Strategy: Be Extraordinary

The video series continues with Tom describing a meeting with Barry Gibbons, former chief of Burger King. Asked to speak to the collected BK managers, Tom sparks Barry's realization that anything is better than being ordinary.

You can watch the video (time: 3 minutes, 5 seconds).

Or get a PDF of the video transcript: Strategy: Be Extraordinary.

Strategies: First-line Supervisors, the Video

On 24 February Tom gave us his "First-line Manager20/1LM20" and declared the choice and nurturing of first-line supervisors a Peerless Strategic Opportunity. In this video, Tom explains why choosing first-line supervisors is among the most important decisions a business can make.

You can watch the video on YouTube (time:
2 minutes, 38 seconds) or download a PDF transcript.

A Peerless Strategic Opportunity:
The First-line Manager20/1LM20

The evidence is clear: Employee satisfaction and like variables are significantly, even overwhelmingly, linked to the employee's relationship with her or his first-line manager. While first-line managers are considered to be of great importance, in my experience few companies truly obsess on every aspect of their care and feeding. In fact, my observations suggest that such things as first-line manager training regimes are often of questionable quality. This is a strategic mistake. More important, a lost strategic opportunity.

What follows is a long way from the "last word"—in fact it is the "first word" from me, and simply an indicative list aimed to stir your analytic juices.

Herewith, my First-line Manager20:

1. The selection process for 1st-line managers (1LMs) should be as rigorous as that of, say, vice presidents. "360" evaluations are a must. Perhaps a selection committee should be appointed, which includes other 1LMs.


2. New hires should be selected in part on the likelihood of subsequent promotion to 1LM, and this goal should be formally emphasized from the start of their tenure.


3. 1LM slots that are open should not be filled until an appropriate (superior beyond a shadow of doubt) candidate is found.


4. 1LMs should be given long probation periods—perhaps 6 months.


5. New 1LMs should "shadow" senior 1LMs for a significant period of time.


6. 1LM training programs should be evaluated far and wide, and, based on "best practices," a stellar/"Wow" 1LM training program should be developed. The "basic" course and intensive continuing-ed curriculum should aim to win "best in class" awards.


7. 1LM designees should receive superior evaluations in "basic training" or be put on probation.


8. Given the abiding importance of cross-functional communication and coordination and synergy, 1LM selection and training and subsequent evaluation should emphasize measurable performance on this dimension. (Poor marks on XF performance should be cause at any time for probation or, after fair notice, removal from the job.)


9. Senior officers (including the CEO) and highly rated-regarded 1LMs should present parts of 1LM training modules, especially the "basic training" program.


10. "People development" should be the central element of 1LM training. (The "people development" training modules should be award-winning.)


11. Success as precisely measured in "people development" should be the central element of 1LM evaluation.


12. "Business" training should also be a central part of 1LM training.


13. 1LMs should be treated as the company's principal "culture carriers" and principal "change agents"—and be treated and trained and "used" accordingly.


14. The abiding importance–Excellence of our portfolio of 1LMs should be considered a formal "core value" of the enterprise.


15. A portfolio of "outside" training courses for 1LMs should be available during the entire tenure in the job.


16. Every 1LM should have two assigned mentors, one from within the 1LM's department, one from outside. One of the two should be a fellow 1LM. The mentoring process should be carefully constructed, not "catch as catch can;" mentors should be evaluated on their results.


17. 1LM reviews should be monthly during the probationary period, quarterly thereafter; these reviews should be carefully designed and rigorous by any standard.


18. Every department head should evaluate her or his "portfolio" of 1LMs regularly; the quality and continuing development of the 1LM portfolio should in turn be a central element in the evaluation of department heads and division heads.


19. A senior HR exec and a senior "line" exec (and perhaps an outsider) should formally evaluate the company's 1LM portfolio annually.


20. After the 1st year of 1LM service, the 1LM should be trained for and become a mentor of new 1LMs. Henceforth, mentoring success or failure should be a central measure of the 1LM's performance.

GE Model 2010?
The World Model 2010?

On March 13th of this year, the Financial Times reported that Jack Welch had reversed course on the principle he had held most dear and that had, on the back of his success in the 80s and 90s, been adopted by many if not most of America's biggest enterprises: "On the face of it, shareholder value is the dumbest idea in the world. Shareholder value is a result, not a strategy. ... Your main constituencies are your employees, your customers and your products."

The reaction by many, myself included, was nothing short of amazement. "Revising" your dogma is one thing, which most all of us have done and which is a sign of flexibility, but calling your principal claim-to-fame "the dumbest idea in the world," well that's ...

Jack's successor, Jeff Immelt, in the top slot since 2001, is a different cup of tea. He is, first and foremost, juicing up R&D and placing big bets on new products and new businesses. (He's been slowed down by putrid results at GE Capital, Welch's centerpiece and the source, in its heyday, of about half of GE's earnings—reducing dependence on GE Capital is another of Immelt's strategic goals.) The fact is that long before the Great Recession, Immelt was questioning rather directly some of GE's and indeed U.S. big business's emphasis in the prior 15 or so years. Consider this, from Mr. Immelt in 2005: "Almost every personal friend I have in the world works on Wall Street. You can buy and sell the same company six times and everybody makes money, but I'm not sure we're actually innovating. ... Our challenge is to take nanotechnology into the future, to do personalized medicine ..."

Which brings us all the way to this past Wednesday and Mr. Immelt's remarks, as reported by the FT, in an address at West Point: "We are at the end of a difficult generation of business leadership [TP query: defined by you know who, Jeff?] ... Tough-mindedness, a good trait, was replaced by meanness and greed, both terrible traits. ... Rewards became perverted. The richest people made the most mistakes with the least accountability." (To be fair, accountability has long been a GE trademark.) And if that stunner was not enough, Mr. Immelt, almost alone among high-visibility CEOs, deigned to address the struggling part of our population: "The bottom 25 percent of the American population is poorer than they were 25 years ago. That is just wrong. Ethically, leaders do share a common responsibility to narrow the gap between the weak and the strong." I'd chide Mr. I on the choice of the word "weak," but all in all, it is perhaps the most stunning-amazing-incredible reversal of course I've observed since I've began watching big business about 35 years ago—though Greenspan's acknowledgement that everything he believed most dearly, such as automatic self-regulation in the financial industry, had taken a shot below the water line, comes close to Immelt's 180-degree course change. (NB: I can't help but wonder if the strength of Immelt's remarks was tied to the setting at the USMA. It's hard to sling bullshit when you are addressing several thousand kids—and they are kids—who will be off to Afghanistan in pretty short order.)

"Meanness."
"Greed."
"Terrible."
"That is just wrong."

Wow!
And: Hooray for Jeff!
(And, about bloody time!)

Success In Five Words.
Success in Nineteen Words.

It wasn't really a sleepless night. But it was "one of those nights" (not that infrequent for me) when some words start rumbling around ... and around and around. I just wanted a list of "stuff" that gets to the essence of human behavior, and thence is directly related to individual effectiveness at pretty much anything. (NB: And, ain't it always the case, "stuff" that business schools either recklessly take for granted or decide is not sophisticated enough to merit their attention.)

So here are "the real basics"—in five words. Achieve Excellence at these five things and the world (of human organizations) will pretty much be your oyster. To wit:

1. Read.


2. Write.


3. Talk.


4. Listen.


5. Appreciate.

Once the keyboard was at my command, I ended up (surprise!) extending the list to 19 words. Herewith:

1. Read.
2. Write.
3. Talk.
4. Listen.
5. Appreciate.
6. Walk.
7. Work.
8. Sweat.
9. Sweat.
10. Enthuse.
11. People.
12. Frontline.
13. Act.
14. Anger.
15. Band.
16. Apologize.
17. Weird-out.
18. Network.
19. EXCELLENCE.

Here, also in very few words, is my more or less definition of the 19 words:

1. Read. (Outstudy 'em.)


2. Write. (Clear, concise, powerful.)


3. Talk. (Presentation mastery. Study. Practice-practice-practice. Storytelling, mastery of.)


4. Listen. (Study. Practice-practice-practice. Understand enormous power thereof.)


5. Appreciate. (Engaged. Thoughtful. Compassionate. Appreciative always, enormous power thereof.)


6. Walk. (MBWA/Managing By Wandering Around. In touch. Again, learning, and learning is required, through practice.)


7. Work. (Work harder than the next person. "Balance"? Uhm ...)


8. Sweat. (Sweat the details with maniacal passion!)


9. Sweat. (Sweat the details with maniacal passion!)


10. Enthuse. (Enthusiasm moves mountains.)


11. People. (Great and engaged people>>>Great strategy. Best bosses = Best people developers.)


12. Frontline. (Firstline supervisors, quality of, determine just about everything. Must become an obsession.)


13. Act. (Most tries wins. Hence "most failures" is a concomitant reality—celebrate 'em.)


14. Anger. (Raging impatience with dumb stuff. Constantly question the status quo.)


15. Band. (Small, passionate, relentless bands of people/renegades change the world. Period. Avoid the hierarchy—it tenaciously defends the past in 9.9 cases out of 10.)


16. Apologize. ("I'm sorry," enormous power thereof. And rare, particularly among men.)


17. Weird-out. (Multiple, unusual sources of information and feedback.)


18. Network. (Develop wider-deeper-downward relationships. Think "suck down for success." Think-obsess on R.O.I.R./Return on investment in relationships. Again, women take to this instinctively.)


19. EXCELLENCE. (The only standard. ALWAYS CAPITALIZE ALL LETTERS.)

Over to you ...

The "Eight Courtesies"

The toughest part of writing a new book is choosing the epigraph—a dozen words penned by someone else that perfectly encapsulate what one has been up to for the prior five years. Well, I am entirely happy, even ecstatic, about the epigraph to The Little BIG Things*:

Courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest in the grateful and appreciating heart.—Henry Clay

In fact, I'm now making what I call "The 'Eight Courtesies'" the centerpiece of my presentations. Below you'll find the List of Eight. Also, I have included a fully annotated version of The Eight Courtesies PowerPoint. (And a shorter version, from shorter presentations, The Five Courtesies PowerPoint.)

The "Eight Courtesies"

1. Stay in touch. (MBWA.)


2. Invest in relationships. (Make friends. Obsess.)


3. Listen. (Respect. Learn. Student. PROFESSIONAL. Sustainable Competitive Advantage #1)


4. Ask. (Engage. Inspire. Consult. React.)


5. Thank. (Appreciate. Acknowledge.)


6. Network. ("Suck down." C(I)>C(E).)


7. Apologize. (Unequivocal. Rectify. Over-react. Forgive.)


8. Practice thoughtfulness. (Kindness is free. This is ... STRATEGIC.)

The "Five Courtesies"

1. Listen. (Respect. Learn. Student. PROFESSIONAL. Sustainable Competitive Advantage #1.)


2. Ask. (Engage. Inspire. Consult. React.)


3. Thank. (Appreciate. Acknowledge.)


4. Apologize. (Unequivocal. Rectify. Over-react. Forgive.)


5. Practice thoughtfulness. (Kindness is free. This is ... STRATEGIC.)

[*Tom's new book, The Little BIG Things: 163 Ways to Pursue Excellence, is to appear in early 2010.—CM]

The Business World's Biggest Wasted Opportunity

[Read more by guest blogger Steve Yastrow at yastrow.com.]

There are hundreds of thousands of retail stores in the world. Today, millions of customers will walk into those stores and interact with owners or employees. Within hours, most of those interactions will have been forgotten by those millions of customers. Why? Because most of the retail interactions that occur today will be flat, uninspired, perfunctory, and transactional. Most interactions won't create sales, and an even greater number will not build a relationship between the store and the customer.

This represents millions of missed opportunities. Imagine if thousands of these retail interactions could be improved, so they are not flat, but instead, interesting, enthusiastic, engaging, and memorable. Would more sales be created for today? Would more relationships be created for tomorrow?

I happened to meet an interesting retail salesperson a few days ago. His name is Jacob Lahr, and he is a manager at the CUSP store for women at Water Tower Place in Chicago. "Even when the store is filled with tourists, who we may never see again, it's possible to clientele," Jacob explained.

"To what?" I asked. "Did you say 'to clientele'?" "Sure," Jacob continued. "It's always possible to clientele. It depends on how you relate to your customers."

Well, that's certainly my favorite new verb of the week. I asked Jacob if he coined the phrase "to clientele," and he couldn't remember if he did or if he had heard it when learning to work in retail. I googled "to clientele" and only found it listed as a noun, so I'm willing to give neologism credit to Jacob. Here's how I'll define it: "To clientele is to create a relationship-building encounter with your customer, so that the customer's relationship with the store is better when she leaves than it was when she came in." Notice that the definition doesn't say anything about making a purchase.

Jacob doesn't want to waste retail interactions. He knows how valuable they are. Not to clientele is to let a precious opportunity slip through your fingers.

So, when you enter stores this week, see if the person who interacts with you is doing a good job "clienteling," or is he/she just going through the basics of serving you. If you work in retail, how often are you able to clientele?

Just imagine how much loyalty stores could create if they were better at clienteling? Too bad most aren't very good at it. Yes, the retail encounter may be the business world's biggest untapped, wasted opportunity.

The Follies of Marketing Measurement

[Our guest blogger is Cool Friend Steve Yastrow. Find out more about Steve at Yastrow.com.]

"If you can't measure it, you shouldn't do it," is one of the stupidest concepts in business.

Many things that can't be directly measured are worth doing.

Here's a really basic example: Should you ask your receptionist to smile when guests enter your office foyer? Of course you should! There is no way to measure the impact of a smile, but you are 100% certain that it is a good idea.

There are many decisions we make every day without being able to measure their direct impact. Should you clean your office before a client visits? Should you use the same logo on your website that you use on your printed brochures?

The answers to these questions seem obvious. But there are many other ideas that are terminated prenatally for one simple reason: The executive with control of the purse strings can't, from his vantage point, see a direct return on investment from this idea.

Important point: Just because this guy can't see a return on investment doesn't mean one doesn't exist.

Our world is very complex, and we create business results through combinations of actions. The receptionist's smile, the clean office, and the standardized logo on all marketing materials combine with hundreds, or thousands, of other customer touchpoints to create a cumulative story. This overall story is what motivates a customer to act, not any one point of contact.

So how do we make decisions in this complex world? We think. We strategize. We learn so much about our businesses and our customers that we are able to make good decisions. We create Brand Harmony.

You can't measure the effect of the receptionist's smile, but here's what you can do:

• Determine what the optimal business results are that you are trying to create, and measure if they are created.
  
• Determine the optimal customer behavior that you are trying to encourage, and measure if customers are doing what you want them to do.
  
• Determine what you want your customers to believe about you, and then measure if they believe it.
  
• Determine what the optimal customer experience should be, and then measure if you are creating it.
  
• Determine what you want your employees to do, and then measure if they are doing it.
  
• Determine what you want your employees to believe about your company, and then measure if they believe it.
  
• Determine the action steps that are on strategy, and then measure if they are happening.

Determining these things will give you a framework for making decisions and measuring if your actions are heading in the right direction. Good strategy and good understanding of your business will give you confidence that your decisions are the right decisions

Don't let your boss get away with being myopic, focusing only on metrics that are right in front of his face. Transcend the mundane measures, and create real ROI.

Story Power!
(Manufacturing Stories.)
(Sometimes from Whole Cloth.)

Those of you interested—as I am—in "the power of the story," may find compelling this description of Churchill trying to keep British morale up during the long years in which the British Army was in no shape to return to Europe, and the Americans weren't willing to pull the trigger either.

Per premier Churchillian historian Max Hastings (Financial Times, 0904.09):

"But where to fight [after successes in the Battle of Britain had staved off imminent danger to survival], given that the British Army was incapable of engaging the Wehrmacht in Europe? Churchill's policy between 1940 and 1944 was dominated by a belief in the importance of military theater. He perceived that there must be action, even if not always useful; there must be successes, even if overstated or even imagined; there must be glory, even if undeserved."

