Monthly Archives: March 2012

March 27, 2012 · 9:10 am

Out Of My Head

I saw my niece in a production of Sondheim‘s “Into The Woods” over the weekend.  It’s the same show my eldest daughter was in 10 years ago.  Both productions were terrific but different enough to show how one can take the same general concept and insert your own vision to transform it.

Into the Woods

Into the Woods (Image via RottenTomatoes.com)

One thing wasn’t different, however: the music.  The score is wonderful and contains, in my opinion, some of Sondheim’s best work, and the plot is a mash-up of several fairy tales such as Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, and Jack and the Beanstalk.

So here I am well after I’ve left the theater and I can’t get the songs out of my head.  My musical tastes are definitely NOT Broadway score focused and yet these are the only tunes popping into my brain several days later.  Which of course is the point.

We should all be trying to create things that consumers and business partners can’t get out of their heads, whether it’s a game that people can’t stop playing, a show that creates massive sharing and grows organically, or a book that readers can’t put down.  We’ve all seen lines for new movies but what about the lines where people are going back to see the film several times?  How many people are on their third or fourth iPhone?  Lots of people post about their obsessions – it’s practically a default category on Pinterest.  How much is what you’ve created there?

The Electric Light Orchestra had a hit with the song “Can’t Get It Out Of My Head“.  Keep that in your head as you work today – like Sondheim, create something that burrows into people’s brains!

Midnight on the water
I saw the ocean’s daughter
Walking on a wave’s chicane she came
Staring as she called my name
And I can’t get it out of my head
No, I can’t get it out of my head…

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March 26, 2012 · 10:13 am

Why Hiring A Star Might Be A Short-term Decision

Think about the best coaches, the ones who will go to their respective Halls Of Fame based on their coaching achievements.  Now think about players who are in their sport’s Hall.  The lists don’t often cross – in basketball there are only three: John Wooden, Bill Sharman, and Lenny Wilkens.  In golf, I can’t think of any Hall of Famers who were both great players and renowned teachers.  In the NFL, maybe Dick LeBeau will get there as a defensive innovator – he’s already in as a player – but that’s about it.  You can look up baseball and other sports – it’s not a long list anywhere.

The fact is that the best players are usually not the best coaches.  Most of the great coaches were average players during that aspect of their careers.  I played a lot of sports and was in the “average” category.  From my own experience I know that I had to pay a lot more attention to technique and strategy that the guys who had way more skill than I did, and I suspect that’s true (at a much higher level) with all of the great coaches.  As a mediocre golfer, I got better by practice (although I still am pretty bad) but also by learning about swing flaws, and now drive my friends nuts by analyzing every swing I make while they just swing and play pretty well.  Which of course got me thinking about how this is applicable to business.

The best salespeople I know were also notorious for not paying attention to “technique.”  They are just gifted in sales and lousy in things like administration and filing expense reports accurately and on time.  Great salespeople often make horrible sales managers because they can’t explain how to do what they do.  Ask an artist to explain the creative process and you get a very different answer from an academic.  The latter will talk about psychology and biology; the former about inspiration.

When someone know what it’s like not to have natural ability – the gift of superior skills – they work harder to become proficient.  They take nothing for granted.  So the question is this:  is it better to hire a naturally gifted star, knowing that they will at some point become frustrated in a larger role (the transition to management) or do we hire the person of above average skill who has worked hard just to compete?

Thoughts?

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March 23, 2012 · 6:52 am

More Doh!

A couple of Foodie Fridays ago, I wrote about a Cooking LIght piece that discussed some of the more common mistakes we amateur cooks make.  Since it’s Friday again (funny how that happens every week or so), I thought I’d present a few more lessons from the kitchen and remind us how what goes on in the kitchen is a lot like what goes on in business.

Today’s first mistake comes from the world of baking.  Unlike cooking, baking is very precise, mostly because it’s chemistry.  The problems come when untrained bakers begin to make substitutions in a baked good.  You know – something sounds too fattening (I hear that’s possible) so you change the butter to oil or applesauce.  Maybe you use a sugar substitute instead of some or all of the sugar.  That’s a noble idea but it disrupts the basic chemistry of the cake and it often comes out badly.  Business is a lot like that.  Some supervisors think that all their workers are interchangeable and ignore the basic chemistry of a good team.  Unfortunately, that kind of thinking often results in a less than optimal result.

Error number two is not understanding the difference between boiling and simmering.  Boiling something happens at a much higher heat than does simmering it gently.  While boiling rather than simmering can cook a dish more rapidly, the result is rarely edible.  Boiling a stew instead of simmering it can result in tough meat, for example.  In business, the equivalent error is yelling and screaming at someone – turning the heat way up – instead of applying a gentle heat that might take a bit longer to work but yields better results.

Finally, many home cooks don’t use thermometers to check the temperature of meat.  They rely on timing as stated in a recipe or some calculation like 6 minutes per pound instead of checking to see if the meat has come to a proper temperature.  This can result in a product that’s over- or under-cooked.  I know of people who don’t rely in measuring devices such as analytics to run their businesses and that’s the equivalent mistake.  There’s no way to tell how a business is doing – digital or otherwise – without using impartial measurements of some sort.  Just as a beautifully browned roast may not be cooked, a business that looks nice on the outside may not be fit for consumption once you dig in.

Enjoy the weekend!

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