Risk Model Inversion

Over the last few years I have had several discussions with colleagues, co-workers and friends around turning their mental models of risk management upside down (at least as far as it applies to taking risks within a particular job or consulting engagement).

Way back in 2003 I had just accepted a new job at a fortune 500 company and did "the unexpected". I took a big risk in my first project. Coming from the outside, I was surprised to learn that my employer at that time had not been using conventional UX practices or deliverables in their projects. I went to both my teammates and to my leadership and told them that the best way for my project to be successful was to create wireframes and perform a paper-prototype test on the interface (neither of which had they ever seen before). I did this knowing one basic truth:

Starting at day 1 in any job or engagement, your ability to try new things or to get change-oriented requests approved decreases over time. Stated another way: People don't like to crush the spirit of the new guy/gal.

The enthusiasm and energy of the new recruit is a cherished asset that will erode over time. Most clients, managers and co-workers, in my experience, unconsciously seek to extend that honeymoon period of rose-colored glasses by allowing the new teammate to demonstrate their capabilities (i.e., "give them enough rope to hang themselves").

Many people I personally know have tended to go the opposite direction and follow their instincts in choosing to "play it safe and establish themselves" in their new role before "shaking things up". In my experience, this rarely works and in fact works less the further/higher you go in your career. Case in point: a colleague who opined that one of his friends, who was the president of his firm, was unable to make the changes he thought were necessary to increase the overall chances of success within his shop. This was very curious to me as I sometimes have a hard time understanding why autonomy is not pushed down along with responsibility within organizations. In response to my question he summed it up thusly:

"He has been in his job 2 years and has not been able to meet the one part of the established success criteria. Given his perceived shortcomings, why would the owner/board take the risk now?"

Most leaders put someone in a position to fill some gap. Whether it's solving a problem or taking advantage of an opportunity, the wishful-thinking perception of the leader (especially the higher you go) is that the new resource will be "fire and forget" (i.e., give basic direction and then hear the good news at the end of the project or the engagement).

The dynamics in the large organizations I have worked with, tend toward rewarding those who perform without flaw rather than those who exhibit a presence of strength. This bias leads to any flaw becoming magnified and being used as the catch-all reason to not moving into unfamiliar territory (because most humans and animals alike correlate unfamiliar with uncomfortable). This discomfort with the unfamiliar tends to be smaller in magnitude than the discomfort of crushing the spirit of the new guy, but depressingly is larger in magnitude than the discomfort of saying no to the established person even if the established person has a good track record (see chart below).

The point where the two discomforts become close enough to flip the bias of the decision maker tends to happen somewhere between 90 and 180 days. I believe this is specifically because most of these types of decisions are made based upon qualitative relationship dynamics. The better you get to know a person, the more comfortable you become in pushing back. In other words familiarity breeds contempt where contempt equals comfort in being the source of disillusionment or disappointment.

I'm not sure I know how to solve this, in fact I am sure that I don't know. I only claim to have a method to identify a time to take risks when the tolerance for change is greatest.

Rating Time:

Playing it safe at the beginning: Garbage

Taking timely risks intelligently: Like it

"Remember that postcard Grandpa sent us from Florida of that Alligator biting that woman's bottom? That's right, we all thought it was hilarious. But, it turns out we were wrong. That alligator was sexually harrassing that woman." - Homer Simpson

True value

Those who work with me know that I am often wont to say: "The best value good user experience consulting can bring to executives of medium to large enterprises is sleep at night." In my experience, executives in medium to large companies are plagued by a downward spiral dynamic that leaves executives awake at night trying to find answers to questions.

The CIOs ask themselves: "Why do they hate me?"

The CMOs, and many other business leaders, ask themselves: "Why don't they get it?"

The dysfunctional spiral I am referring to is so pervasive in corporate America that many a professional has given up on trying to improve things. People don't see any way out. It's been this way forever. It's been this way before most employees started working for the enterprise and it'll be this way after most people change jobs or retire. There are many contributing scenarios that result in this dynamic and I'll attempt to illustrate a few them here:

Scenario 1: Quantitative success can still mean qualitative failure.

Marketing/Business Executive: "I have an a great idea. Let's build a new system to automate process X. We'll save a million dollars annually!"

