I had two conversations in pretty quick succession that pointed towards the extremes of service we face every day.

Both talking about (different) new products. The first, a “name” advertising guy, said,

“It’s possible to cover up a bad product with good advertising.”

The second, a middle manager at one of the world’s biggest computer companies, said,

“We need to make sure the back end is bomb proof before we get the sales force excited.”

Which product would you rather buy?

I’m not suggesting that the advertising guy was recommending what he was saying, or even liking it. He wasn’t. But the fact that he had this answer down pat shows that too few companies take the approach of the computer guy.

Faced with an opportunity to make money, which option do you take? The quick don’t-ask-difficult-questions-how-many-can-we-shift approach or the slower hold-on,-let’s-make-sure-we-do-this-right approach.

Where’s the money?

A certain big computer company might say, “go slow, add a few steps, make sure the back end is bomb proof.”

I’d say, “skip.”

Neatly filed under Keeping Promises,Making Promises,Skippiness on April 22, 2009

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about names recently. Working in a team, we’ve come up with a bunch of alternatives and pretty much settled on one. On the way through though, someone asked, “how do we know when we’re ready?”

For that matter, how do you know when anything is ready? The name, the new product, the presentation, the logo, the promising member of staff being considered for promotion. Are they ready?

“When can you have the report ready?” says the client.
“Er. When do you need it?” says the consultant.

After a point, state-of-readiness is really state-of-polish. Could something or someone be better? Yes. Does it matter? That depends on the answer to another question:

• Will it do what you promised?

Almost everything could be better, but if it does the job you need it to do, and in the way that it should, then it’s time to ship.

No name is perfect but now we have one that works, it’s time to move on.

Neatly filed under Keeping Promises,Making Promises on April 21, 2009

What happens when the slow controls the quick? Sometimes the quick gets stuck.

Bre Pettis and Kio Stark may have the antidote.

Cult of Done Manifesto

1. There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion.
2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.
3. There is no editing stage.
4. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it.
5. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.
6. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done.
7. Once you’re done you can throw it away.
8. Laugh at perfection. It’s boring and keeps you from being done.
9. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you right.
10. Failure counts as done. So do mistakes.
11. Destruction is a variant of done.
12. If you have an idea and publish it on the internet, that counts as a ghost of done.
13. Done is the engine of more.

Which was quickly transformed into this poster by James Provost.

Which all reminds me of something by Yoda said ….

There is no try. There is do, or not do.

It’s too easy to get stuck. Instead … get done.

Neatly filed under Innovating,Keeping Promises,Managing on April 11, 2009