[Hastings also quotes Deputy Prime Minister Clement Attlee: "Churchill was always looking around for 'finest hours,' and if one was not immediately available, his impulse was to manufacture one."]

Talk about "story power" when the stakes are high!!

In your and my more mundane world:

Have you worked-like-a-demon on your story?

Are you clear about your story (you, your service on offer)?

Is your story Clear & Powerful & Compelling & Exciting & Dynamic?

Could It Be This "Simple" #1?

In his superb (What's new?) 2 June New York Times column, "The Quagmire Ahead," David Brooks begins his assessment of the GM fiasco by citing an internal memo written in 1988 by EVP Elmer Johnson:

"We have vastly underestimated how deeply ingrained are the organizational and cultural rigidities that hamper our ability to execute."

That quote reminds me of another, this one by Norberto Odebrecht, head of the Brazilian-based heavy-industrial conglomerate, Odebrecht:

"Data drawn from the real world attest to a fact that is beyond our control: Everything in existence tends to deteriorate."

"Simple" fact: Accompanying GM's longtime designation of "biggest" came Olympian accompanying "rigidities." One is reminded of yet another quote, this from Walt Kelly's Pogo:

"We have met the enemy and he is us."

Business schools, the always helpful whipping boys in my rants, focus on the "cool" FMS troika. (Finance-Marketing-Strategy.) And yet it is the internal organizational characteristics, MIA in B-schools (not sexy enough), that trip companies up. "Rigidities" that impede the ability to "execute" are the culprits behind shoddy performance in 9 out of 9.01 cases.

Toyota didn't do in GM.
Honda didn't do in GM.
Nissan didn't do in GM.

GM did in GM.

This is not news.
It is, however, worth restating.
And I shall do so.
Again.
And again.
And then again.

We have met the enemy.
He is us.

(NB: Brooks' analysis of the GM situation is frightening, and, I fear, accurate. Among other things, he suggests that we've put the foxes in charge of the chicken coop—e.g., same tired execs, same tired union bosses; and further distanced the company from outside winds.)

2009 Recalibration: Part 6

Is your internal brand clear and compelling?

Throughout this series I've encouraged you to "recalibrate" your approach to your business by addressing six questions:

1. Where is the latent profit in your business?
2. How can your current customers help you unleash that latent profit?
3. How does the economic situation help you focus your new customer acquisition efforts?
4. Is your brand strategy right for the times, i.e., what do you want your customers to think about you?
5. Are you communicating optimally with customers at all touchpoints?

And ... the subject of today's post:

6. How clear and compelling is your internal brand?

[Download a PDF from Yastrow.com presenting the six steps graphically.]

Our theme all along has been that your world has completely changed, not only because the economic situation is new, but because the economic mayhem has changed the way your customers think, act, decide, judge, evaluate ... and live. You have to recalibrate, because your customers are recalibrating.

What about the people who work in your company? Two very important points:

1. Your employees/colleagues are also living in a different world, which changes the way they think, act, and decide. Who do you know that's doing their job today the same way they did a year ago?
2. Recalibration is a company-wide affair. In our previous articles in this series we have discussed how your company must interact with its customers differently, and communicate its story in a way that is relevant with the times. Your ability to do this depends on the entire team working off the same page, communicating one clear, compelling, relevant story to customers.
So, how clear and compelling is your internal brand? Does the entire team have a "shared belief of who we intend to be" that transcends the generic language of mission statements, helping everyone understand how the company is recalibrating and what their personal role is in this change?

This economic turmoil, and the 24-hour news cycle that promotes it, has caused significant uncertainty in people's lives. There is a number no one can calculate, which I am sure is in the trillions, that describes the number of work hours wasted this year as people fret over their own circumstance or commiserate with people about "what might happen."

As 2009 began, a client and I were preparing to share a new brand strategy with their team, which included about 400 employees. The strategy was designed to help both employees and customers think of the company in a whole new way, representing a new direction in which the company was headed. We were scheduling a series of employee meetings where we would describe the strategy and then engage the employees in discussions about how they could fulfill this strategy in their work. Unfortunately, as was happening in so many companies this past January, my client's company went through a staff reduction, cutting about 5% of its workforce. Questions came up: Is it appropriate to have branding workshops at a time when we're cutting staff? After all, doesn't this seem superfluous when people are losing their jobs?
As the CEO of this company agreed, this was exactly the time to move forward with this initiative, full-steam ahead. In a time of uncertainty, people in your company need clarity and confidence, and one of the best ways to give them clarity and confidence is to ensure that they know exactly where the company is headed, what it is doing to engage customers, and what each person in the company's role is in creating the company's future.

A strong internal brand is critical anytime, but it's especially critical now. Assume that your mission statement is outdated, incomplete, and irrelevant. Focus on creating a "shared belief of who we intend to be" that will not only create clarity and confidence throughout your organization, but motivate people to participate in the most important project of 2009:

Recalibration.

Once Again:
The True "Heart of Strategy"

My friend and colleague Hal Movius has just delivered to me his profoundly important Built to Win, coauthored with Lawrence Susskind.

The topic is purportedly "negotiation." I use "purportedly" because it so thoroughly re-defines the term that the "old definition" is more or less rendered meaningless, even a distraction.

Much (most) of what we "do" in the real world, internal to our organization or vis-à-vis outsiders, is, in fact, negotiation of one sort or another. But the way the "skill" is typically approached is transactional—how to structure a single negotiation. To be sure, in the last few years we have emphasized such things as "win-win" approaches—and that's no small thing.

But Built to Win goes a country mile or ten further. First, the authors argue that internal politics make a mess of negotiation outcomes as much as the "at the table" bit—complex internal pressures (substantive, political, subjective, as much as "hard numbers") by various functions are as important as the "stuff-at-the-table," especially over the long haul—you know, that funny-ole-word, imp-le-ment-a-tion. Second, they argue that such complex "stuff" at the opposing party's organization is also crucial. "Win-win" at the negotiating table is relatively unimportant if everybody, or lots of bodies, back home (both homes) is pissed off at the result.

Third, and the real breakthrough, is the notion that negotiating per se (remember, much of what we "do") can be an incredibly important "strategic competence" that becomes a core, encompassing, pervasive (i.e., everybody!) system and "cultural trait" of a successful organization.

As you know (see my "Heart of Strategy" post—also PDF and PPT), I fervently believe that "all this stuff" is the true basis for lasting "strategic EXCELLENCE," not the battle plan for conquering markets. "We will conquer X market, a 'Blue Ocean,'" is utterly meaningless (deleterious) if not married to the "all-important last 98%" called Execution or "Implementation through the Enthusiastic Cooperation of 100% of our People."

The book is loaded (!!) with compelling examples—and practical advice for getting the "core competence" imbedded throughout the enterprise. Frankly, in the very best sense, this is not a "page turner." The idea, which of course I've grossly oversimplified, is straightforward enough, but the execution requires a lot of deep thought and very hard work. The payoff is staggering—but building the under-structure ain't no walk in the park.

Bottom line: This is a terrific book, that truly deserves the moniker "an original," and we look forward to adding Hal to our Cool Friends roster. (Incidentally, the authors' credentials are solid gold, such as intense work with the Harvard Law School—on top of extraordinary "in the trenches" work. Yadda, yadda, yadda.)

The Answer to a Model-led Fiasco Is Different Models. Right. And Your Old Auntie Quarterbacked the Dallas Cowboys.

I love this quote: "The level of experimentation is abysmal. These firms do not take full advantage of feedback opportunities they are presented with." The quote accords with my Principal Assertion about Business, which in fact I've called the only thing I've learned "for sure" in 40 years. Namely: "Whoever tries the most stuff and screws the most stuff up and most rapidly launches the next try wins. Failures are not to be 'tolerated,' they are to be celebrated."

The first quote (which, I repeat, I loved) comes courtesy Freakonomics author Steven Levitt. He's launched a course, with fellow economist John List, at the Chicago B.School to teach the kind of thinking featured in the book and referred to in the quote above. It is, therefore, in effect a course on the scientific method. The "scientific method"? "He who tries the most stuff wins. Failures are not to be tolerated, they are to be celebrated."

If the course, aimed at "the best MBA students in the world" (whoever they are—they were the wizards of Wall Street, now serving as busboys in or out of prison), "works," the world will have a new "model" for doing business. List humbly (reminds me of Larry Summers) says, "We're trying to bring about a revolution in business, so this [the course for "the best MBAs"] is the first shot over the bows (sic)." [NB: The ships I served on had only one bow, as I recall.]

I conclude, personally, from the above:

(1) I contend-reiterate that "tryin' a lot a stuff" is the most important thing an enterprise, or individual, can do in pursuit of success.
(2) I report here that "An Experimental Approach to the Right Answers [whatever that means]," in the Financial Times, 0420, and from which the above was taken, made me want to puke! [Re-reading it to prep for this Post induced another wave of stomach flippin'.]

I'm upstairs in biz class in a KLM 747-400 heading for China as I write. I have fretted for days, weeks, about the direction in which I want my 3-day mini-course to go. Last night, between Midnight and 4 a.m. I "got it"—if history is a teacher, I'll undo it and redo it a couple of more times in the next 36 hours,

My "breakthrough" is a determination to pass along this message repeated in as many ways as I can conjure up:

Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)

I'll follow that up with:

Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.) Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)

And then I'll go home to Vermont, where Spring is Springing!

Do business leaders need a ... NEW ANALYTIC FRAMEWORK ... to replace the one Greenspan and Rubin and Summers and pals gave us? Or should they instead pay strict attention to an FT article that appeared the day after the one cited above, titled: "Business Needs to Speak Out Against Greed"?

I quasi-puked after reading the first article—and stood up in my hotel room in Amsterdam, all by my lonesome, and shouted "Bravo" and tossed a tulip at the FT after reading the next day's article.

The last thing business needs is a "new analytic framework" taught only to the "best" MBAs—guys, mostly guys, who'll end up as the next McNamara or Rumsfeld (both members of that dynamic duo score top tenth of the top one percent on "analytic excellence").

What business needs, in my (not particularly) humble opinion is to do more MBWA (Managing By Wandering Around), to really really really "put people first," à la Southwest or Wegmans; to hang out, really really really really hang out with customers à la Cisco boss John Chambers, to learn to listen and apologize, as discussed in yesterday's Post. Etc.

In short:

Business doesn't need a new framework.
Business needs a new attitude.

When I get home I'm going to print new business calling cards—after all these years I've figured out what I do (which is what Bob Waterman and I tried to do 30 years ago in In Search of Excellence). Hence, my new calling card will read:

Tom Peters
The Un-revolutionary

We don't need another "analytic model" to replace the current "analytic model." What we need, and I'm gonna put this on the back of my card:

Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = Wander around.
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.) Excellence = Wander around.
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = Wander around.

And if there's room left:

Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.) Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)
Excellence = People first, second, third. And fourth. (And fifth and sixth and seventh.)

The Invisible Competitive Advantage: Healthy Ecosystems

Businesses are constantly in search of competitive advantages. The question that they constantly ask themselves is "How can we be 'the choice' for our prospects as they evaluate products or services that we offer?" Books have been written about how to get and sustain competitive advantages in the short term and long term.

This short piece will cover an invisible competitive advantage that you can develop over the long term—and that is to develop multiple healthy ecosystems that thrive on your success.

Let me give a few examples:

Across the world, Microsoft has more than 600,000 partners that have based their business models on one more of Microsoft's products. They build solutions on top of the Microsoft platform. Every time they succeed in selling their solution, they contribute a piece to the success of Microsoft.

The App Store on the Apple website offers more than 25,000 titles dealing with everything from business applications, maps, restaurant recommendations, puzzles, games, radio, books, and even Skype. Developers from around the world are creating applications for iPhone and iPod Touch, designed to use their advanced technology, such as the Multi-Touch interface. Though most of the applications were developed by third parties, these other companies are enriching the Apple ecosystem every day.

The latest innovation from Amazon—Kindle—thrives on the ecosystem that is created by the publishers, authors, and media companies (yes, they sell newspapers and magazine subscriptions, too). In fact, the Kindle can only be successful if companies other than Amazon contribute to its usefulness.

The same rules apply to other industries outside of software and technology, although most other industries now have some sort of technology associated with them.

For example, selling flowers. Using technology, 1-800-FLOWERS can fulfill an estimated 6 million floral arrangement and gift orders a day—in most cases, on the same day. Obviously, this can't work unless they have a network of stores to fill the orders to the specifications provided by the company. They employ a franchise model and work with thousands of stores across the U.S. Using this process, they increase their capacity as well as the capacity of all the individual participating flower shops.

Ecosystems take a long time to develop, as the participants in the ecosystem have to feel that there is a big win for them for expending their time, energy, and other resources to work within the ecosystem. The long time it takes to build these ecosystems is another factor that contributes to the competitive advantage they provide.

Yes, it takes time and energy to design an offering/product that will not only serve you well, but also serve to take care of the concerns of the participants in your ecosystem. However, that extra effort is well worth it when you look at the competitive advantage this act produces.

[You can learn more about Cool Friend Raj Setty at www.rajeshsetty.com or read his blog at Life Beyond Code or follow him on Twitter at Twitter.com/UpbeatNow.]

And Then There Were Eight ...

I sent my friend and colleague Ben Ridler, CEO of RESULTS.com, a draft of the "Credo" we posted here a couple of days ago. He gave me some positive feedback—but told me it was too long. He wanted not 49 values, but ONE, or at the most FIVE. I decided it was worth a try—and failed. But I did end up reducing the FORTY-NINE to EIGHT. I did not cheat and try to combine various items from the first list. These EIGHT "finalists" are exactly as they appeared the first time:

Our Credo/A Work in Progress

* We are dedicated to and measure our success to a significant degree by our unwavering commitment to the extreme personal growth of every one of our employees.

* We shall unfailingly aim for EXCELLENCE in all we do.

Strategic Listening Plus

The discussion over the last few days of strategic listening got me somehow thinking about "values statements." They, of course, can be quintessential phony baloney. But in some cases, Johnson & Johnson's Credo comes to mind, they can be worth their weight in something far more valuable than gold.

And that, in turn, got me thinking that something like "excellence at listening" is a true-blue fundamental that belongs in even a very short values statement.

And then it was off to the races!