IT Executive: "That is a great idea. Let's start the process"

Marketing/Business Executive: "ugh!"

<insert corporate business case budgeting processes here>

Marketing/Business Executive: "OK! My team has made an business case. I am allocating X dollars in budget. Get to it!"

IT Executive: "Great! Let's start the requirements gathering process"

Marketing/Business Executive: "ugh!"

<insert requirements gathering processes here>

IT Executive: "My team has gathered requirements. Sign off here and we can start building it!"

Marketing/Business Executive: "Do I have any other choice?"

IT Executive: "Don't worry. Your team helped make the requirements. The system will do all of the things it says in the SRS."

Marketing/Business Executive: "OK. I guess."

<insert development processes here>

Marketing/Business Executive: "My team tells me that the system isn't what they were led to believe.

IT Executive: "My team tells me that the system meets all the requirements."

Marketing/Business Executive: "My team tells me nobody is going to use this thing."

IT Executive: "That's not my problem."Marketing/Business Executive: "ugh"

Scenario 1 | Epilogue
IT Teams more often than not judge success or failure in quantitative terms and use a checklist like approach to define success. This sort of language is aligned with most business executives, so projects float along until someone figures out it is a failure.

The developers and contractors are labeled as incompetent. Major blame is put on the nature of the organization itself as it is not in the position to make any effort to raise the level of talent in the work force.

The bodies are then hidden and crime scene cleaned up so nobody important gets a bad performance review (but that's a story for another day).

The known contributing factors to this dynamic are as follows:

1. The deployment centered methodology that is central to corporate culture in America - this orientation creates a development philosophy that believes that a wrong product served on time is sufficient.
2. The complete lack of understanding or appreciation that corporate leaders have developed with the regard to the skills and activities necessary to create quality experiences (agile methodology has shown some promise to fix this, but as it does not attempt to hit the dysfunction at it's root, only time will tell)
3. The IT bias towards functionalism and left-brained thinking. The idea that function is not only superior to form, but that form is irrelevant compared to function creates the space for the above scenario to start.
4. The root as I see it (and yes this is a recurring theme for me) - contempt for others. Contempt bleeds out as as a lack of respect for the perspectives, thoughts, methods, time, effort, etc. of others. Much of American culture, business or not, falls into a narrative cycle wherein everything should be simple and clean. If it is not simple and clean, than someone else is thinking incorrectly.

Scenario 2 | Scene 1: The shuffle.

Marketing/Business Executive: "I have an a great idea. Let's build a new system to automate process X. We'll save a million dollars annually!"

IT Executive: "That is a great idea. My development team can do it."

Marketing/Business Executive: "I've been down that road before. I want to outsource it."

IT Executive: "No! That will cost much more! Let our team do it!"

Marketing/Business Executive: "Well, alright. But it needs to be done next quarter and it can't cost more than X"

IT Executive: "No problem"

Scenario 2 | Scene 2: The deal.

IT Executive: "I saved this project from being outsourced. Don't screw it up."

Team: "With this deadline and budget restriction, we can't afford any training and we can't bring in any experts"

IT Executive: "I don't care to know how many bubbles are in a bar of soap. You asked me to keep the development work in-house and I did it. Now don't screw it up."

Team: "Ugh."

Scenario 2 | Scene 3: The flop.

Marketing/Business Executive: "This isn't what I wanted"

IT Executive: "Yes it is. It got done within the time limit and met the budget."

Marketing/Business Executive: "Ugh"

Scenario 2 | Epilogue
Business executives share the same misguided bias towards quantitative measures that IT personnel do, it just has a different set of targets: money and time. For some reason, executives can't seem to get on the same page about the realities of the contexts that face them (e.g., time constraints of the marketplace, skill constraints of the teams, the need for collaborative design work throughout a project lifecycle, the inherent risks in the waterfall model of traditional SDLCs, etc). With these realities, it's not a wonder that 3/4 of IT projects fail. The wonder is that the ratio is not higher.

