Archive for July, 2010
Oh, Now I See!
“I was seldom able to see an opportunity until it had ceased to be one.” Mark Twain.
“Oh, now I see!” It’s a phrase we use so often to convey that we understand, or get it. We use sight as a metaphor for understanding all the time. The word lens is used to mean a channel through which something can be seen or understood. “Mary sees the world through rose colored lenses,” (an optimist, or naive). We are creatures of pattern recognition and our conjuring process requires imagery to put things in place, or to make sense of what we experience or think. We will typically apply what we know (our storehouse of imagery) to what we see and work hard to make sense of things.
Lenses matter and the choice of lenses have interesting effects on what follows. We believe that lenses allow us to see better, and that is true, but for a very limited and specific range of stuff. The lens is helpful in that it blocks out an infinite number of things we could see or consider so that we get clarity and detail on what the lens puts into focus for us. I’ve looked through telescopes and microscopes, sunglasses and readers, wide angle lenses and telephoto ,,,, all bringing into focus different stuff and making me oblivious to everything else around me. If driving fast, I do no longer see what was in front of me seconds before. Nor should I, be looking anywhere but where it’s critical when driving. Texting while driving is illegal in some states, thank goodness.
In our enterprises, we make choices about lenses all the time. We don’t call them lenses, even though they affect what we see and subsequently interpret. If our lenses are the wrong ones, then we’ll just have to deal with interpreting what we see and worry about what we don’t see. If our lenses cover too much to absorb at once, because we’re driving the business so fast, then we’ll just to trust our luck that we did not miss an important turn-off or on-ramp. If our business roadways are all smooth and devoid of danger or speed traps, then it doesn’t matter so much. If the scenery doesn’t change or we’re not trying to take our enterprise anywhere new, then all is good.
Among our most important lenses are what we measure, how well we measure, how often we measure, and what we do with what we measure. They are important if we do actually do something of value with what we measure in time to make a difference. It does us little good to find out that we missed a turn-off two weeks or a month ago, unless we’re pretty good at u-turns and restarts, except when opportunities don’t wait around for us to u-turn. Also, who decides what to measure, or who interprets what we measure, or who decides what to do with what we measure, or who reports what we measure, or doesn’t report what we measure is likely to matter a whole bunch too.
When we go for our annual physical, all the same measurement stuff applies, and we surely hope the doctor and the lab get it right. I lost a cousin to cancer this weekend because a doctor and a lab got the measurements wrong years ago when they could have done something in time to save Bob’s life.
So, when was the last time you checked the lenses you use at work, home, or play?
“There are three classes of people; those who see, those who see when they are shown, and those who do not see.” Leonardo da Vinci.
The Right Stuff
Fifteen years ago, I was on a consulting project in the UK. It had to do with the nuclear generation business and the most exciting part of the work centered around privatization and the large nuclear liabilities that had to be addressed (costs to decommission facilties and the processing of the nuclear waste). The financial impacts were very large .. 3.5 billion pounds.
That was for a big change that hinged on the role of private industry and the public welfare. The senior executives then had an unfailing committment to safety and to do the right thing for the right reasons for all concerned … it was wonderful to experience their behaviors.
We’re all familiar by now that BP is changing chief executives and the have set aside 32 billion pounds (as a likely minimum) for the oil platform catastrophe. There’s much to be learned … but leadership matters, and the good ones still lead from the front. Often in adversity, the best ones step up and change the course of events. Mr. Dudley appears to have the right stuff. …
Who’s Not on Board?
