But You Can’t Just Improve Something That’s 450 Years Old – Or Can You?

I was saying the “Hail Mary” aloud with a relatively new convert to Catholicism. It’s a common prayer among Catholics that asks for the intercession of Mary. The prayer ends with the line, “pray for us sinners NOW AND AT the hour of (our) death.” This particular part was added in the mid 1500’s.

We had just finished the prayer when she announced, “That’s not how I say it.”

For whatever reason, when learning the prayer through hearing it, she understood the final line as, “pray for us sinners, NOW UNTIL the hour of (our) death.” While I shared the “correct” words (which she subsequently verified in a prayer book because she didn’t believe me), on the surface, her wording is much more comforting. Having someone pray for you from “now until,” adds up to a lot more praying on your behalf than “now and at” which, strictly defined, translates into two prayers.

So here’s an interesting situation - every Catholic for the past 450 years has learned a common prayer one way, but a single person, through a misunderstanding, has created a unique version that seems better than the original.

Not sure what to do about this (especially since we missed getting this information to the Pope when he was in the U.S. recently), other than to offer this suggestion: just because something has stood the test of time doesn’t mean that a fortunate mistake couldn’t improve it.

I Only Paint When the Walls Are Bare

Last weekend, I finished the first large painting I’ve done in more than a decade. This was prompted by the prospect of losing a cool Howard Finster print that’s been in my office for years at work. I learned of the possibility on a Friday and by Saturday night, I’d purchased a canvas, new paints and brushes, and was gridding out a Peanuts cartoon to do a painting in Tom Everhart’s style.

While painting, I thought about the very productive bursts of artistic creativity followed by long droughts that have marked my life. I’ve always attributed the periods to major life changes (going to grad school, getting married, buying a house), but it doesn’t explain other creative periods, i.e. a tremendous output early in high school and doing a lot of cartooning the past few years – much of it on paper table cloths in Italian restaurants!

It struck me finally that the creative bursts were explained by bare walls - what triggered the output was the need to fill empty space. In each case, I’d moved into a new space with walls needing to be decorated. Some walls have been physical; others have been non-traditional – refrigerators, presentations, blogs. In each case, once the “walls” have been filled, my artistic spark has vanished.

Interestingly, the spark doesn’t come back when a previously bare wall becomes empty again. There’s a big bare area over our mantel where one of my paintings used to hang, yet there’s no inspiration to fill this empty space yet again.

My lesson from all this is that there are different types of creativity patterns. I appear to be a “utilitarian creative.” I don’t ooze artistic creativity all the time as many do. Instead, my creative juices get going only when there’s a clear need and application for the output. So in the future, when I hit a creative block, I’ll just have to find new bare walls to fill.

Change Your Character – Letting Cheerleaders Support Your Team

It can be daunting to build excitement within a team that’s faced with maddening business challenges. Fortunately, if you face such a situation, you can delegate your duty to a cheerleading squad to help you out in the ways that only a cheerleader can by:

• Exhibiting a winning spirit
• Being a great team member and leader
• Going to camps & clinics to improve their performance
• Dressing in team colors
• Inviting people to join with them in the cheers
• Focusing on motivating others – both the team and the audience
• Smiling all the time
• Using a variety of talents to perform the cheers
• Performing catchy, easy to remember cheers
• Cheering for the team, no matter what
• Having cheers suited to specific situations
• Including a mascot as part of the squad
• Being active during the game and during time outs

O – K.
For each idea above,
Gimme three ways,
The squad will cheer your team up,
On any tough day!
YEAH!!!

Note – for the previous post on how to use the Change Your Character technique, click here.

North Coast Music Update from The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

I visited The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame last week after many trips through Cleveland the past four and a half years. Amid some cool rock history artifacts, the music and videos stood out as the museum’s most engaging aspects compared to the static exhibits – not surprising since rock music has never been about peace, quiet, and tranquility.

Of all the video clips, the one that gave me unbelievable chills was a snippet from an induction ceremony concert. It was a performance of “My Guitar Gently Weeps.” Here was a non-Lennon-McCartney Beatles song written by George Harrison performed by Tom Petty with Prince doing the incredible guitar solo originally created by Eric Clapton.

