Posts in ‘Leadership’

I have to prepare you, the reader, before you watch the video that goes along with this post. This is from a hit bollywood movie “Wanted” (which I found particularly cheesy and a bit in the spirit of the gladly forgotten 90’s era when bollywood unfortunately, had forgot how to make good movies). Though the movie was a typical masala movie, this particular dialogue from the movie had hit me just as intensely as the hero (Salman Khan) hits pretty much everyone throughout the movie.

So, what’s a bollywood promo for a movie I found quite cheesy doing on Active Garage? It obviously has a message that applies very closely to business, life and the business of life!

Before I go into that… take a look at the promo first:

Wow! That was Intense!

Translation: The translation of the single dialogue from the promo is:

“Once I make a commitment… I don’t even listen to myself”

I was quite moved by the simplicity and the power of this sentence. Imagine a world where everyone makes commitments and don’t even listen to themselves, if it means breaking them. Imagine a world where people keep their word at every cost. There is no “Sorry for being late… “, no “The dog ate my homework… ” or “I did not think it was that important”. How much easier would it become to work with customers, employers, employees and colleagues! Welcome to the land of Integrity!

There are a few definitions of integrity but the most powerful one is “The quality or state of being whole or complete”.

Consider a couple of examples to clarify this definition:

• When we say a bridge has integrity, we trust that it is functional. That is to say that we trust it to the function as someone has said it will be OR in other words, when the builder declares that a bridge is ready, traffic (buses, trucks, cars etc) can cross over and reach the other side safe and sound. That’s integrity.
• When we say an airline has integrity, we trust that it is functional. That is to say that you and I trust it enough so that we will put ourselves at 30,000 feet above ground in a metal cylinder powered by jet engines and enjoy the ride to the other side of the world safely (and hopefully in time!). That’s integrity.

Consider the lack of integrity (and its consequences) in these two examples:

• Bridge: Even a single brick being lose or a beam not properly constructed can cause havoc in the lives of thousands if that results in the bridge collapsing – that is the price of lack of integrity in this situation.
• Airline: A single oversight in the routine check of the millions of mechanical parts of an airplane can mean unthinkable consequences.

Consider the possibility that we, as individuals, bring this very same concept of integrity to our daily lives, our workplaces and everywhere else with how we show up in this world. You’ll notice that in all the domains of your life, people relate to you the way you show up as (i.e. how you act) with the background of who you declare yourself to be (your word) – and always make the assessment of trust based on if you keep your word or not.

Note: Special thanks to Landmark Education for providing me with the distinction of Integrity.

Tagged as: active garage, bollywood, business, commitment, himanshu jhamb, integrity, landmark education, life, salman khan, wanted, world

We’ve all heard this many times in our workplaces – “The customer is always right” and “All customers are equally important”. Well… I am going to challenge these in this post and will focus more on the latter one. This topic came up in one of my recent conversations with a publishing industry thought leader, Gordon Tibbitts, President, Atypon Systems where both of us were talking about the capacity of individuals and the choices we, as individuals, have to make in order to utilize our limited capacities effectively. At a point in the conversation Gordon said “You know what Himanshu, before you fight them… you have to choose your battles wisely”. One might ask how do you qualify what’s wise Vs. what’s not and the quick answer is – One that you think will produce the results you are after is the wise one to take.

Not all customers are made equal. Some customers are very rewarding, whereas some are pretty much a drain on your resources. For instance, I had a customer once who did not understand the value of Quality Assurance; as a result of that they did not have a clear QA management, a QA team or even any QA processes. The impact of that alone was that the project had many delays and not only impacted the customer in a negative way but even the vendors (us being one of them) felt the reverberations of the impact to a point where it affected (negatively) our bottom-line. If someone were to ask me about if the customer was a beneficial one for us as a vendor, the answer would, most unequivocally, be a resounding NO. These are the kind of customers that you don’t want!

