Category Archives: Challenge

Accountability, Challenge, Empowerment, Leadership, Meetings

Quiet Meetings

It seemed that just the other day that the self-quarantining directives were starting to be relaxed. Stores and restaurants were starting to function at less than total capacity, but they were open. Then cases started to spike again as people either relaxed from, or just got tired of being careful. Many if not all business offices are still closed, and it appears that will be the case for a while.

The result is that travel and face-to-face interaction will still be severely curtailed. This was going to happen anyway as part of an on-going drive to reduce costs. Virtual and video meetings were already making their way into standard corporate operating procedures, particularly for internal meetings, and even some customer meetings. It is just that the current health concerns have significantly accelerated its adoption and implementation.

The “virtual” meeting is now and will be going forward the norm.

It used to be that when a business held a review all aspects of the business were gathered, the door was closed, and nothing was off-limits for the discussion. There was give and take. There was open challenge and discussion. There were questions by superiors, subordinates and peers. Despite the seeming acrimony, there was eventually resolution and alignment. And a stronger team usually emerged.

Afterwards, everybody would then usually go out for a team dinner, and possibly even a team building exercise.

Now we all get on “the bridge”. If the numbers are not large, we can have video, but a small number of attendees does not usually associate with a business review. Also, since it is now a “call”, almost anyone, and usually almost everyone attends since there are no travel and budget issues in play to reduce attendance.

With the increase in attendance and the now virtual nature of the meeting, these meetings seem to have gotten much quieter. If you are not presenting, you are usually on “mute”. If you are on mute, you are also usually multi-tasking and doing something else while listening in. The amount of contribution, questions and challenges has significantly been decreased. Everyone seems to just listen to the speaker, look at the slides and move on.

This concerns me. I think it should probably concern others as well.

I believe that there are very few concepts, ideas, programs and products that cannot be improved by an aligned, yet challenging team. This is the very idea and basis for much of the drive for diversity in the business environment. It is the idea that different people, with different experiences and different points of view can get together and make use of these differences to create a stronger solution.

However now, with the rise of virtual meetings and large audiences, it seems that this challenging aspect of the business process has been fading away. Our meetings are invariably quiet. The presenter presents their charts. They either read them to the audience or read their notes. With so many now online the objective is to stay on the meeting schedule so as not to take up too much or, or even possibly waste the audience’s time.

Nobody wants to challenge because it can be seen as being an obstruction. People are not usually looking for a better solution. They are looking to get through this meeting, and on to their next meeting. Whether they agree or not, their silence is deemed as agreement, and everybody gets to move on.

I know I can sound somewhat like a broken record when it comes to discussing process, but when the process indicates that a review is to be held, that is just what happens. A review is held. The reason for the review is now to fulfill the process, not to work at generating a better capability. In this instance to challenge anything would be seen as challenging the process, and no one wants to be seen as doing that.

It used to be everyone’s responsibility to try and improve the business. Now it is the process’s responsibility. Where it used to be that former president Harry Truman, as the leader of the United States said: “The buck stops here”*, now we must develop matrices so that we can understand who is Responsible, who is Accountable, who must be Consulted and who must merely be Informed

*For those of you that are unfamiliar with the Term: Buck passing, or passing the buck, or sometimes (playing) the blame game, is the act of attributing to another person or group one’s own responsibility. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_passing

This now begs the questions: If your meeting is quiet, and no one is challenging what is being presented, why are you even having a meeting? Wouldn’t it just be easier, not to mention a better use of everyone’s time, to just send out the charts and invite individual input? Instead of having everyone in attendance multi-tasking on something else while the charts are being presented, wouldn’t it be better to allow them to fully focus on what they are doing anyway?

The process of challenging in a meeting needs to somehow be reinstated into the meeting. If everyone is just going to present the charts that they submitted, why have everyone sit through that? They can just as easily read the charts on their own. What value is gained?

I think this is where leadership comes in. Much like Harry Truman ultimately decided that he would make the decision, so must the leader decide to start returning value to the meeting. If the leader starts asking appropriate questions, this will be seen a signal that others, who may have had appropriate questions that they would not have asked in the past, to ask appropriate questions.

If it evolves that too many questions are being asked, and not enough is getting accomplished in the meeting, this is not an indication to stop asking questions. This is an indication that the number of attendees at the meeting is too large, and the meeting should be broken down in more, smaller meetings in order to accommodate the questions.

Conversely, if too many questions are asked during the meeting, it might mean that the topic being presented has not been thoroughly thought through and vetted before-hand with the appropriate people. Either way it would indicate that more work would be required on that specific topic.

The next time that you find yourself in a quiet meeting, listening to someone present their charts, ask yourself “Why are you there?” If you are not there to provide input, or challenge the input provided by others, why would you attend? Meeting charts and meeting notes are usually distributed after the meeting and you could just as easily obtain the meeting information that way.

If you are the leader of the business that the meeting is associated with, and you notice that it is quiet, you should start asking yourself why. If the only one providing input to the meeting is the person presenting, that would indicate that everyone else is somewhat disengaged. If you are the leader and are not asking questions, can you truly say that you are fully engaged as well?

Regardless, the buck does indeed stop with the leader. If they do not challenge, few if any others will challenge. And the meeting, and the business will be diminished in value because of it.

Analysis, Challenge, Change, Markets, Questions

The Causality Event

Technology marches ever forward. I understand that this statement is trite, but it is reasonably accurate none the less. One of the best examples of this is shown in Moore’s Law: “Moore’s Law states that we can expect the speed and capability of our computers to increase every couple of years, and we will pay less for them.” https://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/mooreslaw.asp We have also seen that just because a new technology or service exists, doesn’t mean it will be successful, or even accepted by its target market. A great example of this phenomenon can be seen with 8-Track and Betamax tapes.

Not everyone can have the brilliance of a Steve Jobs and create brand new markets just for their new technologies, such as the iPod. Many have tried. Most have not been successful at it. Something else needs to occur. Just like the oil embargo of the early 1970’s was the turning point for driving the demand for fuel efficient cars – a technology that had existed for some time – there usually needs to be some sort of a causality event that drives the uptake of new technology and service based products.

And boy oh boy, have we just gone through one of the largest causality events in recent history. Or maybe even in not so recent history. And we are not entirely through it yet. But I think you know what I mean.

Businesses are continually looking for ways to enhance their productivity, improve their culture, retain top employees, etc. etc. etc… The list goes on and on. Just when they think they may be on to something, a new idea or methodology evolves, seems to work well in some market, and the race is on to try and adapt it to other companies, markets and applications. The business decides which of these enhancements they will implement in the ongoing effort to increase sales, increase margins, reduce costs, and improve employee satisfaction.

The same process applies to the products and services that they produce. Products are designed and developed in anticipation of what the market will want or even possibly need. The difference here is that the business does not normally get to decide which products will be accepted by the market and sold to customers. The market does. And there is usually some sort event, or occurrence that directly affects this decision.

Sometimes it is great advertising. Don’t underestimate the ability to convince people that they want something. “Don’t sell the steak. Sell the sizzle” is a well-known sales phrase. This sales phrase was coined by Elmer Wheeler in the mid-1920s. It urged salespeople to focus on the experience around a product being sold rather than simply on the object itself.

And that is exactly what we all are going though: A multigenerational experience, which is another name for a causality event.

It is the type of event that will end many services, practices and products, as we know them, but it will also open the door for the introduction and acceptance of many new or existing products, services and practices that may not have enjoyed a desired level of acceptance prior to its occurrence.