Prince owns the second half of the song, taking the solo away from Clapton just as Clapton has done so many times to other performers. And at the end, he throws his guitar in the air, smugly walking off stage because he knows exactly what he just did.

There is incredible power in creative diversity. Check out this video, because creativity doesn’t get much more diverse or powerful than this!

Offered without Comment - The Impact of Good Strategic Thinking

Built for DIscomfort

Does you work group repeatedly gravitate toward the familiar when new possibilities are considered? If that’s so, here’s an alternative prioritization approach that could help break the cycle. It’s a typical four box prioritization grid, but with a twist.

Use “ease of implementation” for one axis, with a range of “simple” to “complex” to implement. On the other axis, instead of the more typical “expected benefit,” use the “level of comfort with the idea” and a “very” to “not very” scale (as shown in the diagram). Having your group prioritize ideas in this way opens up new areas of discussion on tendencies you have to prefer familiar ideas.

For simple, but uncomfortable ideas, focus on understanding what creates the discomfort. For uncomfortable ideas that are more complex to implement, probe on whether there’s long-term potential that could create competitive advantage (or look for ways to implement the idea with greater ease). The key with both cells is getting to the heart of the discomfort. Is it because there are significant flaws in the idea or is it really because the idea is new, challenging, and unfamiliar? If it’s the latter, that’s often a clear sign that the idea could yield tremendous potential for customers who aren’t part of inertia inside a company that thwarts developing new products and services.

For ideas seen as very comfortable, the vital question is how to inject new features and benefits that make them more viable yet potentially increase internal discomfort.

Try this approach and see what it does to move your group toward possibilities that represent more dramatic market changes and impacts.

Change Your Character – Managing Multiple Priorities As an Air Traffic Controller Would

Air traffic controllers shoulder tremendous public safety responsibilities. They have to process various information sources and flawlessly coordinate many airplanes trying to move through the same airspace.

Change “airplanes” to “priorities” and “airspace” to “resources,” and it all of a sudden sounds a lot like having to manage competing priorities in business.

To get a few new ideas, delegate your project and priority management challenges to an air traffic controller and see how they’d handle it. Shoot for 3 new ideas from each method below that air traffic controllers use:

• Undergo rigorous training & certification
• Employ a specific organizational method
• Follow rules to keep things separated from one another and avoid conflicts
• Remaining flexible while applying the rules
• Incorporate & process information from various sources
• Maintain an orderly flow of activity
• Communicate precisely
• Communicate regularly with everyone in their areas of responsibility
• Speak in special terms & language known by participants
• Display exceptional listening skills
• Visualize what they’re controlling
• Continually monitor each element of a situation without overly focusing on any single one
• Focus on preventing potential future problems
• Take breaks to deal with stress and to refresh their perspectives
• Stay current by practicing / using their skills regularly

Note – for the previous post on how to use the Change Your Character technique, click here.

Good Marketing’s Where You Find it

Having gone through a duty free area at a foreign airport recently, there was some great store planning in evidence:

• Every traveler had to go through the duty free shop immediately after the security checkpoint – there was no getting around it.
• It was very bright with lots of room to branch off and shop.
• There were very visible sales clerks in brightly colored outfits (you guessed it – they were orange!)
• The luxury items (perfume & liquor) were right inside the door, getting your attention early while you were still orienting yourself from security and had the most money to spend.
• Toys and other kids’ items were located at the far end of the store, so kids didn't get distracted early and potentially frustrate parental shopping efforts until right before checkout.
• You had to walk through nearly the entire store before the first opportunity to exit.

It was a strong use of place to generate sales opportunities. How can you apply these lessons directly if you’re in a placed-related business or indirectly, if you’re not, to create more stickiness in your marketing and sales efforts?

Subtle Forms of Censorship

When brainstorming, we talk about not censoring new ideas and reserving judgment until specific periods where evaluations are being made. Not all censorship is blatant; often, it is much more subtle.