Not that long ago, a major mobile phone carrier had an effective advertising campaign with a catchy slogan. Yet, I found their slogan troubling. It was troubling in that their banner, “We have fewer lost calls” left with me an impression that “we’re not as bad as the other guys” was written with the intent to establish a positive differentiator of quality and reliability. My reaction then was that the goal was to be the best of the bad, or cream of the crap. Upon reflection, I realized that the problem was with me, and in fact, the carrier’s message was the right one. This carrier was actually speaking the language of quality, not of spin (as I confess was my reaction). Quality is measured by the likelihood of failure against a specification. In their case, our case, it was a message that what mattered to the customer was continuity of service and there is a probability that that service will be interrupted, and the best do it fewer times. The carrier must have studied Dr. Noriaki Kano and realized that in some cases, the best can mean fewer defects, and failures against a basic requirement can only bring dissatisfaction. For the basic requirement of service availability, a service unavailability measure is the right metric and satisfaction is not achievable, that is, zero defects can bring only zero dissatisfaction.
This last week, we witnessed what appeared as truly bizarre behavior from Apple. The new flagship, the iPhone 4, has a troublesome performance problem with the reception. The very beautiful phone integrated the antenna into a smooth metal casing, creating a problem when the phone was held in a particular, albeit very normal, way. Some would argue that the decision process for the product launch suffered from an unhealthy bias wherein form trumped substance and engineering warnings. It’s saddening, coming from an exciting and innovative producer of form and substance. What was befuddling was the chairman’s response to the defects. It began with hubris with what appeared a dismissive tone that trivialized the problem …. Customers don’t know how to hold our phone properly, what’s all the fuss about; it’s the bad media at play. As the evidence mounted of the reception calamity and the web took over, sharing the data, the next stage of responsiveness focused on an attack on the competition, asserting that other smart phones shared the same problem. From here it sounds like it’s about “my” product and brand, not the customer pain. That strategy was a big boo-boo. Motorola, HTC, and RIM did not remain silent, each stating that their designs did obey the laws of physics and sound engineering, after all, customers wanted continuity of service.
Today’s connected world is a dangerous place to forget that respect for the customer and respect for the competition are essential for sustainability of brand value and economic goodwill, just ask Toyota. I’ve always loved Apple’s creativity in form and substance. I also believed that Toyota put the customer first. Funny how often bigger does not beget better. It’s called entropy, another engineering insight often forgotten.
On reflection, I wonder how much of the problem had to do with poor engineering and how much with a culture of “enforced optimism” or some variant of the “emperor’s new clothes?” The evidence to date on the catastrophic BP oil rig explosion and the subsequent environmental opening of Pandora’s Box seem to support the dangers of “enforced optimism” leadership behaviors.
How often does the “enforced optimism” show up in planning (pick any type), budget sessions, objectives, progress reviews and reports, investor sessions, group decision making, scheduling and commitment setting, …., other stuff?
Thoughts?
Reddy or Not, Here I Come!
We have an app for that,” so goes the ad for a smart phone. I am still amazed by how life is changing through technology. The accessibility and choices at our disposal have redefined nearly everything, and to a great part for the better. Several years I joked about the day when I could sit atop a mountain with a laptop connected to the world and able to conduct my business, only to see someone smile and say, “It’s not that far away.” So, here I am on a mountain, loving the view, with the world at my fingertips, conducting my business and knowing that our readers across the world can share in the output this experience, when, how, and where they chose. We’ve shared the transformation of our lives and our enterprises as a consequence of leaps in telecommunications and the myriad of choices and facilitated activities available to us, our customers, suppliers, competitors, and our world.
New enterprises have jumped on the electronic carpet ride, perhaps working in a “cloud”, and creating new value propositions in a connected world. Business models have literally crumbled, leaving relics, much like those of Ozymandias, because brick, mortar, and paper have been replaced by electrons. In his grave, my very old friend, Reddy Kilowatt, both rejoices, and perhaps weeps as well, as the role of his offspring continue to transform the world. Perhaps it’s a bias, a consequence of a prior professional life, but I believe that nothing has come close to transforming the quality of human life as the availability of reliable electric power. In fact, the arguments that it’s about water, food, education and health care cannot stand alone without the platform built on our friends the electrons. We depend on many energy sources, but in many ways, they are often diminished in value without the electrons at play. Our electrons are such important servants that we store them in forms that make them available 24-7; in fact they make the world available to us 24-7.
