Archive for the ‘Strategic Planning’ Category

In Crisis, There’s No Time For Nonsense

Monday, October 30th, 2023

In difficult times, there’s no time for nonsense. Forgive yourselves everything from the past, but right now there is no time for excuses. There is no time for whining and complaining about what doesn’t work. There’s no time for gossip, whether you spread it or are receiving it. In fact, that should be a non-negotiable at all times, because that makes for an unsafe work environment.

Instead, this is the time to bring your highest and best self to work every single day, to also find ways to do things that you never thought that you could. Listen, everything that someone’s a master at, they didn’t use to be a master at it. So why would you be different? If you’re not good at grammar and spelling, use these challenging times to go home at night, read a couple of books, get online, take some testing, learn grammar and spelling, become a master. If you’re not good at marketing copy, go figure that piece out. If you’re not good at sales processes, go decide to be a master of it. Whatever it is that is your profession, step in, get good at it, and allow no-nonsense from yourself or from anyone else in your organization.

These are the times where everyone wants to be a leader, and if you’re waiting for someone else to say, no, we don’t do things like that around here, let me assure you that that nonsense will be the reason that layoffs will happen and that your salaries will be frozen. So step in and be a shepherd of your culture right now.

In Crisis, There’s No Time For Nonsense

Sunday, April 12th, 2020

In difficult times, there’s no time for nonsense. Forgive yourselves everything from the past, but right now there is no time for excuses. There is no time for whining and complaining about what doesn’t work. There’s no time for gossip, whether you spread it or are receiving it. In fact, that should be a non-negotiable at all times, because that makes for an unsafe work environment.

Instead, this is the time to bring your highest and best self to work every single day, to also find ways to do things that you never thought that you could. Listen, everything that someone’s a master at, they didn’t use to be a master at it. So why would you be different? If you’re not good at grammar and spelling, use these challenging times to go home at night, read a couple of books, get online, take some testing, learn grammar and spelling, become a master. If you’re not good at marketing copy, go figure that piece out. If you’re not good at sales processes, go decide to be a master of it. Whatever it is that is your profession, step in, get good at it, and allow no-nonsense from yourself or from anyone else in your organization.

These are the times where everyone wants to be a leader, and if you’re waiting for someone else to say, no, we don’t do things like that around here, let me assure you that that nonsense will be the reason that layoffs will happen and that your salaries will be frozen. So step in and be a shepherd of your culture right now.

The brilliant BHAG

Sunday, August 24th, 2014

Goals are important. That’s not news to anyone. But every goal in your professional life should have another goal hiding in quiet parentheses behind it – the Big Hairy Audacious Goal, or BHAG.

Hit the http://www.thankgoditsmonday.com/blog/wp-admin/post.php?post=3635&action=editgoal set by the boss and everything’s fine. But don’t watch for fireworks and champagne corks after you hit the goal. Instead, if you make a habit of hitting those BHAGs, it’s a massive and ongoing opportunity to be noticed.

If your goal is 20 closed deals in a given period, hear that as 25 or 30. Don’t even THINK about the number 20. Consider the BHAG your actual goal and move heaven and Earth to get there.

The BHAG gets you out of the habit of thinking too small. It changes your own sense of urgency and possibility. So hit the real goal, by all means. But always put a BHAG in its shadow, ready to break free. Then create an ironclad plan to make that happen.
Your work and your life will never be the same.

Planning for Certain Uncertainty

Tuesday, April 27th, 2010

© Solarseven | Dreamstime.com

© Solarseven | Dreamstime.com

You’ve probably heard of the Butterfly Effect, where the beating of a butterfly’s wings sets off a chain of countless small reactions until you’ve got a hurricane on your hands. That’s the economy for you – an incredibly complex web of tiny causes and huge effects. It’s difficult to predict what the world will look like three, six, or twelve months out.

Given all that uncertainty, any minute-to-minute plan you carve in stone is doomed to fail. The move from Step 5 to Step 6 that seemed so logical and inevitable in January may be suicide in July, once the economy has shaken the ground beneath your feet a few times. What you need is a constant reassessment and reorientation to the end results you want, coupled with the skills to adapt and adjust your strategies as the world turns. And churns.

