If you want help, ask for it.

Some of my friends have asked me to start my jokes by introducing them as such and then saying when they have ended - so that they can laugh at the right time. :-( So:

(start) Once upon a time, there was a man who was having some tough times in his life. He could not figure out a solution to his problems. So he prayed to God, "Please let me win the lottery." However, his situation did not improve. He lost his car a few days later to a creditor. He prayed again, explaining his situation. A few days later, the creditors came again threatening to take away his house. Again, he begged God, "Please God, let me win the lottery. Otherwise, I will lose everything." Suddenly, he heard a deep voice telling him, "John, please meet me half-way on this. At least buy a lottery ticket." (end)

The point is that in many situations, although many people are willing to help us, we do not place ourselves in a good position for them to help us. But sometimes, we do not even do what John did - we do not even take the first step to ask for help. Some examples:

• We assume that people are too busy to help us by looking at a closed door, a powered-off cell phone or a "Busy" status on their IM. In many cases, they may have been busy for some reason, but after that, they forgot to change their outward status. If you want help, knock on the door. Leave a voice message. Buzz the person. If the person is really busy, they will tell you so or get back to you later.
  
  
• We sometimes make assumptions whether someone will help us or not. Instead of asking a simple question, "Can you please do me a favor?", we tie ourselves in knots and are forced to deal with the situation ourselves.
  
  
• We make our complaint, but we don't tell the other person what solution we want. This makes the helper try to guess what we want and come up with a wrong or different solution which doesn't meet our needs. It frustrates both us and the helper.
  
  
• We sometimes think that because someone has not helped us in the past, they may not help us in the future. Unless there was some dispute between you and them, it is very likely that some other factor (not related to you) was responsible. This may have changed now. Very likely, the other person is feeling guilty that they could not help you before and they will be more enthusiastic now.
  
  
• We assume that people in a higher social or professional position will not help us and we nurse irrational grudges against them. Actually, most senior and successful people will do exactly the opposite - they want to have your loyalty, co-operation and respect, which they won't by rejecting your requests. Most have, in fact, go to the top by being of help to others.

Human beings are social creatures. Most people value community and friendship. They will help if they can. Just ask.

Technorati tags: help, assumptions, problems, solutions

The Weight of Old Baggage

Today, I was re-organizing my web bookmarks - the ones I have been collecting over the years. Although it was to be expected, I was surprised to see how many bookmarks were totally outdated - mostly relating to technologies that have bit the dust or been replaced by newer ones. There were many websites that have gone out of business or re-located - so those URLs are no longer valid.

The same situation happens in other cases too - like when I am organizing my computer files or my personal papers at home. Always, I find a lot of stuff that has totally outlived its utility, but I have been holding onto them for too long. And this when I think of myself as being too organized.

There are many problems with keeping old stuff around: too much clutter, too much time, energy, space and money to maintain them and the difficulty in recognizing what is truly needed and perhaps accidentally destroying them.

In some instances, I like keeping things around for nostalgic reasons. For example, when I was a young teenager, I used to write down trivia facts from various sources in my school library. But I realize today that apart from the memories, that information is useless, because today anyone can find those facts on the Internet in a few seconds through Google or Wikipedia.

This also applies to bookmarks and other sites that allow one to capture content. So here is a shift in my thinking.

1. I see no point in collecting links that have good content unless I don't have time to read them now and want to save them for later reading.
2. Once I read the content, I should use the information in some way:
   1. Create action items to follow up on, such as reading some article on healthy food and making a note to eat that.
   2. Share the link with others using a service like del.icio.us.
   3. Email the link to people or blog about it - the latter is much better as it can be searched upon later.
3. Delete the link. The chances that I will look at that content again is very low. Why keep it around?

The only links worth keeping around are services that I use so that I can quickly launch them - for example, Yahoo!, MSDN, New York Times, etc.

Technorati tags: bookmarks, bookmarking software, del.icio.us, Yahoo! Bookmarks

Collaboration Across Geographic Locations

To state a rather obvious point, the Internet and web-based technologies have enabled organizations to manage projects using teams and employees in different geographic locations across the globe. However, despite the increase in such activities, effective team effort still continues to be challenging. Here are a few high-level guidelines that can help:

1. Plan for miscommunication and misunderstanding: Misunderstandings happen between two people in neighboring cubicles. And they will always occur if one person doesn't have the entire information that the other person has. It is definitely worse with people in different locations when information flow is highly limited and each person interprets incoming communication according to their knowledge and experience.
   
   If you expect and plan for such problems, you will be pro-active in providing as much information as possible so that the other person can understand what you are talking about. If you don't plan for that, both sides will get frustrated at the other party's "incompetence" and "lack of understanding".
   
   
2. Use different methods of communication: Don't restrict yourself to one way of communication. Sometimes, emails are fine. Sometimes, you need to pick up the phone and talk to people. Maybe, you should use a desktop sharing tool to demonstrate an application or show an example. Or, use a whiteboard to illustrate a point through diagrams. Or use video conferencing, if available. If everything else fails, maybe someone should fly out to the other location and spend a few days.
   
   In simple terms, do what it takes to get the information across and don't limit your options of how you can communicate.
   
   
3. Write it down: Although this is true for all projects, it takes on a different dimension in remote collaboration. During phone calls and discussions, many points may get lost simply because of fundamental human limitations. It is very difficult to remember everything said during a talk, even if everyone is paying full attention (which is also not always the case). Also, while a normal conversation includes information conveyed through gestures and facial expressions, this is not possible in a non-video teleconference.
   
   So use documents to spell out what each side wants. And when there are questions and clarifications about the content in the document, put that back in the document. This leaves less things to memory or chance. Any disputes are easily resolved by referring back to the document.
   

There are many tactics that will help, but I won't go into them here. The important thing to realize is that the nature of such collaboration is fundamentally different, harder and more complex than one-office interaction. It requires different methods and a whole deal of patience and perseverance to make it work. But to directly apply tactics in local collaboration to a remote collaboration situation and expect them to work seamlessly is a hopeless dream.

