The need to create

Sometimes after a long day at work (like today, 14 hours) I reach home pining to create something, to arrive at a new insight, to develop something on my own. This comes out of deep desire to feel independent and like I can determine my future after spending many hours punching away at excel sheets.

My insight for today is "The Time Trump Card"

Probably the most discussed and researched management question of the last 50 years is "what makes great leaders effective?" There are multiple ways to approach the topic. McKinsey (the ilk I come from) says structure. Take a problem and break it into pieces. Identify the sub-questions, then the sub issues. Locate a source for each set of data. Construct a work-plan, put names next to sections and execute rigidly. I once heard Jack Welsh speak and he frequently talked about how personal accountability is critical to team leadership and accomplishing goals. Other people say learn from experts. Latch on to the best and soak up what you can. And still others spout the age old tune, its who you know not what you know.

The best and highest bang for your buck starting point in my opinion is to look at one simple factor: time. How do you spend your time? Drucker argued that since time is the scarcest resource we have, treat it like its gold. Record how you spend your time over a couple weeks and you may be surprised. For me? On my latest project its been time alone that drives the most results and has proven the most effective use of the day.

Time is also a sharp lens into consumer behavior, cutting through the noise of what many people say but don't mean. It all comes down to a simple question about human nature. What do people really value? Answer: Look at how they spend their time. (This is also a great tool in assessing individual character - it quickly separates the well wishes from the impact agents). The key learning here is that how people spend their time frequently contrasts how people say/think they spend their time.

I have been stapling candy wrappers up on my cubicle wall to see how much I really eat. So far its been 1 week. The results are staggering (and tasty).

- Often, just watch where people's eyes go and begin counting - The wrappers on my wall told me that my eyes frequently go to the candy bowl. The amount of wrappers per day tell me the quantity of my engagement with Totsie Rolls. It probably my most repeated activity other than checking in with my direct team mate and e-mail.

- What tools does the individual require? - By far the greatest driver of my eating this candy is convenience. I would not go across the street or even down the hall for the candy. Consequently, the most important, in fact the critical factor of Totsie Roll's success, is their access point - in this case the dealer, our office assistant Carrie.

- Debunkify Myths - 'JP is a good guy that I bet takes care of himself at every chance he gets' ...debunkify... he eats a teaspoon of sugar a day. News today is just terrible, what can America do? ...debunkify... USA today is the fastest growing newspaper in America. Are readers complaining? Bottled water hurts the environment and it popularity is decreasing rapidly ...debunkify... Whole Foods (the haven of the environmentally friendly, features as its number one seller, wait for it, yep Bottled Water!


Fun stuff.

Insights from the protein shake industry

My mom recently sent me a great article on protein drinks from the nytimes (http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2007/10/18/fashion/
20071018_PHYS_SLIDESHOW_index.html). Bellow is my response e-mail that outlines the key takeaways from the aritcle.


Thanks for sending the NY Times article on protein drinks. Isn't it interesting that these workout drinks have seen steady growth recently? Functional drinks seem to be the hot product right now. It struck me that the article provided some solid learnings on how to approach a fragmented high growth beverage market.


I took away two key points:

1. Established brands stretch into new product lines - 3 of the 5 drinks featured are well known brands in other beverage or workout categories. This transition of a brand to a new product line can work extremely well as long as the core equity isn't stretch too far. Successful Transition: swiffer - its brand has been expanded into air freshners and dusting tools. Unsuccessful Transition: Coke - coke plus, its tough to think that consumers will ever consider a soft drink healthy...learning: invest in new categories (water for example) to capture health segment (maybe refrain from using the coke name all together).

2. Product attributes must build upon eachother - EAS's screw on cap sets it product apart from the competition in a distinct, visual and repeatable way. As the woman said I "absolutely loved the resealable container". The intriguing detail however is that the "Muscle Milk" product also had the screw cap (saw it in the picture), but it wasn't mentioned by the author. This tells me that the cap is not the primary driver of purchase but instead the secondary or tertiary driver. My guess is that the design of the bottle comes first, with contents and taste second, and package function third. The funny thing is, frequently the fundamentals (design in this case) must be met before a consumer will consider additional attributes. This hits on a concept I have been exploring: on the margin businesses. What does it take to get to the margin? What must be delivered upon just to be considered? The thought quickly pushes you to simplicity if you're thinking about starting something new. Its also the key advantage of expanding established brands into new categories, they're frequently already at the margin from day 1.

