Aaron Hoos

Great link, sent to me quite some time ago (last year maybe?) by my start-up guru colleague Jeffrey Priebe, probably in relation to a project we were talking about at the time. I filed it in my bookmarks and then it got buried.

Finally found it, read it (again), and thoroughly enjoyed it (again).

While the article outlines the experience of grad students creating computer games, it really is a brilliant model for innovation in a business, as well.  I have seen start-ups (as well as business initiatives like new brands and new products) started this way.

Gamasutra – Feature – “How to Prototype a Game in Under 7 Days”.

The Question:

Wilame Lima asked: “Why is it so hard to follow a strategy? While some companies don’t have prepared professionals or sectors to effectively plan their activities, others do not have this kind of problem. However, even for those, strategic planning becomes ineffective, this because of internal culture, lack of acceptation of the directors or lack of preparation of managers and employees. In your opinion, how to surpass (or to minimize) the impact of the “human factor” in the implementation of the strategic planning of the company/sectors? Can a good plan to surpass a problematic organizational culture?”
[Visit Wilame Lima's LinkedIn profile]

Aaron’s Answer:

There have been some really good answers so far. I would echo a lot of the ideas, especially regarding the importance of focus.

In my experience, there a few ways to help implement strategy effectively:

* Get early stage buy-in from people. Don’t just tell them that the strategy has changed. This is the “top-down” approach and employees feel like it’s being rammed down their throats. They might also feel like their jobs are in jeopardy. Instead, tell them much earlier that you’re exploring changes to help them (i.e, help them do their jobs better or help them make more money, etc.). Implementing strategy is essentially a sales job: You need to sell it to your people in the same way you’d sell a product to a customer: Focus on the benefits to the employee first and then to the company second.

* Communicate often. Walk people through the process. Employees often resist change because there’s the unspoken threat that their jobs are in danger or the predictability of their work will vanish. Keep them informed. Offer lots of training. Get a champion in each department to spearhead the change. Keep the communication positive. I’ve seen lots of strategy changes that were implemented for negative reasons and it seemed like bosses were “turning the screws” on the employees.

* If the strategy is important to the company, tie incentives and pay structure to it. Obviously a strategy like “we’re going to use instant messaging instead of email for internal communications” isn’t what I’m talking about. Instead, I mean something like “We’re going to increase our insurance-industry business so any employee who can bring in an insurance lead will get a bonus, and if that company signs with us, our employee will get a larger bonus”, etc.
Good luck!

-Aaron Hoos
http://aaronhoos.com

[Visit my LinkedIn profile]

Just read Zane Safrit’s article “Which Report is the Most Important?” over at SmallBizTrends. Good article. Zane lays out that there are two kinds of reports he recommends that business owners read: Financial reports like the income statement, balance sheet, and cashflow statement, and operational reports like conversion rate, customer churn, leads, referrals, and customer service requests.

Safrit outlines the frequency these reports should be read and why small business owners should be looking at these reports.

Read “Which Report is the Most Important?”

In the Business Diamond Framework™, each Function Diamond should review these reports and the Leadership Diamond should strategize to improve the numbers. Delivering on those strategies, though, is usually the role of all Function Diamonds working together.

The following is a case study derived from working with a client. To preserve confidentiality, I am only describing the problem and not the client.

PROBLEM: A client approached me with a problem. Their organization had invested thousands of dollars to hire a company to create 3 five minute training videos for their new product. Unfortunately, the result (after pre-paying for the work) was extremely poor quality and insufficient for their needs. They had potentially lost thousands of dollars for worthless videos.

SOLUTION: We talked about what their needs were for these videos (ultimately to train their sales people) and I analyzed the content in each video and redeveloped a storyboard that salvaged significant elements of the videos. I also developed a script that was read by a professional voice artist. Collaborating with other professionals, we recrafted the video by chopping up and repurposing the videos, and then adding a new voiceover. For a small additional investment, the client was able to salvage what was once lost.

RELEVANCE TO THE BUSINESS DIAMOND FRAMEWORKâ„¢: I’ve done this kind of work (in various media) with other clients, too, and I’ve found that the most frequently wasted assets are in the Support Diamond — typically training material intended to help different areas of the organization. A lot of investment is put into the content and then it goes unused.

Seth Godin encouraged us to push through The Dip.

Jim Collins talked about using the “hedgehog concept” to create a breakthrough in Good to Great.

Malcolm Gladwell called it “The Tipping Point“.

It’s that moment when your business transforms from “just another business” into “THE business”.  It’s the moment when your company straps on a rocket pack and zooms into the stratosphere while every other business is left behind.

How can businesses achieve that? What makes the difference? I think about this a lot and work with clients who are driving toward it.

So, what ARE the ways that businesses can get there? Well, I don’t think it’s a magic formula — “Do these 5 things and you’ll get it” — because there are plenty of factors involved. But it seems to me that if a small business owner/entrepreneur is going to explode his or her business, the following things need to happen:

1. Deliver clear value: Make people feel that they can’t live without your products or services. This is a branding, selling, vision-casting, and value-chain effort!
2. Focus on your sales funnel: Avoid getting caught up in the myriad of marketing opportunities and business models available. Find a few things you do well (a few lead generating things, a few prospect qualification things, a few selling things, etc.) and just do them over and over and over and over and over! Create a way to capture more people and lock them in to a relationship with you.
3. Invest in excellence: Identify the mediocre elements of your business and get rid of them. Spend (wisely) to improve, automate, and scale. In my business this includes a toll-free number, an assistant, and supporting applications.
4. Stop doing it all yourself: Get someone to help you with your business. Seriously. Hire an assistant. (This was something I knew I needed for a while but kept putting off. My friend Heather Villa of IAC Professionals finally pushed me to do it and the impact on my business has made me regret not doing it sooner).
5. Work today for tomorrow: In the early years of business, you’re often working today for today — just trying to generate near-term revenue. But at some point you need to start building business “investments” for tomorrow. Passive income, automatic revenue streams, etc. Michael E Gerber (the E-Myth guy) called this “working on your business instead of working in your business.
6. Plan, plan, plan, plan, plan: Plan your year, your quarter, your month, your week, your day. Have an exit strategy on every project and on your business. I’m talking about business plans, marketing plans, workflow plans, publishing plans, and plans for every project and customer.
7. Take risks: Try new things, collaborate and partner, create initiatives. Some stuff will fail and that’s okay; you’ll still learn from it and it all builds towards a brighter future. Eventually, you will hit on a winner.
8. Act: Planning and thinking and strategizing are good. Reading and researching and talking to a mentor are good. But at some point, these need to be acted on. “Analysis paralysis” is an epidemic among SMBs.