Another very insightful point that Gordon made during our conversation was that it is a good thing not to ruffle any feathers if you see your competitor serving a high cost client. What made this insightful for me was the observation that Mr. competitor would face a lack of capacity if they are busy servicing high cost clients, and you don’t want to burn the midnight oil to get these clients from your competitors as this would almost be counter-intuitive to your productivity (and you’d be helping Mr. Competitor, too).

This also reminds me of a quote by Napolean Bonaparte:

“Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake”

I’d like to acknowledge Mr. Tibbits for the pearls of wisdom he shared with me and I am more likely (than before) to think twice (or maybe even thrice) before I choose where I invest my resources… and I suggest you do, too!

Tagged as: active garage, atypon systems, battles, clients, competitors, customers, equal, gordon tibbitts, himanshu jhamb, leaders, Leadership, wise, workplace

What’s your ante?

by Himanshu Jhamb, Mar 1, 2010

Poker is about making wagers. You need to pay up to get in the game and which table you play depends upon how much you want to ante up. Life and business are no different. Evaluate what table you are sitting at. If the potential payout is not going to help you reach your goal, you need to quit that table you are at and move to a table where the payout is large enough. Quitting is easy to do, but make sure you have the required skills to play at a high stakes table. more…

Change Management #6 – Processes: Two tips for refereeing business rule changes

by Gary Monti, Mar 2, 2010

To say that bringing change to an organization will be challenging is a gross understatement. You may feel like Sisyphus rolling the huge rock uphill only to see it roll back down again. Your success at this is predicated on two components: What to do and How to do it. more…

Are you moving forward or drifting in your life?

by Vijay Peduru, Mar 3, 2010

If you examine your life, you may find areas which are not the way you want them to be. For instance, you may be stuck at the same position in your career. If you analyze why, you will find out that you are simply reacting to situations and not producing the situations you want to be in. You can rectify this if you learn how to be the “cause in the matter”. more…

Social Media and making a $1 Billion movie: Avatar

by Deepika Bajaj, Mar 4. 2010

Avatar is a phenomenal movie and it is setting a new standard for movie makers. Nevertheless, Social Media had a role to play in its box office success. Avatar, through its own Facebook and Twitter pages spread the word all over the web. The red carpet premier was broadcast live to web audience. These were capped by the interview the movie director, producer and the lead actors gave on MTV.com in which they took questions from internet fans. That is Social Media for you! more…

Do you have the tools you need to write a book?

by Roger Parker, Mar 5, 2010

Writing is a craft and yes, writers need the right tools too. Apart from a variety of low-tech tools you can get at office supply stores, writers need some high-tech tools like Mind mapping tools, Keystroke substitution software and speech recognition software. You also need to gain mastery of the word processing program you use. Read the article and take a free online evaluation to test your knowledge. more…

Tagged as: active garage, business, Business Management, Business Strategy, Change Management, deepika bajaj, gary monti, himanshu jhamb, http://activegarage.com, Magesh Tarala, roger parker, Social Media, vijay peduru, Writing for Business

If we examine our life, we have some areas which are not the way we want them to be. For example, we want to move ahead in our career but we are stuck at the same position, Things don’t happen the way we want them to happen. Why?, It is because we have not genuinely accepted this as a problem and have not taken full responsibility for it. We may think we took responsibility but we don’t. The good news is it is very easy to find out if we are genuinely taking responsibility and the test is rooted in action. The test is simply to notice if we are acting or reacting. The former resides in the land of ‘taking responsibility’ and the latter does not.

In reading about countless successful people, I have noticed that they move things forward to produce the situations they want.

In other words they become a “cause in the matter” i.e they cause things to happen. Once we know that we are the “cause in the matter”… opportunities that we were blind to before will start to appear, they appear because , now we are looking for them. For example, when you drive today, decide to enjoy the roads, the scenery along the way.. and for this trip stop thinking about anything. I bet even if you have been driving for a few years, in this trip you will “notice” new things that you never saw before… even though the driving route is the same, the car is the same, the destination is the same and even the components of the scenery are the same (they have always been there!)