Technorati tags: communication, remote locations, outsourcing, documentation

The Procrastination Technique

I recently finished reading "Managing in the Next Society" by the late Peter Drucker. It is a very good book that discusses about the future of business in a world fundamentally changed by the advent of the digital economy. He also explains how different countries are placed with regard to taking advantage of the new business environment. One of the points he mentioned, namely, judicious use of procrastination, struck me.

Drucker mentioned how the Japanese bureaucracy failed to take action to resolve two major crises facing their economy, but instead decided to ride the problem out. One situation was the precarious situation of the Japanese farmers after World War II and the other was the multitude of small shops that were not profitable or efficient. In both cases, each problem resolved itself due to changing social conditions.

The point was this: Is it sometimes more effective not to do anything? Our normal tendency is to attack the problem at hand and come up with some action plan to resolve it at the earliest. And I think that is a good thing. But can an action plan be "wait and watch"?

I believe that some situations may lend themselves to a course of inaction. Here are some general situations:

1. Doing something now may worsen the situation: Sometimes every course of action possible may lead to serious risks and worsen the situation. For example, in a project that is already late, adding more resources may introduce even more bugs leading to greater project delays.
2. The future may have better circumstances for taking action: Possible actions may have conditions ripe for them, but a later situation may be. For example, Internet video hosting sites would have instantly failed in the early days of the Web because of poor bandwidth of end users. Today we have YouTube.
3. A tipping point has not yet reached: A course of action may be very meaningful today, but has less support among those who would implement them. One must wait for a crisis that allows such actions to be accepted. Politicians are usually masters at this.

The problem with procrastination is that one cannot really predict that the future will be any better. The Japanese certainly didn't - they did what they did in the "hope" (not the certainty) that the problem would go away. So delaying action is a leap of faith. It can also be frustrating to followers and on-lookers who can mistake such behavior for apathy or cowardice.

So use this tactic sparingly. Use it wisely.

Technorati tags: procrastination, Peter Drucker, management, next society

Incorrect Dataset - Distorted Analysis

Being in the information technology field sometimes divorces one from reality. A particular case is the extrapolation of results based on Internet audiences as compared to what is happening in the real world. This was brought into focus recently when I examined some of the details from my web analytics.

Logically progressing from available data, I could infer that:

• Most people in the world live in the United States, Europe, India and Japan. Hardly anyone lives in Africa, South America, Australia and the former Soviet republics.
• Most people in the world speak English. A few people talk Chinese, German, Italian and Spanish, but they are insignificant.
• High-speed Internet connection is available to 75% of the population.
• Almost an equal number of people use Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. [Not true. Read here]
• Nobody uses any search engine other than Google. Yahoo who? Live what? [Not true. Read here]

I am always amazed at the political polls on the Internet on various news websites. The Internet audience is fundamentally different from the actual voting public and the results of these polls are less than worthless - they totally distort the truth and serve no purpose other than to manipulate readers.

A big problem about the Internet is that people trust it too much. They are very likely to believe anything they read on the Internet without any further research or asking questions. How can one avoid this?

1. Always look for the negative argument. If you read an article saying, "X did this", then spend a few minutes searching for the opposite statement.
2. Read both sides of the argument. For example, if you read something in the New York Times, read its counter-argument in the Wall Street Journal and vice versa.
3. Get information from different sources - TV, newspapers, radio, books, magazines, authoritative sources, trusted friends, etc.
4. Be a skeptic. As Carl Sagan said, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence."

Technorati tags: research, skepticism, analytics

5 Great Software Development Blogs

Here are 5 blogs that I really love. They are all related to various aspects of software development. If you are a software professional or an IT manager, I am sure that these will be relevant to you. What is particular great about these blogs is the amazing quality of archived information. If you have any spare time, it would be put to good use if you visit and spend as much time as possible reading the old articles on these sites:

1. Joel on Software: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/ - I was first introduced to Joel Spolsky through his book, "User Interface Design for Programmers" - the paper copy, not the online version. It was thoroughly enjoyable and I started visiting his website. This was before I even knew what a blog was. Joel writes about many different aspects of software development, especially analysis, design and project management. The writing is so lovely and lined with such wonderful anecdotes that you have a huge grin on your face when reading it.
   
2. Coding Horror: http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/ - Jeff Atwood, in comparison, deals with more technical issues including straight programming. Jeff writes articles with great depth and uses images and statistics to illustrate his points very clearly. It is one of the most subscribed-to blogs on the Internet. The site has the benefit of a vibrant community that posts some very insightful comments to complement the articles.
   
3. Creating Passionate Users: http://headrush.typepad.com/ - Kathy Sierra is associated with the very popular "Head First" programming book series and the popular javaranch.com (which used to be one of my favorite Java sites in the past). The "Creating Passionate Users" blog is primarily about aligning your product and services to the needs of end users. A key feature of the blog is its use of simple graphs to explain usability concepts. Dan Russell (a Google researcher) also contributes to this blog.
   
4. Berkun Blog: http://www.scottberkun.com/blog/ - Scott Berkun is the author of the popular "The Art of Project Management". As you would expect from him, he writes primarily about management in the software environment - people and projects. Very useful to any IT manager.
   
5. Hacknot: http://www.hacknot.info/hacknot/action/home - Funnily enough, I don't know who the author is. But this site contains a set of impressive articles about software development methodologies and design decisions. Every article is highly researched and serves to debunk hype and common myths about software issues. For example, the latest one is a detailed analysis against the hype of dynamic languages like Ruby and Python. The articles can be freely downloaded as a PDF in addition to reading them online. You may not agree to all the arguments, but you better know about them.

Other useful sites: Eric Sink and Scott Hanselman

Technorati tags: software development, blogs, joel on software, coding horror, creating passionate users, berkun blog, hacknot, programming, project management

Microsoft's Competitive Openings

More than a decade ago, I read an interview with Bill Gates. I apologize for the lack of proper reference here, as I am unable to recall the name of the book which contained the interview. But the point I remember was that Gates talked about how Microsoft Excel lagged behind other spreadsheet products in the market for a long time. But when graphical user interfaces on operating systems became very popular, Excel was able to surge ahead because of the investments that Microsoft had made in optimizing it for a GUI environment.