When you’re trying to get a group to actively participate and share new ideas, be on the lookout for these subtle forms of censorship:

• Laughter when there hasn’t been any.
• Silence where there hasn’t been any.
• Visible disinterest from senior group members.
• Participants physically or virtually removing themselves from the process.
• Over-sharing knowledge that monopolizes the discussion or overwhelms others’ abilities to contribute.
• A senior person arriving late and expecting to be caught up as the group waits.

If you see any of these behaviors going on, it’s likely that participants are getting the message that there’s less than genuine interest in the fruits of their efforts.

Another Creative Blockbuster to Try

When you’re stuck creatively, almost any forward progress is positive, no matter how small. It’s even better when your progress can be turned into something tangible, i.e. an artifact.

An artifact can take any of a variety of forms including a word, a sentence, an image, an outline, a chart or graph, a good article you’ve found, etc. Anything that provides you with a jumping off point for further opportunity is ideal.

The next time you hit a creative block, simply lower your expectations, find a small something that’s more achievable than the whole project (maybe even something already sitting in the creative trash heap), create it, and use it as your first step to get to the next step!

If Not Time, Then What Else Matters?

My contention is that time shouldn’t be a factor in determining whether an issue is strategic, i.e., what you're having for lunch 3 years from today isn't strategic simply because it's long-term and a significant quality performance conversation isn't tactical simply because it's happening this afternoon.

Based on this assertion, somebody asked me the question: if long-term doesn’t define strategic, what does?

Here’s a partial list for considering what’s strategic for a brand. Obviously the list would look different at a department or project level, but here’s an overall picture.

• Is it central to the brand, its representation, or delivery of the brand promise?
• Does it broadly and/or directly affect key audiences for your brand?
• Could it significantly attract or disaffect customers and prospects?
• Does it significantly affect organizational structure or alignment?
• Could it materially affect the brand’s financial prospects?
• Does it touch the heart of the core purpose, values, and/or vision of the organization?
• Will the organization’s supply of resources or raw materials be dramatically affected?

The more questions you can answer in the affirmative, the more likely an issue is and should be addressed strategically.

Change Your Character - What To Look for in Prospects

Baseball scouts review many talented players, narrowing prospects through successfully anticipating which have the talent to perform at the highest levels of the game.

You can benefit from generalizing their selection criteria in the “Change Your Character” exercise to strengthen the prospect assessment criteria that you’re called on to perform in your job. Your prospects may be employees, customers, vendors, or other parties in business. Baseball scouts look for the following types of characteristics in their best prospects:

• Have strong interest in success
• Are always aware of what’s going on and what the right thing to do next is
• Are dedicated and loyal
• Are easy to be around and are strong influencers
• Can make things happen & produce consistently
• Have the skills to turn apparent failure into success
• Field whatever comes their way
• Never give up
• Will follow through and give everything they have

Next time you have to develop criteria to assess prospects, identify three new ideas from those used by baseball scouts. And to get more background on how to use the Change Your Character technique, click here.

The CMO Summit - Take Aways & Questions for Marketers - Part 2

Here's the second part of the recap from The CMO Summit based on my notes and “ideas” list:

• Jim Hintze from Fujitsu addressed creating a new category for your brand amid competitors who are investing much more in marketing. QTM: Can we quit complaining about having too few $ and concentrate on consistent, new, and relevant messages? Extra credit: Can you create, help launch, and SUSTAIN a new category in your business that forces your competitors to follow you?
  
• Liz Cahill delivered an understandable explanation of marketing mix modeling at Lee Jeans as a way to make better decisions. QTM: When was the last time you took a Byzantine topic and forced yourself to communicate it S I M P L Y?
  
• QTM: Would somebody look up the damn Spencer Stuart survey and figure out how many months CMO’s really have on the job? The figures quoted at the conference (and it was mentioned in many presentations) ranged from 23 to 36 months. The best antidote for this phenomenon suggested at the conference came from Phil Kotler – if you’re a new CMO (or any marketing exec), quickly identify the best combo of high impact / low cost efforts you can implement and get on with them IN A HURRY!!!
  
