Tag Archives: Business and Economy

December 15, 2017 · 1:51 pm

Cookies And Caster Sugar

It’s Foodie Friday! I’ve written before that I’m not much of a baker and only do so when a guest is counting on some sort of baked dessert. It’s not because I don’t have a sweet tooth though. One weakness I do have with respect to baked goods is cookies. The blue guy on Sesame Street has nothing on me and I suspect if I didn’t exercise some sort of self-control I’d weigh 300+ pounds.

I love me some cookies and take a vicarious thrill in looking at various cookie recipes even though I will only consume them through my eyes and not my mouth. One thing that I noticed popping up in a number of recipes was caster sugar, and an article on Food52 yesterday helped me understand what it is and why it’s used in baking. This is their very fine explanation:

Caster sugar goes by a variety of names, including castor sugar, baker’s sugar, and superfine sugar, the last of which alludes to what exactly it is: a finer granulated sugar. If a grain of granulated sugar is big and a grain of powdered sugar is tiny, caster sugar would be somewhere in between.

Which of course got me thinking about business, and about data in particular. Just as the more granular nature of caster sugar makes cookies a better product (they’re softer and lighter), so too can refining your data yield much better results. You’ve probably heard about the need to segment your data but if you’ve never done so or have never gone beyond basic age/sex or other large groups, you’re really missing out. Refining your data makes it possible to address each segment in a way that’s meaningful to them. The more personalized you can make your messaging, the more effective it will be. Getting beyond “first name” and into where in a purchase cycle a customer might be as a data segment will make for a better outcome. Special offers by segment only yield great results when the specificity of those segments make the offer truly special.

Caster sugar is more refined but not overly so. That’s a great thing to keep in mind as you analyze and use all the raw data you collect every day. The fact that the data isn’t fattening is a big plus!

 

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December 13, 2017 · 1:03 pm

The Ninth Candle

Last night was the first night of Hanukkah. You’ve probably seen a version of the candelabra that is used to hold the candles that are lit each night of the holiday. You might not, however, have noticed that while the holiday goes for 8 nights there are spaces for 9 candles in the candelabra, called a Menorah. The ninth candle is our business topic today.

That candle is called the shamash in Hebrew, which translates to “helper” or “servant.” It’s not like the other candles in that it sits either higher or lower than the others in the menorah. It’s used to light the other candles, and although it burns just as brightly and sits in the same candelabra, it’s different.

What this brings to mind is how those of us who have grown up into managers and executives become very much like the ninth candle. We’re servants and helpers. Our job is to help the other members of the team to do their job, much like the shamash enables the other candles. Where we get into trouble is when we forget that. The people who actually do the work don’t serve us. They serve the organization, its goals, and customers.

Think about the best boss you’ve ever had (and I hope you’ve had some great ones!). My guess is that they were clear communicators who respected you as a person and as a professional. They probably never talked down to you when you didn’t understand something and were always pushing you to be your best self. They were also willing to get you whatever you needed to do your job, to the extent they could whether that’s a better computer or a pencil. They were also unwilling to let a weak team member jeopardize the entire team so they were clear about standards and held everyone to the same ones.

As you pass by a menorah (whether it’s a real one or a picture) this Hanukkah, remind yourself that while you may be the boss, you’re also a shamash, a ninth candle that’s a part of the team. You might sit higher up but you’re really there to help. Make sense?

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December 11, 2017 · 11:38 am

The Spanish Inquisition

I’m a big fan of Monty Python, as I am of anyone or anything that provides great insight amidst great silliness. One of my favorite Python sketches is The Spanish Inquisition. Not only is it funny (if you like really silly) but it also provides a great business reminder:

Nobody Expects The Spanish Inquisition

It’s a phrase I’ve found myself saying many times in business as some unforeseen circumstance causes great disruption. You see examples of it every day. Just this morning, there was a report of a newspaper closing in Houston which is blamed primarily on the effects of Hurricane Harvey. I’m sure there wasn’t a business plan built around that sort of natural disaster.

Sometimes, the disruptive event can be seen but its dramatic effects aren’t. Take, for example, the discussions I used to have with some higher-ups during Internet 1.0. One person was totally convinced the explosion in web properties and the dawning digital age was “a scam.” He didn’t believe that people wanted to watch TV on their computers when a brand new HD-TV was in their living room (HD was pretty new at the time). Of course, he also didn’t expect that broadband would make delivering video to any device wirelessly as good an HD experience as that same TV, nor did he understand that it literally was the same bits that comprise the “broadcast” signal.

Those same broadcasters denied that cord-cutting would have any effect on viewing. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition, you see. However, ESPN has lost more than 12 million subscribers since 2011. You think the recent waves of layoffs aren’t related to cord-cutting? When cable is losing hundreds of thousands of subscribers each month, you can count on there being an effect on the business.

The hardest part of being in business is seeing over the horizon. Brexit? President Trump? China leading the charge against climate change? The Cubs winning the World Series?? Who expected those things? Equally as difficult can be in believing what you’re seeing. Nobody may expect The Spanish Inquisition, but part of our job as businesspeople is to be ready when it pops into the room. Are you?

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