I spent most of a dreary weekend working on the "stuff" that ought to go into a "credo" or "values statement" or "working rules" or "things we care about"—or something. As usual, there's too much here, but I thought you might like to join in the fun:

Our Credo/A Work in Progress

*We are thoughtful in all we do.
*We are excellent listeners—to each other and to all members of our extended family (vendors, customers, communities, etc.).
*We will make the four words "What do you think?" an automatic instinct in all of our internal and external dealings; moreover, "What do you think?" will precede the explication of our own view in 99 out of 100 instances.
*We are dedicated to and measure our success to a significant degree by our unwavering commitment to the extreme personal growth of every one of our employees.
*We will only be "delighted" with our managers if their employees are universally surprised by the level of their personal and professional growth.
*We will be clear that we view leadership at every level as a sacred trust—and that leaders are indeed the servants of their employees just as the effective classroom teacher is servant to the lives and growth of her or his students.
*We believe in the "inverted organization chart"—with the "leaders" at the "bottom" of a reverse pyramid.
*We will construct leaders' incentive schemes so that measureable progress in human development is weighed as highly as marketplace success.
*We will be a leader in research and development in every aspect of our business—and we will work primarily with vendors who are also fanatical about research and development; and work to attract a set of core customers willing to play at the edge of things and become our co-developers.
*We will aim to make our customer engagements adventures beyond the comfort zone, or adventures in growth to use a less intimidating phrase—we will aim to add value in novel ways that surprise and stretch our customers and ourselves.
*We will use the three words "Try it! Now!" almost as often as "What do you think?"
*We revere the experimental method, and believe success is mostly correlated with the number of things one tries.
*We wholeheartedly acknowledge the value of analysis, but in the end swear by "Actions speak louder than words."
*We "encourage" failures; that is we acknowledge that a near-religious devotion to "Try it! Now!" necessarily invites the failures that are part and parcel of trying new things.
*We will, in fact, look askance at those whose records include few or no failures—such a spotless record suggests an unwillingness to brave the unknown.
*We will, to summarize the last few items, all view ourselves as explorers-adventurers, proceeding toward individual and collective growth by actively engaging at the edge of things; we unstintingly believe that our customers will reap enormous value from our commitment to our constant, restless exploration.
*We will encourage and insist upon constant and vociferous disagreement, but be absolutely intolerant of disagreement in the form of personal attacks.
*We will cut "overhead" to zero—every "department" shall aim to be best-in-class in its arena, and hence a full-scale participant in our concerted effort to add value in all we do.
*We will exude integrity, individually and collectively.
*We will exemplify the word transparency in all of our internal and external dealings—and bend over backwards to give new meaning and breadth to the term "information sharing."
*We will individually and collectively accept blame for our mistakes, or even our rather minor contribution to others' mistakes—and apologize accordingly and with dispatch.
*We will bring to bear overwhelming and instant and collective force to redress any customer problem, real or imagined.
*We will under no circumstance badmouth a competitor.
*We will aim to turn every customer contact into a memorable experience, remembering that all of life is indeed a stage.
*We honor the word "design" in all we do, in every nook and every cranny of our organization; every system, every web page, every customer invoice, every employee restroom is part of our purposefully designed "signature," and stand out and exude exceptionalism in one way or another.
*We understand that difficult decisions must be made, but we will bend over backwards to implement such decisions with kindness and grace—the dignity of the individual will always be foremost in our mind.
*We will not intrude into our employees' lives, but we are committed to aggressively helping employees achieve a healthy lifestyle.
*We will master the art of appreciation and be profuse in our use of the words "thank you" to honor assistance of even the most minor sort.
*We will acknowledge through celebration even small successes—and always cast a wide net in our "thank yous" to include bit players, especially from other functions.
*We aim for others to always be surprised by our "vibrancy" and "vitality"—we view enthusiasm as the key to success in anything, and take particular care in leader selection to ensure that every one of our leaders is a "remarkable" "carrier" of enthusiasm through thick and, especially, thin.
*We will drop whatever we are doing and rush to the aid of those involved in tight-deadline activities—even if those involved caused some of their own problems.
*We will be careful in our planning, but also understand that nothing ever unfolds as planned—hence we will be known for our ability to muster resources in an instant, without fuss and from everywhere, to deal with the unexpected; participating in these ad hoc response activities will not be seen as a distraction from our "real work," but as a significant part of our "real work" and an opportunity to contribute to others and build our own skills in ways we might not have imagined.
*We fully acknowledge that other units-departments-functions have other points of view than ours, but we will bend over backwards to develop social connections with those in other functions so that dealings over warring perspectives are dealings among friends.
*We acknowledge that agreed upon deadlines are holy writ, and will attempt to balance requisite urgency and requisite realism in all of our commitments.
*We will fight tooth and nail to minimize the complexity that "necessarily" comes with Growth and the mere passage of time.
*We will declare total war on our own systems to ensure that they do not strangle us.
*We gladly acknowledge that anyone in the organization has the duty as well as the right to challenge anyone else when he or she believes they have a valid and useful perspective to offer—this is particularly true regarding any issue that has to do with safety, quality, or meeting agreed upon deadlines; such challenges may be firm but not rude.
*We will be civil in all our dealings with one another.
*We will bend over backwards to bring truly (not superficially) diverse views of every stripe imaginable to bear on plans and decisions of all sorts.
*We will pursue "diversity" in part so that the composition of our workforce and leadership from top to bottom is a "pretty good" reflection of the demographics of the markets we serve or aim to serve.
*We will use new technology tools to extend the definition of "our family" to every corner of the globe—we will welcome ideas and participation in our affairs from anyone and everyone.
*We will aim for gender balance in all we do and from tippy top to bottom—for reasons commercial more than reasons moral.
*We will never, in any way, compromise on the quality of our products or services—regardless of difficulties in our marketplace and economy.
*We wholeheartedly acknowledge that in the short term (as well, obviously, as the long term) we must be profitable and exhibit stellar financial performance that is consistent with the audacious efforts to serve our people and our clients as described above.
*We aim to be seen by others as "conservative" in our financial practices.
*We shall talk about EXCELLENCE constantly.
*We shall unfailingly aim for EXCELLENCE in all we do.
*We shall use EXCELLENCE as the principal benchmark in the assessment of ourselves and our work and our community.
*We shall never forget that the bedrock of EXCELLENCE is the unwavering commitment to growth of 100% of our employees—and, in fact, all of those we come in contact with.

[Above, also available as a PDF. Below, after the peepers came more snow on Saturday, as seen through our living room window at 6 p.m.—at least it was light at 6!]

The Strategic Importance of Listening

I decided, with a little help from participants, to Post the entire set of Comments on LISTENING—some of these posts may seem less relevant than others, but we did not feel it was appropriate to edit as any editing is an application of bias. I think these 45 comments provide a range of perspectives—all worthy of your time:

Great post Tom. Is the video of the professor moving to the right available online somewhere? I tried googling it but couldn't find anything.

Posted by Brett Tilford at April 2, 2009 10:12 AM

Please, someone post a link to that video ...

Posted by Cam at April 2, 2009 10:12 AM

[I tried, too. No luck.—CM]

Pet peeve subject of mine.
Listening is NOT a skill - you can learn some techniques but this is not true listening.
Listening, above all, is an attitude. If you are/not interested in the person your body language will show it.
This is the reason why so many senior people are not good at listening - their attitude (I am Smarter, more successful, more important, have to answer this question, know the way forward etc) gets in the way.
Your interest in the other person has to be genuine. Your head needs to be totally empty of your thoughts - you need to be at one with the other person.
When preparing for a meeting (say a coaching session with an employee or a 1:1 with a customer) most people prepare notes, things to talk about etc - how many prepare their attitude and deliberately empty their mind?
Be Curious!

Posted by PaulH at April 2, 2009 10:27 AM

I agree with Paul.
I was talking to a nurse a few weeks back after a communication skills workshop. We discussed listening. She said 'Listening is a function of the ear, hearing is a function of the brain' - I like that and I now use it regularly. It's neat and says it all.

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 2, 2009 10:38 AM

Nodding not listening?
Writing not listening?
Listening is listening?
and hearing
and understanding
and acting
and caring
and respectful
and right
and occasionally you hit gold!
Pan for the gold, it's there - you just need to listen.

Posted by patrick at April 2, 2009 10:56 AM

I'm stealing this line: 'Listening is a function of the ear, hearing is a function of the brain' Thanks, Trevor!
Being in the middle of a duck-nibbling mess right now (because nobody will actually pick up a damned phone and talk to the other people. They'd rather fire emails back and forth...) - it really hits home. Aargggh.
One very valuable lesson I also learned when working for a Japanese company is that nodding doesn't mean agreement. It just means "I hear you." Something we Americans don't always grok.

Posted by Mary Schmidt at April 2, 2009 11:20 AM

I don't disagree on the attitude-skill distinction. But I'd argue that awareness may come first. Some are not aware of what lousy listeners they are--most bosses, for instance; they think they're listeners, their employees think they're interrupters.
I also think that a lot of people simply have not thought about the "strategic" importance of listening per se.
Finally, I think if you get a little better at listening-as-a-skill, you may be surprised at how interesting some of the stuff people say is--and some attitude adjustment may take place.
Finally finally: I think (no evidence) that about 60% of people, and 80% of men (there is evidence--on the gender differences) are lousy listeners--and you can't just write off that share of the population.

Posted by tom peters at April 2, 2009 11:40 AM

Learning to shut up is - well - learned behavior. That's the first step to developing the listening ability. Sure, it can be learned, to a certain extent. At least, you can practice the art of silence.
It's one of the hardest things I had to learn when I became a consultant. Since - OF COURSE - I already know what the problem is and how to solve it (um, maybe not...;-)

Posted by Mary Schmidt at April 2, 2009 12:13 PM

No problem Mary - I stole it too! :-) There is of course, very little originality.
Tom - "their employees think they're interrupters." - I worked for him! - Adapting a well known quote - "A conversation between two bosses is a competitive exercise where the first person to draw breath is declared the listener"

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 2, 2009 12:36 PM

Nice, Trevor!

Posted by tom peters at April 2, 2009 12:40 PM

Back to attitude vs skills. Any good trainer is working on attitude as much as skills. I acknowledge attitude is hard to change, but central to great training is giving people a whole new way to frame a problem--which may indeed lead to the start of a new attitude.
If you go down the "attitude--and it's fixed" path, then more or less shut the door to 100% of leadership training.
(All that said, I surely subscribe to "Hire for attitude, train for skills." One must, however by and large work with the hand we were dealt.)

Posted by tom peters at April 2, 2009 12:45 PM

I too am a fully signed up member of the club ‘recruit for attitude train for skills.’ I agree with your sentiments about trainers. As a trainer myself I estimate 85% of my workshop time is on attitude and 15% on skills. I’ve met well over 2500 front line healthcare staff in the last three years in customer care/communications workshops for front line healthcare staff. One of my favourite quotes I use in all workshops is this one:
"The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitude of mind" - William James 1842 – 1910
Feel free to steal :-)

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 2, 2009 12:57 PM

Training is of little value if the culture does not encourage (institutionalize) the requisite behavior.

Posted by Tom Asacker at April 2, 2009 1:03 PM

In terms of attitude - one question set worth asking a "poor" listener.
Who do you most respect as your hero?
Let's say they answer Tiger Woods
If I could engineer a day with Tiger Woods would you listen to him?
As well as 80% being lousy listeners. How many of you have really been listened to?
There is a level of listening in coaching beyond active listening where the coach is almost in a transcendental state and the listener feels as if their very soul is being heard. It's the most amazing experience - so few get to feel it.
Listening is a massive gift to humanity - if you can do it you can touch people in a way others can't.
Listening works well with children too. One of my favourite quotes from child coaching:
"What the children of today need is a damned good listening to."

Posted by PaulH at April 2, 2009 1:04 PM

"What the children of today need is a damned good listening to."
Like it Paul - thanks, another one for the slides.

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 2, 2009 1:10 PM

If I could be presumptuous enough to offer you guys another tip: when in a meeting requiring them, offer to write the minutes. It has 2 advantages: a) it makes you listen; b) s/he who writes the minutes gets to shape the official record and the action points. It's a double win!

Posted by Mark JF at April 2, 2009 1:42 PM

The Japanese teach and practice the art of "active listening." Nodding, note taking, eye contact, and the regular "ah..." are all tools to help the listener be an active participant in the exercise, not just a passive lump.

Posted by Useless Sam Grant at April 2, 2009 2:49 PM

Denzel Washington (attorney) in the 1993 movie Philadelphia, "Talk to me like I'm a two year old."
Not because he can't listen
Not because the other person can't be heard
But because, even when listened to, most people don't speak intelligently enough to be "heard" clearly with understanding.
Therefore, for another slide, proudly display TALK TO ME LIKE I'M A 2 YEAR OLD so you can truly understand what people are attempting to say in a meeting.
Funny exchange I had with an executive leader once...we were disagreeing on a budget for finished goods. In my assessments, I thought his numbers were stratospheric and unattainable. He wanted to convince me the numbers were supported by sound principles of business. Before he begins to plea his case he states, "Let's have a positive probe for a few minutes." I gave him a look like he was F'ed out of his mind. Before he continued, I blurted out...
"The doctor said the same thing last week and the probe wasn't so positive." The President and CEO were in the meeting and began to laugh. I was trying to show everyone how stupid we sounded, when listened to, in the meeting.
As much as these posts (very good) are focusing on listening, how about focusing on the dumb ass that's trying to communicate too.
TP----nice to see you provide a lot of pointers on this blog. Good blog!
Nodding in America, to me, now means the other person is full of s&^t, full of themselves, or both.

Posted by Scott Peters at April 2, 2009 3:13 PM

Thanks Mark JF - your point b is something Tom's been advocating for years!

Posted by Shelley Dolley at April 2, 2009 5:07 PM

Once we had an active listen session with Trevor Gay with plenty of nodding & copius notes - & got TG to admit to:
1. plenty of soccer hooligan events with him as ring leader
2. up is down & down is up in the new utopia socialism of Labour
3. Margaret Thatcher is his secret heroine of all time
4. complex tranche derivatives are his real passion
Then he deftly & super swiftly ran an intricate maze like a genius member of the rodentia family.
And he was super pleased to get all-you-can-eat fish & chips as a reward. :>)

Posted by C Love at April 2, 2009 6:43 PM

PS: "You Are Psychic" is a favorite - the author lives in Sedona, AZ. - take a seminar from him perhaps. Psychic 3.0 gets beyond mere "listening" 1.0.

Posted by C Love at April 2, 2009 6:59 PM

Listening is a skill, and an attitude.
But it seems that Tom is describing something different: How to communicate empathy, as a listener, to the speaker. These are great techniques, that do not have to be manipulative, to invite a speaker to engage with you more deeply. Nothing wrong with that!
Next time you are trying to get a slightly disinterested prospect or lukewarm customer to pay attention to a conversation with you, get them talking and then use the techniques Tom is suggesting. Nod, take notes, and then take notice. The other person will be much more engaged with you.

Posted by Steve Yastrow at April 2, 2009 8:14 PM

Steve,
I agree. Another tactic to use, when listening to someone that doesn't make a bit of sense, is to look bewildered, stoic, and puzzled throughout the conversation. Don't say a word and let them talk themselves in circles. Just use body language and an occasional Hmmmm. Sooner or later the person will state that they're full of poop, and then you can begin a real conversation. I believe the biggest flaw with communication today is the overemphasis on being politically correct!
When I was training as a counselor, there were times in a 50 minute session that I wouldn't say a word (deliberately). I would just use facial expressions and utterances. I was amazed to find out how many people would flip-flop through a session, a story, and get to the truth. They knew, based on my non-verbal messages, that I knew they were skewing the truth.

Posted by Scott Peters at April 2, 2009 10:18 PM

"First comes my belief that Serious Training in listening-information extraction is a "Top 5" skill for leaders, and non-leaders for that matter."
Information extraction! Yes, definitely a skill that is needed and one that can be taught indeed. You extract information through questions, by gaining confidence and credibility...even in the briefest exchange. You can teach folks to "hear" what people aren't saying. What's the old story about the reason you have two ears and one month is listen twice as much as you speak? Our biggest challenge in training new customer service reps is convincing them the ability to game and use social networking sites means nothing when you have to access an unfamiliar system, extract information to answer a customer's question, and then apply that information to exceed the customer's expectations.

Posted by Dave Wheeler at April 2, 2009 11:47 PM

C Love - Brilliant ... with one minor criticism. You forgot the mushy peas and salt & vinegar with my fish and chips. Promise me you will try harder :-)
Yours as always ... affectionately
from "Thug Tory Thatcher Complex Kid"

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 3, 2009 1:12 AM

If you vary the pace of your nodding you can get the speaker to speak slower or quicker. It's all part of the natural ability all humans share to be in rapport with each other.
Other tips for rapport involve frequent uses of the word "Yes" especially when used at the first word in response to a statement that you may disagree with fundamentally. Also everywhere you would consider using the word "But" switch to "And". "But" means delete everything before and substitute with everything following and that can come across as a real slap in the face. If you use "And" you can subvert without necessarily getting into a fight.
To the person who said listening is not a skill, I completely disagree. It is a skill because you can learn to do it, and that includes learning actually to be interested in other people and what they have to say. The word "Attitude" is hopeless as it is unmeasurable, ambiguous and unteachable. Never use it in a personnel appraisal because the appraisee might challenge you for evidence and accuse you of prejudice if you haven't got any.