The known contributing factors to this dynamic are as follows:

1. The American business paradigms that elevate short term results above all (this has been discussed in detail by people all over the world for more than 30 years).
2. The missing roles for research and design disciplines within large corporations (another story for another day).
3. The rampant practice of empire building within corporate America (I think this one has roots in American culture more than anything else).
4. Fear of change (this is part of the human condition) 

What I find very curious, is that people don't actually use the same singular focus on budgets and time outside of work. People, in my experience are not as reluctant to bend personal deadlines and budgets to get what they really want. For some reason, there has been a failure in the business community to admit that the current dynamic is inherently broken and that the rules and very structure of the game need to be changed in order to fix it.

I do believe that the injection of UX perspectives is a step in the right direction. However, I believe this step can only reach its potential impact when UX professionals in combination with IT and business professionals separate needs from positions. Focusing on needs rather than positions is the only way, in my experience, to bring the warring tribes together before they kill their projects or one another.

Separating needs from positions isn't as hard as it seems and while it's not the sole province of UX, UX seems to be very well positioned to drive the dialogue. Ultimately, it requires a curious, empathic mind in search of authentic motivations. This is what, for me, separates UX from interface design. A desire to understand the answer to a question simple to pose but hard to answer;"Why?"

Rating time:

Typical american business/IT culture: Garbage

"I want to share something with you: The three little sentences that will get you through life. Number 1: Cover for me. Number 2: Oh, good idea, Boss! Number 3: It was like that when I got here." - Homer Simpson

Contempt Hall of Fame

Comcast and Blockbuster have been one-upped by Allstate. While not as brilliant as Comcast's outsourcing of system integration to it's customers, in terms of displaying blatant contempt for it's customers, Allstate has got it going on like Donkey Kong! The highlight came when an Allstate manager literally claimed that "Allstate is not accountable for the promises made by its employees". Talk about guts! Telling a customer that anything they or any other employee says to you is meaningless! Allstate must have hired a senior official from the US state department. No other organization knows that the only sure way to avoid dialogue is to systematically shut down the conditions necessary for dialogue to occur.

Think about it, what can you say after this? Given that any actual resolution has no future value what-so-ever, the possibility of a fruitful discussion is completely nil after this basic statement.

My specific disagreement with Allstate is in this case not the relevant factor. The real importance to me is the formalism (an emphasis on the ritual and observance of religious dogma, rather than its meaning) rampant in US companies and how it is destroying customer service inside and outside of enterprises. I saw a brilliant presentation from Netflix the other day which highlights the flip side of formalistic process-centric cultures.

Many organizations teach process as a thing to be worshipped separate from the intended state to be arrived at via adherence to the process. This fundamental flaw creates organizational dissonance (a context wherein an organization has internal discomfort based on mis-alignment of it processes and cultural mores). You'll see this when a company representative says that they want to help you because they believe you are right, but that they cannot because a process prevents them (side note - they never actually say this...it's usually articulated as "I'm sorry. I can't do that", which infuriates me more, because they don't actually mean either of these two sentences, but there does not seem to be much I can do about the fact that actual communication is a dying art form).

This is not the root of the problem however, The real root is a lack of commitment to hire "the right" people (i.e., smart people who are aligned with the vision and values of the company). Both the Netflix presentation and the well respected business book "Good to Great" explain the concept very well. Process centric cultures are created to lessen the effect of bad/mediocre hiring decisions. The long and short of it is explained in two steps:

1. Hire good people who are aligned with your values
2. Trust them to make decisions aligned with your values

An old boss of mine described me and another process-breaking colleague thusly: "The difference between you two is that he will act first and beg forgiveness later and that you will act first and then deny that forgiveness is needed at all." This is a pretty accurate description of me - In professional contexts I'm usually trying to act in a manner that is in direct alignment with the long term goals of my leadership.

The sorts of organizations that use formalism, have not grasped a great lesson from the military - "Commander's Intent". When my leadership asks me to do something, I ask an annoying list of detailed questions to suss out what they are actually trying to achieve and I use this understanding of intent to make the appropriate calls on the field. Arbitrary rules are for employees who cannot be trusted to make decisions appropriately. The question I ask of these organizations is this: "If you can't trust your people to make reasonably good decisions, then why did you hire them?"

Rating time:

Rigid processes that sap the spirit and passion from an organization - CRAP

"Lisa, if you don't like your job you don't strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed. That's the American way." - Homer Simpson

What's holding back UX

I don't know if my peers would agree with me.