Learnings from James D Watson

Doctor Watson, author of double helix and winner of the Nobel prize, has come out with a new book entitled "Avoid (other) Boring People". I particularly enjoy his a clinical writing style. For each chapter he starts with "Manners from (insert stage of his life)" and closes with 5 to 8 key learnings.

Peter Drucker, the late famous management guru, frequently emphasize the usefulness of the self-reflective approach utilized by Watson. The study of past performance at attaining goals Drucker argues, is the most effective and arguably only method of assessing what you're good at.

Below are my 5 key learnings from the past 2 years in life and business.

1. Dancing is critical to happiness - You don't like dancing? Comon! I know your true feelings. As Prof. Moroson, hallowed Russian Literature professor at Northwestern, said while sharing life lessons with students during my Last Lectures series, "don't forget to play".

2. Depth = learning - Getting into a subject, synthesizing it, reiterating, reiterating, reiterating, showing your thoughts to experts, getting back at it, refining it are so critical and the roots of intellectual joy. (I've refined this post 6 times now)

3. Attitude can make or break you - A thirst for life actually changes what exists not solely what you see.

4. We all excel in certain areas and not others - For me: my key strengths are people, marketing intuition, and delivery when times are tight. My opportunity for growth is structured planning/thinking.

5. Offbeat is more fun than onbeat - (Even when creating new words!)

Building a product

I recently read an article on a redesign of a car air freshner in Packworld magazine that highlighted three key steps in the design process.

Goal: Clear through the clutter

Step 1: Customer research - conduct an awareness and usage study with target customers across multiple geographies with 4 products (including your current offering) to identify needs not currently met. In this case it was an ability to smell and test the Aero Metrics product before purchase.

Step 2: Choose the most important points of differentiation and begin redesign process. The Aero Metrics team described this step as particularly challenging with the small space provided on the product for words and visual information. They chose the test and sniff function and designed a sniff hole in the product.

Step 3: Store and shelf research - Products exist in physical environments and it is important to understand their place on the shelf. Aero Metrics saw that most competitor products banged up against each other on the shelf and that store lighting reached only the first couple rows. The team shrank the size of the packaging to reduce friction and muted the grey color to bring out further visibility of products way back in the shelf.

Two thoughts regarding the above approach.
1. Solid methodoical and process driven approach to redesigning a product
2. It seems they did not have a core definition of their own brand equity from the start. Single-mindedness on what you offer and consequently what you mean to customers should be cristal clear. Re designs like this, especially with regard to new functionality, should occur rarely and executed with the utmost care.

My Start Up Life

As Ben quotes at the end of his book.

"Mavis Leyer once said, "The object of life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting, Holy shit, what a ride!!!"

Networking - highlights from Ben Casnocha

Ben Casnocha, author of "My Start Up Life" has some great tips on networking and why its critical to business success.

Networking 101
1. Know yourself - What is your pitch? What unique skills, perspective, knowledge do you bring to the table?
2. Set goals - Develop a network before you need one
3. Do research - If you are about to reach out to someone know who they are and where your skills match with theirs
4. Develop a platform - Write a blog. Then you can ask questions like "I would like to do an article about you"

Networking 202
1. The "what you know" is important - While who you know is critical, its important to establish value to continue these relationships
2. Weak ties vs. strong ties - both are important
3. Maintenance - This one I like the most
a. e-mail newsletter - once a month
b. send some "touch base" snail mail
c. send articles to people
d. make introductions - a couple a week

www.kiva.org

This is what business is about. Helping people help themselves. For that matter, thats what life is about too.

check it out.

www.kiva.org

McDonalds is on fire

After a longo day at the job I wanted to briefly discuss my lunch experience today. I was out on the road visiting a business client and stopped at McDonalds following my meeting for a quick meal. I decided to go inside instead of the classic drive through. This turned out to be a great move.

Look at the above picture. That is the most pretty, highly refined, colorful, sharp $6.90 meal I have ever seen. And everything and I mean everything (except the bathrooms funny enough) have this brilliant design. Colors and sleek design is everywhere (including the tables, you can't see it here but they have a picture of a burger on each table - it looks better than the burgers I cook at home on my grill).