Regardless of whether the story is true or not, it raises an important point today. Despite the enormous resources of Microsoft, it has been lagging significantly behind Google, Yahoo! and other companies in web-based services. Since Microsoft-bashing has become a fashion statement, most analysts have started writing about the demise of Microsoft and about Google as the empire-in-waiting.

That may yet happen, but there are some competitive openings for Microsoft which may change the technology landscape:

• Although Windows Vista has had a lukewarm opening, it will become the pre-dominant operating system in the next several months as companies upgrade and consumers buy new machines. That literally translates to hundreds of millions of users and computers. Vista's integrated search features means that desktop search products are on their way out. Desktop widgets may also go the same way because of the Vista user interface and gadgets. And if the Vista security features match up to the marketing, Microsoft has scored significant points against critics. I could go on, but suffice it to say that Vista is going to create greater use of operating system functionality that will lessen the demand for online applications.
  
  
• The Office 2007 products with the new Ribbon-based UI and OpenXML document formats are effective weapons against the encroaching threat of online word processors and spreadsheets. It buys Microsoft some more time by presenting another entry barrier for competitors because of end users who will increasingly be used to the new Office user interface at work. So instead of hurting Microsoft, what the online desktop application market will do is effectively kill Office's competitors, namely, OpenOffice and Star Office. Most anti-Microsoft fanatics are blind to this possibility.
  
  
• Live Search is nowhere near Google Search at the moment (in fact, suggesting it would be laughable), but there are 2 questions here:
  • Will Live Search reach the "good enough" stage that Microsoft can effectively bundle Live Search as a default within the Windows environment and not have users switch over? If you remember how Internet Explorer was terrible initially and then became "good enough" to displace Netscape, you will understand what I am talking about.
  • How will the search market splinter? Google itself has various search categories - web sites, images, blogs, products, etc. Will Google be busy defending its turf against many different entrants and not pay enough attention to Microsoft's threat? Microsoft has enough money and resources to take the backseat for years until it can forge ahead.
    
    
• The YouTube acquisition and the subsequent failed media negotiations/lawsuits/counter-attacks are an unnecessary diversion for Google. It dilutes their video search focus. Perhaps more importantly, management will pay heavily in valuable time and effort defending such an expensive investment and making it profitable. The question is: Having spent $1.65 billion in stock, what will be the return on investment in YouTube for Google? Microsoft has been making noises to exploit the copyright situation and present a more friendly face to the big media companies.

Google has a lot going for it, but will the Empire just lie down and be rolled over? If the past indicates anything, it will be a tough fight to the finish.

Technorati tags: Google, Microsoft, Windows Vista, Office 2007, YouTube

The Charitable Reason

Many conflicts in business arise because of misunderstandings between different people. Companies don't understand what consumers want. Management misinterprets what employees say and vice versa. This is not a theory or off-hand observation - it is a fact of life.

Misunderstanding often produces results that one party in the arrangement does not like. And unfortunately, very frequently, insults are thrown around. For example, consumers rail about "incompetent" customer service. The service representative gets angry dealing with "stupid" customers. Management is upset about "lazy" employees. Employees, on their part, spend their time gossiping about "clueless" managers.

Everybody thinks that the other party "just doesn't get it". The ironic part is that no one ever thinks that they could be making a mistake. Everyone thinks that they are doing the best they can, but they are held back by the vices of others.

I believe that many of these problems would solve themselves if each person had the following thought process:

1. I am going to assume that the person(s) I am interacting with has my best interests at heart.
2. If that is the case, why is he or she behaving like this or producing results like this?
3. Is it because of something I have told them? Or is it the way I interact with them?
4. Is it because I haven't communicated something to them?
5. Why don't I tell them what I want completely and clearly, instead of having them guess it for themselves?
6. How can I ask them or tell them something in the most pleasant manner? How about "please" and "thank you"?
7. If I ever have to interact with them again, how do I leave this transaction with the most goodwill?
8. What do they think of me?

It is always better to attribute the most charitable reason to someone's behavior instead of automatically assuming the worst. In the past, to my regret, I have done the opposite at time, and almost always, found that the problems were due to miscommunication rather than purposeful bad conduct. It is quite difficult to rebuild trust after such incidents.

Promoting empathy is not only useful in business, but also in every aspect of life - personal relationships (family, friends, relatives), community life, politics, etc. Yes, sometimes, the other person may be actually wrong. But very likely not and, unless there are extenuating circumstances, it is better to be careful than ruin relationships and interactions with other people.

Technorati tags: business management, empathy, interaction, misunderstanding

Leadership and Sinking Markets

This is the last in a series of posts regarding how companies and their leaders and managers should change their organizational strategies to suit different market conditions. The previous posts are here, here and here.

Obviously, this is not a market where a company should be. Many companies, however, do find themselves in this situation because of various reasons like:

1. Resting on one's laurels: The organization may have been the leader at one time and has grown complacent over time. If it had maintained the same competitive focus as it had in the past, it may have been in a better condition.
2. Lack of innovation: The company continues to milk its past successes without planning for the future.
3. Ignorance or disdain of external happenings: The company is inwardly focused. It doesn't pay attention to trends in the market place and among consumers. It becomes arrogant and dismisses the activities of competitors without seeing them as possible threats.

There are external factors why the market is shrinking. Demographics, social changes, changing consumer tastes, competitive innovations, etc. all contribute to reducing demand for a particular good or service. However, when a company is in a state where it depends on declining products and services for the bulk of its revenue and profits, it has only itself to blame.

Management at different levels of the company usually is the primary guilty party for this state of affairs. When things are going right, they fail to notice contrary signals in the market. In bigger companies, this happens because management is more heavily shielded from the end customer's complaints and suggestions. However, smaller companies, who are closer to the end user, fail to take advantage too, because sometimes change means significant investment of time, money and effort - which may be a stretch for the resources of that company.

