Tag Archives: Business and Economy

August 7, 2013 · 10:14 am

If You See Something…

I don’t know about where you live, but those of us in the New York area are hit on a regular basis with a message that “if you see something, say something.”

say something

(Photo credit: istolethetv)

It’s in the subway, on trains, on bus stops, and on mass media. If you believe the reports, and I do, those sorts of actions have prevented some nasty incidents over the last decade.

I got to thinking about that the other day from a bit of a different perspective which of course then led into some business thinking. We all know a person who displays symptoms of things not being right in their lives. Those symptoms could come in the form of substance abuse or a big weight gain. Maybe their personality has changed – gone from light to dark. If you care about that person, you probably think about a way to say something that asks about what’s going on. It’s hard – people have feelings, after all and they are probably just as aware as you are of what they’re doing. Probably more so.  The ensuing discussion can be hard for both of you.  Sometimes it can derail a friendship.  More often, it begins a healing process, but only if you care enough to say something.

The same is true in a business.  The symptoms are different, obviously.  Unhappy team members, a faltering bottom line, processes that are inefficient.  Those things won’t fix themselves until someone cares enough to say something.  Oddly, the people who are best equipped to do that are often the youngest or newest members of the team.  They approach the business with few preconceptions and “new eyes.”  The problem is that they tend to hold their tongues believing that it’s their newness or lack of knowledge that makes them see the flaws rather than the familiarity of the day-to-day that’s blinding everyone else.

I always demanded that new hires speak up.  I reminded them of their special status – everything is new – and that they should ask about anything that didn’t make sense to them.  If they saw something, they were to say something.  If their supervisor or I didn’t have a good reason for the way things were, we needed to do the hard work of introspection.

Hopefully you’d never let a friend in pain stay there alone once you see the symptoms.  You can’t let a business remain there either.  Say something – everyone will be better off.  Agreed?

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July 29, 2013 · 10:18 am

Being Fearless

I played (badly) in a golf tournament over the weekend and on the heels of that I saw an article that triggered some business thinking.

Tigers fight

(Photo credit: @Doug88888)

The piece was from last week and was on ABC News’ site.  It is about a paper written, as it turns out, in 2010 by a professor at the Kellogg School of Management and concerns what the author called the “Tiger Woods Effect” (you knew it would relate to golf, didn’t you?).  The author – Jennifer Brown – explained it this way to the Wall Street Journal:

Ms. Brown argues that the superstar effect is not just relevant on the golf course. Instead, she suggests that the presence of superstars can be “de-motivating” in a wide variety of competitions, from the sales office to the law firm. “Most people assume that competing against an elite performer makes everyone else step up their game and perform better,” Ms. Brown says. “But the Tiger Woods data demonstrate that the opposite can also occur. It doesn’t matter if the superstar is an athlete or a corporate vice president. After all, why should we invest a lot of energy in a tournament that we’re probably going to lose?”

Do we set ourselves up for failure by surveying the competitive landscape and recognizing the presence of some superstars in our competitive area or is that motivation to beat them?  I always make the distinction between losing and being beaten.  The latter is easier to swallow in my book – you did your best and someone was better that day.  Losing, however, stings – we know we were capable of so much more and didn’t perform.

It’s an easy out to discount your chances due to the presence of a superstar brand or firm or individual.  Mike Tyson used to win a lot of his fights without throwing a punch because his opponents would see him across the ring and a look of fear would cross their faces.  Pre-game trash talking is, in my mind, as much about bringing the opponent down to your level as it is false bravado.

We need to be fearless.    Even superstars have a bad day.  Once Tiger’s veil of invulnerability was lifted due to him being beaten on the course and his troubles off of it, the rest of the field recognized that they could win no matter what he did.  That was the case all along, by the way – they just stopped beating themselves.

What will it be?  The choice is yours.

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July 24, 2013 · 8:45 am

Clients And Clarity

A couple of conversations over the last few days provided today’s inspiration.  The chats were with two folks who are smart, good at what they do, and completely lost when it comes to technology.  That’s really not a big deal for either them given that they’re not tech professionals.

Chat bubbles

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

They do know as much as the typical “civilian” and they spend time on the web and using digital tech in their non-work lives.  In fact, they know quite a bit more than the average person since both have web sites for their respective businesses and were involved in those sites’ creation.  Each is also working on making improvements – new designs, better SEO, a smoother social integration.  That’s where things have gone awry and what provides a good business thought today.

The design and coding firms with which they’re working are typical of a number of folks working in the field.  Their work is fine but their interaction with their clients sucks.  They build up barriers of bullcrap instead of providing clear explanations of not just what they’re doing but why they’re doing it.  They are incapable of translating what can be baffling vernacular into terms that their clients can grasp. This frustrates (and I expect frightens) their clients, who are smart business people used to making informed decisions.

Keeping them in the dark by speaking to them in a language they don’t speak is harmful to everyone involved.  The client can’t be sure they’re making the right choices and, frankly, neither can you since you haven’t provided clarity.  If it’s NOT the right decision, would your expectation be that the client will immediately re-engage you to fix it?  Maybe so, but it won’t be at additional cost to them.  All it does it eat into your margins by your having to perform more work for no more money.

My rule of thumb is this:  I channel my mom.  My mom is TOTALLY technically illiterate (she’d be the first to tell you that) but smart about a lot of other stuff. If I feel as if the explanation I’m giving a client  would be good enough for my mom to explain it back to me after I say it, I’m probably on solid ground.

Like any business, the business I’m in – tech and consulting –  has a lot of moving pieces and tons of jargon, but the concepts aren’t dissimilar to other things.  As professionals, part of  our job to be translators for those folks who touch our business even if they don’t speak its language.  What do you think?

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