Monthly Archives: May 2013

May 17, 2013 · 9:32 am

Smoked Salmon Vodka

For our Foodie Friday Fun this week, let’s start with a movie. Oh sure, there have been plenty of foodie movies over the years (Big Night is my favorite) but I want to start with the 1982 Michael Keaton classic Night Shift. I know – not really a foodie movie but in it Keaton offers up a food-oriented line that I thought of yesterday:

What if you mix the mayonnaise in the can, WITH the tunafish? Or… hold it! Chuck! I got it! Take LIVE tuna fish, and FEED ’em mayonnaise! Oh this is great.

What prompted the thought was someone mentioning that they’d recently tried smoked salmon vodka.  My immediate response probably mirrored yours: YECH!  Then I thought about it for a second.  How often have you gone to a nice wedding or similar function and there’s been chilled vodka put out alongside the platter of salmon?  The two really do go together when you step back and think about it.  Or take the idea of making doughnuts in a muffin tin.  They’re not muffins and they’re certainly not doughnuts  but is there a way to get the texture and flavor of a donut in the easier to make form of a muffin?  There is, and someone figured out exactly how.  Which is the business point.

Tuna and mayonnaise, salmon and vodka – normal combinations presented in a different way of thinking (I’d tweak the tuna notion a bit but he’s on the right track).  Often in business we’re presented with ideas that seem ridiculous on the first pass but when you stop thinking “bad idea” and start thinking “interesting notion – what does it need to be a great idea” you just might end up with a better mousetrap.

Pushing ourselves to think differently is the only way we grow our businesses   People get bored quickly these days and if you’re not innovating you get left behind.  While I’m not sure that smoked salmon vodka is going to be my drink of choice, the thinking behind it is very much what I like to order up.  You?

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May 16, 2013 · 11:06 am

Embracing Number Crunching

Great piece in this morning’s USAToday on how NFL teams are building analytics departments to take advantage of all the data they get.

The new NFL logo went into use at the 2008 draft.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This isn’t about their digital properties either. Instead, they are used in the draft (what better way to compare hundreds of college kids than with test results?), game-management (play-calling tendencies, personnel match-ups, etc.), and in managing their rosters – the salary cap, free agent players, etc. What does this have to do with your business?

If you saw Moneyball, you probably recall the reluctance the scouts had in accepting the data being used to analyze players.  There’s a tendency in all businesses, particularly among those of us who have decades of experience, to believe our own impressions more often than we believe the impartial numbers that might be available.  An NFL coach might think that a running back can’t block, but when the numbers show that the missed block only come on plays where the  safety blitzes, the right answer isn’t a better blocker – it’s to get the tackle to give the running back blocking help when they see a blitz.

Your business isn’t that different.  You get reams of data on an hourly basis that explain what is or isn’t working.  It’s overwhelming  and because it is the data is often ignored (“I can’t react to everything every minute of the day”).  As I’ve said to clients, it’s not so much what’s happening in the moment but the trend over a bunch of moments that’s important. Ignoring those trends can be fatal, especially if they’re being subordinated to the often blurry vision each manager has.

That said, I’m among the first to say that numbers don’t show everything.  Leadership on the field, for example, isn’t really quantifiable (no numbers available from what goes on in the huddle, folks).   Still, confirming one’s own impressions against impartial measures from ongoing business activities is an important check and balance.

If you’re running a business and you’re not involved in analytics of some sort, you’re running that business blindfolded.  If you’re don’t have full-time people supporting your data efforts, there are outside folks like me who can help.  As the NFL shows, even the top dogs need to learn a few new tricks.

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May 15, 2013 · 10:57 am

Playing In A Different Mode

We haven’t done music here on the screed in a while so how about we take on modal music? For those of you without the benefit of music theory classes, modes are types of musical scales that create very specific sounds. Not much of an explanation, but if you play a “C” major scale (all the white keys on a piano) while playing in the key of “D” rather than using a typical “D” scale, you’re playing modally.  If you know the Metallica song “Sandman” you’re hearing modal music.  Same thing with Led Zep‘s “Dancing Days.”  To your ear they’re not exactly in a major key or a minor key and they create a very specific sound, and no, it’s not just heavy metal bands that use it.

Interesting, but what’s it doing here on a business blog?

As I see it, we should all think about playing modally in our businesses.  Ask yourself what happens if you continue to play a certain way but do so in a different environment:   a “C” scale in the key of “D” has a business equivalent of transforming content cross-platform for example.  It can also involve how one creates a specific feeling that might not be as straightforward as, say, a major or minor scale.  In other words, maybe we need to spend less time thinking linearly and a lot more time thinking modally.

Modes aren’t just musical either.  There are modal verbs in English which we use when we want to express our intentions and attitudes, talk about necessity and possibility, or make offers, requests, or suggestions.  “Can, may, will, would” and others are all examples.  They’re “helper” words.  “Can you shut the door?” is a good example and points out that modals often bring confusion along with them.  I raise this because while we’re adjusting our musical modal thinking we can bring about the sort of confusing jumble that modal verbs can cause (in the previous example, you don’t know if the speaker is asking for someone to close the door of if they have the ability to do so).  When we start to do business in different ways, staying focused on clarity needs to go along with the effort.

You know it when a business is playing modally.  You take notice of their marketing because it sounds different and yet is very clear. The real question is how do we all get to that place?  Thoughts?

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