Companies typically use R&D divisions to avoid landing into such situations. However, many companies don't do well in commercializing innovations for various reasons. One is that the new product or service needs sufficient support in development and marketing effort before it can become a sustainable success. Secondly, the launch of the new invention may be wrongly timed - it may have to be shut down and re-launched at a later time. A good example of the latter is when existing technology (like household Internet bandwidth) is not capable of supporting the innovation.

What can a company already mired in a declining industry do? Sometimes, there may be little to salvage. Most talented employees may already have left the organization for greener pastures. The remaining employees and managers are low on motivation and capability. Capital reserves may have shrunk to insignificance. No new product or service offering has potential.

But perhaps all is not lost. The first step, though, is to infuse a spirit of fightback into the company and generate momentum. This may start with a change in the leadership and management team by bringing on or promoting managers who are action-driven. The company must reach out to its existing customers (some of whom may be disillusioned or angry with it) and see how it can serve them better - perhaps by introducing simpler or different variants of its products or services.

Restoring a company from this situation is a long-haul game. It requires perseverance and enormous patience to deal with setbacks on the road to recovery. Of course, there are always quick-fix artists who can bring back profitability to a company by laying off people and cutting expenses everywhere. But without coupling that to steps that can align the company with market demands, it is a futile exercise that only delays the end.

Technorati tags: business leadership, market situation, declining markets

Leadership and Stable Markets

This is the third in a series of posts regarding how companies and their leaders and managers should change their organizational strategies to suit different market conditions. The previous posts are here and here.

Many management books, especially the older ones, are written for companies in stable markets. Their key assumption is that companies and managers have sufficient time on their hands to implement activities and processes that will contribute to the success of the organizations. Nothing wrong in such assumptions, since many markets are, indeed, less dynamic with relatively low growth rates. Competition exists, but is not business-threatening.

Stable markets are usually the end result of rising markets. When a new market emerges, companies rush in to tap the potential. There is brutal competition. Some firms succeed while others go bankrupt. The level of innovation decreases as market potential is reached. The remaining businesses stake out their market segments and establish their brands. Barriers of entry (capital costs, brand names, etc.) prevent new companies from breaking into the market.

A stable market will remain so until there is a drastic innovation that changes the rules of the game. The Internet did this for many companies. It lowered marketing and distribution costs that presented obstacles to many entrant businesses. Because of the snowball effect in technological advances, every industry could be potentially turned inside out because of new discoveries and inventions. Aside from that, political, social and economic changes may also pose great threats to the stability of a market.

With that in mind, it must be understood that today, the right method to operate in a stable market is to prepare for sudden disruption and innovation. The wrong approach would be to assume that things are going to stay great for ever and create a company with processes, employees and partners that makes it difficult to react to changes.

The most important step in this direction is to create the right culture. This means things like:

• Nobody and nothing in the company is sacred and can be criticized openly within the company. When people resort to resignations to make a point, it is already too late.
• There is an inclination to getting things done instead of controlling them. The more control there is, the less fluid the business is.
• There is an awareness of what is happening in the outside world. People focus on not only understanding their current work better, but also thinking of what could come down the road.
• The competition is treated with respect. When you wake every morning knowing that the competition can put you out of business, it is likely you will do something about it.

A point to remember: Let the entire company think and plan - not just the chief executives.

Unlike the rising market situation, human resources are where the company needs to place its bets. Why? In a stable market situation, there are many different uncertain possibilities for the company and it needs every single employee to contribute with every resource at their disposal. In a rising market situation, when time is at a premium, the company has less flexibility to try different approaches - and hence sometimes a few "stars" may make a greater difference.

The management team must be composed of experienced people who are willing to experiment. I am not taking about rash gambles by people who don't know what they are doing. Instead this is about controlled ventures of exploring various ideas and seeing what sticks. Try and discard OR try and continue. And quickly. This needs leaders who have knowledge based on their past successes and failures, but who also treat such experiences as guidelines, not doctrines.

A final comment: The Innovator's Dilemma concept challenges (and rightly in my opinion) the idea of existing businesses being able to use disruptive innovation successfully. But there are solutions to the dilemma, prominently in terms of establishing separate divisions that can invest correctly in bringing the technology to fruition. Also, many businesses tend to ignore sustaining innovations that competition latches on.

The biggest danger is to dismiss the competition (however small they may be) and be under the delusion that consumers cannot go anywhere else.

Technorati tags: business leadership, market situation, steady growth, human resource management, innovator's dilemma

Leadership and Rising Market Situation

This is the second in a series of posts regarding how companies and their leaders and managers should change their organizational strategies to suit different market conditions. The previous (first) post was the lead-in article "Leadership in Different Market Situations".

In this post, let us consider a rising market situation. The most fundamental thing is to understand that the high growth potential is temporary. With increase in production by existing producers, influx of competition and enhanced public awareness, growth will slow down at some point in the future. The length of the high growth period itself is difficult to predict as it is highly dependent on the industry and the consumers in that market. But end it must.

This means that time is the most critical resource. Any wasted time means wasted opportunity. This gives the first indication of what a management team must look like. The members must be extremely dynamic and quick-thinking. They should be able to change direction and make decisions quickly, while considering all the multiple variables floating around. Such a situation demands intelligence, hard work, high accountability and ego-less behavior.

Because of untapped potential in the market, gaining market share has to be a primary goal of the company. This means that marketing should be reporting frequently and directly to top management about strategies and results. All the necessary questions about the right marketing message, the correct target audience, the visibility of the message, etc. should be asked. Once the market settles down, the companies with the biggest market share would have established their brands and it is very difficult to displace them.

Profitability is less important than positive cash flow. Without cash, there will be no money to finance the growth of the company to meet the demands of the market. There will be less investment in necessary infrastructure and technology - This will cripple the organization's capability to meet consumer needs. Hence, a viable business model is a must. Without it, the company will run out of gas while competitors forge ahead. On the other hand, any sort of misguided emphasis on cost control can be pretty suicidal - it is more important getting the cash in than keeping it in.