Posted by Sean at April 3, 2009 2:22 AM

Levels of listening:
1) Cosmetic – Not really listening, going through the motions. Often happens in social situations. Unfortunately it's very common in business situations too.
2) Conversational – general mixture of talking, thinking, and listening. If you catch yourself thinking about anything else or even what you are going to say next this is the level you are at. Behaviours are often outwardly positive (the nodding, ahas, etc). Most meetings happen at this level as people are actually thinking about the responses or what they are going to say next.
3) Active Listening – very focused on the individual – ensuring understanding of what is said. This is where you are 100% focused on UNDERSTANDING the other person. You move from the Aha and nodding and you are actively using different questioning techniques (open and closed questions, etc) to really get deep on what is in the other person's head.
4) Deep Listening – a level where the listener is able to experience the other person. It is a deep emotional engagement as well as understanding. Has similar qualities to meditation. Generally this doesn't last very long - you can't conduct a whole meeting like this.
Most people who think they are active listening are still in conversation level. 99% of business interactions take place at levels 1+2. Remember if you are trying to think about what they are saying and understand it in your head you are not listening - you want to get to the point where you understand it in THEIR head.
Level 3 is the one to aim for. If you are really curious about the other person you don't have to think about the questions (the act of thinking about your questions puts you back to level 2) - they will arrive from your intuition/subconscious. Your aim should be to be a catalyst (i.e. not adding to or being changed by the situation - simply helping it to happen)
Part of the challenge of listening in a business context is in letting go and trusting your intuition to ask the right questions. Many business people (especially senior) struggle with this.
It's probably unlikely you will experience level 4 in a normal business environment - it's a little too intense without permission to go that deep anyway.

Posted by PaulH at April 3, 2009 2:36 AM

Sean
I understand your point about skill - there are skills you can learn. However I would say most people would gain more in terms of their listening ability by changing their attitude first.
If you don't respect another person's views you are simply not going to listen to them - no matter how much skill you have. I would say that in learning to do this their attitude might change.
In terms of "attitude" I would agree that attitude is not useful in most appraisal situations because most appraisal type meetings are massively superficial.
In a coaching environment where you are exploring values, self limiting beliefs and perceptions, the attitudes and beliefs that people have about others, events and themselves are very useful.

Posted by PaulH at April 3, 2009 2:47 AM

Sean - on reflection I might have been a bit strong against the importance of skill part - good call on your part to bring that up.
I should have been clearer - What I detest is the superficial skills that is often talked about around listening (use of body language, mirroring, the ahas etc). Sorry Steve Y - I do disagree - these techniques are nothing to do with real empathy. You have exactly the right approach - (i.e. start listening to the customer) but the wrong method to carry it out.
Perhaps I am being a bit harsh here - any listening is better than none! But I would urge you to find out more and practice this art.

Posted by PaulH at April 3, 2009 3:02 AM

"In a coaching environment where you are exploring values, self limiting beliefs and perceptions the attitudes and beliefs that people have about others, events and themselves are very useful."
I would argue that attitude is not useful even in a coaching environment because it's such an ambiguous word. Behaviours, skills and beliefs are more accessible and observable characteristics of a person. All of those are involved in listening and they can all be identified, taught and measured.

Posted by Sean at April 3, 2009 3:03 AM

"What I detest is the superficial skills that is often talked about around listening (use of body language, mirroring, the ahas etc)."
Couldn't agree more. If you attempt to break rapport or learning down into simplistic, unthinking procedures you will fail. Then again too much in business these days is procedural. Thomas Watson's greatest (I would argue) contribution to IBM was the introduction of the word "Think" as the corporate motto.

Posted by Sean at April 3, 2009 3:07 AM

Hi Paul - these are the notes from our handbook used in our customer service/communications workshops - very much like yours I guess
In order to provide an exceptional service to patients we must be able to listen. Listening is not something that most people do well naturally. There are several levels of listening:
Level 1: Background: Most people can listen to what is going on in the background without really listening to it. Interestingly enough they do hear and can replay the last couple of sentences from memory on request. Many of us did this at school when the teacher caught us daydreaming!
Level 2: Superficial: This is when we are not really listening. We are only pretending. We naturally slip in "Umm" or "Uhh" to give an impression of listening.
Level 3: Positive: This is when we really put energy into listening, and focus on what the person is saying.
Level 4: Empathetic: This is a higher level of listening when we really try to understand what it is the speaker is saying, and how they feel about it.
At work most of us listen at level 3 (unless someone is being long-winded in which case we may swap to level 2). In order to offer exceptional customer service we need to work at moving towards level 4. In order to do this we need to learn the skill of active listening.
Have a great weekend!

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 3, 2009 3:13 AM

This is a great conversation. I am tempted to post the whole thing as a single "run on" post. I think the thoughtful disagreements would be invaluable to somone try to decide whether or not the topic was BS, whether it's teachable or not, etc..
What do you think?
Post the whole thing?
Or not?
It's "yes" or "no," whole thing or no thing. I don't want to apply my own edits.

Posted by tom peters at April 3, 2009 7:17 AM

Wow! This is a great conversation.
To me, the heart of listening is reflected in the well-known story of Zen master Nan-In. The story goes that a professor of philosophy from Tokyo University once came to Nan-In to learn Zen from him. And Nan-In said sure, let's talk. As they spoke, Nan-In soon realized that the professor was more interested in putting across his point of view than in really learning about Zen. So Nan-In offered him tea. And while pouring him a cup of tea, he poured until the cup was full and kept pouring until the cup overflowed and hot tea spilt onto the good professor's lap. The professor jumped up and yelled: "What are you doing? Can't you see the cup is full? It won't take in anymore." At which Nan-In replied calmly, "Like the cup, you are full and you aren't taking in anything. Why don't you leave now and come back when you've emptied your cup, and then we'll talk about Zen."
In my mind, Listening is about emptying the cup. Not only the listener's cup, but also the speaker's. It’s only when the speaker's cup begins to empty that the real insights, reflections and deepest truths begin to emerge. And perhaps Tom's experience with the journalist was around this emptying-the-cup kind of listening and speaking. Here's to more empty cups?
And yes Tom, I do think this is a great conversation that deserves a post of its own.

Posted by Porus Munshi at April 3, 2009 9:38 AM

Porus, one vote is enough--it shall be done.

Posted by tom peters at April 3, 2009 9:44 AM

A separate post? Did you not see me nodding? ;-)

Posted by Sean at April 3, 2009 10:05 AM

yes

Posted by PaulH at April 3, 2009 10:19 AM

Great post Tom. Is the video of the professor moving to the right available online somewhere? I tried googling it but couldn't find anything.

Posted by Brett Tilford at April 2, 2009 10:12 AM

Brett, I VEEEEERY RELUCTANTLY admit that I saw this in the fall of 1970, right after I'd started at the Stanford Business School. Hence, 39--yikes--years have passed. God alone knows whether or not you can unearth it.

Posted by tom peters at April 3, 2009 10:20 AM

This has been one of my favorite discussions because you can feel the passion. In my experience, most people want to be better listeners and hence the development of listener training. What is lacking is the mental preparation to go into a meeting and listen. We work with our clients to do a short mental preparation before any meeting, negotiation, etc. to set their intentions, visualize their physical response, establish their state, and set their energy level. I posted a blog on www.tignum.com called What You Focus On Grows and this is a perfect example. If you focus on your interest and curiosity in another person's opinion your engagement grows. As a bonus, so does their interest in you.

At first, clients feel like this is a little forced but can you imagine an athlete not "warming up" before they perform. I have had clients call me immediately after a meeting to share how engaged they were and how much more effective they were because they took the time to go into the meeting prepared.

I agree with PaulH's very first comment about being curious. Next is be prepared. This means making the effort to clear your mind, prepare your mind, make up your mind and then engage your mind.

Posted by Scott Peltin at April 3, 2009 10:29 AM

Yes

Posted by Trevor Gay at April 3, 2009 10:56 AM

In our age of Blackberrys, Buttberrys, Treos, iPhones, Twittering, Tweeting, Facebooking, My Spacing, etc., I find that listening skills have eroded over very recent years.

I think about how many times I've been to lunch with someone that is texting, tweeting, or generally annoying me.

Tom, I think it's prudent to continue the conversation as you see fit, because, in my assessments, all of our F'ing gadgets keep us from truly focusing on the here, now, and future.

Thx,

----I see the next generation as completely preoccupied in the world of nothingness. Many people overcommunicate, which de-sensitizes people from listening.

Posted by Scott Peters at April 3, 2009 11:03 AM

I'm with you, Scott. My observation -- especially disconcerting when watching teens today -- is that by and large Facebook, MySpace, et al, have become mechanisms of vanity. When I see a teen who can't seem to carry on a face-to-face conversation with someone posting dozens... hundreds... of pictures of themselves and merely writing words to convince someone how wonderful they are, I am saddened by the lack of true communications and social skills they are stepping into life equipped with. My feeling is, if you REALLY want to convince me your my "friend," do a bit more than including me in the list of a quadrillion (thanks, TP) people you emailed today. I watch these teens key in literally hundreds of text messages with lightning speed on their cell phones, then at the end of the day, they have NO CLUE what any of their friends are up to. HUH? Bottom line, "Everybody's talkin' at me... I'd don't hear a word they're sayin'..." To me, that's not "commnication," "conversation," or "dialog." It's BROADCASTING.

Perhaps nodding as a means of pretending to be listen could be analogous to just having your cell phone turned on so the other person's message is received... by the phone anyway. "MENU... INBOX... UNREAD MESSAGES - 285... DELETE ALL MESSAGES FROM INBOX?... Y.

No time. Too busy SENDING.

To loosely quote Stephen Covey: "We were given two ears and a mouth. Only one of those holes was DESIGNED to close." (Emphasis added.)
Posted by Dan Gunter at April 3, 2009 12:05 PM

Scott - at the risk of sounding like an old fart, I agree with the point about people texting, doing e-mail on the Blackberry etc over lunch but I'd expand the point. A) I think it's a basic lack of manners. B) If answering e-mail during a meeting is more important than being in the meeting and contributing, you shouldn't be in the meeting. C) If people concentrated on the meeting and it's properly run, it probably would only take about half the time that's needed when people bring these distractions in with them: you need to break the vicious circle.

I used to work for a company that operated "Champagne Rules" during formal meetings: if your mobile phone rings or you're caught using your Blackberry, you have to buy a glass of champagne for everyone present. Someone left his phone on during the annual sales kick-off meeting once: that was expensive!

Posted by Mark JF at April 3, 2009 1:01 PM

I must be an old fart, too, because I agree with Scott and Mark above. Although I've never figured out why my wife doesn't think I'm listening to her when we are on the phone with each other. I'm nodding away like a madman and she thinks I'm ignoring her!

I interviewed with a large, high-profile company for a nice position last summer, but the person who would be my boss took me to dinner the night before to "get to know me" and he spent the entire time either on the phone or texting--to his children! I asked them not to make me an offer the next day. Never looked back.

Posted by Useless Sam Grant at April 3, 2009 2:23 PM

One thing, mostly missing in this excellent discussion, is gender differences. Are women who read this blog laughing at us boys (mostly) for even having this discussion?

Posted by tom peters at April 3, 2009 3:21 PM

I Hate This ...

I really do hate manipulation. Nonetheless, I thought I'd share this "obvious" listening strategy—it was used, to great effect, on me, even though I knew precisely what was happening as it went down.

First comes my belief that Serious Training in listening-information extraction is a "Top 5" skill for leaders, and non-leaders for that matter. And I believe, furthermore, that it can be learned/"trained in." (In Tom's GTDMBA—Getting Things Done MBA—there will, in fact, be a core course in Strategic Listening-Interviewing, and a couple of advanced electives.)

Now to the "tricks":

(1) Nod (interviewer) until your head flies off! I was interviewed several times during last week's Vilnius-Tallinn-Helsinki fling. One interviewer was a Professional Nodder. And the more she nodded the more I spilled my guts—if I'd been a mass murderer, I've no doubt that I would have fessed up on the spot! Seriously, very seriously, nodding is virtually irresistible. It, obviously, which is the "secret," plays to one's ego—"What you are saying is so profound, so true ... please keep going." That's the implicit message. Just try and stop going—and perhaps spilling your guts!

(2) The second "strategy" (trick?!) is a simple variation on the theme: Take copious notes! Of course it's a good idea in general—but, hey, you can be making a shopping list if you want. Once again, the act of note taking is an ego-stroker: "Goodness, I've got to record every word of your invaluable thoughts."

And that's it. Am I "fessing up" to a Big Ego? Nope. Or, rather, we all have big egos wired in. And actually, I don't even need the ego explanation, though I believe it. All I need is to trot out BF Skinner's rats; this is the effect of positive reinforcement at its most primitive.

(There's a wonderful social psych experiment where a classroom full of students is instructed by a psych professor to nod whenever the prof moves to his right—and not to nod when he moves to his left. The video is hilarious: In short order, the poor soul, PhD in physics notwithstanding, is backed into the far right of the classroom!)

Some Stuff ...

#1/A couple of weeks ago I offered up a document called "The Heart of Strategy." It was a list of 48 ideas about the essence of what I see as strategic excellence—or some such. The word count was 538. I thought it was worth fleshing out, so attached as a pdf you will find the annotated version, now 57 items ("The Heart of Business Strategy: 57 Things That Matter"), with a word count of 5,051.

[04.01.09 version: "Heart of Strategy" is edited once more, now 56 items.—CM]

#2/You will also find on offer a "collection" I'm calling: "Tom Peters' Thoughts About Getting Things Done, in Good Times and Bad." It includes a somewhat updated version of "Recession45: Forty-five 'Secrets' and 'Clever Strategies' For Dealing with the Recession of 2008-XXXX," which appeared last week; the aforementioned "The Heart of Business Strategy: 57 Things That Matter;" "The 'Have You 50;'" and, from among last year's offerings, "Attending to the 'Last 98%': The New 'Management Science,' or 'Hard Is Soft, Soft Is Hard.'"

All yours ...

Multiple Choice ...

Identify the correct statement among this set:

(a) Pope converts to Lutheranism.
(b) Sun rises in the West.
(c) Jack Welch calls focusing on shareholder
     value "dumbest idea in the world."
(d) Barry Bonds never used steroids.

Thank you, Jack Welch

In an interview with the Financial Times, Jack Welch stated, "On the face of it, shareholder value is the dumbest idea in the world," he said. "Shareholder value is a result, not a strategy ... your main constituencies are your employees, your customers and your products." I admit I have had reservations about Jack's wisdom in the past, probably because I remember Neutron Jack and haven't been as forgiving as many of my colleagues. But this reversal in his thinking is dead on.

I see far too many of my clients, good people with good motives, obsessing on pleasing Wall Street analysts, and taking actions that may well reduce their stock's value two to three years out. They have slashed budgets on many longer-term strategies, such as research and development, talent retention and development, even preventive maintenance on their equipment. All of it in the name of improving margins and a short-term increase in share value (or so the analysts say). Here are a few points, and I will let our bloggers add theirs as well, including dissenting points of view.

• The war for talent is still ongoing. There is and will be for some time, a shortage of leadership talent as a result of the baby boomers leaving the workforce. There will be plenty of "bodies" available, but that doesn't equate to talent. Cutting back on development efforts to grow your own leaders will leave you at the mercy of the market when the economy picks back up. You will end up paying more for outside talent instead of developing your bench strength now.
• Cutting material costs and pushing suppliers to cut corners to meet cost targets is impacting quality. These short-term measures will have long-term costs with increased warranty costs and lost sales because of the damage to the "brand."
• Instead of spending so much time with the Wall Street gang, why not spend that time talking to the constituents Jack calls out; employees and customers. You might just find out that your cost-cutting measures have led to employee disengagement and a loss in brand equity.
• If you must cut costs, start at the top. In the organizations I work with, the front lines are bearing much of the cost pressure. One client has even eliminated the free coffee at the daily pre-production meetings of supervisors! The front line is the place in your organization where all the knowledge and staff work must come together as product. Be careful whom you are messing with.

