Quote Of The Day 31/12

“A year from now you may wish you had started today.”
—Karen Lamb

On Reading ‘Level 5 Leadership’

I had encountered this material when I read Jim Collins’ earlier book ‘Good To Great’ over the past Summer.

There is some interesting cross-over between this article and Goldman’s ‘Emotional Intelligence’, but whereas Goldman talks more about interpersonal, people-management, aspects of leadership Collins also addresses resolve, vision and direction-setting.

One fact to note when mapping any learnings from this article onto my real experience is that Collins is looking at a company’s performance over a thirty-year cycle and few, if any, Irish design companies have lasted that long. That is not to say that they will never achieve that span of years, just that they have not yet so far.

Quote of the Day 30/12/09

“It’s more important that you be passionate about what you do all day than it is to be passionate about the product that is being sold.”
—Seth Godin

Quote of the Day 28/12/09

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”
—General Eric Shinseki, retired Chief of Staff, US Army

Self-Management And The Leader

In reviewing my thinking on leadership during the course of this module I went back and watched David Allen’s talk at Google on personal productivity. He is not an authoritative voice on leadership, nor does he claim to be, so his thinking most likely falls outside of the canon of leadership literature which I am exploring for this module. However one always needs to look for good ideas in unsuspecting places.

What drew me back to this video was his central thought that when you are in charge of others and leading them in whatever direction you all need to go, you need to be very much in charge of yourself and totally clear about your own direction. I remembered his four panel matrix* of self management. This is a good diagnostic tool to evaluate where you are at in terms of your degrees of perspective and control, and once aware then you can act to improve. I made this diagram of the four categories that Allen identifies.

• The Crazy-Maker has no consciousness of constraints or resources.
• The Reactor is driven by the latest and the loudest.
• The Micro-Manager is over-structured: ‘too controlled is out of control’.
• The Master & Commander has his eye on all of the horizons, walks the line between structure and freedom so as to get to where he needs to go most elegantly.

Where am I located on this matrix then? I would say that I am too high in control and only lower mid-level in perspective.

*It is always a four-panel matrix isn’t it?

Four And Three-Quarter Theoretical Hours A Day

When do I find time to tackle all of the tasks I am required to complete on this MA programme — in between work hours, parenting, spending time with my family and such? I have worked out this breakdown

Weekdays
7:15-7:45 on the train into town.
8:00-8:45 in the office before official work hours.
12:30–13:30 on my lunch break.
17:45–18:45 on my train home in the evening.
Then finally 21:30–23:00 when the kids have gone to bed.

Weekends 
I get an hour of reading done when I bring Ethan to his gym class on Saturdays.

It is amazing how much free time you find you actually have available to you when you put yourself into the scenario of having to use every single minute. Cutting-out all distractions such as watching television and keeping up with social media is a huge part of achieving time optimisation.

(And now I have two weeks of such ‘every-minute-maximisation’ ahead of me over the Christmas holiday break. Oh the joys!)

Leadership In ‘Tribes’

Seth Godin’s latest book Tribes is essentially about leadership. Mostly about leadership within the business context, but not exclusively so. Scanning through it again I captured these four quotes which I find inspiring and which also relate to this module’s material.

“The barriers to leadership have fallen. There are tribes everywhere, many in search of leaders. This creates a dilemma for you: without a barrier, why not begin?”

“No one gives you permission or approval or a permit to lead. You can just do it. The only one who can say no is you.”

“Do you have what you need to lead? Do you need more power or education or money? When will you have enough of what you need in order to start leading?”

“What we see, over and over, is that the brave but cheap leadership that leads to passionate movements always (always!) defeats the top-down, mediocre, slow-moving and very expensive techniques we all grew up with. Do the math.”

Those are four very challenging statements and difficult to answer if you are being true to yourself.

Quote of the Day 20/12/09

“Man who not smile should not open shop.”
—Ancient Chinese Proverb

Quote of the Day 15/12/09

“The best way to predict the future is to invent it.”
—Alan Kay

My Thought For The Day 15/12

“Finally, module one essay finished, typeset and proofed at 23:55. Triage of my atypical in-box backlog shall have to wait until morning.”
23:57 December 15 from my Twitter feed.