Human resources can be challenging in this situation. A company that has good buzz in the market or media can recruit and retain employees with the promise of a lucrative IPO. A company with good cash flow can pay astronomical salaries to hire the best talent. But a business which has neither advantage (perhaps because it started late) finds it extremely difficult to hire good talent. And when a company is losing ground (in reality or by perception) in the marketplace battle, most capable professionals will use the opportunity to jump ship faster than you can imagine.

In my opinion, team and motivational exercises are, for the most part, useless (in this situation) because the staff is only motivated by the success of the organization. If the leadership has a poor business strategy or there is less likelihood of it succeeding, there will be heavy attrition. It is pure capitalism - plain and simple.

A final point is should the organization prepare itself for a slowdown in the market? My primary answer would be "No" because it will take away valuable time and attention from management. This includes wasting time on putting together detailed HR and operational processes and hiring temporary employees or contractors. Many of these activities have unwanted side effects that introduce organizational dysfunctions, reduce business fluidity, flexibility and transparency and finally, send wrong signals to the employees.

Typical human resource departments (even when they mean good) operate in ways that directly conflict with marketing needs. When marketing is the focus, do not put power in the hands of finance, procurement and human resources. If you need high growth, empower the heads in sales, marketing, production, operations and business development, and have the other departments be "support departments" to meet their goals.

When the market starts slowing down, the company which has invested well in its products and marketing will be in a much better condition and have greater time to manage the transition because of more resources (like cash) and flexibility in the marketplace (like raising prices). So every business leader should ask: How can I bring my company to be in that position?

Technorati tags: business leadership, market situation, strategy, heavy growth, marketing, human resource management

Leadership in Different Market Situations

This is the first in a series of posts regarding how companies and their leaders and managers should change their organizational strategies to suit different market conditions.

The state of a company's market can have significant influence on the behavior of managers and employees within an organization. This, in turn, places some limitations on the leadership of a company in terms of internal and external strategies and processes. For this discussion, I am not considering the state of the economy as a whole, although in general, most companies have a good market situation when the economy is better.

Please note that this is not just about the company's products and services only. Here I am referring to the entire potential market which includes untapped potential and the share of the competition. There are three possible general market situations, as follows (no real surprises there):

1. Rising market: The market (in which the company is operating in) has huge potential and is growing fast very visibly. Example: Internet search advertising.
2. Stable market: The market is stable and growing at a steady pace. Example: Car companies.
3. Dwindling market: There is a clear indication that the market is decreasing and few companies in the market will survive. Example: desktop computers (being replaced by laptops and handhelds).

A few points to note here:

• A market may be cyclical or seasonal in the sense that it has wide swings of the symptoms of rising and dwindling markets. Staffing companies are good examples. They are highly affected by economic cycles, because their revenue comes from the staffing budgets of regular corporations. [Aside: Staffing and consultancy have an organizational character very different from typical organizations because of its fragmented nature and many typical organizational strategies cannot be applied to them.] Some new markets may be extremely volatile.
  
• The state of the market and the state of the company need not correspond. Some companies can do well for a while in poor markets. If the company is competing poorly, it will fail in a rising market and a stable market.
  
• A rising market is an invitation for companies to rush in, bring innovation and lower prices - so there will be a lot of crunching until a stable market is reached. This is the "long run" concept in economics.

Each situation demands different management approaches because the room for making mistakes and errors in judgment varies considerably in different markets. What choices the market place offers makes a tremendous difference about the level of tolerance of people (customers, employees and vendors) who interact with the company.

The questions the leadership has to ask are

• In this situation, what sort of people should be on the management team?
• Who should report to top management directly?
• What personality characteristics of key personnel should be emphasized?
• How should the organization be structured in terms of human resources?
• What organizational functions (marketing, finance, etc.) should be the primary focus of operations?

In my next post, I will look at the rising market situation and attempt to answer some of these questions.

Technorati tags: business leadership, market situation, strategy

Handling Personnel Conflicts

In an organization, many conflicts and disturbances could arise. These could be due to a variety of reasons such as disputes between personnel, project mistakes or unforeseen circumstances like accidents or natural calamities. This is a fact of life regardless of the size of the organization.

Quite often, the main occurrence is because there are conflicts between different persons in the business. A manager must take the responsibility for resolving such disputes, especially when they involve persons whom he or she is managing. The Human Resources Department (and Legal sometimes) should be involved when necessary.

Some thoughts on this:

1. All disputes must be handled fairly. This means that different people should not be treated differently.
   
2. Final decisions should be aligned with the organizational goals. A resolution that puts the organization at risk with regard to meeting its target would harm other employees.
   
3. The root causes behind such disturbances must be identified and classified as a risk. Such risks should be proactively managed in future. If that cannot be done, the solution for handling the situation should be documented for future use.
   
4. A caveat to the above point: The manager should know how to distinguish between long-term, short-term and one of a kind disturbances because the solutions or the time spent to discover solutions for each can be significantly different.

Conflict resolution frequently requires good negotiating skills. And negotiations typically mean compromises and decision-making on the fly. The manager must have effective knowledge in making the right decisions. Also she should have the acumen to manage the other party diplomatically without making vital concessions.

Sometimes, negotiations may result in the manager identifying new areas of improvement – such as HR policies, product pricing, inter-department coordination, to name a few. Over time, an organization can continue to improve its internal working to minimize conflicts.

Technorati tags: human resource management, negotiation, conflict resolution

Are Books Outdated?

My previous post was about organizing and filtering feedback from advice. I have a weakness for giving unsolicited advice, which includes this blog itself. And the recommendation I like to give most often is simply to read books. Recently, because of an encounter with a friend, I questioned myself: Why do I do that? Is it still a valid tip in the age of the Internet with free articles, podcasts and videos? Are books outdated?

Don't get me wrong: This is not a "books versus Internet" discussion. The Internet is an amazing source of information and to ignore its potential for research and learning is foolish, to say the least. The question: If you have the Internet, do you ALSO need to read books?