There are many more examples, but this should start the conversation. The real changes necessary for a resurgence of our economy, and with it lasting shareholder value, has to start in the boardrooms and the executive suite. Maybe they ought to call Jack.

2009 Recalibration: Part 3

How does the economic situation help you focus your new customer acquisition efforts?

Creating new customer relationships is one of the most expensive, most ineffective things that businesses do.

Consider how many billions of ads will flash in front of people's eyes today, but go unnoticed. How many millions of direct mail offers will end up in the recycling bin, unopened? How many sales calls won't work, despite hours of preparation, starched shirts, and animated PowerPoint slides?

If there is a part of the business world that most resembles a gas-guzzling hummer, it would be new customer acquisition. There is so much waste in the sales and marketing process that, now, more than ever, we have to be smart and focused about which new customers we pursue, and how we pursue them.

Here's one of the best ways you can improve your return on investment of new customer acquisition investment efforts: Focus on the specific actions you want your prospects to take.

A CEO called me a few months ago and asked me to come in to help him and his team deal with the business challenges the economic situation has created. Finding new customers was a big priority for them, so I asked them to show me what they were doing to make that happen. They showed me ads and advertorials they were placing in trade publications, trade shows they were attending, and a series of postcard mailings to prospective customers. They showed me a Google AdWords campaign, and they told me about the many different methods their various sales people were using to find leads. Then, I asked them to map out their sales process on a white board, showing me all the steps from disinterested lead to committed customer. Within five minutes they told me that they have a 90% close rate if they can get a prospect to visit their facility. I stood up, walked to the white board, and wrote down the list of new customer acquisition efforts that they had described earlier. I then handed the pen to the head of marketing, and asked him to draw a line through all the marketing efforts that were not directly focused on getting prospects into their office. He crossed out marketing plans representing 80% of their proposed spending.

By acknowledging that the true goal of those early lead-generation efforts was to persuade someone to visit the company’s facility, we were able to cut a huge chunk of fat out of the marketing budget. They could either save those dollars or apply them to efforts that focus on this goal. The group even agreed that paying someone's way to their facility was not out of the question—especially now that they'd have the money to do it!

Focusing on specific customer actions not only helps you create a "to-don’t list" of marketing efforts, it helps you focus your message. If the purpose of an ad is just to get someone to call you or come to your website, then you can target the message specifically to that goal. The attention that a prospective customer will allot to you is very limited; by knowing what you want that prospect to do, you can use that ration of attention wisely.

[This is Part 3 of a 6-part series. To read the other entries in the series, you can use these links: Part 1 and Part 2. Or, read more by Cool Friend Steve Yastrow at his website: yastrow.com.]

Almost a Guarantee:
The 1% Drill

I did an in-company seminar in the UK several years ago, for a mid-sized firm. ($50 million?) A generalist consultant was my co-presenter; to be more accurate, he did the first two-thirds of the day, and I provided the (hopefully) grand finale.

At about 2 p.m. he called an abrupt halt to things, and said, "I want to make sure I cover my full fee today, and then some. We're going to stop and do a 45-minute exercise."

He explained that any operation can at any time cut one-percent of their budget. (We all have flab, regardless of circumstances.) Though I, in general, (vehemently) oppose across-the-board cuts, I have absolutely no problem with the 1% idea. He then broke the group up by function; about five functions were represented, as I recall. He gave the groups just 30 minutes to identify their team's 1%. Then he had the groups report in public for 2 or 3 minutes each—this public recitation, he told me, raised the odds of execution; it also provided others' ideas.

Indeed the groups readily identified their 1% and reported accordingly—there was actually no bitching.

I called and asked him a couple of months later how things had turned out. (He was a regular advisor to the company, and a coach, though the term really didn't exist in business yet, to the CEO. He said there was almost uniform success—and a couple of groups had decided to repeat the exercise on their own every few months. Given his closeness to the CEO, and my more general judgment, I'd guess he gave me an accurate report.

Times are tough as we all know. I want to urgently suggest that, despite recent cost cutting you've probably done, you try this exercise. (For consultants of any flavor that goes double—especially good to provide almost guaranteed value in excess of your fees.)

The Heart of Business Strategy:
48 Things That Matter

We usually think of business strategy as some sort of aspirational market positioning statement. Doubtless that's part of it. But I believe that the number one "strategic strength" is excellence in execution and systemic relationships (i.e., with everyone we come in contact with). Hence I offer the following 48 pieces of advice for creating a winning strategy that is inherently sustainable:

• "Thank you." Minimum several times a day. Measure it.
• "Thank you" to everyone even peripherally involved in some activity—especially those "deep in the hierarchy."
• Smile. Work on it.
• Apologize. Even if "they" are "mostly" to blame.
• Jump all over those who play the "blame game."
• Hire enthusiasm.
• Low enthusiasm. No hire. Any job.
• Hire optimists. Everywhere. ("Positive outlook on life," not mindless optimism.)
• Hiring: Would you like to go to lunch with him-her. 100% of jobs.
• Hire for good manners.
• Do not reject "trouble makers"—that is those who are uncomfortable with the status quo.
• Expose all would-be hires to something unexpected-weird. Observe their reaction.
• Overwhelm response to even the smallest screw-ups.
• Become a student of all you will meet with. Big time.
• Hang out with interesting new people. Measure it.
• Lunch with folks in other functions. Measure it.
• Listen. Hear. Become a serious student of listening-hearing.
• Work on everyone's listening skills. Practice.
• Become a student of information extraction-interviewing.
• Become a student of presentation giving. Formal. Short and spontaneous.
• Incredible care in 1st line supervisor selection.
• World's best training for 1st line supervisors.
• Construct small leadership opportunities for junior people within days of starting on the job.
• Insane care in all promotion decisions.
• Promote "people people" for all managerial jobs. Finance-logistics-R&D as much as, say, sales.
• Hire-promote for demonstrated curiosity. Check their past commitment to continuous learning.
• Small "d" diversity. Rich mixes for any and all teams.
• Hire women. Roughly 50% women on exec team.
• Exec team "looks like" customer population, actual and desired.
• Focus on creating products for and selling to women.
• Focus on creating products for and selling to boomers-geezers.
• Work on first and last impressions.
• Walls display tomorrow's aspirations, not yesterday's accomplishments.
• Simplify systems. Constantly.
• Insist that almost all material be covered by a 1-page summary. Absolutely no longer.
• Practice decency.
• Add "We are thoughtful in all we do" to corporate values list. Number 1 force for customer loyalty, employee satisfaction.
• Make some form of employee growth (for all) a formal part of values set. Above customer satisfaction. Steal from RE/MAX: "We are a life success company."
• Flowers.
• Celebrate "small wins." Often. Perhaps a "small win of the day."
• Manage your calendar religiously: Does it accurately reflect your espoused priorities?
• Use a "calendar friend" who's not very friendly to help you with this.
• Review your calendar: Work assiduously on your "To don'ts"—stuff that distracts.
• Bosses, especially near the top: Formally cultivate one advisor whose role is to tell you the truth. Regularly!
• Commit to Excellence.
• Talk up Excellence.
• Put "Excellence in all we do" in the values set.
• Measure everyone on demonstrated commitment to Excellence.

You'll find a longer version of this as a PDF—it includes two Appendices.

(Above, windblown trees near Farewell Spit, NZ.)

2009 Recalibration: Part 2

The best source of success is already with you

Ask yourself this question: How can our current customers help us unleash the latent profit in our business?

I believe this with great conviction: Almost without exception, the most lucrative source of latent profit for most companies is in their existing customer relationships.

Let's put this in the context of the tough situation the economy has put all of us in. Your customers have less money to spend, and your competitors, in their desperation, are doing everything they can to steal your business.

Now, ask yourself this question: How many of our customers are giving us all of the business they could?

If you are like most people, your answer to that question is somewhere between none and 20%. Yes, some of you may say that 50% of more of your customers are giving you all the business they could, but you'd be in the minority. Here's the bottom line; we all have significant untapped potential in our existing customer relationships.

I saw an example of this potential just this morning, while I was conducting a phone consultation with a team from a mid-size, business-to-business service company. Right at the beginning of the conversation they told me that the most important issue they face is the challenge of finding new customers in this tough economy. I asked them what percent of their existing customers are giving them all the business that is reasonably possible. Their answer: Fewer than 20% of their client relationships are fully developed. Sure, new customers would be great. But their quickest route to building their business comes from building on the relationships they already have.

We spent the next half-hour talking about their existing customer relationships, and which ones had the most potential to develop additional new business. It became clear to all of us very quickly that the biggest danger they faced was to get distracted by efforts to acquire new customers and shortchange the opportunity right in front of their face: developing existing relationships. They are now well on their way to creating and implementing a plan to mine business from current customers.

So, the first, most important thing you must do to thrive in 2009 is not to cut costs, fire people, or, heaven forbid, bury your head in the sand and wait for the recession to be over. The first, most important thing you have to do is nurture and develop your existing customer relationships.

Yes, you need new customers. But this isn't a question of "either/or," it's a case of "both/and," with existing customer relationships being the thing to attend to first, foremost, and disproportionately.

[This is part 2 of a 6 part series. Click here to read part 1. For more on the idea in today's post, you can listen to Steve Yastrow's 2009 Readiness Teleseminar, in which he presents Six Readiness Questions to help you thrive in 2009. Information related to this post starts at 17 minutes into the one-hour seminar.—CM]

As The World Turns
(Spins)

Gave a speech (no slides) for Westpac yesterday in Auckland. The Aussie-based bank was #100 in market cap in the world a few months ago. Now it's the world's #8.

FYI: Westpac is the same bank it was a few months ago—no acquisitions or other forms of expansion. Westpac didn't grow; the others have shrunk or evaporated.

2009 Recalibration: Part 1

Your business is bursting with profits

Ask yourself this question: Where is the latent profit in our business?

No business, in the history of the world, has created all of the profit it could possibly produce—including yours. There is always money left on the table.

That is especially true in tough times like this. Our world has changed, profoundly and quickly, and we have yet to adjust to our new reality. Many of us are so shell-shocked at what's been taken from us that we have yet to acknowledge what is left for us to take.

Your business is filled with unrealized opportunities. It is bursting with latent profit, just waiting to be unleashed. The real question is whether you will identify those opportunities and grab them. I am 100% convinced that the state of your business on January 1, 2010, has less to do with the Dow Jones Average, the unemployment rate, or the price of gas than it does with how YOU act in the meantime. (And it is in your best interest to believe this, also.)

As a first step, you want to identify the best sources of latent profit for you in this economic climate. To do this, start out by dreaming. Get in a quiet, undistracted place, and imagine it is one year from today. As you dream, imagine that 2009 was the best, most profitable year you have ever had. (Yes, this is a good dream.) Open your mind, and imagine what happened in your business to make 2009 so successful. If you open your mind, and let yourself think positively, you'll be surprised at the ideas that flow to the surface.

I did this exercise with a client a few weeks ago. Despite the economic situation, the CEO sensed that significant opportunity was lurking below the surface. I asked the CEO and his key senior leaders to imagine the company had an incredible 2009 and 2010, and to describe the company to me on January 1, 2011. Although the company produced $15 million in revenue in 2008, it didn’t take this team long to identify a very credible, achievable $30 million business in two years.

Where did we find this opportunity?

• The first place the business's leaders identified was in their existing customer relationships, where a very large percentage of customers were only buying a fraction of what was possible. The executives admitted that they hadn’t spent nearly enough time developing these existing customer relationships.
• They recognized a large number of retail outlets that could carry their products, but which they had not pursued.
• They had recently experimented with some new product combinations, presented as comprehensive solutions, which were showing initial success with a small number of customers. They didn’t have a sales plan to take these ideas to other customers, but realized that there was great potential if they did so.
• They had recently made a big sale to an entirely new kind of customer, that they had never served before. This first sale now gave them credibility and a track record with other companies in that category.

Was it hard for the company to identify these opportunities? No. Had they articulated them clearly before our conversation. No. This idea of "bringing the future forward," by imagining that it is now one year from today, opens your mind to seeing the possibilities in your business. Like my client, your company is likely sitting on a mountain of opportunity, despite the economic situation.

All of us are sitting on mountains of opportunity. But this result really isn't all that surprising. You have left many opportunities unrealized for years. It's only natural; after all, we can't chase everything that it's possible to chase. Life in business is all about making choices about what we do, and what we don't do. Many of the things you chose not to do in the past may be ripe to be done in the present.

As I've been going through this simple exercise with my clients, and with my own business, it's been invigorating to see the ideas that we bring to the surface. I trust you will have the same experience and will find this to be a positive step toward your success during this economic meltdown.

[This is the first in a six-part series by Steve Yastrow, which parallels six ideas he presented in his 2009 Readiness Teleseminar, in which he addresses Six Readiness Questions to help you thrive in 2009. If you fast-forward to 11 minutes into the one-hour seminar, you can hear more about the subject of this blog post.—CM]

Acccccccelerated Learning:
The [Remarkable] Power of Screwing Up

I had a chance to preview Dan Coyle's forthcoming The Talent Code: Unlocking the Secret of Skill in Sports, Art, Music, Math, and Just About Anything. In short, I thought the book was a marvel—explaining pockets of amazing talent, such as Brazil and football-soccer, and, based in part on new findings in neuroscience, turning conventional ideas about teaching and learning on their head. I'll have more to say when The Talent Code appears, and Dan, I hope, will consent to becoming a Cool Friend. In a rather trivial (however, not to me at the time) way I had a chance to practice parts of what Dan discovered—and was stunned at the efficacy of his findings in this small case.

To wit:

Susan and I arrived in New Zealand about 10 days ago. Although we've been here several times before, I've found that it invariably takes almost a week, or possibly longer, to more or less adequately adjust to left-side driving. With a little bit of luck and Dan Coyle, I slashed the adjustment time this trip by perhaps a stunning 75 percent, maybe even 90 percent.

My typical approach is to head for as large a highway as possible and practice, in a low-pressure context, the fundamentals of driving on the "wrong" side; I delay tough situations as long as I can and go to great lengths to do so. This time, due to a badly botched interpretation of directions leaving the airport, I started out in intense traffic in a constrained space that included several rotaries; this amounted to a half hour in hell. In retrospect I call it the "Brazil breakthrough." (Though I was in New Zealand—the Brazilians have a small-scale version of football-soccer that requires learning numerous clever-intricate moves in the smallest of spaces; it is one of the keys to their national success in the sport.) That is, I did a ton of sophisticated practice at slow speed (traffic) in a very short time, "for real," on a very small "field." Call it a hundred maneuvers at "learning speed" in thirty minutes with about two kilometers of accumulated mileage.

That was lucky—and powerful. But I took full advantage of my luck by applying three of Dan Coyle's rules-findings that I have used before, more or less, but now used with mindfulness and a vengeance. First, I talked constantly-continuously-nonstop-out loud-loudly to myself about every twitch of what I was doing-experiencing. Second, I did so with special fervor and completeness when I made mistakes. And third, in the case of mistakes, I tried to repeat the screwed-up maneuver, within the bounds of safety, immediately. The monologue went something like this, as I said non-stop and loud: "You complete jackass, look left first." "Oh that was great, bonehead, you just cut the guy off." "Look left-left-left, idiot." "Try it again, here we go 'round—okay, go around again and see if you can do it better. Okay, dude, better." "Having fun driving in the left gutter, turkey—okay, let's risk it a little and watch ourselves in the rearview mirror. That's it, better, better, whoops, better, better." And so on. And on.