On second thought I'm pretty sure they would disagree.

Actually, the more I think about it, they might even be skeptical about my claim to be their peer.

Which brings me back full circle to the title of this post - What's holding back UX.

UX is a niche discipline. UX strategy is a niche within a niche. Consulting organizations barely recognize UX at all. Some would argue with this point, but I believe that's because the big organizations that have UX professionals more often than not put them in the role of interaction designer and call it UX. Only a few private industry companies have just begun to allow the discipline into their organizations and a ridiculously small minority have actually created an operationalized talent and role structure to support the discipline. Most companies who hire Information Architects ram them into some other label in their existing structure because HR doesn't recognize the need for a discernment.

Is this because the discipline is "new"?

That just doesn't ring true to me. When businesses started bringing programmers into their companies in the 60's and 70's, I dont think they were shy about calling them programmers or system analysts or some other unique label. And even if they did not know what to call them, it did not take the dozen years that UX has been a formal discipline to create a unique title taxonomy within industry.

So why is UX a niche discipline? I have a unique theory.

Pretentiousness.

I have been formally working in the field since 1999 and was a avid reader of HCI books back in 1993. I still to this day get judged all the time by other UX professionals because I came at UX from technology. In 1999, because I was an engineer, other UX practitioners assumed that I not only lacked an ability to design useable interactions, but even went so far as to say that listening to my input was by definition a waste of time. While not all designers or researchers or strategists or visual designers treated me like this (big props to my peeps who worked with me on cancer.org and vitaminshoppe.com), the vast majority went out of their way to snub me and every other software engineer or architect I worked with because we were, in their eyes, not educated in design. This attitude is still rampant today and may even be more so with the hordes of graduates from formal HCI programs across the country.

There are too many flaws and horrible repercussions of this to name, but I'll go over my top 5:

1) Not all engineers or non-designers are alike. Many of us actually care that something will be adopted and used. While I whole-heartedly agree that there are way too many technologists who are too biased by how much perceived effort it takes to write code to make something work in a particular way, it is not universal. And i truly believe that if anyone took the time to show the engineers the math behind why making something useful, usable and desirable was the right thing to do for the business, they would be on the bandwagon cheering the loudest. Any software geek I have worked with has been easily converted to User Centered methodology once they understood why it was superior during the discovery, concept and design phases of a project. The numbers are just too compelling for a geek to deny.

2) The exclusionary attitude scuttles the whole philosophical premise of UX - people count and deserve to be treated in a way that makes them feel respected. You can't be taken seriously as a practitioner who supposedly cares about people's perception when your demeanor towards your teammates is so arrogant.

3) Revolutionary breakthroughs in any discipline only come from those who can see past the conceptual boundaries that hold back transformative progress. Non-designers have something designers lack - a lack of knowledge of convention of the design industry. The very reason their input is met with disdain is the reason they should be embraced.

4) UX needs more allies. We have to fight to get in on strategy and concept. And sometimes even have to fight during the design process. The more allies UX has, the less adversarial the process will be, and subsequently more opportunities, acceptance and success will follow.

5) Work actually can be fun. The most fun projects I have worked on are the ones where the collaborative multi-disciplinary process was set up as "play time". Weather its a design slam or an ideation workshop, collaborative projects are more fun and are more often more successful (duh...teams that like and respect each other more often than not produce better work).

Some readers may argue that software geeks can often be this way too. I agree, but it's just not as pervasive in my experience.

One seemingly esoteric ingredient that I believe has led us all to this place of pretentiousness is surprisingly enough the semantics of the disciplinary labels them selves. When you label disciplines and people as "Creatives", "Designers" and "Technologists" or other variations on these themes, it is an implicit slight to the people on the outside. Are UX professionals who use crazy hard applications not technical? Are software geeks who solve ridiculous challenges not creative designers? This may be heresy in the field, but I believe that being more careful in how we create and apply these labels will go a long way to starting to tear down the adversarial boundaries between the disciplines.

Rating time:

Pretentiousness of disciplines: Crap

Acceptance of outside perspectives: Like it

"If you really want something in life you have to work for it. Now quiet, they're about to announce the lottery numbers." - Homer Simpson

Official prognostication

I'm a relatively avid user of LinkedIn.com and I can easily say it falls into the bucket of "like it" for me.

