Activities or Analytics?

“If you don't measure it, you can't improve it.” Like a mantra, it's chanted over and over - but you must be measuring the right IT or you are just burning time.

For an artist, which is more important – the tack hammer or the paint brush? The brush is used to create the masterpiece; the tack hammer is used to stretch the canvas in preparation.

Does canvas stretching contribute directly to the quality or success of the artwork? It is true that a taut canvas permits more precision in creating fine detail in the painting – so there is definitely some value added by proper stretching. Would knowing that short sides of a canvas have an average of five tacks and long sides have eight, add anything to masterpiece? Counting tacks all day long would have no impact on creating better paintings.

Years ago, as a result of a promotion, I received a detailed analytic report to senior management twice each month which was a quarter inch thick. I eagerly read the entire first copy and discovered only two items in it were useful to me and both were incorrect. I instructed the department to compile the report but stop publishing it and not notify any recipients. After two months without any comment about the absence of this report, I canceled it.

A new devotee to website analytics ran the analysis on her site and the Leadership Breakfast of Maryland's site She showed me a chart and offered her interpretation that the LBMD website needed CPR. Our website has visitors from a restricted group who read the page about the meeting and then register to indicate they plan to attend – the activity is triggered by a monthly announcement of the coming meeting. Her site is an eCommerce site for internet sales and traffic is driven to it continuously by numerous sources.

The results merely show that sites with different purposes do not generate the same traffic pattern or flow. These comparative analytics are meaningless, since the goals of the sites are so different.

Analytics help us measure performance and other factors by direct, indirect, and comparative means. Comparative analytics compare statistics from your organization with those of other organizations, or view your statistics over time.

Metrics and analytics can be useful to set a baseline or measure progress – as long as they are chosen appropriately and recognized for the value they offer.

When all is said and done, analytics are like observing the wake of a boat underway – they provide feedback on how smooth the course has been, but say nothing about the progress toward the goal or destination. Planning and execution get us there.

Using a thermometer to take our temperature is useful in diagnosis, but does little toward the cure; having appropriate analytics is useful in tweaking a plan, but to apply our resources to achieve results – focus them on doing rather than curating.

Leadership and Empathy

George Mason University and Arlington Economic Development presented a panel discussion on Empathy in Business. It focused on empathy as an asset and whether this is an element of what makes a leader great.

The panel composition: Jonathan Aberman, of Amplifier Ventures as moderator; Carly Florina, former CEO of HP; Dr. Angel Cabrera, president of George Mason University; Julie Rogers, president & CEO of Meyer Foundation; and Bill Drayton, CEO and Founder of Ashoka.

Empathy to an individual is like great art...they may know it when they see it, but it is hard to put describe in a clear and concise statement. The panel's treatment of empathy as a leadership asset was not woo-woo, feel-good fluff; it was seen as a powerful tool for change and engagement both inside and outside of the organization.

Key points offered by the panel:

• Everyone has capacity for empathy, except for schizophrenics, narcissists, and psychopaths – most of us can be empathetic
• True leaders will discipline themselves to listen first and declare later
• Example: a situation gone bad and the leader is poised to righteously 'instruct' the errant person chapter and verse about how they screwed up (no empathy); instead the leader pauses to hear the person's view of what happened – then takes appropriate action (empathy)...this can result in better understanding by all parties, but even if no new information is garnered, the person's views were heard and is more receptive to learning from the error
• Empathy is a diminishing trait in segments of today's youth – as a society we must 'teach' and developed it in the children or face virtually unsolvable problems as the kids age into adults.

So, we can be it, can use it, and teach it...on an applied basis – but what is it?

For a leader, empathy is an ability to understand others - a willingness to listen and consider what the other person has to offer. It is not giving insincere feedback to make the person right in a 'wrong' situation, nor is it to puff up their self esteem just to win a smile or a brief sunny outlook.

Can a leader be both empathetic and strategic in running the organization to meet the mission and yield results and 'profit'? Carly Fiorina repurposed a concept from the 1700's – enlightened self interest – to explain how individual input and financial results can coexist for superior outcome. This captures both aspects of the spectrum.

Being open to understanding others, hearing their ideas and offers, and responding with consistency empowers employees and managers to contribute ideas and be innovative, while truly engaging them in the success of the organization. The path is doing the right things and developing internal resources to produce better results.

In an open source environment, a person is invited to improve on what's been created by someone and share the new version with them and the community. Leading with empathy is about modeling permission for employees to find and share innovation and improvement in your organization.

As business structures change, organizations rely more on task teams formed internally (probably not at the same location) and entrepreneurs collaborate with one another to create teams with needed skills and experience for the project. For both, the old silos which restricted sharing are replaced with creative approaches derived from varied backgrounds and experience.