• Gloria Berndl of CDW posed an interesting charge, “Retrain the way you think.” QTM: If there isn’t a course on this, how else can you tackle the challenge? One answer / self-serving plug – sign up for this blog via email.
  
• David May (Goldman Sachs) delivered a presentation on the 4 values of branding that prompted an important affirmation: Nobody succeeds or fails by themselves at ANYTHING. QTM: Do you live your life professionally and personally as if you know that this is true? Extra Credit: What steps are you taking to stay connected to people that you can help?

Those were among the highlights. I’ll also post on some related questions and comments from the strategic thinking session.

Here’s one last recommendation – when attending a conference, don’t check voice mail continually; try to stay in the moment. QTM: Do you give your team the latitude to keep things going when you’re away so that they’re not having to call you all the time? If not, figure out how you can start to do this!

The CMO Summit - Take Aways & Questions for Marketers - Part 1

I spoke recently on “Cultivating a Strategic Perspective” at The CMO Summit sponsored by marcus evans. I spent most of my time on the B2B side, and there were a number of valuable sessions.

From my notes and “ideas” list, here are the first five stand out ideas along with related QTM’s (questions to marketers) from various presentations; we’ll have a second five from the conference tomorrow:

• Kevin Young from LandAmerica delivered a kick-in-the-head on solid business fundamentals that Jay Conrad Levinson introduced as “Guerrilla Marketing.” In developing leads, look at all the available free and low-cost tools you have at your disposal (click here for a set of questions to help target tools for your business). QTM: When was the last time you did a 6-degrees of separation exercise to identify how you can easily get to your hard-to-reach decision makers through a contact you both know?
  
• Stewart Stockdale from Simon Property Group shared a fascinating case study on how the company has turned marketing into a profit center, looking at its shopping center assets and visitors as media outlets and audiences, respectively. QTM: When is the next time (hopefully SOON) you’ll look at turning your business model on its head to find new growth opportunities?
  
• Marketing legend Dr. Phil Kotler made the point that a CMO’s chief role includes seeding strong marketing people and processes throughout the organization. QTM: Are we all investing enough time and effort on this and the related area of team development?
  
• My good friend, Nicholas de Wolff from Thomson used an intriguing audience participation exercise. He had one person try to name nearly 30 brands based only on their logos (he missed just two). Nicholas then challenged all of us to think about whether our brands could be recognized based only on our logos. QTM: Well, could they?
  
• Keith Pigues from PlyGem shared results of a new B2B trend study from the Institute for the Study of Business Marketing. Keith heads the national Business Marketing Association; I was just selected for the national board. If Keith is representative of the passion, intellect, and drive of the other members, I’m even more excited about this opportunity. QTM: How are you giving back to our profession?

Check back tomorrow for another 5 take aways from The CMO Summit.

Spirit in the Sky

Here’s an interesting twist in testing your strategic thinking skills and perspective. Visit http://www.guessthespot.com/ for a quiz based on guessing which well-known sites are depicted in aerial photographs.

While some of them are apparent, many depend on you being able to discern clues from the surrounding geography. The challenge is that these locations’ surrounding areas typically aren’t shown in photos.

Thanks to my strategic cohort Keith Prather for passing this along. Have some fun and watch out on #8!

Force Yourself to Self-Evaluate

I talk all the time about the value of doing a PMIR. It’s an Edward de Bono-based exercise to look at the Plusses, Minuses, Interestings, and Recommendations for an event or project.

Its benefits were underscored the other day. Stuart Fedt from the local BMA chapter was checking up to see what had come out of speaking to the group in March. My first reaction was, “Not much.” Then I started thinking about it for the first time, because I hadn’t done a PMIR after the luncheon, prompting the realization that the appearance had created:

• Source material for several blog posts and an innovation session at Baker University
• An occasion to catch up with a number of former colleagues, including generating 3 posts from two guest bloggers (John Burton and Barrett Sydnor)
• Lunch with Barrett and an offer to talk at his sales management class at KU this summer
• Invitations to speak at the National Association of Women Business Owners on June 18 (from Amy Hoppenrath) and to do two appearances with Jay Liebenguth on his 1510 AM radio program
• A request from another organization for help in thinking through a customer event it was planning

So despite the first reaction, this event prompted perhaps more good things than any speaking engagement in a long time. Something I’d have realized much sooner if I’d have just done what I tell everybody else: create a PMIR. Lesson learned.