This does not mean, however, that the site cannot be improved. I had an idea a couple of weeks back that I believe to be inevitable and it would not surprise me if LinkedIn is the first to do it.

I have given and received my fair share of recommendations on LinkedIn, but I know that they are pretty close to worthless. It is my belief that the recommendations are only really used by the people getting the recommendation, and not at all in the way that they seem to be intended - to allow a third person to gauge if they would like to work with or hire the person being recommended.

Think about it for a second. Do the recommendations actually have the supposed effects that they are intended for?

• Do recruiters or hiring managers or clients really look to see if a person has recommendations? Maybe, but I doubt it.
• Do recruiters or hiring managers or clients actually read recommendations? Maybe, but I highly doubt it.
• Do recruiters or hiring managers or clients take the recommendations into consideration when making a hiring decision? Maybe, but I completely doubt it.

Why would any of these effects take place when everyone knows that the person being recommended can filter all the recommendations anyway? Everyone already knows what your friends would say about you in an open forum if you had complete editorial control.

So if they don't have these effects what effects do they have? I'll throw a couple I find much more likely out there:

• The recommendation alerts people in the network of the person being recommended that they are a flight risk from their current job.
• The receiver of the recommendation is likely to post a recommendation for the giver of the recommendation as a gesture of gratitude to the giver.
• That's it. I'm stumped after that.

So I got to thinking....what would actually result in the desired end state of influencing a person's ability to get an opportunity? Then it hit me.

Create an open rating ecosystem for people just like movies on Rotten Tomatoes or products on Amazon.

Now before you think I'm completely insane, please hear me out.

In my scenario, Person A (let's call her Alice) could decide on her profile to set ratings and recommendations to 1 of 3 levels where Alice's profile calls out what model she has set.

1. Authenticated - any person who is willing to have their identity linked to the rating can say whatever they want, rate the person as a professional on some sort of scale (as simple as 1 to 5 stars, or as complex as a multi-dimensional rating system, it doesn't really matter for the purposes of this topic) and Alice cannot edit or remove it.
2. Connected - any person who fits the criteria in number 1 and is already connected to Alice can say whatever they want, rate the person as a professional on some sort of scale (as simple as 1 to 5 stars, or as complex as a multi-dimensional rating system, it doesn't really matter for the purposes of this topic) and Alice cannot edit or remove it.
3. Filtered - Alice gets final say before anything hits her ratings page.

In this model, people would have the option to open themselves up to criticism from their peers and what would be so wrong about that?

Would flame wars happen? Maybe. But I really don't think so, as people would fear retaliation.

The worst I can see happening is that a couple of so-so reviews might get out and would be out-weighted by the community at large.

What I think would really happen is 2 things:

1. Over time, people would be compelled to at least move to Connected, in that allowing yourself to be open to criticism would be perceived by others (e.g., hiring managers and recruiters) as a sign of a stronger professional, and because a person with a Filtered ratings page would be perceived as maybe having something to hide.
2. People would be MUCH more selective about who they connected with because any actual connection could then say anything about them (this could be counter-balanced by having a contextual connection model which is a post for another day).

One additional thing that could also happen but to a smaller degree is that people who chose "Authenticated" would also be perceived differently in that they would either be really stupid, really brave or really good at not ruffling other people's feathers.

As long as there was a good way to visualize the ratings and reviews for people, I believe recruiters and hiring managers would come to depend upon them in the same way consumers depend on online ratings and reviews of products and services.

I think this model will be out there sooner rather than later. Weather it's on a professional site or a dating site, it's just a matter of time.

Rating Time:

Filtered rating systems: Garbage

Open rating systems: Like them

"If something goes wrong at the plant, blame the guy who can't speak English" - Homer Simpson

It takes two to tango

The amount of coverage that has been given to JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater is not surprising to me at all. What is surprising to me is that no one has hit upon what I believe is at the core of the hostile encounter.

Some articles blame Slater as an individual, more articles and pundits speak to the trend in air-rage, some blame the downgrades in service. While I understand the thinking behind all of these, I don't think any of them have identified the core dynamic that is occurring repeatedly.

