Bill's Blog

On the road again? Innovation Willie Nelson style!

In his book, Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School, John Medina, a developmental molecular biologist suggests in Rule 3 that our Brains are all wired differently.

We all have neural networks like major highways but our side streets, our winding countryside roads are based on our experience. As no two of us have the same set of experiences, all our maps are unique.

When I need to be creative, I find myself travelling the side roads, the single track routes rutted with potholes that bump you to attention or those that run alongside beautiful scenery that inspires.

Alternatively, when in delivery mode, the highway is the best and shortest route. It gets me from A to B optimising the use of my resources: time, fuel and can I say “wear and tear”?

Medina also informs us that when we look at something, our brain dissect the image into multiple elements which are stored in a host of different areas, disassembling the vision like a jigsaw to bring back together when we need it. What if, however, we could create a different picture from the elements? Now that’s innovation! Like, Tim Hurson suggests in “Think Better” that’s the third third – the final stretch where the really great ideas emerge.

So on what route do you find inspiration? What is the scenery of your creativity? I’m interested to hear from you.

Want to find out more of the “Brain Rules”? Check out the following video by Polar Unlimited.

 

 

 

Sorry Mick, You CAN always get what you want!

 
 We will all be familiar with “triangle of options”: in business there are three variables in any business transaction: Cost, Quality and Time. If you want things faster, Cost or quality must suffer. If you want things more feature rich, time and cost will increase. You get it? Any 2 from 3.

 

Well, in his book FL!P, Peter Sheahan suggests we’ve  moved on. In his words, it’s FAST, GOOD, CHEAP pick three then add something else!   Getting what you need is yesterday. Today is getting what you want. And too much is never enough!

 

Sheahan states: Today's customers increasingly think AND not OR. In a world full of oversupply, global under-demand and non-stop technical change, they get more of what they want faster and faster all the time.

 

Fast is not fast enough

 

Fast today is not fast enough for tomorrow, good today is not good enough for tomorrow and cheap today is not cheap enough for tomorrow. Competitive advantages quickly turn into competitive necessities that rivals can copy and adapt for themselves.

  

 Technology (see earlier blog on Four Forces) is speeding up the world and making just about everything other than closing lift doors happen faster and faster all the time. And it is not only technology, when it comes to the youngest customers (and staff in relation to their careers) no demand on speed of delivery feels unreasonable.

 

Good is not good enough

 

Innovation is the lifeblood of businesses. It allows new growth as the old wood rots and breaks off. Companies must continue to innovate, offering aptly designed - design is claimed to be the new business model - user-friendly - remember Mick? - and dependable products or services for customers when and where they want them. Change isn’t inevitable, its intrinsic.

 

Cheap is not cheap enough

 

Look at the growth of the Freemium business model. For the majority of its users, Skype charges nothing for the service yet provides the full featured and regularly updated product, not just a shrunk down, basic, feature reduced version. Look at Google. What would we do without it? How would we search and find the data we need - instantly? Look at Wikipedia - facts on everything - regularly updated - and free.

 

If you are price dependent you are at risk. Sooner or later in this technology supported world, someone will come along and pull the price rug from under your feet and re-invent the entire industry. Need an example? Watch out for major changes in the printed-word world.

 

Fast, Good, Cheap and more

 

Table stakes are getting bigger because of the feedback loop between increasing compression of time and space, increasing complexity and ambiguity, increasing transparency and accountability for actions that have to be performed in conditions of high uncertainty and increasing customer expectations.

 

You must not only ensure that you are fast enough, good enough and cheap enough for today and tomorrow, you must also offer customers something else as well.

 

Sheahan adds: Companies have to do more to win customers than offer a dependable, good-quality, reasonably priced product or service. That’s what ordinary companies do. Extraordinary companies do something else. They realise that in an oversupplied market, competitive advantage will increasingly be built on elements once considered superficial. The small stuff. Make it sweat!

Lights, Camera, Action, Clarity!

Action Creates Clarity

 

In the last post a key point was the fact we need to take action to move forward. Micro planning does not really help us move forward. It is more of a brake than a boost.

 

This is not to say, however, that planning is wrong, but plans must be shorter and more flexible allowing strategy to be refined "on the hoof" what Peter Sheahan in his book, FL!P calls "strategy on go".

 

Strategy on the go

 

What Sheahan suggests is you need to have a broad vision: a trajectory that draws you to a better future. The key is to map out in broad strokes how you will get to where you want to go.

 

Sheahan suggests this ability can become a differentiator, distinguishing you from your competitors. Like the themes set out in Rework by Fried and Heinemeier Hansson of 37Signals, he suggests it best to be results orientated rather than transactional. Be a maverick and celebrate success.

 

Decision making on the go

 

Sheahan suggests human success at adapting to changing conditions lulls us into thinking we can predict the future and hence we start developing and trusting long-term plans. Then change hits.

 

He suggests we need to identify areas in our business where we have become over confident and to look at what would happen if these areas become irrelevant overnight.

 

Decisions need to be made based on the ever trusted gut feel. How many times has it let us down? With reference to Malcolm Gladwell's,  Blink we need to rely on the “power of thinking without thinking”. Go with the flow. As Sheahan suggests, we can make excellent decisions quickly.

 

So what decisions have you been putting off? Make a decision now. Trust your instincts and go with it. Those who will come out on top will be those who act in spite of their fear.

 

Decide on a trajectory

 

Sheahan suggests the beauty of the trajectory model is it leaves plenty of room for serendipity. It’s more about where you are going rather than how you will get there. He makes three key observations.

 

· Connect with the fundamentals

 

What are the fundamentals of your business? How are you performing in these areas? Are you staying abreast of the new developments and rising expectations in these areas? If not, why not? What could you do now to get started?

 

These questions set out a major challenge and if you are in a large business someone will surely be monitoring them. But do you know? Can you give a direct answer to each of them? There is a need to understand the fundamentals, the foundations of your business and the "spine" on which rapid decisions will be made.

 

· Look, listen and unlearn

 

The reason people and the businesses they run fall behind is that we as individuals are not paying attention to the changes taking place. We look in, not out. We claim to be busy, so don't have the time, but are we deluding ourselves?

 

To FL!P, Sheahan suggest we must have high sensory acuity. We must assume the customer is well advised on our business - he will certainly be - and he will have an impression of what we do based on his "lens". We need to therefore listen as we were he, to find out what he requires, what he desires and to change - FL!P - our business to meet the needs.

 

Knowledge, a valuable intangible asset of most companies, has a shelf life. Like a prize plant, if we don't attend to it, prune off the dead branches, reshape it to its surroundings then it will grow lank, shapeless and unattractive. What Knowledge or practices do you hold on to that are no longer empowering? What behaviour that once drove your success do you and your team need to unlearn?

 

• Make up your mind

 

Ask yourself: what do I think? You will come up with new answers - answers that make sense, and are based on all the experience that has brought you to where you are today.

 

Make that decision. It’s key to your success and to making the FL!P. Don’t forget:

 

o   Decisions lead to action

 

When you make your mind up about something it usually leads to action

 

o   Decisions create momentum

 

The action that follows your decision will give you the clarity that was preventing you from making the decision on the first place and set you off on a positive cycle

 

o   Decisions create confidence

 

The decision gives not just you a sense of confidence but also those around you. If you are to get your team or company moving along the chosen trajectory, you had better install some confidence. Decisions create that confidence.