Speaking of the BMA, check out the May 15 Kansas City BMA program. It should be a great one as Tom McEvoy, president of Business Markets for EMBARQ will talk about the challenges of creating a dynamic new brand almost overnight from a company that’s 106 years old. For full details, check out the BMA website.

Change Your Character – Exercise to Reduce Waist and Waste

For this Wednesday’s Change Your Character exercise, let’s look at exercise and doing it successfully. Specifically, someone exercising usually works with a trainer trying to trim their waist.

So let’s think about how we can apply a successful exerciser’s approach to trimming waste in a business setting. A successful exerciser:

• Sets a realistic, aggressive goal
• Works with a trainer to increase their knowledge, accountability, and results
• Exercises regularly
• Varies the workout to stay motivated
• Pushes to achieve better performance all the time
• Tracks and records their activity
• Consumes less food
• Monitors food intake by counting calories
• Measures progress toward the goal

Next time you’re charged with reducing something at work (costs, unnecessary process, re-work, etc.) generate at least three potential new ideas for each of the steps above to help you improve your odds of successfully trimming fat.

Note #1 - Today's post is dedicated to Jenn Oxler, my trainer for the past two years. With her help (and her repeated questions about my food intake), I've lost nearly 30 pounds and have gotten into the best physical shape of my life. Thanks Jenn!

Note #2 – for the previous post on how to use the Change Your Character technique, click here.

Becky’s World - A Horrible Place to Be

Doing a creative development session several years ago, the ground rules were clear: every idea was valid and nothing people said could be wrong. A freeing experience, right? Not so for Becky. Becky didn’t participate that day, much to my surprise, since the session focused on developing themes for a customer conference, and she had extensive analogous trade show experience.

Becky approached me later saying she’d never been in a comparable meeting before and that it had been one of the most uncomfortable experiences in her business life. Startled, I asked her why. She told me at her previous company it wasn’t okay to suggest impractical ideas or ones outside the budget. Without more knowledge of our program, it was nearly impossible to contribute.

One idea at our session was having Lance Armstrong speak. Becky wondered whether we had enough budget. I told her it didn’t matter. By someone suggesting Lance Armstrong, the ideas could branch off to what he’d talk about, who else might cover the same topics, or how we could do team building as he had, among a variety of possibilities.

She also let me know at her old place, only people steeped in a program were allowed in planning discussions. And since she hadn’t seen our program, it was impossible to suggest ideas on the spot. In the future, she asked to get the topics in advance so she could think about ideas, write them out, and bring notes to the session. While I appreciated her diligence, in the time she’d need to write up 10 ideas, the group could generate 150 possibilities or more.

What a sad place Becky’s World (as I called it) must have been.

Think about it - do you live in Becky’s World? Do you and your business embrace new and apparently inexperienced perspectives because they effectively challenge the status quo? Or does your company actively force people to conform to a particular thought pattern or point of view.

Only you can decide. But if you find yourself in Becky’s World, take my advice. GET OUT NOW!!!

Strategic Bread Crumbs - Hansel and Gretel Meet Jim Collins

It’s surprising how many readers go right along with popular business books that report historical case studies as if it were always evident that they’d succeed. It’s easy to pick winners when “the game” is over. It’s much more difficult while the game is still going. Having been in big corporation most of my business life, it’s clear that things which look very calculated after the fact often depend on a variety of very fortunate, difficult to repeat circumstances, for success.

You can glean additional value from case study winners by figuring out how the success could be repeated; in essence, what are the strategic bread crumbs that would help find your way down the success trail again? Here are four questions to identify strategic bread crumbs:

1. What’s a generalized description of the case study, i.e. what were they trying to accomplish and what other businesses have similar situations?
2. What questions would you ask and answer to recreate the successful situation?
3. What were the critical success factors – things that had to be there for success or would have thwarted success had they been present?
4. What steps would it take to recreate the situation or move it into another business?

