical analysis can be bad. Logic is not magic: it just improves your chances of reaching good conclusions. (More on my logical history below.)

Premise quantity and quality (relevant, acceptable) affect the quality of the conclusion: lots of good premises increases the chance of making a good conclusion; adding irrelevant, unacceptable premises, or not including premises that hurt your case, decreases the chance of making a good conclusion. Duh.

People in business often make the latter mistake, focusing just on the points for their case and minimizing--or not including--points that hurt their case. It is a very natural, very human thing to do, "putting your best forward" and all that. It can also be a very sneaky thing to do, a strategy focused strictly on winning the case at hand, not on what might happen in the future.

Why the screed about logic? Politics, of course; Republican arguments, again: a column by William Kristol in the NY Times, "A Heartbeat Away," specifically.

Mr. Kristol defends Sarah Palin's ability to sit in the Big Chair if tradgey happens (which BTW was John McCain's stated only test for his veep pick, pre-Palin that is). How? Because she is young, and there have been two other "young" Veeps who rose to the occasion, Teddy Roosevelt and Harry Truman, therefore Palin can rise as well. Huh?

Standardized, Kristol's argument is:

1. Palin is young
2. Teddy Roosevelt was young when he became POTUS after McKinley died
3. Harry Truman was young when he became POTUS after FDR died
4. Both Roosevelt and Truman "rose to the occasion" and became great presidents
C: Palin will also "rise to the occasion" and become a great president if McCain dies

Hogwash. Put in standard form makes it even more ludicrous. Using youth to put Palin's pre-VP background in the same class as Truman's or Roosevelt's beggars belief. Take a look at what other "qualifications" the two gents had when picked besides being generationally challenged.

Roosevelt:
* graduated from Harvard Phi Betta Kappa and magna cum laude
* wrote book, "The Naval War Of 1812," celebrated then and since as definite study of the conflict (still in print after 124 years!)
* New York Assemblyman
* Governor of New York
* Asst. Secretary of the Navy

Truman:
* served in army before and during WWI, citations for leadership
* county judge
* entrepreneur (with bankruptcy experience as well)
* twice elected US Senate (both tough races)
* Chair of high-profile Truman Committee during WWII, ferreting out military waste and fraud
* on cover of Time magazine

Compare these backgrounds with Palin's; the only thing the gentlemen and the lady truly have in common is their age. Yes, Palin was a mayor, and a governor, but can anyone seriously contend that two years of governing Alaska (through a time of budget surpluses) equate with two years governing New York? Or that the experience gleaned from her total time in office equals the foreign policy experience of leading a prominent war-time committee?

(Please, no culture/values/small town arguments: these issues may rightly be important to being a great president, but miss my point. I am arguing strictly on the experience that comes from making sense of extremely complicated systems/process/events and from managing nationwide groups or organizations with global interests--requirements that seem to be lifted straight from the President's job description.)

Mr. Kristol's argument is another example of starting with the conclusion (Palin is not a bad pick) then finding facts to support that ... warping them if necessary ... and conveniently not including other facts that don't offer support.

A better approach--one I wish to read--would be to argue why the qualities she does have meet all the requirements of the job, i.e., objective as well as subjective requirements. Just nouns and verbs, no adjectives. Finally, this is NOT an argument against Sarah Palin per se, just a plea for better logic.

I sure think better logic is needed.
_______________________
My Logical History
My first logic class was from Mark Battersby (Capilano College, 1979-80) in a course titled "Logical Self Defense," from the book of the same name. First day he warned us that this course would "make all your friends and family hate you." How's that for piquing interest!

He was right: once you learn what the red herring and post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacies (and many others) are, well, you find them everywhere! It is exciting, a skill you want to use, but students (me) take it too far, analyzing and correcting friend and family arguments. Students (me) soon get shunned or slammed: friends do not want to hear about problems in their arguments, and telling your father he is making a straw man argument is a losing proposition ... especially if true.

Wishful Thinking = Good Leaders?

Does Acme need Dick? Why should Dick be the leader? Dick is multi-cultural, well-educated, a highly-experienced manager. Not many of us compare to his qualifications; most of us don't have nearly such an impressive CV. A touch cerebral at times, an overpowering intelligence, I wager many would have trouble relating to Dick. Why not choose someone else, someone we can more easily relate to perhaps.

Maybe a small town mayor who likes to fish, hunt and play basketball. A hockey mom say, who struggles to balance family life and career. A good, god-fearin' woman, tough but with lipstick.

Okay, Acme is a corporation, not a democracy, and until it goes public Dick rules by force majeur, overwhelming force: while too cultured to put it this way, he would say to dissenters, "It's my way or the highway." But the principle is identical: what do I/you/we want in a leader?

As an investor or shareholder (hypothetically speaking) I want the top job to go to someone who has both relevant experience and a proven track record in this specific field, in other words, is qualified to get the job done. Someone like Dick.

Do such "qualifications" guarantee Dick will get the job done? Nope. No way. Decisons based on analyzing qualifications are not necessarily right, but are more frequently right. And there's the rub.

As I tell my logic students, logic is all about probability, not certainty. If you want certainty go to church. Logical analysis writ large can only make conclusions more likely right, can increase the odds of being right. No small feat that, for, as gamblers know, win 51% of time and you'll be rich.

This is in no way an argument against Governor Palin: only by actually assuming and carrying out the job of VP (or P) would we know if she could do the job. My point is not against the person, it is against the process. Oh yes, and against hypocricsy, but I'll get to that.

Okay, I live in small town (Sooke, pop. 9,000 give or take). We need a new Fire Chief. As this decision could have a direct bearing on whether my house burns down or not I am somewhat interested in who we select. While I hope we choose someone who has good communication skills and can "relate" to the community at large, this is not highest, or even high, on my list. I want someone who has shown s/he likely can do the job.

I want us to choose someone with relevant fire-fighting experience, someone who has shown they can motivate and manage a team of firefighters. I would turn down an accountant with extensive accounts receivable experience, no matter how big a team of accountants s/he led. The demands on each position, fire chief and accounting manager, are just too different.

Could the accountant be a great fire chief? Certainly, is it possible, just not likely. Not something you'd like to bet your mortgage on. Would you let a dentist perform brain surgery on your child? No? Why not? They both are medical professionals and, by my extensive experience with "specialists," I'd wager dentists are easier for most people to relate to than brain surgeons. I'm just not sure the dentist drill is the right tool for brain operations, and that's the point.

The Republicans chose the wrong tool for the VP job.

Even a true GOP sycophant can't say Palin's scant executive experience makes her "qualified" for the demands of the modern VP position (let alone qualified for the Big Chair itself). Certainly I see no way to argue that Palin's name was the result of a long, detailed analysis of job needs and qualified possible candidates. She might do a good job, but you would not want to bet your country on it ... unless you had to.

McCain chose Palin for reasons other than her qualifications for likely VP success: he chose her because he had to, had to shake up the polls, had to secure and energize the GOP base. Since the surprise choice he and the GOP polls have done back flips trying to find reasons to prove the already-decided result. The reasons (comparing needs with qualifications) did not drive the result, the result (we choose her as the candidate) drove the almost-desperate search for reasons.