In the 1980’s the term “cocooning” emerged. “Cocooning is staying inside one’s home, insulated from perceived danger, instead of going out. The term was coined in 1981 by Faith Popcorn, a trend forecaster and marketing consultant. It is used in social science, marketing, parenting, economic forecasting, self-help, religion, and has become part of standard English as defined by multiple dictionaries.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocooning_(behaviour)

Cocooning was a desire for a “cozy” location to retreat to. There were several articles talking about the virtues and detriments to society because of it. People like to point to the rise of the Barcalounger as a symbol of cocooning. Now we are told to cocoon for our own safety. Going out now entails a new risk.

Sport was viewed as an entertainment and escape, on all continents of the world. It was nothing to go out and sit shoulder to shoulder with tens of thousands of others to watch an event. Now they are all shut down with only the possibility of games and events resuming in the near future, and even then, with no fans in attendance.

Changing topics here, it is apparent that “content”, especially as it pertains to entertainment will continue to grow in importance as the cocooning associated with the health situation grows. Delivery methods and technology will also grow in importance. This could provide the needed causality events that new high-speed and mobile communication technologies were looking for to help their business cases and rapid adoptions.

We have seen the rise in security “checkpoints” at the entries to strategic or populated areas. We no longer think much of going through security at the airport. It has become common place to go through similar checkpoints when entering arenas and stadiums. We are also seeing the push and rise of similar functions at our schools. This is all being done in the name of safety.

The current causality event will just add another item to the current security checklist. In areas where people congregate, just as there is now a “weapon” checkpoint, there will eventually also be a “health” checkpoint. Just as you have had to empty your pockets and walk through the scanner at many of these selected locations, so will you in the future have to have your temperature checked to see if you are “safe” to enter. Just as you were not allowed to bring certain proscribed items into a location, now you will also not be allowed to bring in your germs.

This will be more far reaching than just the airports and stadiums. Businesses will also need to adapt. It was not uncommon to see the “dress code” for a restaurant (no shirt, no shoes, no service, was one of the first). But now stores may require more than shirts and shoes of their patrons. You may not be able to enter without a face mask.

It is stated that the current accepted prognosis is that a person may be asymptomatic for up to two weeks prior to exhibiting signs of the illness. So, even if someone passes the thermal check at the entrance to an airplane, wouldn’t you feel a little more comfortable if they (and you) were compelled to wear a face mask for the next several hours as you sit shoulder to shoulder in the interior sealed environment of an airplane?

In a round about way this also brings us to business. For some time, business has been drifting into two seemingly opposite directions. On one hand there has been a continual migration toward the “virtual” office. Teams are now located in separate and remote locations and communicate in a variety of manners to accommodate this structure. With the continued growth of cocooning in the face of the health fears, working at home will continue to grow.

On the other hand, business has begun (re)-recognizing the value of working together and collaboration. To this point we have seen the growth of “open” office environments where offices are designed to bring people into closer contact in an effort to both reduce office size and cost, as well as drive up the collaboration effect.

It seems that the shared office environment will run entirely contrary to the “social-distancing” and health conscious desires and directives that we are now all told to adhere to. Businesses will now need to shoulder the new incremental concern regarding their employee’s health.

Just as badge entries and secure locations have evolved to protect employees from unwanted entries into the work space, so will business need to (re)-adapt their work spaces to be more germ secure / resistant, and also to foster an environment that will not be so conducive to the spread of any germ or virus that may enter.

Could masks become a requirement for entry to work? Will businesses also require a health checkpoint (such as the simple taking of an individual’s temperature) before they are allowed entry? What sort of liabilities regarding the requirement to provide a safe and healthy work environment are businesses going to face?

What is yet to be seen are the next level of changes. What happens when so many people stay home to work that there are no more rush hours, or that they are significantly reduced? Will our insurance rates go down because we are not driving as much? Will we still need to build and expand our roads? With distance and remote learning will we still need to build as many schools?

There are a great many changes that will occur to other businesses due to the changes in behavior for both individuals, and the companies that they work for, as a result of the current health issues. I think we can see many of the changes that are directly related to the causality event. I think it will be the secondary changes that occur as a result of these direct responses to the causality event that may have the greatest impact on both business and society.

Accountability, Analysis, Challenge, Responsibility, Task Completion

Deadlines

We live in a deadline-oriented world. There can be little question about that as we are hit with that fact since well before we are born. While it may be your “birth-day”, prior to that it was your mother’s “due-date”. When we have talked in the past about the three basic resources, Time, Money and People, it is only Time that we can not get more of. Throughout our lives and careers, we are given targets and times that we are challenged to hit. We are then measured, reviewed, graded, etc. on how we did and then progress accordingly. Or at least that used to be the case. Has it really changed?

As is typically the case, I read an article that got me thinking. This one was by Jessica Hartogs, an Editor at LinkedIn, titled: “Workforce Less Forgiving than School” (https://www.linkedin.com/feed/news/workforce-less-forgiving-than-school-4509203/). It was a very short blurb where she cited a Wall Street Journal article titled: “Young Workers Seek Mental Health Accommodations, Employers Try to Keep Up” (https://www.wsj.com/articles/managing-mental-health-at-work-is-a-juggle-of-rights-and-realities-11581523201?mod=business_lead_pos5).

As you might guess the gist of the topic is that we as a society are making progress with coming to grips with mental heath issues associated with our members. We all understand and try to make accommodations for mental and emotional disabilities, just as we do for physical ones. This is obviously done with varying levels of focus, and success. We have seen this with the evolutions and accommodations that have occurred in our institutions of learning.

Students with these types of disabilities and disadvantages are given the accommodations of extra support, extra time, etc., when it comes to delivering their assignments or taking their exams. I don’t think there is anyone who could or would argue with these accommodations for these students to assist them in their studies.

Now let’s shift to business and organizational environment. Here again we will find a situation where deadlines and demands will be placed on all participants. However, most of these deadlines and demands are usually created as a result of an interaction or demand by a customer, or some other external entity. I think we all understand and agree that when dealing with a customer, we will usually find ourselves in a “competitive” situation. When we are dealing with a customer-imposed deadline, there is usually little that can be done in the way of addressing accommodations.

This is just one example. Marketing programs have launch dates where everything must be in place before they can go live. Finance and accounting have rules, some of which may be mandated by regulation, where books must be closed, and reports issued by certain dates or time intervals. The list can go on and on.

The point here is, are we putting businesses into a no-win situation when it comes to providing accommodations for these disabled / disadvantaged individuals?

I am by no means qualified to make any judgements as to what or how any such accommodations should be put in place. I will say however that in the global competitive environment there are many competitors that are not even contemplating making any such accommodations. They are in the competitive environment and are subscribing to the adage “the early bird gets the worm”.

They have recognized that rightly or wrongly, customers will accord some advantage to those that are first on the scene and able to deliver on their requirements. This is part of the “Fast, Good, Cheap” trio of criteria in the customer decision making process. The usual addendum to this trio of criteria is that you can only “Choose Two”.

I have written in the past of how the importance of “Good” has fallen over the past while. We are in a disposable environment for both consumer and business purchases. “Good” now no longer seems to carry the weight that it once did. All quality levels are viewed as somewhat the same and are viewed more in the context of what is paid for them. We seem to now expect Superior / Good / Quality as table stakes for even playing, and will only pay more for it for our “luxury” purchases, and even then only when we are truly looking for and willing to pay for it.

This leaves fast and cheap as the primary customer decision criteria. How cheap is it, and how fast can the customer get it? No business wants to ask for extensions or miss any deadlines when it comes to dealing with customers. What’s more most customers do not well tolerate vendors who either cannot or do not meet their desired deadlines. I think that we all can agree that businesses that are slower to meet customer deadlines and demands will be at a competitive disadvantage.