Being open, listening, and adopting the best ideas truly supports an open and collaborative environment – Eric Schmidt of Google summed this up nicely: No one is as smart as all of us.

The Five Keys A Facilitator Brings

Solutions come from discussions. Strategic solutions develop from structured discussions.

For strategic planning, a facilitator is like the conductor of an orchestra – does not write the music or play the instruments, but does bring it all together for the desired result.

The facilitator is an asset to a critical planning session bringing their experience as a resource when wanted and keeping the session on track – here's the top five elements they contribute to the session:

• Free up the Boss: No one can both participate and conduct the same event – this applies for the boss as well...with a facilitator, the leader of the organization is freed up to participate in the conversation, providing relevant information while hearing the views of others
• Additional Experience: When asked, the facilitator can share their knowledge and experience about similar situations to stimulate discussion or clarify the concept or activity
• Clarity of Contributions: The facilitator can probe the participants for more detail and expected outcome, aiding in the understanding of a concept without participants feeling they are being challenged or the contribution is being dismissed
• Recording Intentions: By recording key points from the meeting on flip charts (or by comparable means) and reading these notes back later, the facilitator can engage the participants in focusing the important elements into goals and action statements as the outcome of the session
• Managing Pace & Time: The facilitator must move the event along at an appropriate pace to remain on track and cover the material in the time allotted – like the clock-keeper in a basketball game.

A facilitator is responsible for running the meeting – executing it's operation and logistics – but the participants are responsible for results. A facilitator is not a direct participant in the content of the session, except when asked for information or outside experience.

Following a strategic planning session I recently facilitated – the CEO spoke about the day this way: Done well, a facilitator is a huge value-add to getting the best results from a critical planning session – including recording new goals and action items – and the participants feel their contributions are integral to the results.

Sales Lab Video Channel – Learning with a smile

Innovation – A Precious Asset

The Smith School of Business just held it's Annual Business Summit, a forum about the pressing topics of the time.

A thread throughout the sessions was the hodge-podge innovative change, rigorous adherence to the 'traditional' ways, rapid technological change, shifting global market advantage, and irrational attempts to maintain existing market conditions. This yields an unstable and confusing business environment.

Evolving are the vastly differing approaches of open source (share the code – use it & make it better) and enterprise (lock down the code - prohibit unauthorized modifications) – such as the Android and iPhone operating systems, or the Open Office and Microsoft Office application suites.

The keynote speaker, Dr. Rajshree Agarwal applied these radically different models to the 'care and feeding' of the innovative employee. In simple terms, innovation is finding a way to get better results for less cost.

The innovative employee is regarded as a valuable resource on one level, but organizations tend to adopt three different approaches to managing innovations: Bully; Ostrich; Empowering:

• The Bully creates barriers and penalties around innovation – such as non-compete agreements and IP litigation for developed ideas and use of knowledge leading to the development of ideas – then pounds the trespassers;
• The Ostrich has a laissez fare attitude about innovation until a situation develops, then it shifts to attack mode to protect the investment in the innovative product or service;
• The Empowering approach encourages employees to come up with innovative approaches – even provides personal use of a portion of the workweek or access to company or department equipment to help development.

The unintended result for Bully and Ostrich organizations is less innovations and greater opportunistic turnover among innovative employees. Creativity is seen as not valued and a hassle, so even great ideas for innovative change or new development are not shared.

On the other hand, the Empowering approach produces innovation from simple changes to major new product/service lines, which are conceived, developed, and implemented to 'do it better'. Google's 20% Time has spawned G-mail, AdSense, and Google News among the Google products.

In an environment where computing power is doubling every 18 months or less, and technology is rapidly eliminating repetitive process 'paper-moving' tasks, innovation takes on a critical role of seeding the reinvention of operations and upgrading processes within the organization. How can the new be integrated with the old to improve the result at less cost. What can be eliminated completely and how can the newly freed time be spent for employees to master new skills and gain additional experience to help them remain a viable resource and contributor for the organization (and remain employed).

Instead of rusting-out or fighting for a piece of a shrinking pie, both the individual and the organization can morph as a viable provider of wanted/needed services and products. Creating and nurturing an atmosphere in which employees can create change which is welcomed by the organization or department is the modern version of the continuous improvement cycle and opens up the space for employees to get new experience and skills, thus remaining valuable in a changing world.

What's not to love about 'better for less' while developing the next new role?

Entertaining experience – watch the Sales Lab Video Channel

Techies, Parties, and Success

Peter Corbett is the founder of DC Tech Meetup – a monthly meeting of the local community of techies and startups – to encourage demonstrations of latest technology and what's up with the entrepreneurial community. It is soundly build on open source principles - sharing and advancing good ideas. DC Tech Meetup attracts over 1,000 people to each meeting.

This month was Social Media Week – a week long collection of speakers, workshops, demonstrations, and parties - anchored by the DC Tech Meetup Keynote session.