I especially love their packaging. It like each of those boxes has a present in it and each of the colors coordinates to a different type of prize. It reminds me a lot of casino chips. While I don't frequent those establishments their chips are brilliantly designed (especially their weight). Surprised that McDonald's have brought back Monopoly? Nope. I think they've found a way to make the McDonald's experience about rewarding yourself. I superb accomplishment for a brand built on quality food, speed, and price. I really think this is a great example of secret sauce. They have hit all of their core differentiators so well they have entered into uber-marketing world and are delivering something magical.

Honestly, I felt better after leaving McDonalds. I don't think I've felt good after leaving that place (and leaving is important, because I'm usually hungry on the way in and willing to eat a loaf of bread off the back of a truck in Manhattan) since I was a short kid. And of course, what else they do so well right now? Thats right, just like all great large companies...they sell happiness. (Arguably they are the front runner right now with BP). I saw a guy turn to one of his buddy's in line today and say "I want to be that guy" and pointed at a drawing of a man on a couch on the side of his bag. This guy in line...how old was he? He was a teenager! A teenager! I've never heard a teenager voice anything more than sarcastic optimism in my entire life.

I smiled. Thats gold. There's no way around it.

Get human

This is a really great idea.

www.gethuman.com

The Stamp

1765

The mob of 40 ravenous men, stomping as they marched to the house of the governor made people lock their doors. Like a hungry dog they broke every piece of glass in the large house, tearing the stuffing from couches and pulling back the floor boards.

Luckily Governor Williams had heard from neighbors of the impending mass and escaped minutes before their arrival. The next morning the Governor wrote to his trusted political friend pleading with him to halt any new legislation that might prove "unpopular". "The risks are dire" he said.

At his desk under the light of a white candle, Mr. Franklin read the letter and then sat back in his chair feeling slightly nervous. He had seen and even led battles against Indians on the border lands of Pennsylvania he thought, but these were Americans. He knew some of these men.

Then his eyes fell back to the letter lit by the candle on his desk. On the outside of the envelop he saw the red mark. A stamp. The new taxation on this basic object of everyday society is why those hungry men had splintered the Governors home. But yet there it was. Its power could reach him inside his home, over 80 miles from Philadelphia.

He began to sweat. The same object that was the Governor's crutch, was the gatekeeper for reaching his allies. Without it, could he even even ask for help? Franklin swallowed deeply. There was not a house in the colonies that didn't use that red object. On every kitchen table it sat. It was how they would do it. It was how those 40 men would enter into every family's home without invitation.

This rebellion was bigger than anyone had ever thought.

The Design Dividend

I have talked at good length about the increasing power of design in the American psyche. In one of my previous posts I mentioned how design focused companies have outperformed the rest of the market by 10 to 1. Above is the chart that demonstrates the point.

A component of the American design revolution that is missing from the above and only briefly mentioned in the October issue of Fast Company is what to do with a great peace of design. If you are fortunate enough to have a designer that can create the next i-pod, how do you market it? What steps are necessary to build the essence? This is the stuff I love.

page 339

In 1761 with the commencement of night travel for postal riders, mail delivery was at the peak of service excellence. An individual could post a letter and receive a reply the next day. This record would not be rivaled for two centuries.

Thats awesome. The speed of a man on a horse with passion and a mission held through the perfection of the locomotive, the advent of the automobile and mans conquering of the skies.

The personal revolution

6 of the 10 non-fiction best-sellers at Barnes and Nobel have pictures of individual people on their cover. The interesting thing is that as I looked at each book, a clear and distinct emotion came from each. Clinton's new book made me think powerful man. The Jenny McCarthy new book made me think caring mom. My guess is that what drives most consumers to pick up one of these books and bring it to the counter for purchase, is that they aspire to be the person who wrote it. Someone should test this theory by manufacturing a book with a famous celebrity's face on the cover (Gary Coleman...?) along with some nice text on the back and front covers but completely void of any text inside.

A couple thoughts from the last few days

1. My last blog entry was moderately clear at best
2. Design will continue to enter into more and more categories as a large driver of purchase. I was reading in the most recent issue of Fast Company that a three year study of more than 40 Fortune 500 companies found that organizations focused on customer-experience design have outperformed the S&P 500 by 10 to 1 from 2000 to 2005.
3. When you speak in front of large groups demonstrate value. Utilize examples, data, stories or accomplishments. Speaking in platitudes or methodologies is opaque and a waste of everyone's time.
4. I'm still not sure what makes people successful in large companies. Its been 2 years and I'm still shocked at who rises to positions of leadership. It seems the "I started with $x and grew it to $x in 3 years, etc." is not actually what accelerates people up the corporate ladder.
5. "Hurricane Products" It always amazes me how marketing can move large masses of people. Particularly the products that are built upon belief and substitute traditional functional attributes with heavy doses of emotion. Like a hurricane, they come through and dominate the environments they play in and command attention from everyone. So far I've nailed down two. Fireworks and diamonds.