It is against this backdrop that we seem to be requesting some businesses to make accommodations for those with disabilities and disadvantages, for the one item that up to now customers seem to have been unwilling to grant them, more time.

While it may be reasonable to make special accommodations for those with these types of disabilities and disadvantages in the university environment, where all members will be equally governed by the same accommodation rules (by the university representatives and professors), it may be entirely something else when the same accommodations are expected to be implemented in the open market environment where all do not have to play by the same rules, and the ultimate arbiter, the customer, gets to make their decisions based on the criteria of their choosing, which are usually price and speed.

This is a topic that I really don’t have an answer for. I believe we all wish to be socially conscious, but at what price? It is also obvious that we also live in a global, ever more competitive business environment. I have only touched on the competitive issues and disadvantages that could arise in certain situations. Many companies find themselves on the global stage competing against other organizations that may not have as strong a sense of social responsibility.

And all are dealing with customers who for the most part do not bring social consciousness or social responsibility into their decision-making criteria. They are dealing with customers who again, for the most part are concerned about their financial bottom lines, either corporate or personal.

It seems that adapting the rules of competition to accommodate those with disabilities and disadvantages can only work well, when everybody abides by the same accommodation rules and criteria. When it is attempted to be implemented unilaterally in an uncontrolled competitive environment, it would seem that it only passes the disadvantages along to those that make the accommodations.

While the article that got me started on this may have been titled “Workforce less forgiving than School”, it may be better stated that when it comes to deadlines and demands, customers are the least forgiving of all.

Accountability, Achievement, Adversity, Challenge, Empowerment, Responsibility

Pressure is a Privilege

Most roles in business come with a certain amount of pressure. This is normally in the form of pressure to perform. This is the implied nature of the employment contract. They will give you money, and in return you will perform certain duties, jobs and tasks. Keep in mind that there are usually time constraints applied to these functions such as “it needs to be done by…”. Get used to it. In this instance, pressure is the requirement to perform or deliver on those functions associated with your professional position.

Stress however is a different story. No job comes with stress. It is not inherent to the employment contract. It is something else.

Let’s start (as usual) with a definition:

“Stress is the body’s reaction to any change that requires an adjustment or response. The body reacts to these changes with physical, mental, and emotional responses. Stress is a normal part of life. You can experience stress from your environment, your body, and your thoughts. Even positive life changes such as a promotion, a mortgage, or the birth of a child produce stress.”

(https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/11874-stress)

This is a crucial distinction between Pressure and Stress. As I said, pressure is the requirement placed upon you to perform those requirements and functions associated with your job. Stress is how you (and your body) respond to those pressures. As you might guess different people react to different situations and pressures differently.

I’ll illustrate with a typical sports analogy. I watch professional golfers and I am usually in awe of them. Their job is to hit the golf ball, as few times as possible while putting it into the specific hole. It is not just their abilities, but also the level of their performance, and the stage on which they perform this job. It is not uncommon to see them standing on the green, alone with the entire tournament riding on their ability to make a single putt. Make it and they win, miss it and perhaps someone else wins. Hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of dollars ride on a single swing of any club.

Talk about pressure.

But that is what their job description entails. It is what they signed up for. Every stroke counts. At the end of the tournament you total them all up. Three hundred-yard drives and three-inch tap-in putts. They all count the same. The one with the lowest number wins. It is the most quantifiable of any job performance review. And they all want to be in the position where they control their own destiny with that one last swing of the putter and take home the trophy.

As a side note, there are no “participation trophies”. It’s quantitative as I said, in the extreme. You get what you earn.

Lee Trevino was a competitive professional golfer with his hey-day back in the 1970’s. He won twenty-nine professional tournaments during his career. He is famously quoted as saying “Putts get real difficult the day they hand out the money.” He also tells the story of how he personally learned to deal with that pressure.

He tells the story of standing over a putt and realizing that if he made it, he would win half a million dollars. And his hands started to shake. He stepped back and realized that if he missed the putt, he would still win a quarter of a million dollars. He then realized where he had come from and the heights that he had risen to, were a blessing. He had worked his way into the position where he got the opportunity to make a putt like this.

He also famously remarked that even if he missed the putt, winning a quarter of a million dollars was still pretty good, all things considered. I guess he made the putt since he never said in the story.

He put voice to what most golfers and people who work in general should feel. He was fortunate to be in the position to be under that type of pressure. He had worked hard for that opportunity.

However, this is not always the case in golf, or in business. There are many instances where professional golfers lose that innate ability to deal with the pressure. They begin to dread having to make “that putt”. In many of these instances this pressure manifests itself in the form of something called “the yips”.

“”Yips” is a term most often applied to a putting problem that afflicts some golfers. The term describes a nervous affliction in which the golfer putting cannot make short putts due to the inability to create a smooth putting stroke.”

(https://www.liveabout.com/what-are-yips-1561044)

It is symptomatic of a golfer who cannot, for whatever reason deal with the pressure of that situation. The pressure to perform has now become a stress.

It is when one begins to question their ability to perform and deal with the pressure associated with a situation that stress can occur. Just like some golfers who seem to thrive on the pressure of the big stage and the destiny defining putt, there are business people who also thrive under the pressure of the business opportunity. We all know them. The sales person trying to make the big sale before the end of the year, or the executive making the difficult decision on what to do next.

And there are those that for whatever reason, the job, the position, the situation, the boss, etc., who can struggle in those situations. Many times, it is not the job level or the responsibility. It is something else. The internal mechanism that handles the pressure of the role isn’t working.

The privilege of pressure in the role, the opportunity to get paid to do something they want to do, has become the curse of stress. It is usually associated with the fear of no longer being up to the task. All the training, preparation, and experience are sometimes not enough.

Pressure is something we all must live with, to one level or another. It can be as large as life altering events such as marriage, the birth of a child, or finding a new job, or as seemingly small as just staying in the appropriate lane on the road. Expectations and the pressure to perform and react accordingly accompany all of them.

I remember my parents telling me that driving was a privilege when I first got my driver’s license (a long, long time ago…). I also remember them telling me that if I didn’t perform appropriately on the road, I would not get to enjoy the privilege of driving for a while. After a while they realized that the loss of the driving privilege was a pressure they could apply to other activities and behaviors as well.

Like many other things in life, and on the job, it might not have seemed fair at the time, but it was the reality that had to be dealt with. Needless to say, I tried to modify my behavior (within reason of course, I still had to try and get away with some things) but by and large I did not find myself overly stressed associated with the added pressure associated with the privilege of driving. It was not an entitlement. It was indeed a privilege.

Pressure is always present. The pressure to perform. The pressure to get to work on time. The pressure to achieve. I have seen some managers who have elevated the application of pressure to their teams to a high art form.

I don’t think highly of this technique. And I really haven’t met any team member that has functioned in such an environment who thought highly of it either.

I think the key is to understand that pressure can be used as an internal motivator, as opposed to a stress generator. The new phrase to define this type of approach is “Lean Into It”, and it is defined:

“The act of embracing something, or a situation, by using it to empower yourself. To “lean into” something is to own it, to cast off disparagement. You move forward and deal with it with unhindered confidence, casting off concerns and cares.