Out of the many possibile fallacies, I think this is best described as wishful thinking, that:

1. I (McCain, Republicans) stand to gain from believing P.
2. Hence, I (McCain, Republicans) should, prudentially, believe P.

Now I can hope all I want to that the dentist will operate successfully on my child's brain tumor, and, as I will benefit from believing it, I of course will try my best to believe it. But don't you think I'd have a better chance believing if it was brain surgeon, not a dentist? And that if I could choose, I'd choose the dentist for cavities, not cranium.

I've racked my cranium and can't think of an area outside of politics (and faith) where we happily indulge in wishful thinking. We insist on an experienced fire chief, we (or Americans, maybe not Canucks) would sue the dentist as soon a drill touched scalp. The only time we let the unqualified do something is when we have no better choice.

Says something about the state of the GOP, both that they had to do something special to get back into the race and that Palin was the best special they could find.

Next (?) time I'll broaden the point to the anti-expert bias of the Republicans in particular, and Western society in general. Best said by Nietzsche himself,

Arrogance on the part of the meritorious is even more offensive to us than the arrogance of those without merit: for merit itself is offensive.

In defense of the barely-qualified-for-VP Palin the GOP used an anti-expert, anti-qualifications argument, going so far as the quintessentially-cosmopolitan Giuliani saying questions about Palin stemmed from Democrats thinking her town was not "cosmopolitan" enough.

Can't you just see dressed-in-drag Rudi (the video with the Donald is priceless) settling down in Wassalia, in moose fur perhaps. With lipstick.

Now that is cosmopolitan.

Fine, back to business. I hope I've made the point (long winded as usual: sigh) that we select people for position based on their suitability for carrying out the duties of that position, of their likelihood of being successful in the specific postion. Like much in life, decsions are situational, i.e., based on the specifics of the situation at hand. One size does not fit all.

As an investor/shareholder (hypothetical remember) in Acme I care very much that we have Dick in charge, and that Dick selects new hires based on the merits, that is, on their suitability for the job, not the cut of their jib or preference in fur. I want Acme to make me money.

I would hope that Republicans want their Prez and V-Prez to make them safe, rich and healthy. At least that is what I want in a leader. And as Prime Minister Harper just dissolved Canada's parliament this morning, I will get a chance to vote for leader on October 14.

Oh joy. Just for a minute I wish one of the contenders wore lipstick. I'd settle for a sense of humor.

Ideology and Pains From The "Gut"

The worst thing to be in a Political Science department is apolitical: ideologues on both sides understand each other, and even grant grudging respect, but neither understand "neutrals," nor do they trust them. How can you trust someone when you don't know what s/he will do?

Being fiercely apolitical likely had more to do with my standing among professors and classmates than anything else (though my "Success Without College" T-shirt probably came close). I always sat by myself in seminar rooms, and no discussion was complete until everyone turned and looked at me, waiting for ... heresy, at least to one side.

It is a complicated and often confusing world we must make sense of, and I understand the comfort one can get from a set of rules and principles that simplifies and explains everything. Order from chaos, truth instead of uncertainty, answers not questions, it is like putting on warm socks: all-enveloping comfort. What's not to like?

Nothing, as long as you don't mind being a lemming, occasionally following your idea off the cliff.

Allowing anything, idea or person, to do your thinking for you is a losing strategy. Comforting, at least until you hit the valley floor. Every time a person gets wedded to an idea or way of looking the world, and shapes reality to fit that idea or perception, s/he is guilty of abdicating personal responsibility for ... life? Results? Making the world better?

I raise this subject now because of the US election reality show. I'm a Canuck so can't vote, but as I see the US when I look out the window (across the Strait of Juna de Fuca) I feel I can have an opinion. And my opinion is, are the Republicans nuts?

I'm not a Democrat, just a democrat. While I easily quote fluff like the Anarcist's creed, that "The change of rulers is the joy of fools," I believe my vote counts, and that it is my duty to make it an informed vote.

One of the most useful ideas about leadership comes from philosopher Peter Koestenbaum, specifically his Leadership Diamond (also here and here; used in sports as well) explained in his book, Leadership: The Inner Side Of Greatness. It is a book John McCain should read.

I will explore the Leadership Diamond in much more details later: for now just a quick summary and one excerpt. The concept behind the diamond is that there are four critical aspects (called "strategies") to achieving leadership greatness: vision, courage, ethics and reality. The excerpt is about the latter, reality, is that:

A realistic leader always responds to the facts, for realism means to have no illusions ... Realism means that you are competent, that you are in command of the hard facts of the business. Realism ... is a commitment to obtain extensive information and maintain a stance of aseptic objectivity. [It] stands for detachment, research, facts and calculations.

There, the problems of the Bush years explained in one paragraph: the Bushies read the words then did the opposite. Too much going by the "gut," too much "knowing" and not enough objectivity. And don't get me started on performance. "Good job Brownie" sums it up.

America is in a mess. Income inequality is at a level not seen since the 20s (here, here and here) and the middle class is farther way from the Leave It To Beaver fantasy family than ever (even in Alaska). Ozzie and Harriet simply would not recognize America now. Something has to be done.

I watched damn near the entire Republican convention (I should get out more), and heard damn few arguments based on "detachment, research, facts and calculations." Reforming the senate and congress are laudatory (and needed) goals, but ending earmarks and pork barrel projects hardly will help those struggling in the 20th income percentile.

Would Obama be a good president? Who knows? There certainly are valid questions about his experience, or lack thereof. Would McCain be a good president? Again who knows? There certainly are valid questions about his temperament and decision making. (I will leave alone the point that he has equal or less "executive experience" than Obama.)

One thing I always look for in a leader (client, friend, spouse) is someone who thinks their way through an issue, who is open to facts and dissenting opinions, who chooses an action only after deciding doing it is the best current choice. I run from people who say they "know" the answer, "know" the "right" thing to do. People who "know" give me the heebee jeebees. I look for people who think, not know.

Here the conventions did answer one thing: Obama thinks and McCain knows. Just like Bush II, and we all know how that has turned out. Has there ever been a group so poorly managed as the US has been for the past 7+ years?

As this is a business blog, the Business Dictionary defines ideology as

A system of ideas that explains and lends legitimacy to actions and beliefs of a social, religious, political, or corporate entity.

To this I add beliefs in plans, strategies and tactics. Few things in business hurt more than falling in love with your (or your boss's) idea, and closing your eyes to any datum that contradicts your preferred, pre-chosen reality.

Certainly an entrepreneur (like Dick) has to have an all-encompassing idea, yet believing in your idea when others doubt you is different than closing your eyes to facts. The two Steves had an idea, a personal computer, and believed in it even when all the "experts" scoffed. As Apple grew the idea didn't change because it didn't have to: the market was ready for a personal computer.

I am not sure the market is ready for a Pit Bull with or without lipstick. Does anyone seriously think that the anti-science teaching of creationism will help the US compete with the schools in India and China pumping out legions of engineers?