Also use these questions in your own situations to create the strategic bread crumbs to lead you back to repeat successes.

A Friday Shrimp Special

This fun Friday (or any other day) exercise turns ho-hum ideas into bigger, more dramatic ones. We call the exercise “Shrimp” because it’s typically applied to small, leftover ideas (much like Japanese Steak House chefs save a few shrimp to throw at the meal’s end). Here are the steps:

1. Take 5 or 10 of your smallest, weakest, or run-of-the-mill ideas to reach your business objective.
   
2. Select an authority figure (it can be a boss, the board of directors, or a regulatory body) that could shoot down any new possibilities emerging from these ideas. The more distinct and well-known the authority’s personality the better.
   
3. Use your starter ideas to create incredibly outrageous possibilities by asking, “How could we turn this idea into something that supports our objective but that our authority figure would COMPLETELY HATE?” Remember, you’re going for GENUINE ANGER, not just discomfort; it’s okay to think inappropriate, embarrassing, even illegal possibilities. Go for at least 3 - 5 new possibilities for each starter idea.
   
4. Then, for each new outrageous possibility, ask the following question to bring it back to reality: “How could we carry out this concept in ways that are acceptable, realistic, feasible, or actually able to be implemented?” Don’t settle for less than 10 new concepts from each outrageous idea.

These new, more mainstream ideas will benefit from being stretched beyond the boundaries of normal thinking. They typically take on a surprising richness and depth by having been run through “Shrimp.”

Also by encouraging your group to engage in thinking outside conventions under which it normally operates, the exercise creates both great ideas and great fun! What more could you want for a Friday!

The Dilemma of Objectivity

I'm so excited to have Barrett Sydnor, president of Sydnor & Associates, as today's guest author. We go back nearly 15 years, and I've always enjoyed his business writing tremendously. Today he addresses objectivity within strategic planning; he'll also be back next month with a post on "invented second."


David Ogilvy, the father of modern advertising, quotes the father of modern consulting, Marvin Bower, as defining marketing as “objectivity.” If so, then objectivity is one of the most important qualities that any good strategic marketing planning process must have. But it is tough to do for two reasons.

One is that most people simply aren’t built that way. A few years ago I led a planning session for a company where I wanted people to think from the outside in (no big insight I know, but bear with me). To encourage that, they were not allowed to use first person references when speaking about the company - no “we” or “our.” It had to be third person, as an outsider would refer to it. To enforce it, we charged a quarter each time they referred to the company in first person. By the end of the session we had collected a very considerable sum for charity. One participant gave up about one-third of the way through, tossed a ten dollar bill in the pot, and said “I hope this gets me through the end of the day.”

These were smart people, good strategic thinkers, but they could not totally divorce themselves from thinking of the situation at hand in a first-person way.

The second reason that objectivity is tough is because often the objective person is seen as being negative or cynical. They are accused of not being a team player. And it is true that sometimes the approach and language of objectivity sounds negative and cynical when it is intended as skeptical or cautionary.

So how do you build objectivity into the planning process? One way is to encourage something I would call “passionate objectivity.” This is a quality or skill set that the best news reporters are heavily endowed with.

Those reporters approach stories with enthusiasm and an open mind, but they look for facts -verifiable facts - to back up or refute the opinions and subjectivity they encounter along the way.
An exercise that you can do to ensure that a planning recommendation is based in objectivity is to treat it the way a reporter would (should) treat a news story.

• Write down the questions they would ask. Include the basic neutral, fact-collecting ones and the pointed ones that try to dig deeper.
• Determine who they would go to as sources on the story, both inside the organization and outside sources—competitors, independent industry experts, academicians. Figure out what customers they would talk to.
• What would they ask each of these sources and what would the answers be?

If you can answer those questions with good reliability and it still points favorably to your recommendation, you’ve had a good test of your processes objectivity. If you don’t know what the answers would be or the answers don’t square with the recommendation, maybe it’s time to go back and put some more passionate objectivity into the process. - Barrett Sydnor