Quote Of The Day 14/12

“Thinking is overrated. I only ever learn what I really think by writing or talking.”
—Merlin Mann of 43Folders

A Cup of Recession Joe

Marketing Analysis (6 of 6)

Denis spoke about how factors outside of your company’s direct sphere of activities have to inform and effect your marketing decisions. I came across a good example of this today reading about how McDonalds is aggressively targeting Starbucks in the US coffee market. I am unsure if the same is true over here in Ireland yet. Even up to earlier this year I would have been surprised by the thought that McDonalds could compete effectively in the same market space as Starbucks and appeal to the same target markets.

Lets look at the marketing factors in play here. Given the deteriorating Irish economic environment, people are either looking to rationalise their discretionary spending or, if they have been laid-off, they are having to abandon it. In this climate it is difficult to justify spending five of six euros for a Christmas Gingerbread-Topped Triple-Strength Mocha With Whipped Cream. So everyone is increasingly in the market for a price-sensitive morning coffee. OK, so Starbucks could theoretically make changes to their prices, but a substantial part of their marketing message is still the theme of ‘The Third Place’ – in essence the idea that you are paying premium for the environment, the service and the sense of place that is uniquely Starbucks. So getting into any downward pricing spiral will either damage their brand or really start to reposition it in people’s minds. On the other hand, McDonalds never makes any claims to providing a wonderful environment, but they have proved themselves pretty adept and nimble at successfully adapting to market changes over the years. They now sell a surprising amount of salads and have had their McCafe offering in play for a number of years.

Operationally, once you start selling espressos and mochas to attract in the customers who are open to migrating away from the Starbucks and its ilk, you are faced with an issue of educating your existing customers who have been used to ordering black coffee or white coffee (or perhaps a Latte if if they are feeling particularly adventurous). That poses another marketing challenge. I have found the online component of this campaign: UnsnobbyCoffee.com This site mostly works as customer education: training McDonald’s existing customers to understand the variations of coffee the company is now selling. I presume these marketing messages are mirrored in-store, but I have not been State-side to investigate.

Quote Of The Day 13/12

“Training is a tax you pay for a lousy hiring environment.”
—Robert Stephens of The Geek Squad.

Realpolitik Design

Marketing Analysis (5 of 6): Bord Bia Pork Crisis National Press Advertisement

This full-page advert ran in the national newspapers yesterday. It is interesting as it crosses over the lines between PR, marketing and advertising as discussed in this MA module.

This advert plays an important part in the ongoing pork crisis PR activity and it serves different purposes aimed at the different publics it addresses. To the general pork-consuming public this is an ‘Important Public Announcement’, it puts forward the official Department and Bord Bia version of the facts surrounding the Irish pork recall. It is designed to be informative and factual. The design is very basic, arguably crude, but I propose that is an intentional choice. It needs to shout, to get attention and to be read. While being very factual, this advert is intended to reassure pork-eaters and put them back into a state of mind where they will begin to happily start to buy Irish pork again.


This advert is also indirectly addressed at the food industry, as the various stake-holders on that side need to see that the relevant Government agencies are taking proactive actions to get product selling again. That is why the advert is jointly accredited to both Bord Bia and the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. Joe Public cares little about who is responsible for such official pronouncements, but the industry insiders are very attuned to know who is acting in their interests.

The marketing component of this advert is the promotion of the new ‘Pork and Bacon Approved’ label that consumers are going to see on-pack*. It is important that they are made aware of its existence, although just this one full-page advert is not enough to get the word out about that. I would have also run small follow-on adverts the next week specifically about those new labels. I would have supported those with in-store posters and materials circulated to all retailers.

* Speaking from a design perspective, the new label is a very poor piece of communication. But I have an scenario in my head of the designer saying “we can make this communicate far more effectively if we work on it for more than eleven minutes” and the Man From The Department replying “every hour that pork is off the shelves the industry is losing X-million euros, just send it to the printers”. Real-Politik wins the day.

My Thought For The Day 12/12

“I just wrote a sentence containing the sublimely ugly phrase ‘a proto-coaching mindset’. I feel like some threshold has been crossed.”
8:27 December 12 from my Twitter feed.