Focus

As one of my bosses used to say. Work on one project at a time. I remember reading in a Peter Drucker book about how an executive at (the former) Bank One used to have meetings with his key people once a month. Each of those meetings were 1.5 hours (to match as he said, his max attention span for one topic). The executive came prepared to each meeting, having previously read all pertinent presentations/materials, and expected to discuss only the remaining questions he had. He divided his day in half. Morning: 3 one and half hour meetings with 3 fifteen minute breaks to return phone calls. Afternoon: personal reading and study.

I find the example of Tivo explored below particularly powerful.

Why your start-up will fail

WIL SCHROTER

Forbes.com

September 25, 2007 at 10:15 AM EDT

Whatever the exact figures, no one would argue that scores of budding new ventures die on the vine. One of the most common killers: lack of focus.

With precious few resources to expend, hewing to a specific, well-defined vision is critical for start-up companies. When entrepreneurs attack too many problems or chase too many opportunities at one time, they often end up with nothing to show for it.

• In Pictures: Top Five Startup Killers.

Why do so many entrepreneurs lose focus? The same reason they became entrepreneurs in the first place: ferocious ambition. Entrepreneurs are dreamers; restraint is unnatural. When it comes to staying focused, here are some lessons to keep in mind.

Internet Links

• Secrets of the self made
• Ready to turn your business into an empire
• Ten ways to torpedo your sales pitch
• Do-it-yourself PR tactics

Perfect One Idea First

Start-up Internet company Kiko was off to a terrific launch in 2005. The online calendar service was attracting high-profile investors, impressing industry luminaries and garnering fantastic press with its new product. By all accounts, Kiko was ready to take off.

But instead, a year later, the company went from being at the top of its game to being auctioned off on eBay for $258,000. What happened?

Many speculated that Google's new calendar service spelled Kiko's demise. But if you ask the founders and investors behind the company, it wasn't just about losing to Google. It was also about losing focus on their product.

"One of the reasons Kiko died was that the founders spent several months working on another project," says YCombinator's Paul Graham, a Kiko investor. "If they'd spent those months working on Kiko instead, they might have been far enough along to withstand Google calendar when it came out."

Graham admits that focus alone may not have been enough to survive Google's onslaught, but it would have given Kiko a fighting chance.

Don't Attack Too Many Problems At Once

Face it: You don't have enough money, time, brains and limbs to fix everything that's wrong with your company. That's why you have to focus on the handful of issues that truly demand attention.

Jessica Livingston, author of Founders at Work, has profiled dozens of start-ups. Many have struggled to maintain their focus--even companies that eventually sold shares to the public.

Take TiVo. In its formative years, TiVo wanted to build a network server that could provide an array of home-media services, from movies to music. Soon enough, writes Livingston, the company realized its snazzy box would not only be complicated to install, it would be hard for customers to understand. TiVo's decision: Focus on one killer application and branch out later on.

That "killer app" was the digital video recorder, or DVR--now a market unto itself. TiVo's current market cap: nearly $600 million.

Identify The Real Opportunities

Sometimes the challenge is not focusing on one value proposition, but being flexible enough to recognize when another is more compelling. It's not uncommon that entrepreneurs find their greatest opportunities in products they didn't even realize they were building.

Flickr, the popular photo-sharing site, started life as one feature of a totally different concept: a multiplayer online game called "Game Neverending." Soon the developers started noticing that their photo-sharing feature was stealing the show.

The founders knew they didn't have the time and resources to work on both opportunities, so they shifted their focus (with some regret at the time) to Flickr. Good move: In 2005 Yahoo! shelled out a reported $20 to $30 million for Flickr, now the cornerstone of the Web portal's popular photo-hosting service.

Stick To What You're Good At

Yes, the world is full of opportunities. But the key to making money is recognizing the thing you can do better than the competition.

In his book, Focus: The Future of Your Company Depends on It, author Al Ries describes how behemoths like Dell Computer Home Depot and Best Buy have all built powerful franchises based on one simple concept: being good at one thing.

Like your high school English teacher said: "Keep it simple, stupid."

Wil Schroter is the founder and chief executive of the Go BIG Network, a leading community of start-up companies.