Does anyone seriously think that making decisions based on gut instinct is what America needs? I mean, it didn't work for Coca-Cola and the New Coke. I think the stakes are a tad higher here.

Focussing on process gives me cold fries.

How does a company ask for creativity and initiative from employees while at the same time ask them to follow business process and SOPs? Does not the latter contradict the former?

My wife and I discussed that point yesterday driving home from the fair (talking on topics like this may be the reason why no one wants to drive with us) but to no conclusion. My fault: I just couldn't think clearly. One too many times on the Hurricane perhaps?

Last night I started a new book, Harvard Business Review on Entrepreneurship (I should probably get out more), and there, on page 27, were the words (the answer) that I wanted:

Telling empolyees how to do their jobs ... can stifle initiative. Companies that require frontline employees to act quickly and resourcefully might decide to focus more on outcomes than on behavior, using control systems that set performance targets for employees, compare results against objectives, and provide appropriate incentives.

Focus on result, not process, that is the key. It is where all training should start, at the end. Employees must understand 100% what the desired result is (and why), and only then be trained on the current process that achieves the result.

Regarding creativity and initiative, the key word is current, the key concept being that changes to the current process are allowed as long as the desired result is achieved, as long as customers (internal and external) are happy with the result. The "desired result" becomes the boundaries within which change is allowed.

It sounds easy, but isn't. Here is an example I scribbled on a ripped brown paper bag while sitting outside a MacDonald's in Hsin Chu ("new bamboo," literally) in Taiwan 15 years ago. (I have the brown paper scrap in front of me. Not only should I get out more, I should throw out more.)

MacDonald's served more than hamburgers in China, it also served systems (I think it changed China more any political movement, but that is a story for another day). Staff were always well trained: to do the complicated cooking, supplying, monitoring, filling, requesting ballet, staff had to be well trained!

My turn. I ordered my meal, double cheese burger, medium fries and ice tea. The young counter girl understood (I ordered in Mandarin after all) and began to pick and serve my meal. Ice tea on tray: check. Fries on tray: check. Burger on tray: whoops, not ready yet. I saw all this and told her I wanted my fries and burger "together," going so far to explain that I did not my fries to cool down while they sat on the tray waiting for their burger partner.

No way. There was no way she was going to do that! Why? Because she had been trainied to pick and place meal items as they were available, period. Fries were available, so pick and place now; burger not available so wait.

Not wanting cold fries--I could see the burger was still minutes away from ready--I tried again to explain the result I wanted, to a blank face (the true great wall of China, the Chinese mask). I eventually talked to the shift supervisor--I really like hot fries!--who, grudgingly, put my now near-cold fries under the warming lights, basically to help them stay at that nice near-cold temperature. I digress.

The problem, repeated all over Asia, is that staff are trainined in process, not result. Often extraordinarily good at following complicated "how to" procedures, yet unable to alter the process even a little bit if such is needed to satisfy a unique customer request.

The MacDonald's problem (it still happens) is mistaking process for result: staff are only trainined in process, whereas the true goal of the process is not that all steps are slavishly followed but that the right result is achieved. In my cold fries example, the desried result is a satisfied customer, munching happily on hot fries. To achieve that result the young employee had to have been allowed to be creative and to show initiative, to pick and place my ice tea immediately (thanks: it was hot!) but to wait until burger was ready to pick and place fries.

That only happens when training begins with students understanding the desired end result, and then trained to achieve that, not simply to follow the process rules.

Back to Dick and Acme. He and I have discussed setting measureable SOPs, then training new hires to follow such. All well and good, but not enough. Along with the "do these steps" training must be effort to explain the desired end result, and that the current process is just the best way Acme has so far to achieve it.

If this is so bloody obvious--it should be obvious--why don't companies do it? Because of the difficulty in measuring end results, especially subjective, "customer happy" results. It normally, almost always, is easier to measure adherence to procedure, far easier.

Sigh. I know this from experience. Back in the day I struggled (and succeeded, often anyway) to measure customer end-result satisfaction. I hope my next book, Douglas Hubbard's, How To Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business, will give me more insights into this difficult but critical step.

Oh yes, MacDonald's and cold fries. I still like hot fries but have given up trying to get the counter person to change their process. Instead I now look to see which burgers are being wrapped and I order them, thus getting hot fries and a hot burger. Marvelous.

Labour Day Long Weekend

The Labor Day long weekend (first Monday in September is Labor Day) is the strangest holiday for those with school-age children. For 10 weeks the little hellions run free, staying up long past the parents' bedtime, and sleeping in ... until noon, if not later.

Then comes this long weekend, Saturday is fun, Sunday is fun, Monday is confused, as Tuesday, bang, back to school. The school bus comes at 08:15, so out of bed before 8am, well before.

Am I describing just my daughter's experience (and my wife and my loose parental practices), or is this "run wild" situation widespread? And just what the heck does this personal tale have to do with this blog?

Good questions. For the first, I know there are families that program their child's summer, from this camp to that activity, from learn this to practice that, for 2.5 months. No real time off (as in nothing to do), just a reduced schedule spent in non-school locations. This approach to summer "vacation" is common in Asia, at all family wealth points: only the nature and cost of the chosen activities differs from rich to middle class to poor, not the principle that a "vacation" is a time for extra schooling, not for goofing off.

Do I think this is wrong? Not necessarily: my daughter would have benefited with some more summer structure than when One Tree Hill or Friends reruns were on. But I also strongly feel that if children are not allowed to have unscripted "fun" they will grow into adults who just do not know how to have fun. Maybe we Western slackers know too well how to have fun, maybe, but I have always thought of life as more than just work and duty.

And have always thought of work as more than simply doing what you are told.

While not a development psychologist (phew), I use common sense glasses to see a relationship between creativity/initiative and unscripted fun, and between (whatever the opposite of creativity/initiative is) and scheduled and supervised activities.

Children left on their own have to use their imagination to make up things to do, make up games to play. Children who enjoy (sic) only scheduled and supervised activities learn to follow the rules and to wait to be told what to do.

Hey, following rules is important, and there certainly is a place for waiting to be told what to do, yet if this is all children learn they end up being good followers, not good leaders. From where I sit, we have sufficient followers, perhaps too many, but not enough leaders.

Singapore's celebrated founder and Prime Minister for 31 years (elected, not like Mugabe), said argued that (and I can't find the quote: sigh) Singapore needed to enhance student (hence worker hence citizen) creativity, and to do that must change its top-down, scheduled, wait-to-be-told school system; must adopt the Western, subjective, teach students to think model.

Did my daughter's unscripted, unscheduled and unfocused summer teach her to become a leader, teach her to be creative and to use her imagination? Not that I can see, so far anyway, but I wager it put her closer to that path than a scripted and scheduled summer would have.

That's the point actually, that all we can do as parents and managers is to point children and staff in the "right' direction, to give them the environment within which such growth is likely. Nothing we do will create a certain outcome, but our actions do make some outcomes more likely than others.

Back to work. I contend that companies need more than a good system and staff who are good followers, they also need change leaders, staff/managers who see different possibilities and are not afriad to try them, or at least argue for them.