So when you meet later this year to plan your company’s strategic direction, put away that chisel. Instead, define the targets you intend to keep in your sights and build the shared commitment to reach them.

Be strategic. Speaking of your strategic plan, you might just want to put some…you know…strategies in it. You think I’m kidding? The fact is, if you were severely allergic to strategies, I could fill a swimming pool with the strategic plans of typical banks and throw you in, and you wouldn’t get so much as a SNIFFLE. Why? Because most strategic plans are scoured clean of strategies.

They might have goals—yes, lots of them seem to have goals. There may be some initiatives, too, or tactics. And fonts, and margins. But without strategies, world-class results will be something you read about in headlines about the other guy.

Be specific. Vague wandering in the general direction of results will get you vague and general results. Instead, create a plan that zeroes in on the results you expect with glistening, crackling clarity, and build in follow-through templates, making sure that everyone is aligned through weekly check-ins.

Be systematic. Good intentions are swell. A good start on your plan of action is peachy. But you will never connect the dots between Point A and Point Z unless you put a system in place. Not a system that is written up and forgotten, but one that you return to every week for realignment and one that is integrated into every employee’s quarterly plan.

These elements of a successful plan—strategies, precision, and a drum-tight system—are all optional. So is success. But if you choose to follow these guidelines, you’ll be well on your way to the kind of success that will have your old-school competitors running for their silver bullets. Let ’em run—you’ve got things to do—and an uncertain world in which to do them. Best to have a flexible, dynamic plan to meet that challenge.

It’s Self-Evident: All USPs are NOT Created Equal

Saturday, December 12th, 2009

© Juliafreeman | Dreamstime.com

© Juliafreeman | Dreamstime.com

So you’ve got the message.  You know that marketing today is not about blending in to some industry norm—it’s about standing out.  You’re looking for a USP, a Unique Selling Proposition, something that will get the customers flocking your way.

Unique is important, but is unique the only thing that counts?  Are all USPs created equal?  Not by a long shot.

A USP can be based on almost anything if it makes you visible and appealing:  location, hours, price, product approach, celebrity endorsements, delivery approach, you name it.  But go back and read that IF clause.  If it doesn’t make you visible AND appealing, it may be unique, but it ain’t a USP.

So what makes for a good USP?

It matters to the customer.  Maybe yours is the only bank in town whose president is a Capricorn.  Maybe you’ve got the only rotary-dial phones in the Tri-State area.  Bully for you.  But does it make you visible?  Does it make you appealing?  If not, keep looking.  Find out what matters to your customers, and be that thing.  “Open ’til 10 p.m. on weekends” might sound like a snoozer—until you find out that’s just what your customers were waiting for.  Then it’s a USP.

It’s dramatic.  Not all USPs are dramatic, but if you can find one that is, you’re home free.  Learn what your customers hope for, yearn for, ache for—and give it to them.  The slogan “Federal Express—when it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight” spoke directly to the desperate hopes of sweating middle managers everywhere.  When Club Med called itself “the antidote for civilization,” countless millions sighed and reached for air margaritas.

It’s definable, explicit, and absolutely free of fluff.  I’ve never met a fluffy USP that was worth a nickel.  Say something REAL.  Say something CLEAR.  When Dominos promised “fresh, hot pizza delivered in 30 minutes or less, guaranteed,” they had themselves an explicit, clear USP that put millions of pizzas into millions of Americans.  Don’t tell me about your 24 years in the business.  Don’t bother me with “competitive rates.”  I don’t sit up nights yearning to give my business to a company with a few more years of experience or (please!) rates that are (pfft!) “competitive.”  Give me something solid and I just might bite.

Bottom line:  The best USPs solve real problems that real people have.  I remember the first time I saw an ad for a toothbrush with that ridged rubber grip on it.  Is this a real problem?  I thought.  Are people everywhere struggling with the problem of toothbrushes flying across the room in mid-stroke?  I somehow doubt it.  Listen carefully to you current clients.  Listen even more carefully to your prospective clients.  And when you find out what they really need, what they dream of, what they yearn for, you’ll have your marching orders—and you’ll have your USP.