My answer is "Yes" and here are three simple reasons why I think so:

1. Books can explore a topic unlike any other medium: A book can run into hundreds of pages exploring every aspect of the topic at hand. This is very difficult for audio or video. It is theoretically possible for an Internet article to do it, but few seldom do it. Such analysis is still mostly done in books. The problem with incomplete knowledge of a subject is that one may make hasty decisions without knowing all the ramifications. This is especially true of issues related to business management.
   
2. Books force a navigational structure on the reader: A book forces a strict navigational structure from front to back. This means that the author can take the reader through her arguments to the final conclusions. The Internet is a hypertext medium where you may land on an article, but not understand the context in which the writer has put forth her message.
   
3. Books make the jargon: Most senior managers are extremely well-read in both classics and the latest books. They use terms in those books to establish a lingo that helps them communicate better. For example, using a term like the "Innovator's Dilemma" can easily convince another executive of the need to establish an autonomous research division. It is similar to a developer talking to another about the need to use the "Decorator Pattern" to achieve something with an existing API, because it helps them understand the exact meaning with minimal words.

Now, there are books available on the Internet too. Some articles are pretty lengthy that, if printed, would turn to be a book. This is fine in my opinion, because as I said, I am not advocating against using the Internet.

However, the problem is that many important books are not available online for various reasons, usually copyright-related. Also, some older books are obtainable at sites like Project Gutenberg in pure ASCII text format, but they are less pleasant on the eyes. On the other hand, many of these books are easily available in print at the local library.

Of course, books have their disadvantages. For one, they are extremely time consuming and you can only read so much. So it is important to prioritize well. Here is an older post I wrote on that issue.

Technorati tags: reading, personal learning, books

Organizing the Feedback

Some time back, I had written about getting feedback from people for self-improvement. When you follow this, you will find a lot of suggestions given by people and suddenly you are faced with some new problems like

• Advice given by different people is contradictory. For example, one person says that you are very aggressive in meetings; another says you are too meek.
• Acting upon the advice may mean making other compromises. For example, your boss asks you to be less tolerant of some mistakes, but that could lead to your unpopularity.
• The advice seems to be at odds with your perception. For example, someone may question your spoken communication, but you have never faced any situation.
• Some feedback may be entirely negative without any suggestions for improvement. For example, you are told that your user interface design skills are really bad without providing any specifics.
• You already know the advice, but it is not on the list of your priorities. For example, you already know you are weak in public speaking, but right now, you just want to focus on improving your writing skills.

So, you see - getting feedback is just the first hurdle; acting on it poses other challenges. So what can one do?

The first step is to evaluate the feedback with respect to one's goals. If working on the feedback does not further one's goals, then it is not necessary to work on it. For example, for a student who has poor scores in biology in secondary school, but wants to be a computer programmer, it may not be necessary to work harder on biology. However, if the biology grades affect the overall grade that influences entrance into a science/engineering college, then not working on biology negatively affects the goals and hence the situation should be rectified.

Another thing one needs to do is to organize the feedback items on the basis of authority. A question to ask here is: which person has the better background to provide the feedback? For example, I come from India. If another India-born person says that my spoken English is good, but an American-born person says that he finds it difficult to understand me, the latter is probably correct.

This also applies to us versus others. There are some things that we cannot easily measure for ourselves and must rely on others. For example, our singing and acting talents are dependent on the opinions of others, whereas athletic or sports skills can be measured on the basis of performance and scorecards.

An advice provided without suggestions or recommendations is useless, most of the time. The real problem in this situation is you have a good reason to suspect the motives of the adviser. And if that is the case, fixing the issue doesn't solve anything because the person will have some other gripe. Having said that, it is still worthwhile to review the advice with respect to other people and situations.

Finally, look at your list and prioritize. Do it asking the questions: What are your end goals? What do you want to be? How do you want others to see you?

Technorati tags: Prioritization, Feedback, Personal learning

Dropping the Crutches

Parents attach training wheels on bicycles for young children. This way, they can easily learn to ride and navigate without the fear that they will fall down and get injured. Similarly, children are given metal tumblers and plastic items instead of articles made of glass. Again, this protects them from harm.

In a business environment, such paternalism is a common occurrence. We evaluate risks and take precautions. Locks are put and passwords are enforced. Standards, guidelines and best practices are drawn up to avoid mistakes. Such measures also boast of other benefits like creating stability and avoiding confusion.

However, sometimes these crutches remain even though the circumstances (under which they were introduced) change. You wouldn't have a teenager cycling around with training wheels, would you? But that is very similar to what many organizations do.

Here is an interesting parable on the subject:

Once upon a time, there was a holy man. One day, while he was meditating, his cat came around and troubled him. So the next time, before starting to pray, he tied the cat to a nearby tree. His disciples noticed this practice. After the death of the holy man, when they started meditating, they would duly find a cat and tie it to a tree.

Many organizational practices are like that - invented to solve a problem, but remaining long after the need has passed. The interesting part is that some of these practices could be easily corrected by a quick meeting or email, but because of inertia, people are more content to keep complaining instead of taking the time to correct the processes.

Sometimes the creator of the practice realizes that it is outdated, but neglects to modify the documented standard or inform other people in the organization. So while that person improves himself or herself, all others continue to be victims.

A possible solution is to have "sunset provisions" for all standards and processes. By this, I mean that every enforced process in the organization has an expiration date. Beyond that date, no one must use that process unless it has been re-examined and re-affirmed by key persons in the company. This can be a systematic method for getting rid of outdated processes.

Getting rid of old baggage can free up the organization to meet new challenges. It is amusing to see how different companies, like attics, accumulate all sorts of useless material.

Technorati tags: business management, organizational processes, change management

Training with Limited Time

When I interview developers for new positions, I frequently ask them questions about the latest happenings in the technology or language they are familiar with. On many occasions, the candidates say that they don't know anything about recent releases. The reasons cited are lack of use at their current company and engagement with their present work leaving no free time.

