Amidst a fabulous setting, the Million Dollar Consulting® Graduate School is
in its final day. Yesterday featured presentations by uber-literary agent
Jeff Herman and technology genius Chad Barr, followed by a loud dinner at
“Delicious.”
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Alan’s Monday Morning Memo’s mission is to help readers to thrive.
October 5, 2009—Issue #3
This week’s focus point: There are people who profit from a prolonged downturn, so their interest is in spreading only bad news and in perpetuating fear. There are others who profit from an upturn and who want to find places to add value as people are able to recover. Find, listen to, and associate with the latter group. There is no contribution in perpetuating and profiting from others’ misery. As George Merck noted, “Do good, and good will follow.”
Monday Morning Perspective: “ People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest. — Hermann Hesse
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© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved
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I presented this as food for thought at the Million Dollar Consulting College® Grad School. They are a dozen areas of very common focal points to improve organizations. The list was kindly compiled by Betsy Waits.
Alan’s 12 Consulting Areas
Areas that we can focus on from time to time that you can rely upon to improve:
1. The Leader as avatar. The leader is really a super role model. No one believes what they read or hear—only what they see. The leader has to walk the talk and talk the walk.
2. Silo busting. Silos cause people to go “up and over” to communicate. People sometimes don’t even know the silos are there impeding them.
3. Strategy/tactics confusion. Strategy and tactics are two different things and have nothing to do with time (long-term vs. short-term). Strategy has to do with the direction of the business and tactics have to do with execution. Sit in a strategy meeting and someone has a strategic point, but someone may kill it with a tactical barrier.
• Strategy – framework within which decisions are made which set the nature and direction of the business.
• Tactics – involve what it takes to implement the strategy
• Mission – reason for existence
• Core values and operational values have to align or else you have cognitive dissonance
• Vision – picture of the future
4. Eliminate endless meetings. Endless meetings (eliminate frequency and duration)—we can remove 90% of meetings in organizations because they are used pointlessly to disseminate information. Most meetings can be very short if you don’t assign arbitrary time frames for duration.
5. Talent leaves people, not organizations. Who are they leaving and why are they leaving those people?
6. Not learning from the front-line. Organizations learn from the people who work from them at point of customer contact.
7. Poor/infrequent performance evaluations. These are notoriously connected to salary increases and they shouldn’t be. Should be frequent and informal, written quarterly with employee participation and self-evaluation, disassociated with salary increases.
8. Over-reliance on consultants. A lot of executives bring in consultants instead of doing the hard work themselves. Bring in consultants so they can blame when it goes wrong or find someone who simply parrots their own ideas.
9. Focus on input, not output.
10. Focus on contingent action, not preventative. Preventative action saves time, money and embarrassment every time.
11. Assuming clients know what is needed. They know what they want but they don’t what they need because their nose is too close to the glass.
12. Focus on top line growth, not solely profit. Can’t grow unless top line grows. You can’t cut your way to success.
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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Umwelt (oom-velt) refers to an organism’s self-life. It’s the opposite of anthropomorphism, in that we try to understand an animal’s personal point of view, rather than assigning it human points of view. Or as John Muir once explained, when asked why something as dreadful as poison ivy was even created, “Perhaps it was made for itself.” (Alexandra Horowitz talks about this brilliantly in her new book, Inside Of A Dog.
There is an umwelt in our business and social dealings which, if understood, can lead to far greater success. We tend to assign our own traits, preferences, and proclivities to those around us, and this tendency is not very successful. Sometimes called “projection,” we assign positives and negatives to others based on our own experiences and traits.
For example, if I had a hard time learning to ski and you told me you were about to take lessons, I might recommend that you never descend on a black diamond hill, because I still can’t do it and they are not for the average skier. One of my purposes in this remark is to maintain my self-identity, since if you immediately took to black diamonds like an Alpine native I might believe that I’m simply not that adept a skier (which I’m actually not). The same applies to college courses, food choices, and dating conundrums.
Personal goals are more valuable than common features and benefits
In marketing—and in merely influencing others—it’s better to investigate the umwelt. The buyer, or receiver, or important other may not respond to the same stimuli, motivators, or comforts that you do. The problem with most “features and benefits” sales approaches is that they are immersed in a commodity mindset—what one person finds attractive will surely strike others the same way. That’s blatantly false, which is why we have both Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbuck’s, and PCs and Macs.
You have to put yourself in the others’ shoes. How are they likely to view the world, your offerings, your suggestions? How can you vary your approach to suit their needs, their values, their expectations, all of which may well be starkly difference from your own and even from the prior buyer?
The finest speakers, consultants, coaches, sales people, teachers, and marketers I’ve seen don’t project; they don’t “anthropomorphize” their interactions with others. Instead, they try to get inside others’ points of view, see the world and the situation through others’ eyes and with others’ personal goals in mind.