Quote of the Day 11/12/09

“[You] just can’t have an intelligent conversation with a Coke bottle. People do not wish to speak with brands.”
—Richard Binhammer, Member of Dell’s Digital Media team.

Quote Of The Day 10/12

“That world got blown up and the new democratised world of the enfranchised consumer and the occasional angry crowd has forced businesses (and the PR people and firms that advise them) to open up.”
—David Brain, CEO Edelman Europe, on the empowered consumer.

The Machine Is Us/sing Us

Investigating some more about the topic of ‘User-Generated Content’ after Saturday’s MA class I located this fascinating short film ‘The Machine Is Us/sing Us’ on YouTube. It has been created by Michael Welsh who is the Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at the Kansas State University. So the thinking behind his film is backed up with some serious academic research. That said, I found this to be a most exemplary piece of communication. It really makes its complex points in the clearest manner.

‘Show don’t tell’ is one of the primary rules for effective writing, and this film informs us by showing in the most unique manner. I could use this film to explain Web_2.0 and UGC to my four-year old son. (That is, to people who are not as in love with their own web presence as I am.)

We’re On A Mission From God, Ma’am

I did some following-up on customer service and some reading around the Geek-Squad IT support organisation which was discussed in the marketing book ‘Never Mind the Sizzle... Where’s the Sausage’. They definitely appear to put the customer at the centre of everything that they do. Something we are often not too good at in the design sector. At the subconscious level (and often at the conscious level) one of the foundations of the designer’s mindset invariably seems to be that, to some degree, they are doing their design work for themselves.

The Geek-Squad have a customer service bible called ‘The Little Orange Book’, a remarkable guide to great service (produced by the Squad’s ‘Ministry of Propaganda’ no less). It includes this six-point pledge that every one of their geeks is expected to sign.

I will:
1. Never violate the trust of my clients or disrespect their property.
2. Never say, “I don’t know”. Instead, say “I’ll find out.”
3. Always understand that my clients’ time is more valuable than my own.
4. Assume every problem is my fault, unless proven otherwise.
5. Consider my job done only when my client is completely overwhelmed with joy. And instead of assuming they’re happy, I’ll ask them.
6. Keep every promise I make. Including this one.

I think that this is a really powerful example of customer service orientated thinking that must have some broader general applications.

Here Come The Blue Monsters

Hugh MacLeod is doing an acerbic series of cartoons parodying the self-importance of the Social Media Specialists, Consultants, Advisers and the latest flavour of Voodoo-Peddlers who have arrived on the business consultancy scene this year. I am posting this here as a useful reminder not to become too self-important or pompous, given that I will most likely write my MA dissertation on a topic within this space.

Get Persian: Introduce Some Constructive Conflict

I have located this document: ‘Lets Get Persian’ at changethis.com, an idea-propagating website which I been neglecting to visit since diving head-first into my Masters. The (user-generated) content at ChangeThis can be somewhat hit and miss, but the good material there is well worth truffling out. This particular essay has some interesting things to say about executive-level teamwork. I think that it adds some depth to some of the concepts we have been studying recently. Particularly maximising the performance of our teams. Here is one quote with a very useful list.

“In addition to using what might be called a second-chance meeting to review important decisions in an unbiased light, businesses should also take advantage of other means of introducing constructive contention into their decision-making, because disagreement, managed correctly, turns out to be crucial in avoiding errors. Our research found nine additional ways to introduce disagreement and manage that disagreement so it keeps everyone on their toes without harming the camaraderie of a management team:

• Informal devil’s advocacy
• Escalation systems
• Bets
• Staring into the abyss
• Finding history that fits
• Deciding (ahead of time) how to decide
• Smoothing out management ruts
• Constructing alarm systems
• A formal devil’s advocate review

Quote Of The Day 5/12

“Well done is better than well said.”
–Benjamin Franklin

My Thought For The Day 03/12

“Re-reading Netflix case study yet again. At this point it feels like Harvard Business School should properly be paying me for the privilege.”
22:27 December 03, 2008, from my Twitter feed.