It is a new technology for raising the volume of noise and low value interaction.  People [...]]]> Who is thumbs up for Like? I am referring, of course, to Facebook’s new technology where everyone can buzz about and give approval and… Where is the thumbs down button on what I DON’T like… the new Like button.

It is a new technology for raising the volume of noise and low value interaction.  People are now empowered to drop by and leave their sign without even having to read or interact with the author.

I predict a matter of weeks and this will be seen as just so much MySpace. Imagine the quality information that Facebook is gathering about LIKERS to match Facebook folks to advertisers. It all looks murky to me.

I, a self ordained SEER, expect to see social media break out into channels of highly useful interactions that create value for colleagues and friends totally separate from the numbing level of noise in the blather world of Social Media.

So while sales people are warning you that you are missing out on communicating with 800 million people with social media- always keep in mind that Twitter and LinkedIn and Facebook, et. al.,  are not without substantial cost. An adventure in social media takes time and is distracting from real business…

But social media used strategically is a tremendous business development tool- if you concentrate on helping your prospects create clarity and help your clients succeed in creating value.

Compelling content is the key and your prospect determines what is compelling.

Collaborating also helps make the load lighter and gives better results.

The sad part of Like is that while you might be Liked a bunch-  the people you want to influence don’t care about Like they care about real value.

Megaphone technology works when people are straining to hear what you are actually saying.

So what do you think? Did you like or dislike what I am saying here? You won’t find a thumbs up icon.

But it does take work and constant attention and problem solving skills. It certainly helps to [...]]]>

So many employees do not have a sense of the effort and stress of owning a small businesses. Now any smart small business owner loves being in business for themselves and would not want it any other way-

But it does take work and constant attention and problem solving skills. It certainly helps to understand how to make business development easier, but…

too many employees see all the business coming in and see business ownership as some privileged position where you- the owner- are just driving to the bank and cashing checks.

Succeeding in business is a delicate balance between income and costs and it takes hard work and talent to create success. Traditional failure rates underline the risks- but for successful companies- success can look pretty easy from an employee’s view of operations.

Employees need to understand that making money is essential to being able to pay wages. Employees expect to be paid regular as clockwork but if the efforts of employees are not producing enough value for each hour paid for in wages- then the expense of wages start coming out of the owner’s pocket.

Employees therefore have a strategic interest in what kind of value they are delivering in their job. Now, this is not rocket science. Every business owner understands this very well.

But how many employees understand this beyond an inkling or as an intellectual exercise?

It would be productive for business owners to conjure on enlisting employees in the success of the business. It would behoove business owners to create a conversation with employees letting them in on the inside view of owning a business. Making money, maintaining cash flow- collecting money- making sales – taking care of customers effectively.

The best ways to do this is a conversation for another day and if you have ideas for having such a conversation, feel free to add them below.

A right attitude is certainly necessary- sharing the idea of a partnership towards success would certainly be a part of it- any arrogance at all or a patronizing attitude would certainly be corrosive to the hoped-for effect. Yes, lets revisit this concept later.

I firmly believe that most employees would respond very positively to such information. Most would quickly grasp the concepts and would actually bask in the respect you have given them- trusting them to see and understand your financial situation and what maintains success.

There are employees that might not respond well. And if they don’t, they have done you a favor. You get an opportunity to help engage them or you get an opportunity to help them find work that is more fulfilling for them.

Employees love being given substantial role. Employees thrive on respect. Employees thrive on earning responsibility and doing work that is critical to success.

It certainly helps to know the strengths of all your people. People strive to move towards their personal strengths and interests. It might take some flexibility in roles, but letting engaged people apply their creativity might surprise you with some great suggestions.

Where would you start in this process? That certainly would take some thought. You have key people who have earned your respect. This is where to start. All you have to do is engage the conversation and follow up.

Such a path is the perfect path to getting you more slack. Employees getting more substantial work done means more work getting done.

Now how are you going to apply this new people power in your business?

Your thoughts? What do you see as the downside of sharing business issues more fully with employees? What do you see as an upside? What do you see is missing here? Please leave your thoughts below.

Does it make sense to stir the ambition of entrepreneurship? You would certainly have engaged employees thinking like owners perfecting skills in your business. Lets look [...]]]>

How many great entrepreneurs do you figure started out as employees? Probably a good share of them. Imagine the benefits of  leveraging the entrepreneurial talent of our employees?