Staff development is too much about "do this when that happens," too much about following the rules and waiting to be told. Sure this is absolutely essential, especially with a lesser-educated workforce, yet it alone it not enough to make a company grow to its full potential.

Somehow companies must learn how to encourage creativity and to allow mistakes. Often this means letting staff enjoy non-scipted training, dare I say "fun" training.

In The Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn's description of the Soviet labor camp system, he writes

If, in order to live, one has not to live, then what is life for?

I take the first "live" to mean be alive, the second "live" to mean not have fun (or be in chains, or suffer, or ... you get my drift). In plain language, he asks that if we have to suffer to be alive then what the heck is life all about?

(Please, even though this is Sunday, no religious arguments.)

Turned to the office, if we have to follow someone else's rules and to wait to be told what to do to be successful, then what the heck is work all about?

Do Something ... even if it is wrong

As a callow youth, 19 or so, I worked electrical construction (think poles and power lines, not Glen Campbell's "Whichita Lineman"), the lowly driver-groundman. My foreman used to tell me,

Do something, even if it is wrong, do something.

Huh? I wondered what he meant, really meant. Did he want me to make mistakes, want me to get in trouble? Was he setting me up?

He wasn't. He believed that the only true way you learn things is by trying, by doing. He believed that you never really learned much if all you did was wait to be told what to do. It took me a few years to realize that I believed it too.

I also believe there are four indispensable things needed to build a company: an idea, enough money to implement (start to implement) it, a system or process and people who can do the required tasks. If you have a good idea, enough money, a good system/process and talented people you have a chance: take any away and you don't. Period.

Not many things in life are more Darwinian than building a business: no one outside the company cares if it lives and plenty want it to die. Only the strong survive.

I can't help Dick with the money, and, at least initially, can not help much on the idea. (Besides I don't think he needs help in these areas anyway.) I can offer a lot of theory about SOPs and business processes, and metrics and such, all good stuff, but believe the best I can offer is manager/staff development.

Oh, and dealing with the "gulp" every entrepreneur gets when s/he lets him/self realize just how enormous the task is. Dealing with it without whiskey too.

So expect many more development posts with process/system posts thrown in. And more videos from Greg's office. I hope to improve lighting, focus and sound. But I refuse to wear a wig.

Pop's Garage: Mistakes Are Good ... Sometimes

No one likes making mistakes. But managers make a mistake if they don't see staff mistakes as an opportunity, not a problem.

There are two broad types of mistakes, those made out of ignorance and those made for any other reason (laziness, lack of attention, attitude, whatever). The second type of mistake is bad, the first type isn't. Below I talk about the "good" mistakes, those out of ignorance.

The holy grail of training is learning from experience, to learn by doing. All good, but what is left out is that "learn by experience" actually means "learn from making mistakes." Okay, not always--it is very important that we learn from our successes (which we don't do often enough, a point continued later). But the truth is that most of the time we learn how to do something correctly by first doing it wrong. By making a mistake.

The rule I live by is, The First Mistake Is Free. No one should get in trouble for a mistake made out of ignorance. In fact managers should treat such "first" mistakes by staff as a positive. Why? Simple: because now the manager knows exactly what staff need to learn.

A huge part of a training budget is wasted in two (only?) ways: by training people who already know the stuff, and by training people in skills they don't need to do their job. One of the most critical jobs for managers, HR and trainers is to identify who needs what training.

Looking at mistakes made is perhaps the clearest way to answer the "who needs what training" question. If John makes a mistake then John's manager knows what training John needs. Making this even better is that the manager now knows that John can do the task. Nothing is better than certainty, or more elusive.

(When I led business process improvement/reengineering projects one of the first things I did was to survey staff and customers to find out where the mistakes were: the survey results were always my starting point.)

To complete the circle, treating mistakes as a negative, getting angry and/or punishing staff for "first mistakes," is one of the worst things managers can do. Staff will not only try to hide their mistakes--which always leads to a bad result--they will stop trying new things, stop showing initiative. The latter is death to staff development.

It is not always easy to smile when staff make a critical "first mistake." Yet smile a manager must, saving the grimace, foul language and physical reaction (punching a wall was my favorite) for when no one else is around.

Once again I retrun to the principle that training staff and developing staff into managers requires the ability to accept the inevitable mistakes as a necessary part of the process. Doing otherwise is a true mistake.

Being Selfish To Find Time To Think

To paraphrase Mark Twain, "Use time wisely, they are not making any more." A subject touched on in an earlier post, how Dick deals with the pressures on his time will go a long way to determining how successful he and Acme are.

A recent conversation between Barak Obama and (British Liberal leader) David Cameron sums up the point well, that:

Mr. Cameron: You should be on the beach. You need a break. Well, you need to be able to keep your head together.

Mr. Obama: You’ve got to refresh yourself.

Mr. Cameron: Do you have a break at all?

Mr. Obama: I have not. I am going to take a week in August. But I agree with you that somebody, somebody who had worked in the White House who — not Clinton himself, but somebody who had been close to the process — said that should we be successful, that actually the most important thing you need to do is to have big chunks of time during the day when all you’re doing is thinking. And the biggest mistake that a lot of these folks make is just feeling as if you have to be ...

Mr. Cameron: These guys just chalk your diary up.

Mr. Obama: Right. ... In 15 minute increments and ...

Mr. Cameron: We call it the dentist waiting room. You have to scrap that because you’ve got to have time.

Mr. Obama: And, well, and you start making mistakes or you lose the big picture. Or you lose a sense of, I think you lose a feel ...

Mr. Cameron: Your feeling. And that is exactly what politics is all about. The judgment you bring to make decisions.

Mr. Obama: That’s exactly right. And the truth is that we’ve got a bunch of smart people, I think, who know 10 times more than we do about the specifics of the topics. And so if what you’re trying to do is micromanage and solve everything then you end up being a dilettante, but you have to have enough knowledge to make good judgments about the choices that are presented to you.

Okay, maybe putting Dick in such lofty company isn't fair ... to Dick. He is, after all, a business person, a creator of services, products and jobs, not simply a generator of words, positions and headlines. But the principle is the same: if not careful Dick can find himself consumed by the daily management minutiae.

Dick's job (any entrepreneur's job) is to do what managers can not do: offer a vision, set strategy and see how all parts of the company and environment fit together. Do the Big Thinking. And to do that requires time: quality time, alone time, reflective time.

But how? In a Blackberry, connected-24/7-world, how can Dick escape? How can I, in one post, say that Dick's key job is hiring and training and developing managers, a very time consuming process, then argue that Dick needs to find time to do nothing but think? The cute answer is that I can make contradictory arguments because all I do is offer advice: I don't have to take it.

The real answer is that there is no contradiction: Dick needs to do both, and other tasks as well. How? Well, cloning himself, even though a father-through-passport of Dolly the cloned sheep, won't work ... fast enough anyway. Dick has to learn to manage time, not let time manage him.

Linda Stone makes an interesting distinction, that we should manage our attention, not just our time. Rather than slaving ourselves to a never-ending list of jobs to do, Stone argues that we must create chunks of time where digital, analog and human inputs are blocked, time where we can focus attention on few but key things.