Peter interviewed Steve Case of Revolution about lessons learned from leading AOL and Case's current roles of philanthropist and investor. Two items really popped out for me.

Case said that at AOL he learned to reinvent himself each year – shedding activities that someone else could do better and taking on new projects to learn and grow. Shedding the activities freed up time to take on new projects, while delegating activities gave others an opportunity to grow.

There are three levels of investing – each with a different purpose:

• Angel Investing is to take worthy startups from concept to prototype
• Venture Capital Investing is to take early-stage, high potential, high risk, growth startups from prototype to market
• Speed-up Capital Investing is to take viable young organizations that can change the world to a new level of growth.

Speed-up capital investing is what Case favors – several notable winners have resulted, including Living Social, Zipcar, and AddThis.

In DC Tech Meetups, Peter is investing - in community, self, and others. The return is powerful – Forbes ranks DC area #1 Tech Hot Spot!

Become wise in 5 minute increments - Rainmakers

Scope Creep

Herman Wouk, at age 97, has written a new book – The Lawgiver – the story of a film project about Moses. It is also an insightful study in the dynamics of a project.

In the book, the character Wouk is the advisor to the 'money guy'. He is to read and offer his approval or rejection of the final script.

Simple – straightforward – clear role at the outset of the project.

Of course he has other projects underway as well – including writing a book about Moses – and is feeling the pressure of balancing obligations with a keen eye to time available due to his advanced age.

Early on, the writer sent Wouk for review her story notes for developing the script. His wife, Betty Sarah Wouk, acting as his agent, asked how this work fit into his agreed role? It doesn't, but he still invested time reading the notes – beyond the scope of his agreement.

Later in the project he received an urgent request from the director to review the almost completed script immediately and give his approval. Being curious, he dropped everything to read the script. His wife/agent again asked how this work fit into his agreed role and refused to permit him to give any feedback at this time.

After about three or four months, the writer completed the script and sent it to Wouk for reading. He read it and approved it – satisfying his role in the project.

The Lawgiver shows a seemingly natural evolution of the project team to expand the scope of team members, the tendency of the individuals to become more involved – with no one giving thought to the effect on their original agreement. The book does a good job of painting a clear picture of how such actions affect most of the participants in the project.

A leader wants to get the biggest bang for the buck, but scope creep causes overuse of resources and missing budgets, yielding unintentional outcomes. Being clear about roles in a project – and sticking to those roles – leads to a more rational use of resources and can open up opportunity for other individuals to gain experience.

Do you have a story to share which furthers the discussion?

Check out Sales Lab Video. Enlightenment with grins.

Rainmaker # 18 – Leadership, Technology, and Change

Change is everywhere. Change happens at breakneck speed – BUT it takes time to recognize and adopt/adapt. Recall the typewriter return at the end of each line – and how long it took typists to stop using it in word-processing.

We unconsciously cling to the old models and cite them as ‘rules.’ The Information Interview was a mainstay for job changers to get information and referrals – it doesn't work anymore.

What are some old models/rules that are no longer valid?

Technology is a driver of change. So is the economy. So is the frontier environment where most innovation occurs.

There's more Do It Yourself (DIY) now. More Fix Yourself – reorientation of how you get and use information and vision.

Scale is easy – get 1 or 10,000 units by clicking a box on-line when ordering from a fabricator.

Do your projects on the workbench or the desktop – build your prototypes and learn valuable tips from the process.

Whether you are responsible for just you or are leading a team, or a company, shift from telling your folks What to Do, and instead tell them What you Want. Robots can be programmed to do, people can innovate to satisfy a want.

Change is disrupting the old norms.

Make something – learn – apply – improve – share with your community.

Nike said it best: “Just Do It.”


What's your story?

Previous Rainmakers:

#17 - Breaking The Invisible Wall (12/11/12)

#16 - LinkedIn: Your Personal Publicist (10/9/12)

#15 - Dropping The Other Shoe (9/11/12)

#14 - The Myth of Full Capacity (5-26-12)

#13 - Making the Most of Your Opportunity? (3-27-12)

#12 - The Future is NOW – Makers (3-11-12)

#11 - What Have I Done For You Lately? (2-8-12)

#10 - Tune Your Work for the Internet (1-2-12)

# 9 - Your Internet Personality (12-24-11)

# 8 - Google + Your Personal Website (9-15-11)

# 7 - Mark Your Territory (8-22-11)

# 6 - Networking IS Business (5-25-11)

# 5 - Start With an Offer (4-27-11)

# 4 - Time, Talent, and Treasure (4-10-11)

# 3 - How to Sell Your Skills (3-1-11)

# 2 - The Name Tag (1-5-11)

# 1 - Gifts (11-5-10)

And, Introducing Rainmakers (11-3-10)