Welcome
Welcome to the Foresight Newsletter, a free monthly publication of Prevoyance Group Inc. This newsletter shares tips for high performance IT organizations and observations that we hope will prove informative and enjoyable.
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Contents
CONTENTS
Foresight is published by the Prevoyance Group, and this month contains four sections:
Work
Life
Heard in the Hallways
Travels with Patrick
Work
One of the items on the litany of reasons for failure aimed at the US auto companies is their tendency to compete with themselves, each company marketing several brands of a very similar automobile. Ford might market a mid-sized vehicle called the “Fusion” under its Ford brand, while offering the same car, with some slight changes to time and features as the Mercury Milano. The logic behind this system originated in the bygone era when the US automakers had no foreign competition, and could offer a slightly up market version of each vehicle, under the assumption that as the American consumer grew more affluent, they could migrate to a more prestigious brand while purchasing from the same company.
This logic might have worked in the 1950’s, but as competition intensified and the variations between lines blurred, the consumer could no longer identify any meaningful difference between, say a Dodge Caravan and a Plymouth Voyager. At the end of the day, this strategy layered confusion and uncertainty on the consumer. Would they get the best deal at the Chrysler or Dodge dealer? If the Mercury line was so superior to the Ford line, wasn’t that a poor reflection on the company as a whole?
While we can easily pick apart these companies for their seemingly inane decisions, many other companies have their own internal competition that provides no benefit to their end consumers. A slew of process improvement teams might be pursuing the same objectives, and waste valuable time with “my methodology can beat up your methodology” arguments that provide little benefit to the company as a whole. Perhaps marketing and R&D are looking for similar data from your best customers, presenting a scatterbrained face to your most important consumers as similar surveys or telemarketing solicitations arrive within days or hours.
Perhaps most insidious, one business unit may be actively sabotaging the efforts of another to meet their goals. While it sounds farfetched, one of my clients rigorously aligned a call center VP’s compensation with their average sales per call. Based on this metric, the call center was designed to minimize time spent on non-revenue calls. For product returns, call center reps would provide a return address and nothing else, causing hundreds of boxes to arrive at the warehouse unannounced and bereft of any documentation. 3-4 minutes were saved on each call, at the expense of 60 minutes spent by warehouse staff chasing down documentation and doing detective work to determine the source of the product.
While cutting expenses seems to be all the rage in the current economic climate, spending a bit of cash to weed out these internal competitions will save far more than yet another draconian expense policy. After all, it is hard enough to beat the competition without fighting against yourself.
Life
Most of us probably heard the story of US Airways flight 1549, which made a dramatic emergency landing in New York’s Hudson River after losing both engines in what appears to have been a bird collision. It is a bit humbling that a flock of geese can take down millions of dollars of technical wizardry, but also quite heartening for this US Airways frequent flyer that the seemingly impossible, a water landing, can be successfully executed and all 155 passengers can survive.
One of the other interesting things about the incident was the investigation launched in the aftermath of the accident. I saw a spokesperson for the NTSB, the government agency responsible for investigating airplane accidents, comment that they were not as concerned with what when wrong in this case, but wanted to focus on what went right. As the NTSB noted, the pilot of flight 1549 pulled off the seemingly impossible, performing a water landing with two nonfunctional engines, surely there is much to be learned and incorporated into future pilot training and safety procedures.
In our own lives, perhaps we could spend more time analyzing what when right. We have all been admonished to learn from our mistakes, by everyone from concerned parents when we first touched a hot flame or did something wrong, to bosses, shareholders and the media as we grow older, yet rarely do any of these advisors tell us to look at what went right. In the best case, there were a few identifiable and repeatable actions we can apply to future activities, or a skill or tool that provided a much-needed advantage at just the right moment. In other cases, we might identify a lack of skill. Reflecting on 2008, one of my great achievements was largely the result of dumb luck: being in the right place at the right time. While dumb luck is generally not repeatable, looking at the success after the glow wore away has allowed me to redouble my resolve in other areas that will make “dumb luck” a little smarter in the future.
Heard in the Hallways
Everyone loves a good scapegoat. The current state of the economy has become the scapegoat du jour for everything from climate change to otherwise successful companies shifting conferences to lower-tier venues to “keep up appearances.” I half expect to hear teachers lamenting that “the current economic state” has become the number one excuse for not turning in homework, supplanting “my dog ate it.”
While use of a scapegoat is partially rooted in human nature, the more it becomes accepted the more insidious it becomes. While a scapegoat absolves us from personal responsibility in the short term, it is a boogeyman lurking in that shadows that we cannot defeat. If “the economy” is responsible for all the ills in one’s life, he can never improve, and his condition is subject to the whims of an external force over which he has no control. If some poor financial decisions and overextension are the result of some troubles in another person’s life, these are items that can be attacked and overcome though discipline, learning and a sprinkle of good luck. In short, passing responsibility to a scapegoat puts you in the backseat, allowing life to take you where it may, and casting your lot with an external force. While acknowledging failure in the short term might be painful, it is also liberating as your tackle and best the problems thrown your way. Even if you fail, you are captain of the ship rather than abdicating the responsibility to external forces and assuming the role of passenger rather than driver.
Travels with Patrick
Having been an avid science fiction reader as a child, I often pondered how wonderful the world would be if modern science would finally offer us teleportation. The ability to stand on a special platform and say “beam me up, Scotty,” appearing seconds later at a new destination seems like it would be a godsend.
Now that I have travelled a bit, I am not so sure. To some extent, we have something nearing teleportation in the form of air travel. One steps into a sterile and generic environment the moment they walk into an airport. Moments later they enter an aircraft indistinguishable from any other in the world, save perhaps for the language being spoken over the PA. You are essentially teleported: despite travelling thousands of miles, the environment remains the same from the time you walk into the airport at one end of your trip, until you walk out the door at your destination airport. You are suddenly and irrevocably trust into another culture, climate and environment, your body arriving with such speed that the mind is still lingering in the security line back home.
While one cannot argue the convenience of air travel, I much prefer something slower, where colors and cultures shift subtly rather than the feeling jumping headfirst into a pool of ice water that accompanies arriving by air. Now if only I could convince my clients that travel by motorcycle, hiking boot or ship is both cost effective and efficient…