Sounds a lot like the money-making Time Management mantra, of seeing the difference between "urgent" and "important," then ensuring you spend time on the latter each day. Sounds good, as all platitudes do, but the question of how to do it remains.

The web today abounds with personal-productivity resources: sites like Lifehacker, blogs like 43folders and gurus like David Allen (not in any way a definitive list). All good, but all suffer IMHO from the same fault every time management system has: somewhere, somehow, the person must actually "do" the steps, and that requires being selfish.

Personal productivity, "getting your head together," requires two necessary qualities: ability to say No and willingness to focus on personal needs instead of the never-ending wave of requests from others.

Neither are easy. In future posts I will look closer at some of the most popular personal productivity sites and methods (I'd like to call them fads, but ...). In the end however, the most important step is allowing yourself to be unavailable.

Years ago, when cell phones were just becoming popular (yes, I am that old: I also recall when computers were not personal, but that is another story) I asked a senior Western executive of a Chinese high tech firm why he refused to carry a cell phone. "Because if they can find me to ask what they should do they always will, and so they will never learn to do it themselves."

Great advice. I've repeated it for years to explain why I didn't carry a cell phone. Inside the advice is a greater truth though, that being selfish and finding time for yourself inevitably means allowing subordinates/peers to make mistakes. If you are not there and instead off somewhere alone thinking Big Thoughts, well you can't stop them from doing the wrong things, from making mistakes.

And thus the great bugaboo of developing managers, allowing managers to make mistakes, rears its head here as well.

I know from personal experience, in life as well as work, that allowing someone to make a mistake that you know you can prevent is incredibly difficult to do. But if I want my daughter to ride a bike by herself I have to take off the training wheels and let her ride around the corner without me. Same is true in managers. Getting time for yourself means taking off their training wheels and letting them steer by themselves.

Gulp. We'll talk more about this later as well.

Managers don't work, workers work

Managers don't work: workers work and managers manage. Beyond semantic accuracy, this bromide is actually true.

How do you measure a manager's performance? You start with what a manager is tasked to do (international sales, video editing, accounts payable, whatever) then compare what is accomplished in the area with the objective or target the area should reach. Yes, there is more to it, but at the most basic level it is that simple: compare what is done with what should have been done.

The international sales manager does not visit every customer or close every deal, s/he manages sales staff who do these tasks. If staff achieve their goals then the manager achieves his/her goals; if staff do not achieve goals the manager does not meet his/her goals. The manager is responsible for international sales, true, but his/her performance (total sales) is the sum total of the performance of the staff s/he manages.

Staff are tools used by a manager.

One way to look management is that staff are tools the manager uses to achieve a goal. Don't like that? Not politically correct? Sigh. Fine, then how about this: managers work for their staff (not the other way around), providing staff with everything needed to achieve individual objectives ... which added up equal the manager's performance. I like them both, especially "staff are tools." People who brindle at that just do not understand tools, or tool culture (an argument for another post).

If you accept that managers work for staff then what work do managers need to do? What does "give staff what they need" mean? It means more than physical and financial resources: staff need more than a desk, chair, computer and budget. At minimum staff also need the right skills, clear objectives and sufficient time to accomplish them. They may also need encouragement, direction and continuous feedback. There is no cut-in-stone rule that "staff need X:" what each staff needs depends upon the situation.

One of the most useful (if not the most useful) principles I've found is "situational leadership" (who owns the concept is confusing: see here and here), the simple idea that how you lead a person depends upon the experience and confidence the person has in doing the specific task. An experienced person only needs the bare minimum, a goal to be achieved and a deadline to achieve it in; a true rookie would a heck of a lot more. Maybe a clear description of the task and what "done" looks like, clear instructions about how to do it and hand-holding along the way.

The experienced person would think getting what the rookie needs a waste of time, and it may affect performance; the rookie would be lost only getting what the experienced person needs, again affecting performance. The job as a manager (leader, supervisor, whatever) is to see where the person is along the experienced/confident continum in that specifi task and then to adjust leadership/management style accordingly.

I thought of this principle over and over as I worked through problems all dragon boat weekend. The top festival leadership had given the job of Site Manager (an difficlut and complicated job) to a true rookie, 21 years old with no relevant experience, then had disappeared. Of course the inevitable happened: things were not set up right, key materials were missing or in the wrong place. The chaos made two already-long days seem even longer.

I put the blame squarely on the people who selected the rookie then disappeared. The previous Site Manager was a greybeard with years of experience managing projects, including 10 years experience in the festival. Giving him the position then disapperaing made sense: he would get angry at micro-mangaging. The rookie, well, he needed to be micro-managed.

I've often seen this mistake, leadership filling a position on a organization chart with little or no regard to whether the "name" could do the job. It feels good to have the org chart filled, and, so they think, "hey, if the "name" doesn't perform then that is his/her fault. Nothing to do with us."

I am now waiting for the festival debrief. Knowing the personalities involved I expect blame to go to the rookie, at which time I will interrupt and ... heck, telling the nabobs that it was a failure of their leadership will make it an interesting meeting. Not the first (or likely the last) time I've let my loose-cannon loose.

This issue is critical to Dick and Acme. Dick is furiously building the company, hiring managers to hire managers to hire workers ... to fill the org chart. All fine--it must be done--but it must be done with an eye to what each manager needs to succeed, and that requires time to stop and learn more about each manager's experience and confidence in doing the specific tasks hired for.

It is both time consuming and a job that never really ends. Developing managerial talent is absolutely crucial for business growth (sustainable growth that is: it is always easy to grow fast by putting "names" in empty boxes, but this is growth that doesn't last). Often (always?) it is necessary to let a manager try and fail before you get a good grip on his/her useable experience and confidence level. Again that takes time.

To summarize this rather-rambling post, I've argued that:

1. managers are measured by comparing objectives to accomplishments
2. a manager's accomplishment is the sum total of his/her staff's accomplishments, thus
3. a manager's true job is helping his/her staff achieve their indivdual objectives (managers work for staff)
4. staff need more than physical and financial resources: they need a certain amount of direction and help
   
5. the amount of direction and help staff need depends upon experience and confidence in the specific task at hand, thus
   
6. managers must adjust management (leadership) style to match the needs of each employee doing each task

Phew. Developing managers and staff is a (or the) crucial aspect of Acme's growth, and one of Dick's most important jobs. The principles of managers working for staff (or speakers working for listeners) and of needing to adjust styles depending on who you are managing (or communicating with) will be examined again, and often. Each are keys to my personal beliefs in managing, communicating and, dare I say, life.

Life? Yup: I believe that the only real way to get what you want is to help the others around you get what they want. Another time.

And I will let you know what happens in the dragon boat debrief. All I know now is that I will be wearing my bullet proof underwear.

Dragon Boating mea culpa

Sorry for a week of no posts. Adding to the downsize nightmare was volunteering for the Victoria Dragon Boat Festival, a yearly event that features 90 teams (of 20-25 paddlers plus coaches, managers, friends, family and groupies) from as far away as LA and Toronto. It also features me exhausting myself, every year, and losing my voice, every year. Here are some pictures; here too.