Does it make sense to stir the ambition of entrepreneurship? You would certainly have engaged employees thinking like owners perfecting skills in your business. Lets look at the benefits to your business.

Would-be entrepreneurs have unprecedented access to communication tools, to computing power and to a world wide assortment of talent. So do you. Have you ever wondered how these resources can serve your company?

You would have people you know exploring possibilities with and for you. You know what your business objectives are. You have your methods of accountability. With  the right results coming in- what would it hurt to explore options for innovation?

We live on vast slippery slopes of opportunity. Our challenges today are to succeed and thrive in this sea of opportunity. Threats and opportunities are interchangeable depending on where you sit.

Are you impacting the market with innovation? Is your happy staid business being disrupted by innovative competitors? You need to be challenging the status quo- staying put is not a good strategy in changing times.

So many things to know, to have a perspective on, to have an inkling about… it just might make sense to have  several partners to help you keep up.

Smart business owners are quietly assessing their talent pool. Smart business owners understand employees have many assets that are not being leveraged fully. Employees have so much more talent than most conventional business operations use.

In fact, you see too much creativity and initiative squandered on workarounds and busy work.

Maybe it is time to loosen up the belt a notch, loosen up the shoe laces a bit and listen to what is happening. We don’t have all the answers. The game is changing on the answers we do have. The right answers must be requalified to deal with change on a regular basis.

It just might the right time to release the pent up spirit of employees. Empowered employees see the world differently. They have more energy. They see with more perceptive eyes.

They have to- they are sharing your viewpoint. They have become acquainted with an ownership view, they are beginning to understand their role in your business’ success and are seeing more clearly with the eyes of ownership.

Now imagine what you can do within your business with more eyes, with more brains focused on success rather than watching the clock?

Imagine what might happen if you shared the point of view of ownership- not just the side most people imagine- collecting all those checks- but also the struggle, the sense of responsibility to employees, to family, the sense of risk to what you have created- the forces which gather to impact your business. the world view of the entreprenuer to your people.

What if you lost a few eventually to their own business ideas? Imagine what you could do together in the meantime?

You might even end up in a new line of work. You might end up with your business expanded into another city. No telling what might happen when you unleash creativity and ambition.

And how many of them will discover the hard work you do- the level of risk that you live with- and just say no- just decide that entrepreneurship is not for them. Imagine employees who appreciate what you do as a business owner and are fulfilled just helping you achieve business success.

Imagine the new ventures you could do together in house? Imagine the rich relationships you can build with future businesses.

It all looks like sunshine to me.

What does it look like to you? What do you see as a downside? Leave your thoughts below.

and then in a soft voice he said- “Well, there are more important things than just making money.  Money [...]]]>

I was speaking to a great client yesterday. I was wheedling to grow his appetite for more slack. I asked about the type of activities that he could see himself doing to make more money…

and then in a soft voice he said- “Well, there are more important things than just making money.  Money is not as powerful a motivator as you might think it is.”

I was instantly all ears to hear more. If this client says it- it is important to me. Because I am very picky about who I work for.

I bump into what I would call greedy companies. These are companies who mess with truth and manipulate to influence. Up to 50% savings… Save 88% on… these companies just are not my niche.

Maybe you see the fake certifications- yes-,made up,  and paid for certifications, and fake business reviews- the general tenor of BS on their websites. Some even use faked BBB logos and faked Angies List logos.

Nobody likes fake. Where does fake stop and authentic and trustworthy begin? I don’t think they can’t really coexist. You probably have an extra nerve for gaps between what is said and what is done and it is an easy nerve to irritate. I know I am not alone in having this nerve.

So I am listening well. My good friend suggested that money was important because it insures success, but what he cares about more- is that he has great employees he depends on for watching out for customers and that they depend on him to make the company profitable and see that everybody gets regular paychecks.

I found his remarks profound and figured when I make a fuss about ways to make more money, I was being a bit shallow- particularly with the caliber of people I would like to know better.

So I figure I need to change the nuance of talking about making money.

Making Money is a measure for business success. Making more money is good because it makes your company more robust, it means your employees are more productive, and it points to continuing success.

Of course, measuring money requires a proper length of time. Short term decisions to reduce costs can inflict expenses with interest over the long term… More on that another day…

But the virtues of making more money must be described through the values of the owner.