Instead of letting a shortcoming hold you back, you find acceptance in the situation, perhaps even going as far as to pride yourself on it. “Leaning into it” may even imply doing more of the “thing” in question, or highlighting it, as a means to overpower it and have it no longer be deemed a weakness or unfortunate hangup.” https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Lean%20into%20it

I understand that it is far easier to say than do, but I keep coming back to what Lee Trevino said about missing the big putt. He had worked hard to get to where he was, and that despite missing, he still did pretty good. The best hitters in baseball still miss twice as often as they hit. Out of the one hundred plus golfers competing, only one wins on any given week, and half don’t even get to play on the weekend (they miss the “cut”).

Almost everyone has worked and performed under some sort of pressure to get to where they currently are. Because of that they get to continue to have the privilege of continuing to feel that pressure. I guess the key to it is to not allow it to stress you, but rather use it to drive you. You have to learn how to embrace it, because it is probably never going to go away.

Analysis, Challenge, Decisions, Humor, Leadership, Risk and Return

Low Hanging Fruit

There are many “executive speak” phrases that seem to dot the business vernacular landscape. I have talked about this before. Many of these phrases seem to have evolved due to the desire of managers to fill a void in a conversation by saying something without actually providing any valuable information. I liken these phrases in business communications as the nutritional equivalent of Pop Tarts to food. There are probably some calories for sustenance in there somewhere, and as a change of pace they are sweet and acceptable on occasion, but if you make a steady diet of them, it is probably bad for your health.

With that in mind, I can’t seem to help myself but to go after the one executive speak phrase that seems to continue to grow in popularity, never ceases to amaze me, and all the while driving me crazy at the same time. Am I the only one that must fight the urge to speak up and call people out when they hear the phrase “Low Hanging Fruit”?

I Googled the phrase, just to see if it was really there as well as to provide a relatively equal basis to start this discussion from. I don’t know what I really expected, but it definitely was not the relatively large number of hits that Google delivered. I guess it is even more ubiquitous that I suspected. I selected Dictionary.com as my initial source, since I seem to go to them quite often for just these types of definitions. They said:

low-hanging fruit
noun
1. the fruit that grows low on a tree and is therefore easy to reach
2. a course of action that can be undertaken quickly and easily as part of a wider range of changes or solutions to a problem first pick the low-hanging fruit
3. a suitable company to buy as a straightforward investment opportunity
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/low-hanging-fruit

Now, I get the first definition. There really can’t be any argument about it. It is logical and follows directly from the phrase. Its fruit and it is low to the ground. Got it. It is the second and to some extent the third definitions that I take issue with.

It is at times like this that I feel compelled to step up on any available soap box, set my feet approximately shoulder width apart for good balance and announce to all who might listen, what I like to call “Gobeli’s First Law of Low Hanging Fruit”. In this case, it goes like this:

“There is no such thing as low hanging fruit when it comes to business courses of action, or investment opportunities. Anybody who says there is, is trying to sell you something.”

It doesn’t seem to matter what the discussion is about, or which business discipline is being mentioned. Everybody seems to want to use the term “low hanging fruit”. At the risk of sounding like I am propellering off on some sort of a rant, I need to start out by saying, I just don’t get it.

The instances where I have witnessed the phrase low hanging fruit being used are relatively succinct: During a presentation. When implementing something new such as a new program, project or product. When describing in a new recovery plan because the last program, project or product failed to enable the attainment of the then described low hanging fruit.

The basic idea that is trying to be conveyed is that whatever is being attempted, is going to get off to a fast start because there are quickly and easily obtainable results, as definition number two above would indicate, that are available. This phrase is designed to get management agreement and approval for whatever is being discussed.

It also sounds good and seems to indicate that this should be a “Oh my gosh, how did I miss that!” kind of moment.

It implies that the person uttering the phrase either knows that much more or is that much smarter than everyone else associated with the then current discussion. It hints at that person having either mysteriously or miraculously unlocked some sort hidden business or universal truth or secret that will enable them to make the difficult, challenging, or here to fore unsuccessful, easily attainable and wildly successful in the future.

I will be the first to say that just because I have never witnessed a miracle does not mean that they do not happen. I will say however, that I have heard “we will first grab the low hanging fruit” exponentially more often than I have ever seen such fruit actually grabbed. This leads me to Gobeli’s Second Law of Low Hanging Fruit:

“There is no such thing as Low Hanging Fruit. There are a lot of very bright people around. If there ever was anything even resembling low hanging fruit, one of these very bright people has probably already been there and grabbed it.”

Most people who truly recognize the existence of low hanging fruit keep their mouths shut and just go get it. Once they get it they will then take a bow, and then usually indicate how much more difficult it will be to get any further fruit, thereby keeping management’s expectations somewhat in check for future fruit attainment forecasts.

They don’t go and broadcast or publish the existence and location of low hanging fruit. It is not up for debate or discussion. It is like “Dark Matter”. There is a lot of somewhat esoteric evidence (that only physicists seem to be able to understand) that it probably exists, but nobody (including said physicists) has actually found some and examined it. If low hanging fruit ever did exist, it was an immediate challenge and all out race to get it first. Once obtained, it is gone. If it continues to exist while remaining only slightly out of reach and requiring only a little more time or investment needed to obtain it, it was probably not low hanging fruit in the first place.

As I noted Low Hanging Fruit is a term that is usually used to try to convince someone to do something. My personal experience is that when the term has been used, it was usually used to try and convince someone to do the wrong thing. This leads me to Gobeli’s Third Law of Low Hanging Fruit:

“Low Hanging Fruit is a term that is used to make something look easy. Nothing in business is that easy. It takes a lot of smart people working hard, together to be successful in business.”

Everyone wants an easy answer. We have all been inured to it by our thirteen second soundbite television environment. Simple answers may sound simple, when in fact they are surprisingly complex and difficult to implement.

I understand that on occasion I can sound something like a skeptic. The good thing about being a skeptic is that it is relatively hard to be disappointed. I also like to remember the old adage: “If it sounds to good to be true, then it probably is.” This doesn’t seem to stop us from wanting low hanging fruit to be true, though.

There are inevitably other competing ideas and directions vying for management attention and blessing. Several of them also probably have their here to fore unidentified low hanging fruit out there just waiting to be grabbed as well. All that they need is the time, money and management blessing that is currently being sought.

To me, low hanging fruit is a myth. It will always take time, money, effort, determination and possibly even a little luck (as defined by the phrase “Luck is when preparation meets opportunity” – the Roman philosopher Seneca) for any initiative to be successful. The idea that success in business can be had as simply as wondering over and picking all the fruit off a tree that is within arm’s reach is not something that I have ever seen occur.

The theory of the Black Swan (just because you have never seen something does not mean it doesn’t exist. Swans were only thought to be white until black ones were actually discovered) suggests that such improbable events can occur. However, in all the world, up to this point, only one species of black swan has ever been discovered. And it does prove that there are indeed exceptions to just about every rule.

On the other hand, I have heard that we will be grabbing the low hanging fruit twice already today.

The only story regarding low hanging fruit that I think truly applies comes from the Bible, of all places. It involves a serpent, the first woman and low hanging fruit. It doesn’t seem that that one turned out very well either.

It doesn’t seem to stop us though, from looking for that supposedly easy win.

Alignment, Analysis, Challenge, Change, Communication, Humor

Transformation

Oh, how I long for the days when all we had to worry about was change. We didn’t know or worry about what it was we were changing into. We just knew it was going to be new and different, and hence better than what we currently were. Somewhere along the way, the way we changed, changed on us. Soon we had a changing rate of change in the way we changed. Eventually it was all just considered small change.

Now a days, no one changes. Change is so last century. Change is so passé. Change has changed, yet again. Today, changing is no longer good enough.

Instead of changing, you must now transform.