I am the Crew (or Race) Marshal, in charge of getting the right teams lined up in the right order with the right equipment on to the dock at the right time. Every twelve minutes from 8am to 4-5pm. Standing on hot pavement the entire time, in the hot sun.

I do this a LOT!

I am also on the Race Committee and privy to the inner workings of the festival. I commit my time, energy and increasingly-frail body to the festival not because I like dragon boating. Fra from it: the one and only time I was in a dragon boat was in my student days in Taiwan, on the Danshui River. I looked at the black, fetid water and decided d-boating was not for me.

I participate because of dragon boating's association with breast cancer. Huh? Breast Cancer? That's pretty much out of left field I admit, so let me explain.

In the mid-90s a Vancouver cancer doctor in wanted to help his breast cancer patients exercise., so he started a dragon boat team of patients and survivors. Before this the conventional wisdom was that sufferers should stay away from exercise, but his team exploded that myth. The rest is, as you say, history. Read more here.

There are now many breast cancer teams, worldwide, and even breast cancer d-boating world championship festivals. The effort and spirit from the ladies is remarkable, palpable, uplifting. They know I am there for them, and we now have a special bond: I cheer for them and they rub, pat and kiss my head for luck. This also has become a ritual for most teams. Sigh.

"Don't forget to rub his head for luck."

I offer all this info about dragon boating for two reasons. First, and least, to let you know where I was when I wasn't posting. Second, and key, is that I saw things during the festival that fit right into this blog. Two areas stand out, leadership and business processes.

But for now describing the festival and uploading a few pictures is all I can do before my energy level drops and a nap beckons. TTFN.

Legacy Problems

The easiest way to build the newest, best, most-efficient anything is to start with a blank page, with no constraints from what came before. Sure, knowledge and experience are also important, as are learned skills and skinned knees, and can`t forget deep pockets. But Microsoft (to cite just one case) has all these things in abundance, but to no avail. Or at least no efficient avail.

Gate's gang, er, Balmer's bunch, have to use their skills, experience and dollars building upon an existing system, Windows, an uncertain vista if there ever was one. Indeed, Windows is perhaps the best technical example of a black hole (the opposite of a blank page), where new applications and features must be built upon and made compatible to whatever was done in the past, going back even to DOS.

(That would be a Disc Operating System, the first computer universe for everyone, Windows on just 64K; no mouse, no hard drive, just strange commands like autoexec.bat and configsys, where everything you did started the same way, with c:/ -- the command prompt.)

It is frightening to think of the total of all IQs at Microsoft, a giant, ferocious brilliance in one company. Yet projects arrive late, programs arrive bloated, not because of a lack of anything but because of too much of something: legacy. businessdictionary.com defines a legacy system as

obsolete computer system that may still be in use because its data cannot be changed to newer or standard formats, or its application programs cannot be upgraded.

Windows adds a third issue, that of creating new features or processes while simultaneously insuring that prior features, processes and programs, even from 3rd parties, still work. In other words if a mistake was made in the past you must continue using and building on the mistake. The legacy system is the environment within which you must work. It is the reality.

I am neither a hard nor soft computer professional (or even gifted amateur), so I mention this not to discuss computers in general or Windows in particular, but to introduce the problems of legacy systems. Why? Because of the N=1, R=G world described by C.K. Prahalad and M.S. Krishnan's in their book, The New Age Of Innovation.

P&K describe a world where services, products and delivery systems are customized at the most basic level: the individual. This is the N=1. (R=G describes a focus on access to resources--on a global scale--not ownership of resources.) All fine stuff, yet something kept me coming back to their ideas. Eventually (yesterday actually) I realized it was legacy systems.

P&K use medical insurance and diabetes in India as an example of N=1. Diabetes sufferers pay a unique-to-them premium based on their individual behavior and lifestyle. They argue that

This could be achieved (and the technology is already in use) via remote monitoring of blood sugar and other vital statistics, once a day at random, based on sensors attached to that person's watch or cell phone.

Through this data, the insurer, doctor and patient--based on the patient's full consent (italics added)--could assess the level of compliance of that person to a recommended regimen of medication, diet and exercise. <snip> If, however, the person refused to change her lifestyle and did not comply, the ... premium would then go up.

Personally I have no problem with this. I am a strong believer in user pays and being responsible for your own actions. I believe most obese people are not victims of the fast food industry but are simply lazy, and should have to pay more for health insurance (and for airplane seats, a pet peeve of mine when I fly). I would of course agree to a safety net for true victims and the truly disadvantaged, but for the most people, you do the crime you do the time, period.

Back to P&K. Such personalized N=1 service requires sharing information, personal information. Possible perhaps in India and other communal/collectivist-societies, would it be possible in individualistic-societies like the US or Great Britain? If there is a difference, and I believe there is--check a column by David Brooks in the Aug 11 New York Times for a good description of the differences--what do these differences mean for the N=1 service model?

I will continue this theme and what it might mean for Dick and Acme. In one sense Dick has the best possible position, a blank page upon which to build a company. Many questions arise though: how will his plans and structures fit into different societal types? Will Dick be forced to do N=1 on a macro scale, offering different service models to different locations? If so, what does that mean to business plans? How can Dick create a blank page environment in a dark hole area?

That's enough for today. It is now off to another day of downsize hell. Sigh. I'd much rather sit here and write all day. Heck, I'd much rather do anything. But I was (and still am) influenced by a quote from R.L. Stevenson, that (paraphrasing) "The true measure of a man is not in how well he does the things he likes to do, but in how well he does the things he does not like to do, but must do."

Helping my parent's downsize is a good example of the latter: So far I've done a pretty good job. I think.

Amazing How Time Flies When ...

Amazing how timew flies when you are waist-deep in problems. My "soon over" was woefully wrong. The auction guys showed up Tuesday as planned, filled at 21 ft. (6.4 meter) truck with "stuff" and left, saying, "We'll be back tomorrow for the rest."

A FULL Truck

note large garbage bin at right

Waited, and waited, left message, waited, and waited, until a brief call at 4PM saying they'd now be there on Thursday, early. "How early?" 7AM. Okay.

Was there at 6:45AM, and waited, and waited, and left message, and ... they showed up at 9AM. I was in a good mood, but kept my tongue. Again they filled the large truck, saying they'd be back later that afternoon for the rest.

Received call at 5PM saying there was miscommunication (gee) and actually they'd be back next week (!) for the balance. I was real happy.

Never could get the boss, the man who'd sold me on using the auction service, on the phone. Had not received a copy of the inventory of all they took, the catalog that accompanies the auction. A big selling point to me and Pop, he said numerous times that, "I email it to 1,300 people." But not 1,301 evidently: I still or do not have a copy, even after leaving more messages. Sigh.

Today is auction day however, and wife daughter and I will make our pillgramage to the site, to say goodbye to the "stuff" ... and see just what the heck they are selling, and for how much. It has become a tiny bit of a trust issue, damn, something always bad for business. Especially as he told me, again numerous times, that "Maybe best not to come to the auction: it is hard to see your stuff sold." Hmm.