I do confess the ancient part of me still enjoys reading books, paper books, but news and virtually all other content comes to me electronically. The effectiveness and efficiencies from 24-7 accessibility to current information and content is perhaps the most un-constraining breakthrough since the steam engine. There is little doubt that many enterprises have made huge investments in technological capacity and many have reinvented their capacity to transform. I wonder how much investment has gone into transforming the way we use the electrons within, within our own neural networks … the brain.
Questions:
• What proportion of decision making content is produced for us in a “report”? Does that report contain real time or past time data? Do we decide from the past even when the present is available?
• Is our critical information serviced to us through human “filters” or functions who decide what to search and how to package the answers?
• How long does it take to get an answer? Do we get a version of a Google or a bunch of gaggle?
• Do we get our critical “news”, much like many of us by waiting until the 6:00 PM broadcast on the “tube”; or does the critical data from which to manage and decide stream to us into the right virtual form?
• Does the data wait for you or do you wait for the data?
• When something is happening across the world that could impact the enterprise, do we learn about it when the impact arrives, much like a tsunami?
• Does out data warn us about what is about to happen or is likely to happen:
o To our business?
o To our customers?
o To our resources?
o To our employees?
o To our constraints?
Have we truly transformed our human systems to unleash the genius within, the genius that can create value and innovation from the real time accessibility available?
Are we Reddy?
Oh, Can You See By the Dawn’s Early Light?
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
So begins the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence from Great Britain signed by the United States Congress on July 4, 1776. We in the US, celebrate July 4th as Independence Day this weekend with festivities, fireworks, picnics and devotionals to those whose lives were dedicated and often taken to secure these unalienable rights. In fact, the words could serve as anthem to peoples all over the world as a never ending objective and pursuit.
The instrument declared states as the independent parties, and in doing so established, “that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do.”
The Declaration of Independence was a consequence of a people rebelling against abuses with no responsiveness to appeals or due recourse for resolution. It is interesting to recognize that the only activity specified that is specific to an individual is the right to establish commerce. The document enumerates abuses by the Crown and intolerable and unendurable behaviors and, not surprisingly, many can be traced to actions to serve commercial objectives, those of the Crown and to the detriment of the colonists. (It took a subsequent Constitution and Bill of Rights to establish governance.) But, to continue the thread, business strategies are in fact conquest strategies and occupation strategies, and governments align to these to different degrees. Political colonies have typically as occupation entities to be harvested.
The consequences of the boldness of the Declaration of Independence and subsequent execution have enabled many of us to pursue happiness, enjoy liberty, and create life with hope. Three important dimensions are forever present in my mind:
1. Declaration was followed by sacrifice and vigilance to earn the liberties and the responsibilities to sustain them. Declaring that we are or we will be better or great can warm the tummy for a bit, but it is execution and on-going management that makes it real. Projects exist to create processes and processes must manage to the objectives of the entities. This applies to governance of individuals, organizations, enterprises, societies, religious orders, groups, and nations.
2. As the world changes and our prosperities grow, our opportunities are a powerful magnet for others seeking life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Although many believe that these rights come as a consequence of national versus global birth, perhaps through education or lack thereof, it is the right to earn them that effectively determines what we do and whether life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is achieved.
3. The first two create obligations and responsibilities, societal and commercial. Recognizing the unalienable rights do not come as a geographical or political birthright … not because of where we were born, but rather, because you were born is important, particularly if we are to be civil in our behaviors among our global community. We must not act in a way that denies the right to the pursuit of opportunity to earn happiness, personal or commercial, simply because we can at this point in time.
I cherish the opportunities life in the United States brings every day, and am grateful that my loved ones can pursue their own dreams. I honor and respect those that live and die daily to protect these opportunities and am ashamed of those that deny them to others, here or abroad.
Today, independence is more complex, perhaps because prosperity has redefined for many what the pursuit of happiness is or ought to be. Somehow, I find it is easier to find clarity in challenging times, and rewarding to reflect on the earned independence we enjoy and the responsibility to continue to earn and never deny.
Happy 4th!