I think this is now the appropriate time to understand the vast difference in the definitions of these business terms. To the dictionary:

change
CHānj/

Verb: change;
1. make or become different.
“a proposal to change the law”
2. take or use another instead of.
“she decided to change her name”

Noun: change;
1. the act or instance of making or becoming different.
“the change from a nomadic to an agricultural society”
2. coins as opposed to paper currency.
“a handful of loose change”

In case you were wondering, I think I was able to use every one of those change definitions in some way, in the first paragraph. On the other hand:

trans·form
tran(t)sˈfôrm/

Verb: transform;
1. make a thorough or dramatic change in the form, appearance, or character of.
“lasers have transformed cardiac surgery”

Mathematics Linguistics
Noun: transform;
1. the product of a transformation.
a rule for making a transformation.

(In case any of you are wondering about this mathematic definition for transform, in physics, the Lorentz transforms are coordinate transformations between two coordinate frames that move at constant velocity relative to each other. This is the kind of stuff you learn in any basic mechanics class in physics.)

There you have it.

A change is just a change, but a transformation is a thorough and dramatic change.

I’m glad I was able to clear that up. I like to leave my readers enriched for having read my posts, and this little nugget alone is probably worth the time spent reading, at least up to this point.

Below are a pair of Google based graphs of the use of the words “Change” and “Transform” over time. (I didn’t realize that Google had a function like this, but I think it is pretty neat, and will probably use it again in the future.) As you can see, the use and popularity of “Transform” has grown rapidly in recent times. I attribute this (although I have no way to directly measure it, but based on the nominal usage that of “transform” that I hear, I would believe it to be true) to the vast increase in the use of the word “Transform” in all written documents, articles, presentations, etc., etc., etc. associated with business in the last few years.

And as you can also see “Change” has been a generally more widely used term (with some recent growth – probably due to the number of people looking up and defining the difference between “Change” and “Transform”) until recently, where “Transform” appears to now be the more preferred descriptor (at least when it comes to business).

Change

Transform

One thing that can said about business: When it finds a new term that it likes, it will definitely over-use it.

Despite the similarity of the definitions, I do think that there may be some subtle differences in the connotations that each word evokes. Change, at least to me, speaks of moving from what you are, into some as yet undefined state. As I noted earlier, you may not know exactly what the change will entail, or what the end state of the change is, but you do know it will be different.

Transformation, again at least to me, speaks of moving to a little more defined end state. There is a target and a method to the change, or at least there should be. It implies that the target result of the thorough change is known and the while the required steps to get there may not be fully defined, at least the end state is.

Or at least it should be. The key is always going to be trying to convince those that you want to transform that you really do have an idea of what you want them to transform into, as well as plans for the steps to get there.

Knowing what you want to transform to, but not knowing how to get there, would seem to be only slightly better, if at all, than knowing and expecting to change, but not knowing what it is you will become.

Wow, I think I may have just propellered off into existentialism on that last discussion of change and transformation.

However, this discussion could help answer the question: When do you Transform, and when do you merely Change? I think the answer lies closer to the idea that you transform when you have an idea about what you want to become. You transform from an analog to a digital company. You transform to a cloud based solution.

It just doesn’t have the same ring, or gravitas to say you are changing to a digital company, or you are changing to a cloud based solution.

You change in response to a stimulus acting on a business. You transform in anticipation of the stimulus acting on the business.

I went and searched on the keys to changing. Aside from a lot of musical notation associated with when to use the tonic and how to change keys, most of the statements associated with change centered on two words: Courage and Fear. The courage to change and the conquering of the fear of change.

Perhaps that is the reason for the current popularity associated with Transform instead of change. People seem to need Courage to change, while I don’t nearly so associate Transformation as a courage requiring activity. People need to conquer their fear of change as a prerequisite to a successful change. Again, it would seem that the connotation of transformation does not invoke nearly as much fear in the participants.

It would seem that Transform is now the public relations equivalent of Change. More of a kinder, gentler version of change. It has all of the good aspects of change and not nearly so much of the bad. It would seem that changing (or transforming, if you prefer) “Change” to “Transform” is much along the same lines as when the United States Federal government changed (or transformed) the Department of War into the Department of Defense in 1949.

It functions much the same, but it just sounds better.

Again, perhaps because transformation implies a more directed process and end result, where change appears to be a little more undefined and open ended. And few in business like to be the one that is the first to venture into an as yet open ended and undefined future.

Accountability, Achievement, Analysis, Challenge, Change, Process, Process Management

The Nimble Process

I have read that there have been many claimed sightings of the nimble process in business these days. they usually occur in small out of the way places, and by possibly dubious sources. When the reports of these sightings first come in they are usually confused and somewhat contradictory. Sometimes the questionable sighting is just attributed to the reliability of the witness claiming to have seen it. Whenever there is an examination of the data associated with the sighting, the results are invariable inconclusive. The hunt for conclusive evidence goes on.

In short, confirming the existence of the nimble process may have become the business equivalent of trying to confirm the existence of Big Foot, the Yeti, or the Loch Ness Monster. There are plenty of people who have claimed to have seen them, but there just isn’t that much reliable evidence around to actually confirm their existence.

If we are going to look for, and discuss the nimble process, we need to start with some simple definitions. Where else but the dictionary can you go to get really good definitions:

Nimble [nim-buhl] Adjective: quick and light in movement; moving with ease; agile; active; rapid http://www.dictionary.com/browse/nimble

Process [pros-es; especially British proh-ses] Noun: a systematic series of actions directed to some end: a continuous action, operation, or series of changes taking place in a definite manner: http://www.dictionary.com/browse/process?s=t

As can quickly surmise, a nimble process is what is known in many circles as an oxymoron.

Oxymoron [ok-si-mawr-on, -mohr-] Noun: a figure of speech by which a locution produces an incongruous, seemingly self-contradictory effect, as in “cruel kindness”, “jumbo shrimp” or “to make haste slowly.”. http://www.dictionary.com/browse/oxymoron?s=ts
(I threw in the jumbo shrimp one myself, mainly because a really like it for illustrative purposes. The other two were actually in the definition.)

The primary difference between a nimble process and other oxymorons is that there are verifiable instances of the other oxymorons existing in the real world. You can in fact go to the local grocery store or food market and purchase jumbo shrimp. They are in the bin next to the merely “large shrimp”. The search for the nimble process however, continues to go on.

As noted in their definitions, nimbleness is defined as quick and light in movement, and process is defined as a systematic series of actions, and operation…in a definite manner. Businesses yearn to be able to operate with quick and light movements in a definite manner. This is the big foot / yeti / Loch Ness monster that almost every organization is searching for. The ability to define almost every conceivable option in a process, and the ability to execute on any one of them almost immediately.

Personally, I think there is a greater probability of big foot calling and holding a news conference for the purpose of confirming its own existence.

Process is the defining of specific steps and alternatives. I have written in the past about the fact that process is designed to help generate repeatable results by removing judgement as a variable in the business process. Since almost everyone in business has different types and levels of judgement, it has been identified as a variable that can somewhat be controlled by process. If you define the process steps, you inherently reduce the need for judgement. If all your steps and alternatives are thus defined, what is the use in being nimble in the execution of them?

As more and more process is implemented into the business environment the supposed need for the ability to adapt to new opportunities, or issues, should also be reduced. If this was indeed the case there would be no need for being nimble at all. You would merely continue to increment in new steps to the process until every alternative would be covered.

This is what appears to be the business goal of what happening today.

Processes grow ever bigger and more complex as people strive for that process that can be applied to every situation. Instead of focusing on solutions, focus has shifted to how the process will need to be incremented or modified so that it will generate an acceptable solution.