Maybe true, but as I told him, numerous times, "It is not my stuff." And besides, if they were planning to do a fast one (remember that small "trust issue") the best way would be not to send me a inventory/catalog and then not have me at the auction. Damn, more stress.

What did I do while waiting for the auction truck and messages? Oh, I rested, laid on the sofa, had my naps. Not! I helped mother and sister arrange the Garage Sale From Hell, a title that deserves italics, bold face and underline to go the capital letters.

The sale was yesterday (and today). My daughter and I were out at 10:30PM Thursday night nailing signs to telephone poles. I was there until 11PM Friday night then back at 6:15AM on sale day, putting up signs, blocking of areas with orange tape and generally getting all the "stuff" ready. Once customers started arriving I quit.

And went home? No. Had a nap? Something to eat? No and no. I started working on the garbage.

From 9Am until 3PM I worked, non-stop except for "natural breaks," filling at huge garbage bin with garbage.

Quality garbage: strips of solid oak, half-sheets of plywood, damaged but fixable equipment.
Ugly garbage: bags breaking when lifted, spilling out slimy sloppy "stuff"
Smelly garbage: rotten food and chemical smells, soggy rugs smelling like wet dog.
Dangerous garbage: Cans of oil and kerosene and paint and thinner and creosote and ...

I still hurt, though a shower stopped me from smelling. Methinks I should burn the clothes I wore though. But EUREAKA, the garbage is gone, or loaded anyway. Yesterday was the hardest day yet; one of the hardest days of my life actually.

Physically of course, but also emotionally. I love my siblings, but don't always love to work with them. Then there was Mom, wandering around in shock all day, seeing her treasures priced at ridiculously-low prices of 2 and 3 dollars--and still not selling! Yesterday was a non-stop kick in her guts, as was the $195.25 total sales at the end of the day. Is that all her"stuff" was worth? Mom definitley should not have attended the sale.

So much work for so little. The house is still full, but that's okay, at least in my narrow, selfish view: what doesn't sell ("stuff" I don't have move, again) goes to charity and their big truck and young backs (more "stuff" I don't have move, again).

Truly sorry for not posting this week. It was my 9th, ninth, NINTH! week waist-deep in their "stuff," and I'm ready to quit. Luckily the job now becomes an order of magnitue easier.

I hope.

Pop's Garage - Finishing Projects

Phew! Hot times at the parent's old house. The temperature was high too.

Today's post is about finishing projects, or the last steps before the ending. I call it preventing the three Cs, conflcit, confusion and chaos.

For years I led performance improvement-type projects (quality management, reengineering, performance management, balanced scorecard), the kinds of projects that cause big changes in how business operations are run (new SOPs) and/or how performance is measured (affecting salary increases and promotions). Implementing the project team's plans often caused conflict and chaos, or at least confusion, amoung affected employees. But that is not what I care about, now anyway.

Today I care about preventing conflict inside the team itself.

Projects go through phases. One of the most dangerous project phases is near the end of the preparation, just prior to implementation (or presentation to the powers that be). After geting past the initial confusion at project start teams settle into a routine, almost a boring, "we are doing this to achieve that mentality. Nothing dangerous there.

One day though, all the datum has been collected, the possibilities brainstormed and implementation plans made, almost. It is the almost part that triggers the problems.

By now the team has been together for a while, and routine datum collecting and idea bouncing has shifted to data analyzing and idea hardening. It is a confusing time, bringing everything together. Not just that choices must be made (making some winners and most losers) but that project ennui is at a peak, "won't this damn project ever end?" a common feeling.

Now is when frustrations built up over time are no longer are quite-so-easy to dismiss. Tempers fray, words are said and arguments take place. When implementation starts team members have other, "new" things to think about and do, but in the dog days just before implementing there are only old jobs to do and old ideas to discuss. Again. And again.

Now is when the team leader truly earns his/her salary. Why? Because if team members have a frustration level of X, leader's frustration ix X+10. Or +100. The easiest thing to do is to give in and when team members offer up frustration to answer them with frustration +10. The urge to lash out, to say things you've thought and felt for months, is string, a seductive siren calling you to, paraphrasing Nancy Regan, just let go.

Don't! Now is when project managers need to be calm. If you are calm they will be, or might. If you show you are frenzied, harried and frustrated, they will be too. No fun, for anyone.

Pop's Irishman's Armful

Well, almost done. Soon (day after tomorrow!) Pop's Garage will return to where and what it should be, a subconscious set of principles, a memory with substance. Phew.

So, what's with the Irishman and his armful? I have no idea: the video explains the multi-pronged, fruitless, search I've made to find out.



(The video also talks to the issues the Politically Correct Police will undoubtably make. Sigh.)

Once again I use pithy sayings from my childhood -- adulthood actually: he said both phrases to me last week while I moved them into their new home -- that shaped my life and gave me the foundation of my work, and life. Today's phrases deal with carrying things. Kinda.

"Don't go empty handed" is the first of the two associated phrases. It can, but doesn't have to, refer to carrying anything. More it explains a principle of efficiency, that each step in a process should be productive. Maybe an historial explanation, China, the English and opium.

In the late 1800s Britain was importing a huge and growing amount of "stuff" from China, silk, porcelain and the new hot drink, tea. English ships would leave China full, sail to England, offload the tea and load British manufactures, then sail to India. The manufactures would be offloaded, then ... nothing was loaded. The Chinese didn't want anything English (except silver). Ships would thus sail from India to China empty, and every shipper knows you don't make money with empty bottoms.

This was inefficient: ships had to go from India to China, but were going "empty handed." Making a long story short, to fill these ships (and stop the drain of silver) the British East India Company came upon a brilliant (as far as business is concerned) strategy: fill the ships with India opium to sell to the Chinese. This began the famous triangle trade--British goods to India, Indian opium to China, and Chinese goods to England. Everyone is happy, or at least the British were, especially economists.

That is what "don't go empty handed" means: never waste a step. If you are already gpoing to be doing something, see what else uyou can do to make the thing more productive.

I will add more about the Irish and their armfuls later. Right now I must be off to Pop's Garage. I have help today, and can't be late.


try to make sure you

Wham, it worked!

"Even pyramids erode," a pithy comment from a friend about the fight (cage match actually, or a battle royal) between my work ethic, the work I have to do, the time I have available, my skills and my body. Normally my work ethic wins, my skills running roughshod over physical limitations and stretching time just enough to make the impossible possible.

Not this time. My body won. The day after the last post I put photos online of some choice items and sent the url to the world. Wham, it worked! The next day an auction company expressed interest in my parent's dragon hoard, and arranged to visit the next day. Phew.

I pulled out all stops (seems to be a cliche day) getting their "stuff" ready to be seen. Marketing 101: make the product appealing to potential customers. Think what a customer likes and work backwards to create that. Wham, it worked!

The auction company will brings trucks and strong backs on Tuesday morning, and by that evening Pop's garage will be ... EMPTY!! Yippie. The auction will be next Sunday: I will post the email promotion (describing all the goods so I'm told: a long list) later this week to show what I have been talking about.