Go ahead, Be a causer and drifting will never happen.

P.S. Thanks to landmark Education for the distinction “Cause in the matter”.

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Tagged as: Action, active garage, cause, cause in the matter, distinction, landmark education, life, notice, reaction, vijay peduru

Ever wonder who is in charge when you repeatedly try to change business rules and nothing happens? It can be maddening! You call the meeting, everyone agrees to make the change and then nothing happens. It feels like Sisyphus rolling that huge rock up the organizational hill only to have it roll back down again and again and…

The solution has two components – what to do and how to do it. The “what to do” comprises integration of three sets of business principles. The “how to do it”  balances all the solutions from the previous five posts in this Change Management Series.

What To Do: Align Business Principles

Three sets of business principles are tiered and integrated. They include:

• Business Modeling describing the rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value in a holistic manner.
• Business Process Management aligning all aspects of an organization with the wants and needs of clients. Specifically, integrating the business rulesets (see below) from the various disciplines.
• Business Rules and Rulesets include the individual rules defining or constraining some aspect of the business and the rulesets that are a collection of individual business rules focusing on the same business activity across the organization.

For example, an outsourcing approach (business model) is chosen for a particular project. The management of vendors will involve both engineering and purchasing. The interplay between engineering, purchasing, and the vendor must be defined (business process management). Success lies in the detailed management of the situation.  Engineering and purchasing must combine their criteria (business rules) into a cohesive set (Business Ruleset) keeping the vendor consistently focused on providing value.

Notice how when we get to the most detailed level, Business Rules and Rulesets, they circle back to the most strategic level, Business Modeling. Let’s put that to use in determining “How To”.

How To Do It: Changing The Business Rules

Performance on this project is akin to mud wrestling! At one moment it feels like there’s a grasp on the situation and then the next moment – whoops – either stance, grip or both are lost.

The solution is learning how to referee and let the people in your organization produce the results. Specifically, take the recommendations in the previous 5 posts and perform them in the reverse order.

To produce a sustainable, stable set of business rules and processes focus on quality and risk as mentioned in the fifth post, “Projects: Three Tips to Avoid Creating Frankenstein”.

Is it easy? No. You are dealing with human nature. Use the solutions from the fourth post, “People: Building a Team with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” to gauge the limits of people and resources available, decide on trade-offs, and finalize goals.

If technology is part of the process implementation remember the remedies in the third post, “Technology: Too Good To Be True…Two Deadly Misconceptions and Their Remedies”

Keeping the project from becoming a chaotic mess requires a balance between letting people “go at it” and settling down to build some results. Act as described in the second post, Morphing Organizations: The Executive Samurai and Complexity Theory

Finally, you must be unshakable Do this by knowing your goals, values and beliefs. It sets the context. Lead the way as described in the first post Leadership: Navigating With an Executive Map and Compass

All this is done for one simple reason: to present something of value to the customer. In the seventh and final post of this series we will look at the product.

If this has been beneficial, if you have any comments, or just find this as fascinating as I do then send me an e-mail at gwmonti@mac.com or visit www.ctrchg.com.

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Tagged as: active garage, business, Business Management, business planning, Business Strategy, Change Management, Leadership, management, possibilities, Strategy, www.activegarage.com

If you have ever played poker (and I know there are many experts out there who can beat me hands-down belly-up!), you know what ante is. Simply put, it’s the wager you have to bet without an inkling of the hand that has been dealt to you or in other words It is the wager that you have to bet that simply qualifies you to ‘play’ in the game. Then there are many tables, each table with different stakes. You can choose which table you want to sit at and play on depending on how much money you have.