Nimble is normally associated with the ability to perform the most of complex movements with speed and grace. It is the ability to change and adjust spontaneously to changing issues and inputs. It is moving lightly and actively as opposed to moving passively in a prescribed manner. It is in effect the basic opposite of process.

The only way to make a process more nimble and agile, especially when it comes to issues and events that have no current response defined within the process, is to reduce the intensity of the process.

As processes become more detailed and refined they become more rigid. The more prescribed actions and directions that are contained in a process, the less agile and nimble it becomes. The more judgement that is taken out of the hands of those implementing the process the more fixed and ingrained it becomes.

Judgement, or the lack of it, is an excellent indicator of both an individual’s and organizations ability to adapt and adjust to changes in its environment. It is indicative of the search for the nimble process in that as organizations implement more processes in an effort to remove performance variations, the environment that they must operate in continues to become more variable and to change at a faster rate.

Process, via its fixed step connotation as it is implemented, reduces an organizations ability to adapt to its variable and changing environment.

Still, the search goes on.

There are an ever-growing number of television shows dedicated to the search for finding proof positive regarding bigfoot. There is the show “Finding Bigfoot”. There is “Mountain Monsters”. Heck, even the guy who used to show us how to survive in the wilderness for a week or two with nothing but a multi-tool and some dental floss has given up his show “Survivor” and is now out there looking for bigfoot.

It appears that shows about finding what has to this point proven to be unfindable are entertaining and are generating an ever-increasing following.

Like-wise it appears that there continues to be an ever-increasing drive to create the ever more nimble process by draining the requirements for judgement and flexibility from those who most need, and must utilize those attributes. What really worries me is that there are so many who are comfortable with this ceding of their judgement to the process.

As long as it is easier, and now safer, to follow the steps in a process instead of thinking, using judgement, and possibly being wrong, business risks the continued petrification (a long-term process) of their processes. If business continues to drive judgement out of its staff’s lexicon in favor of process and predictability, then business will continue to become very predictable in its inability to demonstrate any nimbleness or agility.

It’s time to change the meaning of the word “process”. Process, as it is used in business today, is used as a noun describing a fixed methodology for performing actions. It appears that if true nimbleness is desired, many of the prescribed actions need to be removed from the current “by rote” methodology, and process will need to adopt one of its other dictionary definitions:

Process verb: to integrate sensory information received so that an action or response is generated: the brain processes visual images relayed from the retina.
to subject to examination or analysis: computers process data https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/process

The idea here is to take the input associated with the situation and generate a proper response, not follow a preconceived fixed in place response associated with a “process”. Instead of having people merely follow a prescribed set of responses in a process, businesses need to require their people to be smart, examine and analyze the information and input available, process it, and then act in accordance with their resulting judgements and less rigid business guidelines, not prescriptions.

I think therein lies the direction to the nimble process.

Instead of trying to create a process that takes every possible business and market permutation into account, businesses need to scale back the rigor associated with their processes, and require more of their team members. I don’t think that thinking is a lost art in business, yet. The more people that think and exercise judgement the faster a business can respond to new threats and opportunities.

Processes need to become a little more general, and a little less specific for nimbleness to take hold. The more complex the process is, invariably the slower it is to change, be changed and react to new and different circumstances.

There may in fact be a variation in performance as a result of the reduction in the prescribed steps in a process. As I said, not everybody’s judgement is the same. However, if there is as much variation and change in the market (see just about every article ever written about the status and stability of every market, for confirmation of this idea) as noted, then the increased ability to adapt to and deal with this change should in general generate more positive variations than negative ones.

And after all, isn’t positive performance the objective of any process?

Alignment, Alternatives, Analysis, Challenge, Efficiency, Speed

Good, Cheap, Fast – Pick Two

This has been a well-known conundrum in business for quite some time. There are always three variables associated with getting the product or service that you want. The variables are Quality, Price and Speed. They are normally associated with the words Good, Cheap and Fast. The conventional question has always been that you cannot get all three variables at high levels at any specific time. If that indeed is a limitation, the question arises: If you are a vendor or supplier dealing with your customers, which two of the Good, Cheap and Fast variables do you choose when delivering your products and services?

As a customer, the simplest answer has always been to demand all three variables, and to demand them immediately. They want the lowest price, the fastest delivery and the best quality. They want it now and please don’t argue. We have all been there. However, even the most demanding of customers recognize that this is usually only an opening gambit and that there will always be negotiations associated with what is actually obtained and when it is to be delivered.

In the past customer hierarchy of desirable product attributes, Quality has ruled as king. The higher the quality, the more reliable the product, the better the customer liked it. They would possibly make concessions to either Cheap and Fast, if they got the best Good there was.

If Quality, or Good, was the given, then the customer (and vendor) needed to decide which other variable, Price or Speed was going to be sacrificed. I think that history will show that for the most part it was speed. (In support of this position I will submit that almost all product and productivity focus in the last few generations of products have been on how to take time out of the equation). Even the axiomatic statements associated with business in general refer to the fact that the pace of change within business has been accelerating.

That meant that a good customer would wait for a good product, and that they would get at a good price.

Those were the days. That does not seem to be the case anymore.

As I just noted, everything about business has accelerated. Cycle times for everything from product development to customer billing have been reduced. No one wants to wait for anything anymore. What was once fast or accelerated is now the new normal. Full speed is now the minimum accepted and if you expect to get ahead you had better figure out how to go even faster. They want it all now.

We have become an immediate gratification society.

What was once saved for, and purchased later, is now purchased today on credit, and paid for later.

So, if this increased focus on Speed, or Fast, is the new primary given requirement (instead of Quality, or Good) for driving customer satisfaction, then which of the two, Good and Cheap, will be the second factor chosen in the customer purchase decision? (remember, the axiom of you can only have two of the three variables at any time still pretty much holds in reality – or does it….) One would suspect that since Quality was so important in the past that it would also be of high importance today. That would leave cheap as the odd variable out.

That would also mean that customers want their products and services Fast and Good, and would hence be willing to pay the requisite higher price associated with this variable selection.

I do not know about you, but it has been a very long time since I have dealt with a customer that is willing to pay more for anything, regardless of speed and quality.

I think the reality is that price is still king. It is very difficult to sell a higher price versus a competitive product regardless of the speed and quality delivered. It can be done, but you are starting out at a significant competitive disadvantage if you start with a higher price than your competition.

As I have noted in the past Good in the business vernacular has been replaced by “Good Enough”. As product life cycles have become shorter (there’s “Fast” again) and prices have come down as components, support, warranties and service have been reduced (there’s “Cheap” again), Good has been reduced down to Good Enough to compensate.

The answer to the Good, Fast and Cheap, pick two conundrum in today’s business environment is now Fast and Cheap.

How quickly can the product be in the market? It has to be fast because there will be another, better competing product put out by a competitor soon enough. It better be cheap because customers most likely won’t buy a more expensive product, regardless of any (temporary) advantages. As for quality? That’s now a given. It is almost impossible to differentiate in the market based on a quality variable. Almost all manufacturers in just about any given market can be viewed as having a high-quality parity.

Today, if a company is not viewed as having a high / acceptable quality level in its products, they won’t be surviving for very long.

As an example, look at automobiles. Manufacturers have tiered the market into sub-markets based on car size (e.g. Sub-compact, compact, mid-size, etc.). Many manufacturers have created specific models to address and compete in each specific market tier.