• more profit allows more space for testing and innovation.
• more profit helps build the extra energy and resources needed to grow the company to a significant new level of growth – expanding to a new city maybe, expanding into a new line of services…
• more profit helps reduce stress and provides a sense of  more time to relax…
• more profit helps create the attitude which allows thoughts of space for more slack – more time for reconnecting with the strategic –  more space to think about substantial things rather than being as bogged down in the daily battle.
• and more profit  means that you are secure in your ability to keep your trusted employees employed.

What does more profit mean to you?  What does making more money mean to you?

What would you like to add?

Is there something missing here?

It is the result of the righteous government efforts to give talented people employable skills so they can find work.

The true beneficiaries of all this investment are  an entire collection of business schools [...]]]> It might surprise you that taxpayer money is used to train people in skills that are worth little in the marketplace.

It is the result of the righteous government efforts to give talented people employable skills so they can find work.

The true beneficiaries of all this investment are  an entire collection of business schools and colleges that teach people a package of skills and make lots of promises that those skills are in demand in the marketplace. The results are not awe-inspiring. reference New York Times

Now I am not going to get into a  Left – Right Battle here but I do want to address a great alternative.

Smart Business Owners should play an active role in this job training function.

As smart business owners improve business development and figure out ways to remove friction from the work environment and to better utilize the technologies available- they can squeeze a lot of the hidden expenses out of on-going operations.

This allows small business owners to test innovative ways to improve growth and this might be adding employees or adding freelance talent as they are able to figure out new ways to build more business.

Government investment here- coupled with effective guidelines for business partners in the training of new talent- not creating gofers- not taking jobs away from existing employees-  would be a very effective way to move employees who lack skills into an environment where they learn to create value while they learn skills.

Small business owners should have access to “workers in training and give them some hands-on experience in learning to create value in a business. These are the lessons that employees need to know not a set of skills out of a tool box that are moldering before they even start to work.

We can add a lot of new opportunity by helping businesses reduce friction and better apply new technologies towards new opportunities. Innovative companies can reduce losses from friction with business growth and add new talent in exactly the right combinations of talent.

By working effectively and better providing talent the opportunity to learn working skills, learn new attitudes of teamwork and learn how to fit in and be productive- is a win-win for employers and people who need an opportunity to create value and our own governments who would like a better return on their education investment dollar.

What are your thoughts here? What might work better? Do you see some pitfalls? I would like to hear your opinion.

Someone right now is working on something in your business that is trivial.

They are either doing busy work that should be handled differently, or they are doing something they feel is important but in the [...]]]> What kind of time wasting activity is taking place right now in your business that is displacing something substantial?

Someone right now is working on something in your business that is trivial.

They are either doing busy work that should be handled differently, or they are doing something they feel is important but in the strategic scheme of things is trivial.

Such activities are defined as Friction and they are very hard to account for. They don’t cost you any more money, they just prevent future growth.

So how do we spot this kind of thing?

What can you do to rid your business of such things?

First you have to work on yourself. You need more slack. Y0u also need a plan of action for taking on slack. You have to be well prepared in an enlightened leadership role.

You might even need some outside eyes looking in to help you see what doesn’t work well. 3rd party eyes are gifted with the power of seeing around habitual behavior and seeing around what your own eyes have become deadened to.

And 3rd party eyes can ask the naive questions that allow you to breach the usual batch of interpersonal dynamics that might be building roadblocks rather than new productive connections that create value.

Technology plays a role too.

Where do you start? A first step would be to approach doing someplace easy and highly productive.

People love playing significant roles. People love to be engaged in great competitions. Why not try it? Its a win all around the block. You can make more money. Employees enjoy being empowered. Clients are amazed a the high level of service delivered.

Ever seen any signs of trivial activities in your business? What stands in the way of ridding the office of them? It all takes work but look at the return on investment.

What is missing in this post? Has something been over simplified?

Please leave a comment below.

A short story is probably inappropriate. Once for a short period I worked for a large state agency as a contractor.  I watched [...]]]> Ever had a challenge evaluating  intangibles?  I love the term “bean counters” It is so illustrative. Someone able to count beans, but having no breadth of understanding of the value of intangibles.

A short story is probably inappropriate. Once for a short period I worked for a large state agency as a contractor.  I watched as a money saving project moved forward to take personal printers out of staff offices and replace them with networked printers.

The savings appeared substantial on the macro level but at the office level, staff members would have  to get up from their desks, secure their offices and go find the paperwork  at the networked printer. Now cover that human power cost with a percentage of a penny per copy. You might conclude too, that someone had trouble evaluating intangibles, but were ace bean counters to a portion of a penny.