I have heard this reason so many times now that I would say that it is perhaps the primary cause behind lack of improvement in developer skills. What does a person in this situation do? Here are some suggestions I hope will help:

1. Subscribe to RSS feeds and email newsletters: Instead of having to go read content, make it come to you through RSS feeds. If you are just starting to read blogs, use a reading tool that integrates with your email so that you don't have to remember to launch a separate application. Or subscribe to blog feeds that get delivered to your Inbox. Subscribe to email newsletters.
   
   
2. Change your browser startup page: Make your main technology site for .NET, Java, PHP, Python, Ruby, etc. the default home page in your browser so that you are aware of the latest news and events. Nowadays with tabbed browsing, you can have multiple sites open up as start pages.
   
   
3. Learn what you can during short breaks: Trying to find dedicated learning time can be challenging especially with pressure at work. Instead, use free moments that you can find to catch up on your learning. Keep your book or printouts at close hand. Multi-task at meal times with some reading. Stop creating timetables - instead do what you can when you can.
   
   
4. Don't tie yourself down with one learning style: Some developers think they can only learn by typing and running code. Don't underestimate your brain power. Learn from different sources - podcasts, video, books, text, etc. Alternate between skimming and concentrating when learning.
   
   
5. Communicate about technology: When you talk with or email your friends in the same field, introduce technical topics into the discussion. Sometimes, you can gain new insights and great ideas this way. Use your office meetings as a venue to discuss and learn new things.

A fundamental part of learning is to understand that the responsibility lies on one's own shoulders. It is easy to find reasons to justify lack of knowledge - work pressure, employers, subordinates, stress, family needs, etc. But the problem is that ultimately, regardless of the reason, the person who doesn't improve himself is the one who suffers. So start changing your outlook today.

Technorati tags: personal learning, software development, skills

Simple Time Audit

Sometimes, when you are pressed for time, it is useful to take a quick high-level look at the activities one is spending time on. There are many tools out there that help you record the minutes you spend and are extremely accurate. But using them can be time-consuming.

So here is a simple table that may possibly help you evaluate how your time goes and help you make some changes in lifestyle direction. You may find other categories that you may want to add to the first column.

Activity Category	% of Total Time you want to Spend in this category [Your Goal]	Hours Spent Per Week Day (Monday to Friday)	Hours Spent Per Weekend (Saturday & Sunday)	Total Hours Spent Per Week (Weekday Hours * 5 + Weekend Hours * 2)	%age of Hours Spent [Your Actual]	Compare Goal and Actual: Action to Take?
Work
Life Necessities (Sleep, Food, Hygiene)
Health
Entertainment
Learning
Social Activities

Before starting, fill in the first column of where you think you should be spreading your hours. Then start filling in the next two columns. Don't worry about providing exact values. Just get a general idea of the hours you think you spent. Calculate the next two columns.

Finally compare the ratio of how you want your life to be and what your life actually is. You may be surprised at some of the findings. Record what you want to do in the last column. Revisit this again after a few months to see if things have changed.

Technorati tags: time management

Excellence - When and When Not

My statistics professor used to say, "You don't have to do anything difficult to get average points on this paper. But if you either want to fail or get a high percentage, you have to actively do something." He meant what he said - as everyone in the class realized when they got the scores from their papers.

The statement made by the professor is relevant to most skills. It is not very tough to become reasonably competent at many tasks. In fact, if you don't want to learn something, you have to actively decide against learning it. For example, let us take something like cooking. If you never cooked before in your entire life, it is easy to learn to make a few dishes by spending a few hours observing someone. To get through life without learning to cook something is indeed an achievement. :-) The same can be said about other skills.

However, becoming an expert or a leader in an activity is an entirely different issue as it requires dedicating an enormous amount of time and effort. Becoming a top-notch cook is quite different than making your own food. It is far easier to become a competent driver than acquiring the skills required to take part in a Formula One race.

The question is: What do one do? Strive for perfection and excellence? Or achieve the necessary level of competence?

The answer lies in what one's goals and priorities are. If you want to be a great doctor, engineer, salesperson, priest, salesman, etc., the answer is that every moment you spend towards achieving that goal is worth it. Of course, this principle is not just about one's career. It could be about becoming an excellent parent, spouse, child, friend, mentor or social worker. The activity you want to become an expert in could even be a hobby like stamp collecting.

So, the principle is to work hard towards what you want to be and what you want to do. For other things, it is quite enough to be sufficiently capable. However often, people have a tendency to get drawn into things that they neither like nor want to do, and sometimes even what they don't need to do.

One of the common causes of this situation is competition. For example, if one person starts planting roses and beautifying their lawn, the likelihood of his/her neighbors and friends doing the same (despite their possible distaste for gardening) is very high. Generally speaking, in a network of peers, if somebody does something perceived as beneficial to him or her, many others in the same network are likely to imitate that person. 

The other common trend is trying to learn something long after the need has passed. For example, a developer who has had difficulties with a particular technology or business domain in a project can sometimes be found neck-deep in books on those topics after the project has ended - this sometimes when the possibility of working in the same environment is very low.

It is easy to fall prey to one of the two mistakes above. So, it is worthwhile to take a quick look at what activities one is spending time on and seeing whether that investment is in line with one's goals and necessities.

Technorati tags: personal learning, perfection

Why Management is Tough

I am a great fan of the Dilbert cartoon strip by Scott Adams. Its jokes closely resemble real-life dysfunctional organizational behavior, particularly on the part of managers. Stories of idiotic management decisions and poor managers are ubiquitous and the term "bad managers" is a cliché. But why so? A couple of important reasons why people are frustrated with and joke about poor management are

1. The right decisions, which are not taken, seem so obvious, but are ignored by the managers.
2. Managers never seem to accept their decision making mistakes or explain why they did it in the first place.

Of course, this is not restricted to business environments. For example, in sports, every game gets its post-mortem and the mistakes of the losing coach or captain are discussed and pilloried.

The question I want to discuss in this essay is this: On average, managers are likely to be more skilled, talented and educated than the people they manage. Yet, they make decisions that their subordinates can clearly see will lead to failure. Why do managers make them anyway? Here are some thoughts.