The model for buying a car has “Fast” as a given, since I don’t know anyone willing to wait for a specific car to be manufactured for them – they want to drive off the lot in their new car when they buy it, not at some later time. That leaves Price and Quality as the final negotiation variables. I think Quality for the most part is also a given since now almost all cars come with similar warranties, usually somewhere between six and ten years. If you don’t believe Quality is a given in cars, try negotiating a longer warranty for your car as a term of the purchase agreement.

Let me know how that works out for you.

That essentially leaves Price as the next (only) selected variable in your car purchase decision. The starting price can vary a little, based on the feature set that the car is equipped with (X, SX, LX, etc.), but even that is limited. Fast (you want to drive off in it) and Cheap (you don’t want to pay anything more than you absolutely have to), are the criteria.

Fast and Cheap. That’s it. That’s where we are in business.

Now there may be other variables that you input into the decision criteria such as the car must have an appealing design. This is a matter of personal taste. Car companies spend incredible amounts of money in creating appealing designs for each of their cars. Car companies also spend incredible amounts of money advertising these appealing designs with the objective of convincing you that theirs is the most appealing, (Mazda has gone so far as to create a commercial showing what I suppose is a sculptor, sculpting the latest appealing design of their latest car model) and hence getting you to come to their dealership where you can negotiate the price and then drive off in that appealing (work of art) car.

There are always exceptions to every rule in business. That is also probably also a rule of business as well. However, when putting together a strategy on how to attack a market in general, and to pursue specific customers on an individual basis, with quality now thought of as a given in the market where “Good Enough” is now good enough, focusing on speed and price will most likely provide the best competitive advantage.

Answering questions as to how quickly the solution can be acquired and more importantly implemented will be a differentiator. Price, more so than almost ever before will be a decision driver. With almost all products now being viewed as easily interchangeable, why would a customer pay more for anything?

I remember the good old days where management would blithely tell the sales team to sell “quality” when their market price was higher than the competition. Management would say reference the product’s “quality” when there was a delay in product availability.

Now if a product takes too long to arrive in the market, or the price is too high, the opportunity is most likely lost. It doesn’t matter what management will want to tell the sales team. A competitor will have a substitutable product available when the customer wants it at a price they can afford.

Times have changed. Quality was once a product differentiator. It is probably not anymore. Of all the resources available to everyone, time is the only one that we cannot readily get any more of. Hence Speed has become the new prime differentiator. With Quality a given, and speed a differentiator, that leaves Price as a decision driver.

Customers might pay a little more for a preferred product, but that differential is closing fast. The more expensive you are versus the competition, the more disadvantaged you are. There will always come a point where the Price differential will always outweigh any Speed or Quality advantages. That Price differential point is always moving closer and closer to the Cheapest solution.

Activities, Challenge, Decision Making, Humor, Problem Solving

Engineering Solutions

There can be no question that engineers are one of the cornerstones of any successful technology oriented business organization. It doesn’t matter if they are hardware, software, electrical, mechanical, chemical or even civil engineers. Their role and importance cannot be overstated. We need to be very clear about that. I will try to walk the fine line of discussing the work of engineers in business without sliding into the realm of picking on engineers in business. Wish me luck.

It has been said:

“With great power comes great responsibility”

The origin of this quote is attributed to two wildly different sources: Voltaire, the eighteenth-century philosopher, and Uncle Ben, the Spiderman character, not the instant rice one. Both are acknowledged as saying something close but not quite like this, hence the somewhat open-ended attribution.

If I have a choice I’m going with Uncle Ben. Just because I haven’t seen that many entertaining movies about Voltaire and the French Enlightenment. However, I am sure that Marvel Comics will eventually get around to it. Probably after Thor – Thirteen, or some such time.

Mark Twain however, is widely acknowledged as the source of this quote:

“To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”

I believe the modern technology equivalent of this statement is now:

“To an engineer, every question looks like it needs an engineering solution.”

Herein is where we get to the topic of engineering solutions. Engineers have a great power and responsibility when it comes to finding solutions to today’s customer based technological opportunities. A solution usually cannot be created, or implemented without them. Somebody usually has to put them together, and that somebody is usually an engineer.

Engineers have been trained starting in school to create the best solution. It usually entails a single variable. The strongest solution. The highest. The most secure. The longest. The tallest. Very seldom is there a scale or constraint added where there is some sort of trade off versus another variable. This can have a tendency to be the mindset that engineers use when creating real world solutions.

But even in this high technology, engineering dependent environment, it must be remembered that engineering is only part of the solution, not the entire solution. We are no longer in a time where a president can challenge a country to reach a goal, and the engineers can spend whatever is necessary to reach it. Doing things because they are difficult is a great challenge, but doing them within a budget is even a greater challenge.

About this time, I will have lost all readers that have an engineering degree, an engineering role or even just an engineering predilection. To mention that there are items other than engineering that are important to customer solutions, in their eyes can border on blasphemy. Unfortunately, that is the business world that we now live in. I have talked about this evolution before. It is the transition from the best solution, to the solution that is good enough. This idea is likely to drive engineers crazy.

Little things like money, time and resources must also be taken into account when creating a customer centric solution. This is because, contrary to standard engineering thought, the customer does not necessarily want the best engineered solution. They want the best solution that matches their money, time and resource constraints.

Engineers must be continually reminded of these real-world business constraints: money, time and resources. Otherwise it is not uncommon for them to develop the ultimate engineered solution, that is wholly implausible or unimplementable in the real world. It may be the best technical solution, but there will be very few that can afford to buy and implement it.

When engineering customer solutions, it is best not to think in terms of “absolutes”. Words like the “greatest”, “most” and “best” need modifiers otherwise engineers have a tendency to take them as literal objectives and work to them accordingly. This can result in some of the most elegantly over-engineered solutions imaginable.

Pareto Analysis is a statistical technique in decision-making used for the selection of a limited number of tasks that produce significant overall effect. It uses the Pareto Principle (also known as the 80/20 rule) the idea that by doing 20% of the work you can generate 80% of the benefit of doing the entire job. (https://www.projectsmart.co.uk/pareto-analysis-step-by-step.php)

Many think that it was the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto who created the Eighty – Twenty rule. To a certain extent this is somewhat true. Pareto first observed that 80% of income in Italy was received by 20% of the Italian population. However, it was management thinker Joseph M. Juran who actually suggested the principle and its far wider applications. Because of Pareto’s observation and work, the technique was named for him. (https://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/397/80-20-rule-pareto-principle/)

Business, in all its simplest forms, is about investment and return. How much you put in versus how much you get out. This is the basis for employment decisions (if the company thinks that a person will generate more value for the company than the company will have to pay that person in compensation, then the company makes the hiring decision), and it is that way in purchasing decisions (amount paid versus expected return), and it needs to be that way in generating customer solutions.

Customers are not blessed with infinite resources. As I have said, in many instances they cannot afford to pay for what may be considered the “best” solution. Time and money always come into play for them. How much must they pay for each solution? What definable value does the solution generate (reduced costs, increased sales, etc.)? When would they expect to see these returns (the sooner the better)?

Engineers are excellent at the quantifiable. It is the nature of their work. However, if left unchecked they do have a tendency to view costs, time and resources more as “variables” instead of “constraints”. This is where business and leadership reinforcement is required.

When working with engineers, boundaries and constraints are a necessity. An upper limit on costs must be set. This can be in the form of a specific number (The cost cannot exceed…) or a derived relationship (the customer requires a pay-back period of….) based on costs, value generated and specific time frames. This will enable the engineer to modify various combinations of these business variables, but also provide a limiting constraint on the solution.