It is my belief that what we are seeing is a variant of the Stanford Prison Experiment, wherein flight, airline and airport personnel from terminal to terminal have been placed in a pseudo-prison guard role and passengers are nearly prisoners.

The authoritarian undertones from flight, airline and airport personnel is palpable. Quite often, the communication borders on contempt. Things that could be phrased as polite requests for cooperation are worded as mandates from an all powerful machine. The security checks further the metaphor and end result is rebellion.

The solution to this problem does not lie in spot fixes like returning peanuts to flights, but rather in analysis and increased training across the entire air-travel eco-system from organizational behavior professionals. Air travel workers need to be able to recognize confrontation and hostility and be trained to both avoid and defuse it.

In the meantime, try a little bit of niceness (OMG! I used "nice" in a positive way! I'm on record for hating the word!) and stop blaming passengers for responding to cramped spaces combined with overt and rigid authority with hostility - it's human nature.

RATING TIME

Prison guard mentality - Garbage

Steven Slater's dramatic exit - I hate to admit it, but I like it

Maybe, just once, someone will call me 'Sir' without adding, 'You're making a scene.' - Homer Simpson

Why poor design seems to be the rule in business.

I've been working as a consultant advocating good UX design for more than 15 years now and one thing has pervaded almost every interaction with executive management. I'm constantly asked to justify the time and expenditure required for good design practices. Nobody ever asks for a business case to justify the poor design practices that are systemic in corporate IT. My guess is that people do not recognize that the lack of an intentional design is still a design. It's just a poor one (usually).

In thinking about this topic again and again, I think I've had a revelation. I now understand exactly why this attitude is the rule.

It is a habit learned over the last 50 years.

It takes a person about 66 days to form a habit. I could not find any research on how it takes for an industry to form a practice.

Think about it. When computers first entered into business environments, most people did not interact with them, most people interacted with the artifacts that computers could produce and with minority of people who could program the computer using punch-cards. Do you remember punch-cards? Have you seen them in documentaries? This is where the habit started. At this time the equation was very simple:

Cost to design and create a new interface system more usable than a punch-card reader > Cost to train the people who interface with the computer

This was abundantly true for so many reasons:

• The people who interfaced with the computer in the time of punch-card readers were super geeks and punch-card logic came easily to them

• The people who interfaced with the computer in the time of punch-card readers were very few in numbers

• The concept for other possible interfaces did not even exist yet

As time progressed and command line interfaces became the norm, this equation held. The number of people who interfaced with the computer increased ever so slightly, the types of people using them did not shift at all, and a small group of people saw the possibility of graphical interfaces, but the numbers were still overwhelming.

As time progressed even further and WIMP interfaces (thank you Xerox!) became the norm, this equation still held. The number of people who interfaced with the computer increased a little more rapidly, the types of people interfacing with them began to shift as people who used computers in grade school hit the work force, and a different, but still small, group of people saw the possibility of putting standardized graphical frameworks on top of information systems, but the numbers were still overwhelming.

Time moved on yet again and web browsers have now become the norm (thank you Mozilla!), and despite the fact that the equation has finally shifted most businesses do not even realize the basis on which the original decision was made. It's not anyone's fault. There is no "big book of corporate assumptions" lying around that people are supposed to check every couple of years. Just like a habit, the mode of operating has become somewhat unconscious. When executives ask for the business case for good design, I do not believe that they know the basis for the question itself has completely changed.

• The number of people who interface with computers in business or consumer settings is rapidly approaching 100%.

• The types of people who interface with computers has dramatically shifted in ways beyond thinking styles; People of all ages now access computers and a new generation has entered the workforce; A generation of workers who don't view their employers as bosses, but as an easily replaceable organization entering into a trade agreement with them.

• Useful, usable and desirable interfaces and experiences are readily conceivable (thank you Amazon & Apple!)

The equation has changed!

The required investment in user experience pales in comparison to the amount required to train an entire population of job-hopping workers and fickle consumers.

The first step in breaking the habit is admitting we have a problem. If we are to remain economically viable we must challenge our base assumptions.

RATING TIME:

Non-intentional design habit - Garbage

Turning over a new leaf - Like it

"Oh, people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. 14% of people know that." - Homer Simpson

If I were CXO of Disney

Still playing with my new experiment. This is number 3!