The same car will not appeal to an unmarried 25-year-old with a small rent payment, and to a couple with three children, married for ten years, with a substantial mortgage. Vacation alternatives differ, depending upon preferences for travel, ocean, cultural events, bargains, and so forth. I swear by my iPhone while others refuse to buy one, yet we all have the need for wireless communications.
Your dog is hungry, not worried
What is it that your client wants to achieve? Don’t propose a fixed, arbitrary alternative to meet those needs. Propose a more tailored approach that isn’t a commodity. Ironically, you’ll get larger sales from transactions based on meeting need without a fixed methodology than you will from a highly polished, highly rehearsed, and highly irrelevant pitch for a commodity.
To understand others’ points of view, you need to understand their world. Have you asked yourself what it’s like to be the CEO of a community bank in these times? Or what the priorities are for the vice president of nursing in a major hospital? Or what a development director in a non-profit is looking for these days in terms of alternative funding sources? Put yourself in the other person’s shoes, but also look through their eyes, hear through their ears.
This isn’t a bad technique in your personal life, as well. Your kids are not living the life you lived at an equivalent age (not unless you had a cell phone, lap top, and 7000 friends on Facebook). Your spouse has a different view of shared experiences, not better or worse, but different. Your dog isn’t licking you because he’s worried about your well being, but because you spilled a part of your lunch and/or haven’t used any breath mints.
If you want to know what the other person is thinking, and you want to gain some traction with a recommendation or proposal, then determine how he or she views the world. They may well be sailing down that black diamond hill, and your best approach is to propose an even better mountain.
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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October 25-26 I’m in Reno, keynoting the Institute of Management Consultants’ Confab and then receiving their award as a Fellow of the Institute. I leaned on Amex and they have me in a resort somewhere, since I hate Reno hotels. If you’re a member of my communities and are around for any reason, I’m buying drinks, probably hosting a little party. The lovely Maria (TLM) will be with me. Koufax refuses to come, disdains awards, since he’s a pureblood. In any case, find me if you’re there, and you can drink with a Fellow (hale and well met)!
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My driver picked me up in the dark at 5:45 this morning, which I hate, and I read the newspapers on the way to Boston. By the time we were approaching the airport, at about 6:45, traffic was already heavy on the Expressway. If there is any good reason at all for engaging in that commute, it has escaped me.
Delta’s flight is actually a Northwest flight that also includes a KLM, Air France, and apparently Oriental Express/Amtrak designation. Filled to the gills, it leaves smack on time and the first class service is excellent, a very nice breakfast (I’m in the bulkhead seat, my preference). The flight stops in Minneapolis, where the crew changes and we have to disembark for a half-hour. I use the time to call my wife, who has cleared security in Providence to fly to Gainesville via Charlotte to catch our son in a play. I’m sorry I’m missing it (but not sorry to be missing Gainesville).
Descending in Minneapolis, I notice some wonderful things for the first time: there is a railroad roundtable, which you normally only see on models, apparently operational at the end of a marshalling yard; we pass over a relic of a 1950s air force tanker; and then, inexplicably, a dozen army tanks (too fast for me to identify them). I used to have a couple of major clients in Minneapolis, so the trip is not new, but I never managed to see that stuff before. (The Vikings are in Green Bay tonight, undefeated, with Brett Favre trying to defeat his old team. Several ticket agents sport Vikings sweatshirts.)
The Grad School starts tomorrow morning at the Inn at Rancho Santa Fe, where I’ve held two prior events, and where I’m relaxing in a two-bedroom cottage with patios, decks, flat screen TVs, and a fireplace. I figure it will be a great place to watch Dancing with the Stars, alternating with the football game. (Wait: West Coast time—can I watch them both?) AND I’m allowed to smoke cigars out on the decks.
Flight to San Diego featured an excellent lunch, nice job by Delta/Northwest/KLM/Air France/Amtrak.
We’ve an exciting agenda, which I tweaked on the plane, and about 16 people, which is just right.
A limo meets me at the San Diego Airport, and I’m attending to my email on the hour’s drive. I find I can watch the game an Dancing with the Stars. I’m betting on the following: Brett Favre, Donny Osmond, and that cute little blonde model.
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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The Greater Providence Area is like a middleweight moving up a class to fight heavyweights in the cultural arena. Pound for pound, there are theater, dining, museums, dance, touring shows, symphony and more far beyond what a city this size ordinarily expects.