All right, lets get back on point here. On measuring intangibles, back in the good old days you could measure personal productivity by the widgets produced, the bricks laid, the number of screws inserted–. but not so much anymore.

Intellectual work is just plain hard to evaluate… the best managers do this well, others do OK, the rest just make matters worse.

Now lets think about evaluating the processes which impact the intellectual work.  Oh, oh, this sounds really hard too.

Say something like getting estimates completed quickly but effectively. How many people are involved in the process? How much redundancy and reentry of data wastes time and slows down the process? How much is the process impeded by lack of proximity to tools and  documents that are inaccessible from convenient locals.

What other little toe stubbers slow down and impact human creativity and problem solving? What is the ultimate impact when estimates are slowed down?

Well,  prospects turn cool with the delay. Estimates just plain don’t get done. There is this big constraint on getting sales closed– what did Peter Drucker say was the only purpose of business? I forget– but intangibles can be at the very core of  skinny profits.

So why the big fuss about intangibles? Battling with ineffective work processes is a strategic strategic issue. Intangible are at the core of a problem with proximity and the high perceived impact of tangible acts. I just made that up. But I like the phraseology. Let me explain.

It is much easier to feel the impact of writing a check– ouch! than a hunch about what the service might save in costs. The “punch in the gut” feeling of dealing with change and the sense of risk involved in something new has a higher leveraged impact than the obscurity of intangible gains.

Change in hard. Change affects productivity. People have to learn new work habits. People don’t like change, although I know for a fact, that engaged leadership can create an understanding and fashion the positioning necessary to make change exciting, fun and an exercise where everyone is a stakeholder in success.

It is  SO EASY  to just NOT DO, when DOING  will save money and energy into perpetuity.

So how do we reduce the power of the immediate tangible over the significant but intangible?

Time must be taken to make a balanced evaluation. This is not a time to procrastinate. Saving money has to be taken seriously. Improving human productivity and eliminating busywork is essential. And it doesn’t take rocket science to blow up a bad idea. You just  need a balanced evaluation process.

We need to create a cost analysis array where we can attribute estimated costs and time frames into a spreadsheet. We must be able to put a weighting factor into the calculations where priority interests can add impact.

When all is said and done, the numbers can be run and the ROI outlined. This makes decision making much easier and rational and makes everybody feel better. It is a win all around.

Such a procedure can help ameliorate check writing phobias and nervous twitches related to fear of risk and fear of change.

Lets go way out on a limb here.

Right now you are losing countless piles of money perpetuating time wasting operational tasks that if innovation was implemented –

• could make personnel happier:  they are doing less busy work
• better engage team  members because their efforts have more positive impact
• improves accessibility of tools and documents to staff members where they are
• give your team tools to creatively solve problems and better distribute their work load
• everyone can take better care of customers more effectively.

Calculating the value of intangibles is tough but close works OK.  Bottom line, smart business owners do the most even handed  job they can evaluating worthwhile innovation and really smart business owners trust their people doing the work to help make such decisions.

Feel free to toss in your own thoughts here.

We have these great big lizard brains. Our lizard brain protected us during the epochs when we were being chased as a food source. Today our lizard brain- for the most part, just [...]]]> We have these great big brains. I am always amazed at the accomplishments of people working inside their heads and creating wonders.

We have these great big lizard brains. Our lizard brain protected us during the epochs when we were being chased as a food source. Today our lizard brain- for the most part, just stands in the way of creating change.

This is OK is we account for our lizard brain and understand its impact on decision making. Seth Godin was recently eloquent on the subject of decision making and the lizard brain. We need perspective and we need rational processes to make decision based on what we know and what we can infer from experience and testing.

If we don’t account for our Lizard brain- it is not serving us well. It just might be causing us to stand still when the really smart thing would be to move.

The lizard brain does not differentiate between perceived risk and actual risk. In fact, the lizard brain merely fears change.

Technology and a changing culture has changed how we buy things and what we buy. This is well beyond the impact of the recession. We discussed this issue here.

If you do not have a sense of this change- if you are feeling uncomfortable where you are, but not really comfortable with change, and if you have a long list of reasons why you cannot change right now- well you are probably mismanaging your lizard brain.

That sense of something not feeling right is good lizard brain, but being immobilized is not good use of the lizard brain.

Bold is more fun. But, of course, with risk well managed.

What are your thoughts here? Have you ever had to deal with a lizard brain?