Dan Coughlin's Acceleration Blog

Rudy Giuliani and Lessons on Performance

Rudy Giuliani sits out the first month of the presidential race, more or less, steps into the states he wants to focus on and gets clobbered.

If you want to be extraordinary at what you do, you can't pick and choose your spots. You have to step in when the race begins, and start honing your craft, your message, your support, and so on.

Identify what you want to be extraordinary at, and then embrace the long, hard, detailed approach to improvement. Look at Tiger Woods. He worked all winter to improve the best swing in golf, his.

Hang Your Problem on the Wall

When your business is facing a problem, don’t cling to the problem and wrap yourself around it. That causes ulcers. Instead put the problem up on the wall where you and your associates can see it, discuss it, and find innovative ways to resolve it.

Just like a painting needs a frame around it to look appropriate on the wall, your problem needs a frame around it so people can see exactly what they’re talking about. For each problem, answer these questions:

• What is the desired success?
• What is the problem?
• What is the root cause of the problem?
• What is the financial scope of the problem?
• What is the timeline of the problem?
• Who is part of the problem?
• Who is affected by the problem?

A Sample Problem on the Wall

Here’s a description of what a framed problem might look like for each of the questions above:

Success would be expanding our customer base so that at least 35% of all our revenue in 2008 is coming in from new customers.

The problem is we are investing 95% or more of our time and energy into serving our current customers. We are investing almost no effort into reaching out to new customers.

The root cause of our problem is we have set up unrealistic customer expectations where customers feel we will respond to every phone call and every e-mail within 15 minutes. Consequently, we spend the vast majority of our time responding to very small customer needs that they could easily resolve themselves.

The financial scope of our problem is we are keeping customers at very small profit margins when you consider the amount of time that we dedicate to them, and we are not generating any revenue from new customers.

The timeline for our problem is we need to implement a value-added marketing approach within 90 days or we will experience dangerously low profit margins from a relatively small client base.

As the owner of this business, I’m part of the problem because I obsess over current customers and so are my direct reports because they haven’t pushed me back hard enough to create time to gain new customers.

Stand and Discuss the Problem

Just as guests in your home will discuss a painting hanging in the living room, have your associates, suppliers, and possibly even customers, give you feedback on the business problem. The better you answer the questions above, the easier it will be for you and for the group to generate an actionable solution.

If I was at your party and saw the painting above about no new customers, I would suggest you create something of real value to send out to your prospective clients that will help them to think of you. I’m not talking about calendars. I’m talking about something that your company does well that you could send out for free to your prospects. The all-time best example for me was the Gillette Mach 3 razor. I received the razor and blades 15 years ago for free. I still have the razor, but I’ve gone through about $45,000 worth of blades since then.

Get busy and start hanging your problems on the wall, get the discussions moving, and then start resolving those problems.

Bobby Fischer: Memories and Insights

I read in Time magazine about Bobby Fischer's death. It brought back so many memories. In 1972 I was nine years old. Bobby Fischer's matches with Boris Spassky were in the newspaper everyday and on the news every night. Chess was becoming a phenomenon.

After each match, I would grab my little magnetic chess board and race up to my friend, Dennis Seerey's house, to play a game. That match for the world championship was one of the biggest events of the '70s.

And then Fischer disappeared. He only played in public one more time. It took him more than 15 years to hone his game to that level and win the world championship, and then he walked away.

I'm not sure if the lesson to be learned is to walk away when you can do it on your terms, or not to burn yourself out to the point you never want to compete again.

I never really knew anything about Fischer after those matches so I'm definitely throwing darts in the dark. But to me the lesson learned is to do what you love to do even if those people who once loved you turn on you. One minute you might be a super, superstar, and the next minute a has-been. But those are labels from other people. Do what you love and do it with passion, even if others make the road difficult for you.

And then when you decide to swivel your head in a new direction, be ok with that even though others may pressure you to continue doing the thing that made you famous.

Pinewood Derby and Nintendo DS

Last night I went to the time-honored tradition of the Cub Scout's Pinewood Derby. Since I lasted as a Cub Scout for three weeks back in 1969, I never experienced the Pinewood Derby growing up. So we called in Uncle Richard to design and build my son Ben's car. And he did a magnificent job. Ben had a great time watching his car zoom down the tracks. And it was a great family memory. The only problem was Ben didn't do much of the problem-solving. A little painting, a little sanding, a few decals and that was about it.

Ben also has a Nintendo DS that he plays with all of the time. And he's figured out more games without reading the directions, remember he's six, then I could with reading the directions. He's problem-solving like crazy and calling in his buddies when he needs advice for a next step that he can't figure out.

As much as I love traditions and as much as I yell at him to stop playing that game all day, maybe he's wiser than I realize. I can see him working through challenges and experiencing the thrill of problem-solving far more on his Nintendo game than at the Pinewood Derby.