The most important problem is that there is no single right answer that applies to every situation. There are different techniques, tactics, strategies and methods available to managers, but their use depends on the particular situation faced. Many managers have pre-conceived notions of what must be done. They blindly apply what has worked for them in a previous situation only to be rudely disappointed.

Reality does not lend itself easily to silver bullets. For example, each employee is motivated differently - some by the work they do, others by wealth/charity, power/collaboration, prestige/community, jet-set/laid-back lifestyle, challenge/familiarity, etc. There may be many right decisions or even an assortment of small custom decisions.

Sometimes, managers do spend the time to carefully analyze the state of affairs. They use their theoretical knowledge, past experience and the feedback of subordinates and bosses to come up with a right decision. But that only reduces the possibility of failure, not guarantee success. This is not very visible to someone outside the decision-making process. (Think sports and Monday morning quarterbacks.)

Also, even if a manager does everything right to the best of her knowledge, she may still fail. There are many outside factors (economy, consumer preferences, support of external groups) that the manager has little control over. This is very difficult for some managers to accept. They treat any failure as a reflection of their capabilities and are discouraged to follow similar practices in future. But there will always be winners and losers in business and not always for the right reasons. For example, a small manufacturing company's great product may be crushed by the brand name of a larger competitor's poorer one.

Management involves hard choices. A manager has to choose strategies that can yield benefits both short-term and long-term. This was discussed by Jack Welch in his book "Winning" and a recent BusinessWeek column where he says that it is easy to do one or other, but it is tough to do both. Here is an excerpt:

"... anyone can manage for the short term - just keep squeezing the lemon. And anyone can manage for the long - just keep dreaming. You were made leader because someone believed you could squeeze and dream at the same time. They saw in you a person with enough insight, experience, and rigor to balance the conflicting demands of short- and long-term results. Performing balancing acts every day is leadership."

This is difficult for some managers to digest. They are unable to deal with more than a few variables at a time. They think everything has a simple and painless answer. For example, some managers find it really difficult to tell a non-performing employee about their shoddy work. Instead, they jump through all sort of obfuscation and hoops like creating elaborate processes and systems instead of just speaking a few words of truth. Yes, it is tough, but that is why you are there.

Finally, managers are human. I read this amazing blog post by Michael Wade where he attempts to show the sincere thoughts of a manager. Bad managers forget that managers can make mistakes like anyone else. They think they are infallible and don't have the courage or sense of humor to laugh at themselves. They use deception to cover up their errors and feel ashamed when they fail.

Let go. Mistakes are an essential part of management. Don't take yourself too seriously. Don't be worried about others seeing you fail. Try to learn from past experiences and look at the real reasons, including both inside yourself and outside factors. Over time, the sincerity will pay several-fold.

Technorati tags: Business Management, Bad Managers

Pitfalls of New Managers

Long ago, when our club (back in Pallom, my village in India) used to practice cricket for tournaments, it was stunning to see how some of my team mates batted. Sometimes, they were in such good form that it was impossible to bowl any ball that they wouldn't smash out of the ground. The practice matches gave them a lot of confidence. But when the tournament came around, it was the exact opposite - some of them were hard pressed to find a single run.

The same phenomenon happens every day in business life. People who are extremely successful at a job fall apart when promoted to the next level. Dr. Laurence J Peter immortalized this observation through his Peter Principle: "In a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence." Why does this happen?

As a person who has experienced setbacks during such transitions and who has seen others in the same situations, here are some reasons why this occurs. These are not comprehensive, of course:

1. Failure to change work styles: A newly promoted manager sometimes does not easily relinquish his (or her) way of working. For example, a previous job as a developer may require detailed hands-on analysis involving intricate details. Such active participation when managing can lead to putting a lot of pressure on one's time. It can de-motivate employees who view it as micro-management and lack of trust. Similarly, a work style dependent on long stretches of uninterrupted time may in a management position with innumerable distractions.
   
   
2. Clinging to past relationships: Barack Obama, in his 2004 Democratic Convention address, talked about the "slander that says a black youth with a book is acting white". In many situations (like poor neighborhoods as well as business environments), people fear that their new position may lead to their alienation from existing friends and community. To placate their peers, people take care not to modify any behavior (including dress, speech, etc.) that may set them apart. Managing conflicts and establishing performance guidelines become extremely challenging with such an attitude.
   
   
3. Hubris: Since the promoted persons have been successful at their previous jobs, they have exaggerated self-confidence which means that they are blind to the possibility of risks and failures. When such problems materialize, the person is totally unprepared to deal with the situation and all sorts of self-defeating behavior (denial, depression, anger, etc.) can result. A related problem is that since most management skills are "soft" skills (like team building, negotiation, etc.) that cannot be quantitatively measured easily, many new managers tend to over-estimate their capability in those qualities.
   
   
4. Focus on the wrong skills: I cannot count the number of occasions when I have seen people wasting enormous amounts of time and money on training for skills that were useful in their prior job, but pretty much worthless for their immediate and long-term future. Some subjects are like a person's first love - extremely difficult to say goodbye to. Hoarding knowledge is sometimes tempting because it creates a sense of achievement, which is ultimately false, because it is a significant loss of opportunity.
   
   
5. Not being able to cut the cord: The new manager was herself managed in the previous job, which meant taking less responsibility. In contrast, a managerial role can be terribly lonely and suffocating. Some people may thrive on autonomy, but it can be frightening for others who may feel abandoned and neglected by their superiors. I am not a psychiatrist, but my empirical observations suggest that the personal background of a person, such as family upbringing, schooling and prior employment, play a significant role in shaping a person's ability to be self-sufficient and battle issues alone.

I do not mean to belittle someone who feels content to work in a non-managerial capacity. A conscious choice to work in the field that one loves is a decision that deserves the utmost respect. This article is meant for those who find themselves, like I did in the past, totally unprepared in a new managerial position. Awareness of these pitfalls can provide some relief.

Technorati tags: Management lessons, Peter Principle, Change Management