This customer pay-back period can also be used to help generate the value limit as well. If as Pareto has asserted that first eighty percent of the value can usually be derived with the first twenty percent of the effort, then it should follow that each additional amount of engineering effort (or any effort for that matter) will only provide a continually decreasing return. If the desired customer pay-back is based on returns and time, there is a limit as to what can be engineered within the constraint. Only so much can be done before the cost or pay-back period are exceeded.

It should be noted that not all engineers are so single-mindedly focused on engineering solutions. I have had the opportunity to work with several who understood that good customer solutions are the result of many, sometimes opposing forces in the solution creation process. These are the engineers that have recognized that real world issues and solutions have both a cost and a value associated with them.

A few final comments and observations on the engineering of solutions:

The optimist will look a glass that is half full of water and say that it is indeed half full.

The pessimist will look at the same glass and say that it is in fact half empty.

The engineer will look at it and say the glass is twice as big as it should be, and will set about trying to engineer a smaller glass that will be much more efficient in the holding of that specific amount of water.

Before they are allowed to do that, it is best to check to make sure that the customer wasn’t all that thirsty to begin with, and the amount in the glass is all the water that they wanted at this time. It might actually save more time, money and effort than the solution the engineer would create.

There are probably many engineers that would like to argue this point of view. I have found that for an engineer, the next best thing to trying to engineer the best solution to a problem, is to argue about what is the best engineered solution to a problem. For those of you that have not had the opportunity to argue with an engineer, this is a good time to remember the following quote:

“Arguing with an engineer is a lot like wrestling in the mud with a pig, after a couple of hours you realize the pig likes it.” (anonymous).

Analysis, Challenge, Experience, Learning

Write It Down

A very small event occurred yesterday. On the surface, it usually doesn’t mean much, but I try to recognize them anyway. The pen I had been using to take notes on my activities and calls with, to jot down ideas with, and to work out solutions with, ran out of ink. As I said, on the surface, it didn’t mean much other than I had written down enough stuff that I had exhausted the ink cartridge in one of those disposable pens that I like to use. And as I said, it was a little thing, but I noticed it.

So, why am I writing about such a seemingly innocuous topic?

I learned long ago, back in college, in a time long before Personal Computers, that the quality of what I was able to learn, retain and utilize was directly related to what I wrote down. It was just me, but writing something helped me get it.

This of course was then the only way to capture information when taking notes in a lecture. This was a time before smart phones that enabled you to play Angry Birds video games in class while they recorded the entire lecture for you to peruse at some later time when you weren’t so focused on something else. It was a time when the professor’s words were ephemeral. They were spoken and then they were gone.

I found that intently listening was not good enough. If I physically wrote them down I not only captured them on paper, I captured them much better in my own mind. Revisiting the notes was always useful when it came time to study, but it was the initial writing down of the information that provided the most value.

When it came time for studying, I found that annotating those already written notes, in effect rewriting them, helped me prepare that much better. Somehow the act of writing helped me learn and retain information that much better.

When I told some of my friends about this study and retention technique, they looked at me like I was from another planet. I still used it anyway.

I thought about this idea, which is no mean feat for a then teenager. I wondered if the simple act of writing down concepts and notes as they pertain to lectures was such an aid to my learning and retention, would it also work with my academic reading load?

Till then I, like most of my student peers, just used a highlighter to highlight those passages in text books that I thought were important. I then tried taking notes on the textbook assignments I had instead of just the typical highlighting. It seemed to work as well. At least for me, it worked. I retained and was able to utilize the information far better than when I just read and highlighted it.

These realizations drove several changes in my behavior that still stay with me today. Whenever I need to learn and retain something I write it down. I learned that I no longer wanted lose-leaf binders and discrete sheets of paper. Paper would become ragged and eventually tear and fall out. I wanted permanently bound composition notebooks so the notes would always be there.

I didn’t want large, full sheet sized notebooks as they were prone to succumbing to the abuse that repeated access would cause, nor did I want the small note card sized ones as those did not allow for sufficient information per page. Hard cardboard or plastic covers were also desirable.

The simple act of my pen running out of ink got me to thinking about all of this learning, and retention and utilization of information. I wondered if it was just me or did others utilize this practice. I noticed that some of my now professional peers in the office also had notebooks, although many did not. As PCs have continued to proliferate, this notebook habit seems to be rarer and rarer.

I have tried to replace my notebooks with my PC. There are a couple of things holding me back. First, although I took typing in high school, I am still basically a “two-finger” typist. If I really get going, the number might expand to four, but never approaches the ultimate of using all ten fingers. The second is, that when I used the PC instead of the notebook, I didn’t retain the information nearly as well. It just didn’t work as well as writing it down for me.

I wondered if this was just me, or if others had found the same thing, so I Googled it. By the way, I continue to find it interesting how in this language a proper noun, the name of a company, can become a verb. Sort of like how having a “party” has now morphed into “partying”. I guess this is also the origin of “Xeroxing” as well.

Sorry. I digressed.

I searched “information retention from writing”. Holy smokes. A ton of stuff came up, supporting and detailing just what I have been talking about.

“A Learning Secret: Don’t Take Notes with a Laptop” https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-learning-secret-don-t-take-notes-with-a-laptop/

“Why Using Pen And Paper, Not Laptops, Boosts Memory: Writing Notes Helps Recall Concepts, Ability To Understand” http://www.medicaldaily.com/why-using-pen-and-paper-not-laptops-boosts-memory-writing-notes-helps-recall-concepts-ability-268770

“Take Notes by Hand for Better Long-Term Comprehension” https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/take-notes-by-hand-for-better-long-term-comprehension.html

“Writing by hand strengthens the learning process. When typing on a keyboard, this process may be impaired.” https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/01/110119095458.htm

These are just some of the articles that came up on the first page, and they are predominantly from the last ten years or so. They also seem to deal with the difference in learning between typing and writing, although the last couple do deal with the cognitive and comprehension benefits of writing something down.

This was just the first page. Google said there was something on the order of one hundred and twenty-one million results to my search. Judging by the first hits, I am going to guess that the rest will be rather supportive of the position.

That position, as you might guess, is write it down.

Ah, but there are probably some out there that are at least thinking to themselves that this is all well and good, and after all this discussion about the value of writing things down, does he “write” down his blogs and then transcribe them on the computer? The answer is no. I do not. I actually compose at the computer.

I have thought about this as well.

The best description of the difference that I can come up with is that when I want to learn and retain information, I write it down. I am trying to take external information and internalize it. Writing it down is part of the process that helps me do this more efficiently.

On the other hand, when I am trying to take thoughts and information that are already internalized and express them, I find that the keyboard is actually a faster methodology. I can compose better at the keyboard.

It seems that at least in this cognitive approach technology has the benefit of improving the expression of the written word, but not so much the learning or retention of the information that it represents.

We all like to think of ourselves as somewhat unique. However, there are many things that we have in common. Understanding how we learn is something of a baseline that can also help us understand how we work, and more importantly how we can work better.

As business continues to increase in complexity and velocity, we have more and more information that we need to find ways to internalize that much faster. I think we need to understand that the tools that we employ, at least for me, are best utilized at helping in the expressing of our ideas. The taking of what we have and providing it to others.

On the other side of the same coin though, they are probably not so much good in the process of learning and utilizing of the ideas and information that others have provided via the same medium.

I think this is a point that needs to be remembered going forward. Computers and all the other forms of automation and intelligence that are out there, are better applied as capabilities that enable us to express the information that we have already internalized, but they are not nearly so good, or so helpful in aiding us in the understanding or internalizing of the information that they provide us.

If you really want to learn something, all the data and the research says that one of the best ways to do it is to write it down.

I think I’ll go get another disposable pen out of the pack now.