Yet success comes at a price. Not always, but often. Usually. It did here: my back, neck and shoulder went on strike, insisting on rest, ice, heat and massage. While normally I'd pay there demands no attention, this time I had no choice. The Boss (wife) laid down the Law--no work, including computer, for, well, almost three days.

So, that's why no posts for a few days. I am pretty much back to normal (sic) now, and have a couple more Pop's Garage videos mentally prepared.

Not much relevance to Dick and Acme, sorry. Relevant to me, Dick's Boswell, though. I hope that is enough.

We've Always Been On The Moon

Dick plans to offer custom services (N=1) to every customer, big or small; each will receive a service unique-to-them. From watching my daughter and her friends accept unique-to-them services as a given, like air or electricity, I realize N=1 is not an academic exercise but a reality, indeed a tsunami racing towards us.

Old people everywhere tend to remark, usually with a negative moan, that the young people today think differently, act differently, dress and speak differently. Luckily still remembering my hippie, counter-culture, long-hair (well, everyone else had long hair) background, I can see the situation from both sides. The young are different. They "see" things differently. And, as the pace of change (in culture and society as well as technology) gets faster and faster the difference in "seeing" increases as well. A story.

A few years back my good friend Robert told the story of the first moon landing to his young daughter. A space and technology buff, Robert explained the excitement of that day, his family (and mine, and most) glued to the grainy black-and-white TV images, thrilling to the time-lapse, echoey, "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," Neil first-foot-on-the-ground Armstrong homily.

Patience worn thin from listening to her dad wax on and on--as old people tend to do--about how the wonder of the event, his daughter answered,

But Daddy, we've always been on the Moon.

Yikes. To our generation the landing was a true seminal event, the culmination of Sputnik and of seeing the blue, green and white world suspended in the blackness of infinite space; we never felt more like global citizens than we did on that July 20, 1969 day.

Yet to Robert's daughter the moon landing was old news, just part of the furniture that makes up her world. Nothing special, no wonder attached.

(Which makes me wonder what might make this generation (X? Y? Z?), weaned on cell phones, text, Facebook, MySpace and iWhatevers, feel wonder? I recall the founding of Greenpeace for example, and wonder at what Rachel Carlson and her book, Silent Spring, created, the green movement that today has largely taken over--even if not always accepted. What will make my daughter feel wonder?)

Good Friends?

Anyway, I began this post with the intention to describe a truly fascinating example of N=1, the offering in India of 100% customized medical insurance based on each person's health and lifestyle, monitored on a daily basis by an R=G grouping of partners. An amazing example!

I will continue this post tomorrow (I promise!), my goal to use the medical insurance example to examine: a) what such a system requires; b) the obstacles facing implementing it today in Western countries (especially the US); and c) how the new generation (above) might accept this "based on lifestyle" method.

To bring this back to Dick and Acme, it is crucial that Dick and his key team do not simply use the way they "see" the world and the market to set policies and plans. In argument logic this is called the fallacy of Provincialism, that the way you and your friends think is the only (or the only correct) way to think. Dick must be able to step outside of his generation's and his culture's way of "seeing" if Acme is truly going to embrace the N-1, R=G world.

To SOP or not to SOP

Enter an old (to me anyway) argument: should you treat employees like factory machines, making them follow detailed SOPs (standard operating procedures, or rules), or should you treat them like people and let them find their own ways to get the required results? My answer? Both.

Okay, let's start with the company. What does the company require to succeed? Results. For now let's forget the macro, "pick right strategy/business model/product or service mix" issues. That to me is a given: without the right macro choices no level of achievement matters. High achievement in a failed strategy still equals failure.

But the twain is not true: poor achievement in a perfect strategy also equals failure. Certainly there is more to success than making the right macro choices. The company still needs to perform, to achieve, to succeed.

Fine. Now, achievement, or, even better, the "work" of a company can be divided (loosely) into repetitive and creative tasks. The former are akin to production line steps, including the entire list of bureaucratic, file this, make three copies of that, tasks, as well as areas like shipping, finance and, well, production. Repetitive tasks make up the bulk of "work" done; using Pareto and the ever-useful 80:20 rule, maybe 80% of the "work" is repetitive.

The remaining 20% of the "work" requires some level of choice, some amount of creativity. While the job description may not change--write marketing plan--the innards of the task, the data, the resources, the urgency for examples, change each time it is done. Moreover, while each type of task can be described in the same language ("add column A to column B" and "analyze market situation"), plainly the non-repetitive tasks need more people-input than just following the task description. I can make a machine or a program (or a chimp) add A to B, but neither could analyze the market situation (no matter how many chess grandmasters the program beats).

A company needs excellent results in both types of jobs to succeed. Okay, but what does this mean to Dick and Acme? Where should Dick be expending his effort?

In a startup phase I think the answer is clearly training staff to do the repetitive tasks perfectly every time. The creativity inputs should come from Dick and his senior managers, the core of the startup. That means that Dick and his key managers should be listing each final result needed in each business area then working backwards to the initial inputs, flowcharting each step in the bsuiness process. (Once I get off Blogger I will show examples of flowcharts and process descriptions.) Creating SOPs, helping staff understand and follow the SOPs, then measuring two things: are staff following the SOPs and, if so, are the SOPs achieving the right results?

This "start with SOPs" is especially true in a cross-culture environment (continued anon).

Ah, about now is when the politically-correct beseech me to mend my ways, to treat people like people, not machines. "How can people grow if you don't let them try things on their own? If you won't let them make mistakes?"

Well, quite frankly I am not sure allowing people to choose whether or not to add Column A to B is good or wise policy. Most jobs require SOPs because they are repetitive and that the SOP will achieve the required result, every time. Effectiveness and efficiency, the twin Es of quality, depend upon this "achieve ... every time" outcome.

Yet I still feel there is place for creativity, even in repetitive, SOP'ed jobs. I contend there are two times when people are naturally creative: when facing a crisis and when following the SOP guarantees achieving good results and a bonus is offered for new ideas. Let's hope Acme is not facing crisis yet (though many would argue that the statup phase itself is just one long crisis: I digress).

So, what about non-crises creativity? It requires two inputs: People can not be worried about achieving the right result, making the SOP a security blanket; and people must be rewarded for new ideas that increase either of the twin Es. Built in is the rule that nothing can be tried that will hurt achieving required results.

What ends up is a policy that allows people the time to think of new ways (as good results are guaranteed by following the old) and motivation to think (because of the reward). How it works in real life is Mr. A or Ms. B has a new idea; a real-life test is carried out on a simulated case; if that works more tests are done; if they work out then the SOP is re-written and Mr. A and Ms. retire on their bonus reward. (I can dream can't I?)

The above is a long-winded (sorry: I was channeling Charles Dickens this morning) analysis of how Dick should go about building the company during the start of the startup phase. Crucial to success is that Dick can depend on staff achieving X results every time for the 80% of the tasks that are repetitive. Once that is done great things can happen; without that all that happens is Dick takes more and more aspirin every day.