Archive for July, 2009

One reason is, Trust.

Trust is both and emotional and logical act. Emotionally, it is where you expose your vulnerabilities to people, but believing they will not take advantage of your openness. Logically, it is where you have assessed the probabilities of gain and loss, calculating expected utility based on hard performance data, and concluded that the person in question will behave in a predictable manner. In practice, trust is a bit of both. I trust you because I have experienced your trustworthiness and because I have faith in human nature.

SSON, the Shared Services & Outsourcing Network, recently posted a good article on the general topic of deep change. There are innumerable articles on the topic. The challenges can technical, financial, cultural, operational, organizational, political, compensatory, and more. Perhaps one of the best books, which I’ve referenced previously, is Jim Collins‘, “Good to Great.” While I recommend reading the entire book, he provides a good summary of it on his http://www.jimcollins.com site.

One reason that seems to be generally overlooked is Read the rest of this entry »

Coffee Shops

If you know me much at all, you know I like coffee shops (a lot). Some time ago, I learned the working lunch has its uses. One good use, is simply relationship building. But as a tool for getting something done, the Working Lunch really isn’t that productive, and it’s expensive (even if we’re only talking my waist line). The goal? Get someone out of the office for an undistracted discussion, or, meeting someone whose schedule is jammed.

Using a coffee shop for a meeting is much more cost effective ($4 vs $40?), can be scheduled any time (6:45a, 1:30p, 6:45p), and have last as long or as little as both parties desire. Love ‘em. Read the rest of this entry »

Interesting discussion today, over at Infoworld.  One of the respondents to a prior posting bemoans, “Is there more to business than revenue, cost, and risk?“  I generally enjoy reading the common sense Bob Lewis doles out over there.  But, I think his response is a tad off the mark.

Bob says, No, that’s all there is.  He further suggests there’s difference between for-profit and non.

I typically state it differently: The only thing that matters is Productivity and Revenue.  Everything else that is cited contributes to one, or both, of those two components.  Even Risk, is simply a sub-component that you need to manage to the benefit of productivity and revenue.

Don’t quite agree Read the rest of this entry »

Somewhat abated, since its introduction a few weeks back now, Google Wave continues to generate discussion about just what it is. Andy Mulholland’s post over at Capgemini talks about this. Is it a new collaboration platform? Is it a new email solution? Is it a new photo gallery manager? Is it a new blogging alternative? Is it a new project management tool? Yes?

My initial thoughts are getting refined Read the rest of this entry »

So, would you? Would you seriously consider buying life insurance for key member(s) of your organization?

Twice in the past, I have made the recommendation to senior management, to seriously consider purchasing life insurance for a particular individual. The recommendation was to insure the individual’s life according to the amount of impacted revenue they represent.

In one case, we had a network licensing guru through whom almost every major Read the rest of this entry »

In a recent post, Seth Godin talks about what to do with special requests. It’s worth a moment to read, especially for leaders and mentors. Boiling it down, if someone has a special request, don’t send them away because you’re busy. They probably will go (and stay) away.

So, what to do with them? This line of thinking triggered a not too distant memory. I had received complaints from other departments that this person’s most likely response to a request was, No!  The person in question was a high-value team member, responsible for coordinating team resources.  We were constantly stretched beyond reason, so hearing ‘No’ to requests might not seem unreasonable.

In line with Seth’s, ‘…cost you $90…,’ I gave some advice.  Don’t say, No.  No, in translation, was this person’s way of saying, ‘No (it cannot be done in the requested time frame).’  The recipient would bristle as a result.We probably all tend to bristle when simply being told, No.  Instead, tell them we’d love to do it, but it might be 5 days/weeks/months.  Anything but ‘No.’  Let the requester decide whether to pursue the issue, or not. After a couple of weeks, the complaints died down, and the internal friction from hearing ‘no’ faded away.

I’d also suggest a third reason for turning down special requests: They are not in line with your (organization’s) chosen path.  Just because you can, just because you’d like to, doesn’t mean it’s wise.

Even with all our current challenges in the United States of America, we are still one of the most blessed, prosperous, positive, countries in the world. So, I wanted to remind everyone, using a few pictures, of just what a great country we have. The sheer diversity of what is available to us.

We have an incredible richness that I think, after listening to the daily onslaught of ‘noise’ in our lives, we tend to forget.

When was the last time you took a walk through the woods with family, friends, with yourself? Read the rest of this entry »

Generally considered Universally True: It costs more to get a new customer than to keep an old one.  Whether we’re specifically talking about SaaS providers, or not, this seems to be lost on so many businesses.  How much more profitable might a wireless carrier be, for instance, if they focused on keeping existing customers, rather than incessantly focusing on new?

Listening to the likes of quarterly reports from Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T, for instance show companies focused on gaining more new customers than the number of old ones they lose. How much more profitable might they be if Read the rest of this entry »