Austerity, Assiduous, and Lack of Affectation

I love the word "austerity." It means rigorously simple. It means removing all superficialities and getting down to the simplest possible explanation or solution. It means strict economy of words and actions. It means no affectations, no pretenses of being someone you are not.

I love the word "assiduous." It means devotedly attentive.

There's an old saying, "If you don't beat your own drum, there is no music." I disagree. Don't use up your words, and other people's energy, bragging about your accomplishments. It's exhausting to listen to. Instead, provide value in an austere manner with rigorous simplicity.

Daily Lasting Impact

I love reading about people who have had an impact that has lasted beyond their lifetimes or beyond their time with an organization. They've had a significant and lasting impact. I've never been one who was turned on by the idea of doing a job for 45 years just to get a paycheck.

So I've been willing to take long-term risks in the hopes of making a long-term impact.

However, there is a down side to this approach. It makes you live in the distant rather than the moment. It makes you focus on aspiring to some day make an amazing imprint on the world that will outlive your existence. But what if your existence were to end tomorrow when crossing the street? Were you a failure?

So rather than hoping to make an amazing impact over the course of a lifetime why not focus on making an amazing difference over the course of a day? Granted you can't win a Nobel Peace Prize in a day or right a classic business book like The Effective Executive in a day. But you can make that one day as significant as possible in the lives of the people you interact with. Some days those people will consist purely of family members and other days they will consist purely of strangers that you will never see again.

Regardless, at the end of each day you could go to sleep knowing that you made a difference that will outlive you if your living were to actually end that day.

Short-Term Fixes to Long-Term Problems

Why give tax rebates? Especially to the tune of $185 Billion. I don't get it. If a person is starving or freezing, then absolutely the U.S. should do whatever it takes to care for that person. But why give money back to people are doing ok, especially when the United States national debt is nine trillion dollars and is increasing by $1.4 billion every day.

It makes no sense to me. As a country we are literally borrowing money to give away to stimulate the economy. So we'll increase spending until people run out again and then we'll borrow more money from the future to stimulate spending until people run out and then...

Makes no sense to me.

That's like telling a salesperson, "Here's your end-of-year bonus in January. Go buy something nice for yourself. That will be your incentive to do great work." It doesn't work that way. First achieve something, and then you get the reward.

Tax rebates are giving people spending money for having accomplished nothing. I don't get it.

The Power of Arguing

Maybe I should rename this blog, "Dan Coughlin's Book Referral Blog." I'm reading another great book right now. It's called, American Creation, by Joseph Ellis.

One of the most powerful paragraphs is on page 90-91. It says,

"The argument that eventually won out, which was a new and wholly unprecedented version of federalism, emerged from the messy political process itself rather than from the mind of any single thinker. In essence, the argument that triumphed defied logic and the accumulated wisdom of the entire European political tradition, for it made argument itself the answer by creating a framework in which federal and state authority engaged in an ongoing negotiation for supremacy, thereby making the Constitution, like history itself, an argument without end."

The most powerful part of that paragraph to me is, "...it made argument itself the answer..."

Ellis is writing about the crucial period in 1787 when the states realized to achieve individual greatness they had to work together as a collective whole on key initiatives. If the individual states had pulled into individual confederations, they may very well have disintegrated into a constant series of wars. Instead the states retained the individual status within the powerful framework of the United States of America. And the country has made a great deal of progress because of the states ability to argue and find better solutions.

In great organizations, people are willing to and are encouraged to argue for the best possible solution for the organization. Argument is the essence of collaboration and the driver of better ideas.

Values Create the Engine that Drives Results

Values are beliefs that determine behaviors. Behaviors sustained over time drive improved results.

Write down three statements that describe what drives your behaviors. And then capture each statement with one word if you can. Here's three of mine.

1. I will always do what I think is the right thing to do in every business situation. (Integrity)

2. I try to deliver value every day to at least one person. (Contribution)

3. I try to improve the value I deliver every day. (Innovation)

When you know what values drive your behaviors and ultimately your results you can decide whether or not you want to go back and reconfigure your values.

For example, I've never placed much value on the statement, "I will save a portion of my earnings every day." However, I see the opportunity I've missed by not having that as one of my values. So I've decided I want to incorporate that as one of my values going forward.

Discipline Without Excitement

There have been some interesting articles lately about Bill Belichik, the head coach of the New England Patriots. They've provided some insights into his philosophy about work, which is essentially a "no frills, focus on performance and results" philosophy.

Apparently, he is a big fan of the following quote, at least according to the USA Today,

"Discipline is based on a meticulous attention to details. Discipline must be a habit so ingrained that it is stronger than the excitement of the battle."

I really like that quote. Greatness in any activity comes about as the result of sustained focus over an extended period of time. I watched the "Pioneers of Television" on Wednesday and learned about Johnny Carson's early days on the Tonight Show. For the first two months he floundered. The interim host, Merv Griffin, was far better than Carson. But Johnny hung in there and thirty years later, well, you know the rest of that story.