As an example, here are two performances you shouldn’t miss if you’re in the area:
Trinity Rep (disclaimer: I’m a former board member) is staging “Cabaret” based on the original Isherwood work, so that the wonderful Rachel Warren as Sally Bowles does not have to channel Liza Minnelli. The Kit Kat troupe is worth the price of admission, and Curt Columbus has directed the superficial patina of gaiety nicely over the looming Nazi menace. Stealing the show—and, frankly, too often off stage—is the emcee, Joe Wilson, who is in fine voice, fine fettle, and fine lingerie. He bears an eerie resemblance to LaToya Jackson, which threw me for a while, but he has better legs. This is a wonderful rendition of a classic work: http://www.trinityrep.com/.
A couple of miles north in Pawtucket at the GAMM Theater (disclaimer: I’m on the board), director Tony Estrella also stars in a screamingly funny “Much Ado About Nothing” that is a masterpiece. Tony is arguably the finest working actor in New England (and possibly beyond), and his Benedick is a tour de force. At times the show had to momentarily stop to allow the laughter to die down. We were lucky to see it with a large group of St. George’s School students who had just read it, so it was a more knowledgeable crowd than would ordinarily be the case. The warden (the play is set in 1945 and, unlike so much of Shakespeare that is just a conceit in modern settings, this play sizzles), played by Tom Gleadow, has evidently been given permission to eat the scenery and, quite positively, there’s little left when he’s done with it. GAMM provides great art in an intimate setting, and this is the first of a paired set, with Romeo and Juliet coming with the same cast: http://www.gammtheatre.org/.
There is far better dining in Providence than Boston (we eat out seven nights a week), so take a couple of evenings and enjoy yourselves!
(Recommended pre-Trinity: Gracie’s, right across the street; pre-GAMM: Chez Pascal, 960 Hope St., Providence, a five-minute drive from the theater.)
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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It’s easier to carp than to improve. It’s easier to blame than to take accountability. It’s easier to be pessimistic and justify your lack of success than to be optimistic and work at success.
I admire people who join mastermind groups because these usually aren’t people who sit around bemoaning their fate, but rather who hold each other accountable and permit no whining. The whiners tell you in good times that things can’t stay this way, and in bad times that any hint of improvement is false and things will only get worse. In the cosmos of the cynical, down times never end and up times are ephemeral. They remind me of the old definition of Puritanism: The dread fear that someone, someplace, is enjoying himself.
It’s easy to take shots, especially if you use a shotgun. The trouble is you have neither the greatest range nor accuracy, but you can be really annoying.
If you get up on Monday morning with the endemic belief that things are bad and will get worse, you’ve got one hell of a week staring you in the face. But if you get up and feel like there’s another week of opportunity, contribution, and success out there, then you can’t wait to get out the door.
Life is what you make it. Take your best shot. Just don’t shoot yourself in the foot. And if you choose to do so deliberately, stay away from me.
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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If we’re pursuing clergy for decades-old acts of pedophilia, which I believe we should, and are trying to pursue actions against superiors who shielded or transferred them, which I think we should, then why, exactly, wouldn’t we want to pursue similar heinous charges against Roman Polanski? Because he’s a movie director? Because he successfully evaded the law for 30 years?
When David Letterman was constantly mocking the transgressions of Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, or John Edwards, or dozens of others (whose acts were reprehensible), was he concurrently having illicit relationships with his own staff members? Should we forgive him when he didn’t forgive the others and used them for comic relief, because he’s a television talk show host?
Some things I just don’t grok….
* See Heinlein’s A Stranger in A Strange Land if you’re not grokking this, either.
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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This isn’t a profession (few are) where you merely to something right and wait for the rewards to rain down. You have to do the right things continually.
Your clients may love you, but your prospects are not privy to that relationship. You must convey it in the form of testimonials, references, and referrals. If you’re not asking for these, then how do you convey the great work you’ve already done, and significant relationships you’ve already formed?
When is the last time you added testimonials to your materials, Internet presence, and conversation? This is a moving picture, not a snapshot.
Your methodology might be working just dandy for a decade. When is the last time you bothered to improve it? Minor details such as society, technology, and the economy change. Have you? What was 98 percent effective five years ago is probably 60 percent effective now. What have you done to streamline and adjust your approaches?
Here’s a telltale indicator: If your locus of learning has been almost entirely internal over the past few years, you’re not developing. If you have not been attending workshops, or participating in mastermind groups (in which you are not the most successful person), or engaging in learning experiences of some sort with others, then you’re simply in a state of mental atrophy. Even if these activities simply validate what you’re doing, you need them to calibrate your effectiveness.
You’ve all seen the people who loiter in the halls during the workshops. They feel they know too much to actually sit inside, and instead share war stories over coffee, lying to each other about how great they’re doing. They track their email if they are forced to sit in a session. They know it all, why should they listen? They only tell.
Here’s what I know: I’m constantly surprised at how stupid I was two weeks ago. But, daily, I’m doing something about it.
© Alan Weiss 2009. All rights reserved.
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