Paperbackswap.com

This is a great idea. Imagine the hundreds (soon to be thousands?) of books traveling across the United States at any one time. Napster for books ...

www.paperbackswap.com

Verbal communication

In many ways being an entrepreneur is no different than working in more traditional businesses. One of the essential skills that overlaps both spheres of the commercial world is verbal communication. I was fortunate enough to be born with a natural inclination towards the verbal gab and grew up in a household where the traditional tools and techniques of persuasion could frequently be heard around the dinner table.

With all that said ... as I spend more of my time talking with various potential business partners I am struck that when I reflect upon my impact and overall effectiveness in communicating the point I would like to get across, that my performance is varied. Sometimes I find myself "in the zone" and my tone is firm but generous, I interject appropriate humor as the conversation gets tense or uncomfortable, I remember to smile and to look directly in their eyes and I keep ready that mental check list in my head and easily transition to the next point or topic at the appropriate time. Other times ... its just bad. I feel uptight, nervous, can't remember what I have to say and my overall effectiveness deflates almost immediately as these things happen.

I would like to begin to document some of the key steps in conducting a concrete conversation in order to develop a process that I can repeat and refine as time progresses.

Two very important ground rules:
- Be kind and purposeful in all of your comments. This is really critical, and the best businessmen/women I've seen perfect this balance. Getting mad is almost never worth while and timidity earns little respect from even the least sophisticated individuals. In the end, take to heart what your mother taught you. Always be respectful and kind and set your own path in this world.

- Prepare. Its amazing how much even 3 minutes of note jotting can help prior to a conversation. While prep time varies a great deal depending upon the circumstance, knowing in your mind the list of 3 -4 things that you would like to get out of the conversation or from that person seems basic, but its frequently overlooked and an easy step to take.

Ok, so now to the chronological conversation.
First - Say your name and why you're speaking with that person. If the occasion presents itself, provide an introduction, but when you get to a question be specific but not confrontational.

Last - Ask if there is anyone else they think might be a helpful person for you to speak with. End every interaction with that question. A lot of the whole business game its networking and finding the correct people.

Theres a lot more in there and I'll add as I track more of what feels most effective. How do you approach business interactions? What works best on your end?

Communicate, communicate, communicate

Clear communication is a learned art (just ask my writing teacher in college), but at the same time has the added benefit of being simple in its finest form. Look for it and you'll see it in a snap. Ba da ba ba ba ... I'm lovin it. The quilted quicker picker upper, bounty. Expect more, pay less.

Great communicators are able to sift through the clutter, to sift through all the nosie and arrive at a simple, short, and emotional message. In today's highly competitive marketing world short and simple could not be more important. Take a look at TMZ.com or USA today ... or my all-time favorite, cnn. Its almost like American consumers want to be woken up every 7 seconds ... maybe we should start selling dancing monkeys for the kitchen counter top.

The three companies below, two new and one established, use different tools and methods to clearly communicate their message. Frequently they employ a small twist, and it makes all the difference.

1. Ebates - Cash in my pocket (instead of discount). I ran across these guys in a recent article on new web2.0 companies. The article discussed how google was considering advertising models that offered partial compensation to users for clicking on adds (sorry, not yet folks). Ebates is currently utilizing this model in its online store. The name, ebates, communicates rebate + internet. The pages are organized by how much you get back for each product purchased. While Amazon may offer 20% off the new Harry Potter book, Ebates pays you to buy things off their website.

2. Real Age - You are infact younger than you get credit for (instead of health information). Don't prevent aging affects, return to how you feel, to your youth! If I remember correctly these guys were just bought by a private equity shop. Again, why listen to your doctor or health planner when you can have Oprah tell you how young you actually feel (that show is a lot more about youth ideals than it at first appears ... its the second - or first - youth for the housewife). (Small side note, this is whats so brilliant about Adam Werbach's new environmental plan with WalMart employees, he keeps its personal, emotional ... don't attack the world, improve your own life first. Its personal and its sharp.)

3. Abercrombie & Fitch - Sex (instead of sexy clothes). Walk into one of their stores. Go ahead, I know its painful, just try it. It hurts, I know, but its simple, short, and emotional. Take one of those posters home with you and put it in your bathroom. My dad said last week, and this is really strange if you know my dad, that sex is used in selling every product except no product. Own a component of design (or in this case messaging) and leverage it at the expense of the other components. Its how you want to see yourself down the road...