The four high-leverage tactics—small field "game" with complex maneuvers, constant self-talk, self-discussion re mistakes, followed by more quick tries*—resulted in a miracle of sorts, and in a "life or death" "game" at that.

By the time you read this I may have been in a head-on accident and be dead—overconfidence is a constant and deadly threat. But if I'm still around, I will have had a fascinating experience, and a powerful one. And one with extraordinary implications.

Cheers from Golden Bay, South Island, NZ.

Think left!

(*If there is a single key to Coyle's findings, it's "mistakes-based learning"—literally generating as many mistakes as possible as quickly as possible.)

Downturn or Tighten Up?

The news on layoffs for January was as bleak as the previous months'. One could wonder when these job cuts are going to subside. But according to the Wharton School, it may not just be the economic downturn that is forcing the layoffs. They could be revealing the fact that the company was already in trouble. As the Wharton report indicates, "But the caveat is that layoffs are a proxy for the fact that companies which decide to do them are already in trouble. It is hard to sort the effect of the layoffs, per se, from the proxy effect."

We know that the automobile industry has been limping along for years. But some of the other companies in the news may have managed to shield from themselves, from their workers, and from the public that they were not strong operationally. Too often, companies become complacent and do not spend the time to do a little self-reflection and analysis of their systems, processes, and procedures. Many companies are running on antiquated thinking, systems, and practices. Tom has talked about Re-imagining organizations, and I think that now is the time for even the best companies to take a look at what's under the hood. Is the vision still on target, are the processes and systems designed to enhance customer experiences, are the talent performance systems attracting and retaining the right people? What do you think? How does your company assess itself? We go to the doctor for regular check-ups so that we can stay healthy and identify small problems before they become large problems. In business, there is no time to assess; everyone keeps running until they are winded and the next thing we know, there is a major collapse. I am sure that before a physical collapse or a business collapse there were some warning signs along the way, if someone had only looked.

The Business Case for Giving Away Your Best Work for FREE!

If you want to create something very good, it takes time, energy, and sometimes money. There might also be an opportunity cost (you could be doing something else rather than creating this) associated with that creation.

Should you give away that creation for FREE?

I'd say ... "Yes."

Here is a business case for doing just that:

10. Get feedback: The best can even get better.

Yes, I said give away your best work for FREE. Remember that even the "best" has room for improvement. When you give your best work for free, smart people will get to see your work. They may comment on your work, enhance your work, and maybe even, challenge your work. Your best work will get better when you get input from smart people.

9. Extend reach: Spread your ideas fast AND at a low cost.

There is an information overload out there. If you put out mediocre work, it will simply add to that overload. But, if you give out your best work, chances are that it gets noticed and it spreads fast. People like to talk about about "good" (and "bad") stuff. If you think about it, there is nothing to say about "mediocre" work—it's there everywhere.

Most people spread the "good" stuff automatically (even if you don't request that they spread this information.)

Giving away good stuff for FREE may be the fastest way to reach a lot of people.

8. Enhance your Personal Brand.

Give the best out to the world and you will create a positive assessment of yourself in the minds of people. That positive assessment will act as a stepping-stone towards building a powerful personal brand.

7. Amplify your Organization's Brand.

You will not only amplify your personal brand, you will also automatically amplify your organization's brand on the way. When people see something really good, they not only want to know who is providing it, but also what is the organization the provider is associated (or affiliated) with. You will do your organization a favor by giving away the good stuff for FREE.

6. Build Relationships Across the Globe.

You will have a hard time building relationships with people who are smart and share your interests across the world unless those smart people know that you "exist" and you have something "good" to offer.

Giving away something "good" is a quick way to increase your visibility. Do this consistently and a sub-set of these smart people will reach out to you and start building relationships with you.

5. Increase the Signal-to-Noise Ratio.

There is already a lot of noise online. If anything, that noise is going to increase in the next few years. While there are no simple techniques to avoid this noise, you can attack the problem by pushing a lot of "good" content out for FREE. An increase in the signal-to-noise ratio on the Web will boost productivity of hundreds of thousands of people around the world.

4. Gain Mindshare.

There is so much noise out there on the Web. When you consistently produce good stuff and give it away (be it via your blog, podcasts, eBooks, books, columns, or any other means that you choose to use) people mentally bookmark you as a "good source" to keep coming back to. In other words, you earn your mindshare in the marketplace by giving away "good" stuff for FREE.

3. Make Your Next Project Even Better.

The feedback you receive for this work will also serve as a forward feedback for your next unpublished work. You will now be "listening" to the marketplace, and what you learn in the context of one project will have some bearing on how you approach your next project. It's really a 2-for-1 deal.

2. Lower the Cost of Sale.

Whatever you create—even when it is the best—won't be applicable for a specific situation for an individual or an organization. Ideas are plentiful, but it's all in the execution. So, when smart people and smart companies decide to implement your ideas, at least some of them will reach out to you or your organization for specific help. Giving away free (and good) stuff, you would have lowered the cost for that sale.

1. Increase your premium for those that are not FREE.

Not only will you lower the cost of sale, you will also increase the premium for whatever else you are offering for a fee. Buyers would have seen samples of your work via the "good" stuff you have offered for FREE. They don't have to guess the quality of your work anymore—so they will be more open to paying a premium for additional work.

With the above points in the background, here are my quick questions for you:
a. Have you produced something spectacular in the last sixty days?
b. Are you giving that away for FREE?
c. If yes, congratulations! If not, why not?

[You can learn more about Cool Friend Raj Setty at www.rajeshsetty.com or follow his blog at Life Beyond Code or on Twitter at Twitter.com/UpbeatNow.

How to Fire Right

Fortune Small Business recently interviewed Tom about layoffs, the current economic crisis, and the German Mittlestand. You can find the article here and the accompanying video here.

Idiots on the Loose

Former Bank of America CEO Hugh McColl criticizes current Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis for stupid acquisitions. Pfizer, unable to develop new drugs, will pay $68 billion for Wyeth. When will these idiots learn?

[Tom called to say that he wrote the above lines very early in the morning at Logan Airport.—CM]

Be Suspicious of Across the Board Cuts

Yes, I said that. Be suspicious of across the board cuts.

If your company declares, "We are cutting all salespeople's travel by 25 percent," or "Every department will cut staff by ten percent," lift your eyebrows superciliously, and say, "That's pretty stupid."

Making across the board cuts is like going to the bank and asking for five inches of money. A ten dollar bill and a one dollar bill take up the same amount of space, but their value is not equal. Your company does many things, and making across the board cuts ignores that each of these things has its own value.

Maybe some salespeople in your company should double their travel because they are great in person with customers, while others should stay in the office and talk to customers by phone. Maybe certain departments should cut 50 percent of their staff and others should add people.

Now is the time to think! Avoid the temptation to "be bold" and use the budget bulldozer to plow through tough times. Discernment will result in profitable action. Slash and burn will feel good for a few minutes, but in the end, it will cost you.

Don't confuse movement with progress! Do things, and do them quickly, but do the right things. Otherwise, you're really not doing anything.

A Mission Statement Must, Circa 2009

Gerson Barbosa posted a Comment yesterday that included the following: "The mission statement of Johns Hopkins includes 'cultivate their capacity for life-long learning, to foster independent and original research, and to bring the benefits of discovery to the world.'"

It got me thinking. In our rapidly gyrating world (see the two Posts immediately above), learning-for-life is no longer an option. This is true of you at 6 or 26 or 46, and of me at 66 and my great pal Warren Bennis in his 80s. Moreover, explicit focus on "life-long learning" for everyone on board may be the most sustainable advantage an organization of any flavor can have.

Hence, I strongly suggest that "A commitment by all of us to accelerated lifelong learning," or some such be made a formal part of your mission statement. It deserves to be right up there with the likes of superior quality and profitability.

Christmas 2008

So, a Christmas post is in order. I have been thinking about it for days, no kidding, and have had no success in the arenas of Big Ideas. Or little ideas. And I am ever so fearful-horrified of glibness at this particular moment.

Let's start with the fact that a lot of people who deserved better (or didn't, for that matter) are having truly crappy-rotten Christmases. And it pains me personally—one case at a time ad infinitum. Sure, the auto industry made its own mess by and large, but I honestly teared up yesterday listening to a little ("little"?) NPR story about a 15-year-old family-run restaurant-tavern directly across from the main gate to a GM plant that closed down indefinitely last night. Sure it's a "big world out there," and sure such things are always going on—but this one got to me as I went about my Christmas shopping, modest though it is this year. And then that led me to my frighteningly rare thoughts about the roughly two billions of my "global village" neighbors trying to make it on a buck-a-day ...

And then I stopped for papers—and picked up the New York Post (I have a longstanding penchant for tabloids), and said in an inappropriately loud voice that turned heads, "You f#%^ers." I had just seen the big photo on page one of Bernard Madoff's son Andrew and his wife, laden with conspicuously high-end shopping bags as they went about their holiday shopping in Manhattan. Just got to me. Should they not buy gifts? Or go to Wal*Mart? That's not the point (for me); the point is Total Incredible Inexcusable Nauseating Pathetic Insensitivity, of the sort we saw from the Big Three Beggars flying in their corporate jets to D.C. a few weeks ago. In my head the words "Have they no shame?" run around and around and around.

And then my hair shirt starts to itch. I've asked myself 100 times, or a hundred hundred times, "Tom, what could you have done differently?" While I cannot bear the entire burden of human greed run amok, I can find plenty of fault. I ceaselessly preach the basics and people first. Yet I did not in any way, shape, or form scream often enough or loud enough about the obvious wretchedly wretched excess of the last several years. Like Greenspan, I definitely believe that I took my Silicon Valley lessons a bit too seriously and drank the "self-regulating unfettered capitalism" Koolaid. I remain a capitalist (it works) but I shall go to my grave beating the crap out of myself for not having seen the obvious and for not having used my not inconsequential bully pulpit. (For God's sake, I routinely call health care professionals killers for not washing their hands; surely I could have shouted "Enough!" upon regular occasion regarding the growing absurdity of demonstrated greed and the lack of any semblance of accountability.)

So, we're in for it. And may be in for it for the foreseeable future. And the bottom may—or may not—be in sight. This is beyond any shadow of doubt the biggest financial crisis in 75 years. And despite my advanced age, even I have Zero Experience with anything like this. Hence, how does one give serious advice, or play expert with a straight face?

Then there's the glib stuff galore that is the current staple of the shameless self-help gurus. E.g., get up with a smile and get on with life! Or, remember it's your family and friends who are your anchors! Both things are true, but hackneyed to say the least.

So here is my effort, probably futile and surely inadequate, to be a little less hackneyed than I otherwise might:

***Feel the pain. Feel free to hurt and hurt badly for every single person laid off or fired, maybe even the Lehman gang. (I admit I can't personally go as far as Lehmanites, but I do feel that I should—they are, after all, more or less human beings.) There is a lot of hurt "out there" and it is inappropriate not to feel it; that's my view. It shouldn't paralyze you, but it should haunt you.

***Be of help. Feel the pain—and do something about it. Whether it's a $100 bill dropped in the Salvation Army bowl, or some hours serving in the soup kitchen, help out. Sure, it'll make you feel better, but that's not the point. There are a lot of people who need help. Period. So help. And keep helping. This is not a rich man's-woman's blog, but the average peruser of tp.com has a little room to spare—or more. Give until you are half poor—money and time.

***Kind words or no words. Go gentle in the world. Period. A little kindness goes a long way. Especially when the fans are all covered with crap. I said "action" a minute ago, but now I'm saying attitude. No, not some ginned up "positive mental attitude"—just human grace and thoughtfulness and gentleness and decency roughly 100% of the time.

***Say "Thank you" to anyone who goes even a quarter-step, eighth-step out of their way to be helpful or cheerful. Most everyone is under great pressure—and positive acknowledgement of their being is a true and enormous gift.

***In your professional lives, work on your thoughtfulness as if your life depended on it—it does in the sense of your Final Exam with St Peter. (Or whomever.) You may have to make tough decisions, but you can streeeeetch to ameliorate the pain and, per the above, exude decency 100.00000% of the time.

***Re-assess your needs. From an economic standpoint, we do, in fact, have to spend our way out of this bind—banks must offer credit for new car purchases, etc. On the other hand, many of us could use a hearty dose of newfound simplicity and thriftiness in our lives longterm. This is a matchless, if painful, time to reassess what it's all about.

***People have long memories. To be "P&L" focused, those to whom you extend kindnesses in tough times will likely reward you 10-fold in the long term. (Make that 100-fold.) "Thoughtfulness pays" is a fact of life in business or "the rest."

***Get outdoors. Exercise and good breathing habits are gifts from the Gods when it comes to longevity or equanimity or stress reduction. But do your exercise outside—"close to the soil" is not reserved for those of us who live on farms in the likes of Vermont. Up your daily exercise regimen to at least an hour—outdoors. Being in touch with the soil, including urban asphalt, is good for the soul and sanity and those around you.

***Basics #1. "It's always 'the people.'" It may be glib, but in this instance I don't care. Network, keep your promises, behave decently. You are as good as your relationships. Period. Short term. Long term. Good times. Tough times. This is the time (though all times are, in fact, the time) to "over"invest in relationship building and maintenance.

***Basics #2. Execution is king. I arrived at a retail shop at, literally, 4:57 p.m. three days ago. It closed at 5 p.m., and the doorcloser was poised by the door, hovering by the door, whatever. Open early, stay open late—even if the traffic is approximately zilch. For God's sake ......
(Why o why o why o why should I have to write this???)

***Basics #3. MBWA.* (*Managing By Wandering Around.) To be present is to care. To be absent is broadcasting contempt or disregard or shameful insensitivity.

***Basics #4. Keep growing. Learn new stuff. Have lunch with new people. Get better and better at what you do. Glib or not, we're either growing or contracting—and it's not your 401(k) I'm talking about. I'm off on a new sustainable architecture jag. I indulged in a mini-library of about 10 books—and I'm about to dig in.

***Basics #5. Be accountable. You must take absolute & unequivocal & total responsibility for the stuff you promise, real or implied—especially the accumulation of so-called "small stuff." (Five minutes late to a meeting is late, not "a little late.") The current mega-crisis is to a significant degree an accountability (lack thereof) crisis—sure, Mr Rubin, you had nothing to do with the Citigroup implosion; sure, Angelo-I-screwed-the-world-and-took-home-$100,000,000-for-my-efforts-as-a-walkaway-reward (Countrywide), you were jus' helpin' people buy homes.

***Basic #6. Become a better listener-hearer. Practice. Practice. Practice.

***"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."—Gandhi. (Talk about glib!!!!!!) "Make each day matter." (Talk about glib!!!!!) This is your life. You have neither yesterday. Nor tomorrow. Only today. (Talk about glib!!!!!!)

In summary, as I try to sort all this out:

Graceful.
Decent.
Kind.
Caring.
Attentive.
Thoughtful.
Accountable.
Helpful.
Close at 5:05 p.m.

Sorry, it's the best I can do.

Bullet Points

A new client (praise be) asked for 5 bullets about my forthcoming presentation to use for marketing purposes. As an overachiever since about age 5, thanks (?) Mom, I offered up 27. See below:

The "Top 27": Twenty-seven Practical Ideas That Will Transform Every Organization

1. Learn to thrive in unstable times—our lot (and our opportunity) for the foreseeable future.

2. Only putting people first wins in the long haul, good times and especially tough times. (No "cultural differences" on that one! Colombia = Germany = the USA.)

3. MBWA/Managing By Wandering Around. Stay in touch!

4. Call a customer today!

5. Train! Train! Train! (Growing people outperform stagnant people in terms of attitude and output—by a wide margin.)

6. "Putting people first" means making everyone successful at work (and at home).