Business is very similar to poker. It requires us to wager something – an ante before we even have an inkling of the hand that is dealt to us. Think about the investment you have to make in order to bring a product to market or start your next entrepreneurial venture or even the new job that you get. In each of these situations there is this pesky ante that you cringe to put down but have to put down in order to play on the table! Here’s how the ante appears in each of these situations:

1. Bringing a product to the market: You put your time, money (maybe not yours!) and energy as ante in building the product, doing your market research & getting help from others.
2. Starting your entrepreneurial venture: Your ’skin-in-the-game’ is pretty much your ante here.
3. Getting a new job: You apply for your dream job, excel in that interview, land the job and within 2 months realize that what you’re doing is nothing like what you had imagined you’d be doing (Err.. I mean this in a negative way). In this case, all the effort that you put in to the point where you started the new job is your Ante.

My point so far: There is an ante in every game you play (Business being a game, too… )

Here’s the golden question: Is the table you are sitting at (which basically determines what ante you put) is the right table for what you want to achieve?

Consider this example: You are 45 years old & have plans of retiring with $4M in your bank account at the age of 65. You currently have $1M saved up. You make $100K a year. That’s a gap of $3M you have to cover in 20 years. You don’t need to be a math whiz to notice that it is impossible to get to this number with what you are making currently – You are basically sitting at the wrong table! because regardless of how well you play at this table, you’re never going to make your goal of $4M!

So you figured out that you’re sitting and playing at a table where no matter how well you play (heck! you might be the best player) you’re still not going to make it to your goal.

Now what?

Before you decide to take the leap of faith and move to the high-ante table, be aware that as you move up to the high-ante, the competition gets thick too. The players at the high-ante table are no pushovers. In fact, one mistake there and they’ll wipe you out before you know what hit you! So, yes – by all means, quit playing at the table where you are not going to make it BUT continue playing at the low-ante table until you are Skilled enough to move higher up and be the best player at the high-ante table!

… and of course, the last piece of advice and perhaps the most important to remember – Know when you have made it to your goal, get up from the table and go play a new game!

Good luck!

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Tagged as: active garage, ante, entrepreneur, Entrepreneurship, excel, financial goal, goals, himanshu jhamb, interview, job, poker, product, quit

The Art of getting what you want

by Vijay Peduru, Feb 22, 2010

Human brain has the tendency to avoid anything that it considers will cause pain. It reaches this conclusion based on instinct and/or past experience. This part of the brain is called the Lizard brain. The Possibilities brain seeks opportunity and freedom. When you want to work out and get in shape or in general, put in effort to convert a possibility into opportunity, your lizard brain may prevent you because it sees pain in the endeavor. You can remove this roadblock placed by the lizard brain by putting the endeavor in the right context.

Seth Godin in his brilliant book “Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?” talks about the Lizard Brain. For a brief Introduction to the lizard brain check this post , this video and this short e-book. more…

Change Management #5 – Project: Three tips to avoid creating Frankenstein

by Gary Monti, Feb 23, 2010

You can avoid creating a Frankenstein if you follow these simple steps:

1. Consider the needs of all the stakeholders when creating a scope of work including competitors and clients. Success includes your needs being met as part of the outflow of providing opportunity for others.

2. Your work must be sustainable, i.e., of good quality.

3. Provide stability, i.e., manage risk effectively.

Dr. Frankenstein driven by ego, pride and vainglory, got isolated from society and this caused him to lose direction and ultimately resulted in his downfall. more…

Growing Pains for Startups

by Guy Ralfe, Feb 24, 2010

Businesses are built around network interactions; each person in the network is a potential communication channel. As the number of people in your organization grows, the number of communication channels grows rapidly according to the formula (N * (N-1))/2 where N is the number of people in the group. This is a potential source of inaction or introducing bureaucracy. Educating the organization on this principle and providing guidance will help employees act confidently in the best interest of the company. more…

Social Media BRANDing – 5 tips to make it work

by Deepika Bajaj, Feb 25, 2010

Many companies have created digital channels like Facebook Fan pages, Twitter, SEO, etc to establish a digital presence. Now, how can they measure the effectiveness and improve? Here are some recommendations:

1. Tie social media activity to revenue growth

2. Know your customers. Don’t limit yourself based on what you know. Instead, try to find who your customers is.

3. Provide relevant content to draw the attention of your customers.

4. Put in place a mobile strategy.

5. Create strong relationships with your customers.

more…

Author’s Journey #10 – How to make the time to write a book

by Roger Parker, Feb 26, 2010

Time is not something you find like a needle in a hay stack. You need to make time for your endeavor by managing your commitments. Here are some techniques to make time to write your book:

1. Start with a plan

2. Commit to daily progress

3. Harvest time

4. Track your progress

more…

Tagged as: active garage, business, Business Management, business planning, Business Strategy, Change Management, deepika bajaj, Entrepreneurship, execution, gary monti, Guy Ralfe, roger parker, Social Media, startup, vijay peduru, Writing for Business, www.activegarage.com

Is your change leadership transforming your company into a front-runner in your market niche or turning it into aversion of Dr. Frankenstein’s monster? How do you even go about answering this question? What’s your reference point? Is it reliable?

Mary Shelley’s protagonist, Victor Frankenstein, combined with three project management principles, scope management, quality management and risk management, can help answer these questions and keep you and your organization on the right track. By following these principles your organization’s performance will have two important characteristics – Sustainability and Stability.

Frankenstein

Victor Frankenstein suffered from an extreme case of hubris. He was caught up in appearances. He wanted all the glory. He pulled pieces and parts together to create something that breathed and moved and ended up being a demented testament to his limited genius. The monster lacked human spirit. In the end, his creation was the source of his downfall.

Scope Management

The human spirit that was missing in the monster stands out clearly when examined in terms of leadership (see the Leadership post, the first in this series.)

From that blog you may recall the magnetic north for the executive compass comprises the leader’s beliefs and values. For Dr. Frankenstein they were ego, pride, and vainglory. The team (society) was shut out. His only worry was about what he would get from the situation. With that attitude no matter how hard he worked failure was certain.

To be successful the needs of all relevant stakeholders must be included when creating a scope of work that is going to transform your company. This includes competitors as well as clients. Knowing the competition is just as important as knowing your customers.  Success also includes your needs being met as part of the outflow of providing opportunity for others.

Quality Management

So how do you know if changes are moving in the right direction? The answer is simple. Your work must be sustainable. A synonym for “sustainable” is “quality management.” With quality management deliverables are defined in measurable terms consistent with the scope of work. This is the same scope of work that includes all stakeholders.

Going back to the Leadership post, the plan is the arrow on the executive compass that points the way. Quality underpins the plans credibility. It is incorporated into the overall change strategy as well as day-to-day management.

Dr. Frankenstein’s compass was useless. It was unable to provide meaningful direction. His plan was unsustainable.

Risk Management

The final component needed is stability. A synonym for stability is “risk management.”

Dr. Frankenstein’s work lacked stability. He worked in isolation. He lost his connection with society. All his work was self-referencing.

Why is this so important? Recall the dancing terrain from the Leadership post. Complex situations have a terrain that is constantly shape-shifting. There is too much for one person to map reliably and keep current.

Success requires everyone in the organization to be eyes and ears for new, changing information that can keep the map current.

With an accurate map the organization, under your leadership, can plan how best to deal with threats and opportunities present. This is risk management. Executing the risk management plans provides stability.

In the next blog we will look at process management’s place in change management. If this blog has been beneficial and you would like more information or care to comment send me an e-mail at gwmonti@mac.com or visit www.ctrchg.com.