7. Make "we care" a/the company motto—a moneymaker as well as a source of pride.

8. All around the world, women are an undervalued asset.

9. Diversity is a winning strategy, and not for reasons of social justice: The more different perspectives around the table, the better the thinking.

10. Take a person in another function to lunch; friendships, lots of, are the best antidote to bad cross-functional task accomplishments. (Lousy cross-functional communication stops companies and armies alike.)

11. Transparency in all we do.

12. Create an "Innovation Machine" (even in tough times). (Hint: Trying more stuff than the other guy is Tactic #1.)

13. We always underestimate the Innovation Advantage when 100% of people see themselves as "innovators." (Hint: They are if only you'd bother to ask "What can we do better?")

14. Get the darned Basics right—always Competitive Advantage #1. (Be relentless!)

15. Great Execution beats great strategy—99% of the time. (Make that 100% of the time.)

16. A "bias for action" is a "bias for success." (Great hockey player Wayne Gretzky: "You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.")

17. No mistakes, no progress! (A lot of fast mistakes, a lot of fast progress.) (Australian businessman Phil Daniels: "Reward excellent failures. Punish mediocre successes.")

18. Sometimes "little stuff" is more powerful than "big stuff" when it comes to change.

19. Keep it simple! (Making "it" "simple" is hard work! And pays off!)

20. Remember the "eternal truths" of leadership—constants over the centuries. (They say Nelson Mandela's greatest asset was a great smile—you couldn't say no to him, even his jailors couldn't.)

21. Walk the talk. ("You must be the change you wish to see in the world."—Gandhi)

22. When it comes to leadership, character and people skills beat technical skills. (Emotional Intelligence beats, or at least ties, school intelligence.)

23. It's always "the little things" when it comes to "people stuff." (Learn to say "thank you" with great regularity. Learn to apologize when you're wrong. Learn the Big Four words: "What do you think?" Learn to listen—it can be learned with lots and lots of practice.)

24. The "obvious" may be obvious, but "getting the obvious done" is harder said than done.

25. Time micro-management is the only real "control" variable we have. (You = Your calendar. Calendars never lie.)

26. All managers have a professional obligation to their communities and their country as well as to the company and profit and themselves. (Forgetting this got the Americans into deep trouble.)

27. EXCELLENCE. ALWAYS. (What else?)

[Of course, you can get a PPT version of the "Top 27" also.—CM]

Gill MA, Part Two

My latest trip from VT to MA, 173.6 miles, got me thinking of something else besides pit stops. I was running late, and noting my progress via odometer and various landmarks and highway markers. As my mood went up and down I realized (re-realized?) the power of manageable goals in every form of activity. Amassing 173+ miles, the entire task, is of course the Big Enchilada—but a horrifying and de-motivating thought at 4 a.m., which is often my departure time. The sort of thing that spurs me on is scoring the readily achievable 13-mile nugget from home to Dorset VT. (Hooray, I've made a noticeable start!!) Likewise, bagging the 12 miles from the aforementioned Gill MA to Erving MA is downright exhilarating (it means 50% done on the most traffic-y part of the road).

As I thought on this, I realized/re-realized a bunch of things:

***Milestones are all-important, no matter how trivial or repetitive the task.

***"Milestoning" is a real art for reasons psychological, as much as or more than for reasons of "substance."

***Truly trivial milestones are often meaningless even if they are "accomplishments" of a sort and milestones of a sort—scoring the five miles from the Dorset turn to the Stratton turn is no big deal amidst my journey to Logan.

***"Milestone power" is variable. E.g., at the beginning or near the end of a task the apparently trivial can be grand. "Well, I've done something"—that's what I feel at 4 a.m. when I make it to the immediate end of the farm road that starts at our house, thus putting behind me the first 0.7 miles, in numbing reality a scant 0.4% of the whole. (Milestone power is also variable in other dimensions. E.g., in the workday context, smallish milestones that are critical spurs to the team's doing the job—may look pretty darned puny to the boss; hence, widespread publication thereof may not be a great idea.)

***There is a definite sweetspot, "the perfect milestone." That 13 miles to Dorset, or 12 miles to Erving, is a winner—substantial enough to matter, merit a pumped fist at 4 a.m., and constitute "progress of note."

***There is a pretty fine line between "trivial" on the one end and "daunting" on the other. (A 30-mile stretch, if thought of that way, is downright discouraging: "Dear God, these 27 miles of Route 2 are frigging endless.")

VT winter approaches, and at times I'll be forced to do my powerwalking on my treadmill. I hate hate hate exercising indoors! But to the point of this post, I spent a pretty penny on a new treadmill a while back. Why? Mostly because the distance accumulator indicator has three decimal places instead of two. I crave constant measurable progress while on the damn machine, and nothing, but nothing, is "trivial." I feel like the wind is at my back as the odometer moves from 1.723 miles to 1.724. Forever, per the old machine, was struggling from 1.72 to 1.73. Ah, milestone Power!

You are welcome to dismiss the triviality of my examples here—but I do urge you to pay the closest attention to the Art of Milestoneing. It's actually of the utmost importance if, like me, you believe in the Ultimate and Abiding Power of what I call "XX," or "Double X"—the relentless pursuit of Excellence in Execution.

Tangled

When I was a very young manager at United Parcel Service, there were two books I kept close at hand. The first was a slim, brown policy manual. It was full of plain-speaking guidance on the values of UPS. The second was a thick three-ring binder called the standard practices manual. The industrial engineering function produced this straightforward guide that laid out step by step approaches to operations and general management practices and challenges. The procedures outlined in the manual were guided by a simple idea; the shortest path between any two points is a straight line. When coupled with the compelling mandate that failure was never an option, the manual held the solution to almost every problem. It served me well.

I am no longer very young, and I have come to appreciate that the world of enterprise is no longer linear. Straight lines have been replaced by an intricate web of networks where an action anywhere in the system affects other critical areas of the enterprise. The current economic crisis has many leaders and managers focusing on immediate needs. There is a feeling that we must solve looming financial problems, now! This often means looking for the shortest path to efficiencies. Achieving lean operations seems to be guiding much of the managerial activities among my clients. There will be an immediate improvement in metrics by this approach; numbers will look better. Please, be careful. Consider the impact on other areas of the business. Consider the impact on the business three to five years from now. That straight line might be the shortest distance, but it might take you quickly to a place you do not want to go.

Two areas to watch come to mind. Talent and brand. When I work at the operative level of organizations I find good people stretched to the point of near burnout trying to produce results with shrinking resources. This, in too many cases, has led these folks to hunker down and try to just get through the day. The passion for excellence is being replaced by a sometimes desperate need to merely survive. Hardly the environment that breeds the risk-taking needed for innovation. Leaders, if you really believe that talent is your most important asset, let them play on a field where they have a chance of winning.

Cost-cutting is also affecting brand equity. Well-intentioned people are working hard to cut the cost of products and services in response to a perception that we have to lower prices to compete. Any isolated cost improvement probably does little harm to the brand. If no one is watching the cumulative impact of all the small cuts, however, product and service quality could suffer in a way that does irreparable harm to the brand. The future effect on brand and the possible resulting loss of sales and revenue must be considered.

What's the answer to this conundrum? How to contain costs without overburdening talent and damaging the brand? I wish I knew. What I do know is that the solution is not linear. We won't find it in a standard practices manual. The world has changed. Leaders need to up their game and consider solutions that are as all-encompassing as the complexity of the current challenge. Sure, execute swiftly and efficiently, but only after a patient and thoughtful analysis of the plans. The good feeling of today's improvement of metrics could lead to a future distaste of failure three to five years out.

The Black Swan 44: Tactical Rules for Survival (and Success) in Looney times

[Herewith, the list referenced in Friday's Post—it is also attached as an MSWord file and as a PDF.]

"I [will] not accept the explanation of a recession negatively affecting the [new] business. There are still people traveling. We just have to get them to stay in our hotel."—Horst Schulze, former president of Ritz-Carlton, on his new luxury hotel chain, Capella, from Prestige (06.08)

There's really only one story these days, collapse of the financial markets. We are a long way from knowing the outcome. For starters, if you are under about 50 years of age, you've never lived through, as a manager, a truly deep and lasting recession—the last one was in the early '80s. Some of us will combust, some (most) will more or less muddle through—and a few will see opportunity and jump on it.

I have prepared a decidedly un-profound set of "tactical rules" for weathering the storm—and maybe coming out ahead. Named after Nassim Nicholas Taleb's profoundly important book, The Black Swan (a highly improbable nasty event), this list is presented below, in shorthand:

1. K.I.S.S.
2. Hammer on the basics.
3. Focus on us, not the competition.
4. Puzzle-solving: How to turn this into an opportunity.
5. MBWA/X.
6. MBWA/I.
7. MBWA/Vendors.
8. Waaaaay over-communicate!!!!!! (With everyone—start with your banker.)
9. All work is team work.
10. Transparency.
11. Work the phones.
12. Perception of fairness.
13. Share the pain.
14. Decency!!!!!!!
15. Grace!!
16. "Thank you."
17. Control your impatience—no temper tantrums.
18. Constant attitude checks—you.
19. Dress for success.
20. Avoid burnout/you, the team, the entire organization.
21. Re-emphasize the company values-philosophy. (Now, more than ever.)
22. Quality!!!!!! (Now, more than ever.)
23. No corner cutting. (Now, more than ever.)
24. Constant reviews/War room.
25. Celebration of small wins.
26. People First/HR is King.
27. Help people with personal financial management.
28. Be generous to those who are let go—e.g., healthcare benefits.
29. Don't over-analyze.
30. Don't under-analyze.
31. Cuts all at once—if possible.
32. Cuts explained in great detail.
33. Quantitative calendar management—focus on "to don'ts."
34. Increase customer-service training.
35. In general, minimize training cuts.
36. Be(very)ware R&D cuts; R&D quick pay SWAT teams.
37. Beware such things as sales travel cuts, ad cuts.
38. "Across the board" = Dumb.
39. Is this a time to over-invest if cash is at hand? (E.g., distressed innovative start-ups?)
40. Stealth work on the likes of XF communication.
41. This could last a long time—LT prep is necessary now.
42. Prepare/Be prepared for more Black Swans.
43. Excellence. (Now, more than ever.)
(44. Remember all this in peacetime—Chuck Knight's legacy.)

[Please re-read Success Tip #139: Work the Damn Phones! Treble Your MBWA! (Managing by Wandering Around.)]

2) The Basics Are the Basics Are the Basics Are the Basics:
The Worse the Times the Better They Work;
Or, Listen to Grandfather Snow

The "engine" of the current economic mess is losing total touch with the basics. That is: lending money to people, by the millions in the end, who "obviously" couldn't pay it back. In many ways, that is the whole story—at the bottom of the bottom of the bottom of the pile of derivatives of derivatives of derivatives are truly stupid real-estate loans that "any fool" would say should never have been made.

We get in trouble when we forget the basics.
We get out of trouble when we remember the basics.
We stay out of trouble when we become perpetually "insane" about the basics.
(It ain't quite that simple, but it'll do for starters.)

When "times are tough," the payoff, survival that is, comes from what?

Survival—even growth!—in bad times comes from having wildly "over"-invested in relationships and training and service and employee-customer-vendor loyalty, while behaving in a fiscally prudent manner, in good times.

Well, "Duh."

I'm allowed out in public in 2008, in effect, because I wrote a book with Bob Waterman in 1982 (called In Search of Excellence) that said that Americans were in deeeeeeep trouble—vis-à-vis Japan at the time—because we failed to put people & service & listening to customers & making products that worked & doing-instead-of-talking & staying intimately in touch with "real stuff" at the top of our business agendas. We had placed too much emphasis on "sophisticated," abstract, "MBA thinking" and not enough emphasis on the things that led over a thousand people to show up for my Grandfather Owen Snow's funeral in little Wicomico Church VA over a quarter-century ago.

Grandfather Owen had run a country store—he'd been counselor, banker, and friend of customers and community, as well as shopkeeper, to thousands over the years. He was a math whiz (he passed a bit of it on to me, and thanks), but those thousands showed up at his funeral because he never forgot the basics of taking the time to listen and care and invariably put people first!

The great news for Fall 2008: The worst of the worst can be managed, within limits at least, if we remember and assiduously apply my grandfather's Business Basics 101.

Does that sound simplistic?
Perhaps.
But remember: We're deep in the deep doggy doo-doo because of "nothing more than" lending money to people who obviously (!!!) couldn't pay it back.

********

The CEO of a very successful mid-sized bank, in the Mid-west, attended a seminar of mine in Northern California many years ago—but I remember the following as if it were yesterday. I've forgotten the specific context, but I recall him saying to me, pretty much word for word, "Tom, let me tell you the definition of a good lending officer. After church on Sunday, on the way home with his family, he takes a little detour to drive by the factory he just lent money to. Doesn't go in or any such thing, just drives by and takes a look."

(1) Amen.
(2) Damn few drive-bys at WaMu or Countrywide, I suspect.

On the Attack!

At an Inc. magazine forum last week, I found myself on the attack. The target? Me. I was engaging in a moderated dialogue with Seth Godin—not only do I have the utmost respect for him, but we are in agreement a frightening percentage of the time. It seems at times that we use the same adjectives and adverbs to make the same points. Hence, the surprise at some areas of disagreement.

As you know from my last post, I'm preoccupied with the financial markets chaos—which I see as anything but tamed, though I strongly support recent decisions to boldly interfere in the untrammeled market mechanism. One of the questions, following my public encomium (also in the last post) for Msssrs Paulson, Bernanke, and Geithner, was about the need for authoritarian-significantly centralized leadership at times. I am a rabid (pretty much the right word) decentralist, but I gave a firm and immediate "Yes" to the question.

Seth attacked, reminding me of my roots and arguing that authoritarianism is a slippery slope. And there is always an excuse for it.

I agree about both the slippery slope and the ubiquity of excuses for longer policy manuals, particularly following screw-ups, and more and more centralization of decision making—ad infinitum.

My counter argument has mostly to do with speed. That is, there are times, rare occasions, such as the end of last week, when hours make-made all the difference. There was no time to waste and no time to consult. This is pretty much the case following any major disaster.

There are a bushel of caveats. The situation must be dire—and seen as dire by a majority of the organization's members. Speedy action must be widely seen as imperative, and the absence of speedy action must be deemed catastrophic. The authoritarians must be greatly respected and skilled. (In a more or less perfect world, as is the case now with Paulson, the authoritarians must be seen as pained by the need to take the controls and make the decisions they feel they are forced to take.) The centralized commanders must soon turn to a consultative mode. (Paulson et al. are now fully engaged with Congress—such engagement began in a matter of hours.) The troops engaged in implementation must indeed be engaged and ready to take autonomous action and initiative within the confines of the decisions made by the top dogs. And a formal system must be in place to implement a pre-arranged sunset for authoritarian action.

With all the checks and balances in place, there will be occasions where, indeed, the authoritarianism extends and extends—think of military coups in the likes of Pakistan and Thailand in fairly recent times, or emergency centralized controls at many a corporation.

I will, then, stand by my principles concerning decentralization, argue for rare exceptions, and worry that the centralists' mandate will be self-extended in more than a few cases, human nature being what it often sadly is. I will also argue, more oceanically, that human governance of any sort is a necessary but messy affair.

My next assault on myself will be covered in a subsequent post. Meanwhile, I would beg you to weigh in on the case of Tom v. Tom (and Tom v. Seth) concerning centralized leadership.

NB: Jim Collins was also at the Inc. event. Some of you see the two of us at each others' throats—or, at least, me at his throat. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. I was genuinely delighted to see him—it made my day. My respect for him is limitless, and goes back about 30 years. And while I do have some disagreements with him, the fact of the matter is that, like Seth and I do, Jim and I agree, in my opinion, on 99% of what's important about human affairs—and I unequivocally think that his work has done the world a world of good. And I like him as much as I admire him. (No one I know has more integrity. Period.)