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Tagged as: active garage, business, Business Management, business planning, Business Strategy, Frankenstein, leaders, Leadership, management, possibilities, quality, Quality Management, Risk Management, Scope Management

Are you feeling helpless?

by Vijay Peduru, Feb 15, 2010

Going through the same situation repeatedly, unable to control it, and accepting to suffer through it is called Learned Helplessness. Once you understand this important distinction, you can recognize the situation and take action to unlearn it. Vijay illustrates this with an example of an experiment conducted on dogs by Martin Seligson, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and the author of several books including “Learned Optimism”. more…

Change Management #4 – People: Building a team with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

by Gary Monti, Feb 16, 2010

Implementing change in an organization will bring out the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde personas of the team members. This is part of human nature and if you do not plan for this, you will face serious problems reaching your goals. Your leadership is what will help keep the project on track. Gary provides several tips to help you understand the risk and navigate the terrain. more…

Commitments Change Over Time

by Guy Ralfe, Feb 17, 2010

One of the fundamental requirements for increasing our power and value in the marketplace is our ability to make and keep promises and commitments. A promise or commitment is between two parties. And each of them is locked into their stories viewed through their eyes. Between the time a promise is made and it is fulfilled, situations will change for both parties. It is essential to maintain the story for both parties through time or commitments will fail. more…

Selecting a Business Valuation expert

by Steve Popell, Feb 18, 2010

There are myriad reasons why the owner of a privately held company may want or need to have the company valued. Regardless of the reason, finding the right expert will pay off in the quality and utility of the opinion. In this article, Steve offers the criteria for assessment and gives some tips on how to ground your assessments. more…

Author’s Journey #9 – Cultivating the habits of writing success

by Roger Parker, Feb 19, 2010

Essential habits for writing success are Targeting, Positioning and Efficiency. In this article Roger describes how he put this theory to practice when writing his next book #Book Title Tweet: 140 Bite-Sized Ideas for Article, Book, and Event Titles. more…

Tagged as: Action, active garage, business, Business Strategy, Business Valuation, gary monti, Guy Ralfe, Project Management, roger parker, steve popell, vijay peduru, writing, Writing for Business, www.activegarage.com

Making and fulfilling commitments is the only way by which we can accumulate power and produce an identity in the marketplace which to a large part determines our value in the marketplace. Commitments (promises) are such a cornerstone to our lives yet we often pay little attention to how we manage them.

Business is about people making promises and accepting commitments, through conversations of action in their lives. Yes there are loads of conversations that take place around the water cooler, but until they turn into something you care about, those conversations will not be contributing to building your identity and power, most of these are just expressive.

Managing and keeping our commitments is fundamental to our personal business success, first we start by trying to memorize our commitments. But the more complex our requests become we need to seek out tools to help us manage such as calendars, notebooks, software. With even more complexity and number we outgrow our tools and hire PA’s /Assistants to help us. When this is not enough we hire more people to make more commitments on our behalf which then becomes the enterprise organization – the business, our power.

Thankfully the map of a conversation for action was mapped out by Terry Winograd and Fernando Flores back in 1986 in their book Understanding Computers and Cognition.

There are only a set number of possibilities at each stage of a conversation, which would lead you to believe this would be easy. However for a conversation to have been successful it needs to have been fulfilled and produced an assessment of satisfaction for the requester after completion.

This is where I witness the challenge coming into business. Time as always is the culprit, and we as humans living in a world of our own stories, see the world as a reflection of our moods and circumstances at any point in time. No matter how well a request is made and accepted between a requester and supplier, over time both will be in different situations from which to assess the commitment and this can lead to many breakdowns.

It is a bit like taking my child to the toy store and asking him which toy would he chose if he could have one choice. In the aisle that we are in he will find the best toy he can see based on his current criteria and space. With the toy locked under his arm we then move off and walk into the next isle, suddenly the toy will be dropped and a new one snapped up – as his circumstances change.

The point here is that just because you have made a request and received a promise or commitment to fulfill, you have to maintain the story for both parties or commitments will fail. Another point to watch out is that we talk of conversations for ACTION – Actions is what produces satisfactory outcomes, lookout for inconsistencies in actions. Such an example would be a client requesting a tightly managed project however they will not commit to signing a scope document…

Tagged as: Action, active garage, Commitments, Communication, conditions of satisfaction, execution, Guy Ralfe, Identity, promises, www.activegarage.com