The Art of Reframing

Ah, context is everything. This hits home to me every time I hear the Céline Dion song, "Because You Loved Me."

My initial reaction to the tune, when I first heard it a dozen years ago, went something like, "Ok, nice vocal performance and musical arrangement. But ENOUGH of these slavishly dependent love lyrics where someone's very existence is contingent on a lover's attention. 'I'm everything I am because you loved me.' Really! Is that a message you want to be sending out to a hundred million listeners, especially other women? How about believing in yourself no matter what he thinks?"

But a few years later I came across an interview with the writer of the song, Diane Warren, who explained that she wrote "Because You Loved Me" to thank her father for his unshakable belief in her—and especially his relentless support of her artistic aspirations. Wham! The song was instantly transformed before my very ears! A mawkish ballad became a paean to a father's love. Instead of being annoyed, I was immediately inspired and even choked up by it. (After all, what parent would not die to hear that sentiment from a daughter?) The song itself didn't change, but seen in a new light, the song could have a dramatically different effect.

This, of course, has applications to work life where we can feel slapped around by events daily that have unpleasant meanings for us. But an event itself doesn't determine its meaning, we do. What matters is our interpretation of an event. And with a little thought and creativity we can find different interpretations to most things that happen to us. Such is the art of "reframing"—viewing an event through a new and deliberately chosen frame. We probably all do it at times—for instance, when we decide to view a misfortune (perhaps a career setback or a job loss) as a constructive opportunity (perhaps an occasion to take a new direction in our work or learn a new set of skills). The choice is up to us in how to interpret these events. And from our interpretation comes our response.

So it is that a pop tune on the radio can be heard as either a sappy report on helpless infatuation or as a timeless acknowledgment of a daughter's enduring love for her father.

Fold 'em in Hell!

Fold 'em?

Consider this AOL report from Beijing: "[Angelo] Taylor, a once-troubled 29-year-old who was laying electrical wire 14 months ago, became the first 400-meter hurdler since Edwin Moses to win gold medals eight years apart Monday. He led the first sweep of the event since the U.S. did it in 1960."

(And for every Angelo Taylor there are hundreds who we never hear of, many of whom should have long before age 29 gotten a life beyond running. Yadda, yadda, yadda.)

World's Worst Advice!

An old friend visited for a couple of days last week. Google him, and you'll be impressed. Or you would be, if I'd tell you who it is.

In the course of a dozen conversations—old guy conversations—we shared stories of joys and sorrows, anger and pain, good fortune and ill winds, pals and foes and traitors and through-it-all supporters.

His Hall-of-Fame career includes bushels of excoriating criticisms along the way. Embarrassing and well-deserved failures. Off years—in fact, off decades.

And musing on it all reminded me of a Very Sensible Saying that I think is pure, unmitigated crap, in fact the World's Worst Advice: "Know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em."

As I said ... pure crap.

Forget "fold 'em."
Drop it from your vocabulary.
Excise it.
Bury it.
Stomp on its grave.

If you care, really care, really really care about what you are pursuing, well, then, pursue-the-hell-out-of-it-until-hell-freezes-over-and-then-some-and-then-some-more. And may the naysayers roast in hell or freeze in the Antarctic or bore themselves to death with the sound of their "statistically accurate" advice.

It's a good fortnight to bring this up. I'll bet the farm, my farm, or at least an acre thereof, that less than 1% of the 10,000 athletes in Beijing moved smoothly through their careers. I'll bet virtually all had coaches who advised 'em to hang it up, "career-ending" injuries, humiliations heaped upon humiliations, and so on. And on.

And yet they persisted.
And they're in Beijing.

My anonymous visiting friend gave me The Pixar Touch: The Making of a Company, by David Price. Consider this paragraph:

"One of the curious aspects of Pixar's story is that each of the leaders was, by conventional standards, a failure at the time he came onto the scene. [Animator-superstar John] Lasseter landed his dream job at Disney out of college—and had just been fired from it. [Tech genius and founding CEO Ed] Catmull had done well-respected work as a graduate student in computer graphics, but had been turned down for a teaching position and ended up in what he felt was a dead-end software development job. Alvy Ray Smith, the company's co-founder, had checked out of academia, got work at Xerox's famous Palo Alto Research Center, and then abruptly found himself on the street. [Steve] Jobs had endured humiliation and pain as he was rejected by Apple Computer; overnight he had transformed from boy wonder of Silicon Valley to a roundly ridiculed has been. ..."

That is, shit happens. And if enough of it happens to you, then, if you are wise, you'll fold 'em. And God (and I) will love you just as much as if you'd endured—but we won't read about you in the history books.

Now if you do indeed "endure"—well, we probably won't read about you either, because the odds indeed are long against you making it to that history book or Beijing. I readily admit that.

But if you really really really care ...

About computer animation. Or rowing. Or the shotput. Or those supercalifragilisticexpialidocious chocolate-chip cookies you bake. (Alas, Mrs. Fields announced a bankruptcy filing today.) Or haiku. Or better ways to provide a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious customer experience.

Or ...
Or ...

If you really really really really really care ... then there ain't no time to fold 'em until your last breath is drawn—and even that's too soon if you've bothered along the way to inflame others about your presumed Quixotic cause.

In the (doubtless not) immortal words of Tom Peters: "There's a time to hold 'em and a time to keep on holdin' 'em—if you really really really care."

Your responses are as always very very welcome!

Our "Flirtatious Old Man" in Paris

You well know my bias, especially of late, that it's the nuts and bolts of relationship development and maintenance that make all the difference in outcomes of issues of tactical and strategic importance. Nothing has been of greater importance in American history than acquiring an ally in the Revolutionary War. That essential ally was France, and one can say in this rare instance that the efforts of Ben Franklin in Paris are almost single-handedly responsible for bringing the French on board. In its Independence Day issue, U.S. News & World Report reviewed Franklin's masterful performance, and a performance it was. The following is extracted from the article "In Paris, Taking the Salons by Storm: How the Canny Ben Franklin Talked the French into Forming a Crucial Alliance":

"In the same bitter winter of 1776 that Gen. George Washington led his beleaguered troops across the Delaware River to safety, Benjamin Franklin sailed across the Atlantic to Paris to engage in an equally crucial campaign, this one diplomatic. A lot depended on the bespectacled and decidedly unfashionable 70-year-old as he entered the world's fashion capitol sporting a simple brown suit and a fur cap. ... Franklin's miracle was that armed only with his canny personal charm and reputation as a scientist and philosopher, he was able to cajole a wary French government into lending the fledgling American nation an enormous fortune. ... The enduring image of Franklin in Paris tends to be that of a flirtatious old man, too busy visiting the city's fashionable salons to pursue affairs of state as rigorously as John Adams. When Adams joined Franklin in Paris in 1779, he was scandalized by the late hours and French lifestyle his colleague had adopted, says [Stacy Schiff, in A Great Improvisation]. Adams was clueless that it was through the dropped hints and seemingly offhand remarks at these salons that so much of French diplomacy was conducted. ... Like the Beatles arriving in America, Franklin aroused fervor—his face appeared on prints, teacups and even chamber pots. The extraordinary popularity served Franklin's diplomatic purposes splendidly. Not even King Louis XVI could ignore the enthusiasm that had won over both the nobility and the bourgeoisie. ..."

I guess this makes it less surprising that in the current issue of Time, in the cover story on Nelson Mandela's leadership "secrets," one was the great man's smile!

Grand Strategy may be of significant importance to an earthshaking success, but the likes of skill in the salon and a great smile often as not are the key ingredients of that "last 98%," persuasion and implementation.

Place Those Small Bets, Quickly!

Nothing goes so well with that first cup of coffee as having your biases confirmed!

In yesterday's Wall Street Journal ("In Search of Growth Leaders"), University of Virginia/Darden Graduate School of Business Prof Sean Carr, et al., lay out a growth model. There are, more or less, two flavors of companies:

The first sort, focused on avoiding downsides, treats customers "only as data," "manages risk through analysis," "places big bets, slowly," and frequently fails in new situations; alas, its rigidity and fearfulness increases through time in a vicious circle.

The second sort sees life as a "journey of learning." It treats customers "as people"—and constantly seeks new input through direct contact with those customers. The Type Two group "places small bets, quickly" and manages risk through hustle and an abiding bias for test-try-adjust-action. It is relatively more successful in novel situations—which in turn creates a virtuous circle through which a "growth mindset" becomes the raison d'être of the firm itself.

TP reaction: Amen.

My Kind of Acquisition

A couple of thoughts from my pile of tearouts during my just completed China trip. First:

I am considered to be an avowed enemy of acquisitions, and I can understand why. I do indeed decry the typical "Fat 'n Ugly + Fat 'n Ugly = Quick and slick" "logic" behind giant get-togethers of mediocrities for defensive purposes in industries in distress.

On the other hand, there is an acquisition type I applaud, and the Wall Street Journal recently (0703) featured just such a pairing. GE plans to take on Pratt & Whitney in the turboprop market. To spearhead the effort, GE has just completed the purchase of Walter Engines, an 85-year old firm from the Czech Republic—Walter, the WSJ reports, "earned a reputation ... for building rugged propeller engines used heavily in Eastern Europe and niche markets such as agriculture and cargo planes."

Bingo! Fill a need-hole by paying top dollar for a superb, well-regarded firm of modest size that complements your main business. Of course, achieving the desired result is not easy, as the melding of the desirable practices of a non-bureaucratic, independent, and proud firm into a Big Dog's corporate culture is very hard and delicate work—the failure rate is high. Still, the practice makes sense if you are willing to work patiently with such acquired companies.

The "Stuff" Is the Fluff, The Flower Is the Power

I see there's a lotta talk about Posts with flowers pics! Fact is, The Great Peony Post was just an innocent (I thought) riff about missing home, pretty flowers, and Mid-summer's.

But if you wanna fight ...

I stand foursquare ("fivesquare," if there were such squares) on ... The Side of the Flower.

Remember my Post a while back about "mapping your competitive position," in which I said, in effect, forget the intellectual mapping exercise—go visit a customer instead? Well, I feel the same way about Peonies.

Forget the "clever" rants on "mergers, yes or no" or some such weighty strategic matter, and get on with the business—The Real Business—of, say, recognizing someone who went the extra quarter step for a colleague, vendor, customer. Recognize him-her-them, I suggest-demand-command, with Flowers! Do it ... NOW!!!!

Invest in a new, well reviewed management book (or an old one, by me)? Or invest in Power Peonies to enhance or cement a relationship? Game, set, match, Center Court Wimbledon to those Relationship-building Peonies!

(Above, from our garden—Susan's garden!—for Midsummer's.)

All At Once!

I'm an avowed incrementalist—even if the aim is stratospherically high. That is, get going ASAP—and quickly experiment your way toward/to success.

But this spring-summer has been different at our house. We had a Grand Idea for a landscaping project that would change the look and feel of the Farm here in Tinmouth VT.

And we decided, more or less, to do it all at once.

There has been pain—from biting off more than one can readily chew—but the story to this point has the mark of a real success far beyond our initial imaginings.

The power of "getting going on everything at once" with but a sliver of a master plan (a couple of sketches) was that we could see (see, the real deal) from the outset what was sort of going to end up more or less happening—and then we could adjust like crazy, improvise constantly, destroy and create using the entire palette, and dramatically reshape the overall work, and even the overall concept, as we went along. Which, of course, means we didn't really reject my beloved Rapid Experimentation Method—we just did it on and amidst a grand platform called "everything is in motion and up for grabs."

To be more specific, we essentially started by blowing everything up—sticking in a roughed out new road that changed the entire dynamics (look, feel, flow) of the Farm. From there a dozen supporting projects began, or were also roughed out, at once. (In the space of a couple of weeks.) While we didn't look as devastated as our poor neighbors in Iowa do this morning, the place was a disheveled inchoate mess ("that only a mother could love") from stem to stern, north to south, and east to west.

And then the real "serious play" (book with this title by Michael Schrage is an inspiration) began. To stick to the Basic Texts of Life, we were following the master economic growth process labeled "spontaneous discovery" by Nobel Prize winner F.A. Hayek.

I'm not sure I'd do things, big things, this way in every instance, but I do think there are times when such an "all at once" approach is merited—when you have a Big Idea but need to be living "in the middle of it," with all ends loose ends, to figure out what it means. You might say that this is the approach, in his case on a monster scale, that HRH Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum has taken in Dubai over the last two decades.

Further confirmation of this idea—and how gutsy-nutsy it is!—has come from, coincidentally, reading Wendy Kopp's (One Day, All Children: The Unlikely Triumph of Teach For America and What I Learned Along the Way. I think Ms Kopp's story is one of the most amazing sagas—ever. From a Princeton dorm room, in 1988, she hatched a scheme that has arguably become the most profound educational and public service experiment-success in America in many a year or decade.

The point in the context of this Post is that then 20-ish Ms Kopp rejected from the start the advice from the Captains of Industry and other Great Ones who intended to support her—namely, she decided that even though she really didn't know what she was up to tactically, she would mount an enormous program launch to demonstrate to the world the power of her idea. Test it with a handful of young untutored teachers in an out of the way place—off off off off Broadway, if you will—was the advice she got again and again and again and without exception. But she was adamant that if she was going to attract great recent graduates to give up two years of their lives teaching in depressed areas she had to create a Wave of World-rattling Momentum on Day One.

Of course we now know she pulled it off ... Big Time. But the close calls and pratfalls occupy most of the 193-page book. Everything that could go wrong—and then some—did go wrong. Not just tiny miscues, but enormous boo-boos—again and again and again. Her tiny staff fumbled and bumbled their way to survival, then eventually success, holding on only to the Dream and Ms Kopp's staggering intensity and energy.

As I read the book I came to the conclusion that she had been right—that the only way to go in her case had been the Big Way from Day One. One needed the energy of youth and the spirit of youthful naiveté to bite off such an enormous, often contentious ("20 year old 'girl' tackles teachers unions in Manhattan, etc., etc.") notion.

(I also had the chance to think about "all this" on my recent trip to Korea. The Korean approach to many humongous opportunities is to eschew the master plan, or much of any plan—and just get the hell going, firing full bore on a thousand thousand cylinders at once. I witnessed one Act of their show a couple of decades ago, when they leapt, from ground zero, into electronics. From that cold start they built, à la Dubai, enormous production facilities—and learned on the fly how to make it all work and effectively compete with the best. Their individual and collective success, and the speed thereof, was mind-boggling in aim and accomplishment alike.)

Between my little project and Wendy Kopp's Richter 8.0 project, and Dubai and Korea, I am pondering the circumstances when "do it all at once and figure out what 'it' is and how to do it on the fly" is the right answer. There is no doubt that such conditions exist—though the key, beyond the compelling dream, is the raw talent and energy and enthusiasm and obsession and resilience of the participants. It is 99.99% (or more) a matter of raw emotion—not a matter of analytically identifying a big opportunity, assigning "good people," and then proceeding based on state-of-the-art project management software.

The Real Stunner!

I am not a golfer. But I am unabashedly mesmerized by Tiger Woods. (How the hell could anyone not be?) I was reading a David Brooks column (New York Times) on Mr Woods yesterday, and was reminded of what, to me, is the most astonishing part of the Woods story. Namely, that on two occasions Woods no less than "risked his career," per Brooks, re-tooling his (already amazing!!) swing—and then survived months and months of inconsistent performance to get into his new groove.

The principal reason, invariably, most "successful" giant companies rather quickly become also-rans, or just amorphous blobs on the competitive landscape, is their failure to re-tool in anything like a fundamental way. In fact, the worse things get, typically, the more they dig in their heels and defend yesterday's turf. Not Tiger Woods—with all the world's eyes on him all the time, he twice retreated and blew up the centerpiece of his game.

How do you get the nerve to do such a thing—or even admit that it needs to be done when you are sitting atop the personal or professional or corporate skyscraper? If you can answer that one, let me know!