If I were CXO of Disney I would:

1. Make grand gestures - I would immediately remind each and every member of the Disney team of the overall vision imparted by Walt and remind them to think and act as Walt would want them to. Establishing the necessary framework for a commander's intent model is only half of the equation. The other half is to show the level of commitment that leadership is making to achieve Walt's vision in order to remove the fear of consequences of "mistakes". I would look throughout the company to find highly visible ways to reinforce the desired cultural behavior and make several grand gestures to walk the walk. The first on my list - dramatically expand the monorail system at Walt Disney World. WDW is supposed to represent the mix of fantasy, adventure and hope for the future. I never knew Walt personally, and I do understand that transportation memes change, but I'm pretty sure that the current hodge-podge patchwork of buses and monorails & shuttles is not what Walt had in mind.
2. Focus on story telling - Story telling is the heart of everything that is Disney from movies and TV to the park. In past years, Disney seemed to forget this and now with the Pixar acquisition, it seems this has improved but I would work to find ways to spread the concept further into other areas of the business (e.g., Disney TV, the Parks, etc) noting that Disney is at its very best when it is telling great stories. Story telling is not an abstract concept reserved for media communications. Epcot told a story. Space Mountain told a story. The original contemporary hotel at WDW told a story. I would find ways to bring that spirit back.
3. Bring excellence to the employee experience - Great companies know that while brands are envisioned from the outside in, great brands are built from the inside out. Good employee experience drives good customer experience drives shareholder value. Showing the cast & crew that Disney is a magical place to work will drive the passion that will make Disney magical to interact with.
4. Make Disney TV parent friendly - The sheer amount of shows that paint parents as mentally challenged is egregious. Disney is on the edge of losing its reputation of wholesomeness. I'm not saying return to the 1950's style Mickey Mouse Club, I'm saying that shows on Disney TV should not consistently make parents out to be clueless buffoons out of touch with the lives of their children.

Rating:

#3 (of my experiment) - getting harder to keep up the frequency, but I still like it.

Losing the essence of greatness - garbage

If I were CXO (part 1)

This is the first in an experimental series of entries. I am going to pick 10 different companies and explain what I would do if I were hired as the CXO (Chief Experience Officer). I don't know if I'll continue just yet, but I'm willing to give it a shot to see how it works out.

First off, my favorite company to hate, and a frequent bash victim of this blog - Blockbuster.

Discarding the fact that I would more than likely turn down an offer by a company that is doomed to be out of business before 2020 and is squarely opposite in orientation to my principles, this is what I would do...

1. Start with why - Refocus the company from making short-term revenue to one of providing truly great in-home entertainment experiences
2. Apologize with a megaphone - Blockbuster recently reinstated the dumb tax and is once again collecting late fees. This action speaks to the fact that Blockbuster exists to make money first and foremost and does not exist to be of preeminent value to people seeking home entertainment. I would immediately and publicly apologize for this misstep, remove the late fee policy and explain how it is antithetical to Blockbusters fundamental reason for being.
3. Make amends - Just like a past entry in this blog points out, apologies without genuine gestures that show contrition are platitudes and ultimately contemptuous. I would refund each and every late fee collected since the reinstatement in the form of store credit.
4. Catch-up - Partner with a hardware retailer (Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony, or possibly Tivo) to get downloadable movies off of computers and onto the television.
5. Fix the in-store experience:
   • The lines are too long and picking a movie from the shelves is too time consuming. Put kiosks in the store for help selecting movies and checking out.
   • Stop yelling "Welcome to Blockbuster" as customers walk in.
   • Upgrade the POS and peripherals (scanner, printer and signature pad) along with the couponing process that barely work, waste paper and power and serve to commoditize the offering.
   • Unify all the CRM systems to enable promotions to be applied and tracked without the use of paper
   • Enable "return to any store"
6. Fix the multi-channel experience - starting with quantitative and qualitative user research search for opportunities to ultimately improve customers in-home entertainment lives and execute on those that align with the overall brand proposition.
7. Expand the reach - Put vending kiosks or mini-stores into airports and other locations where impulse meets opportunity. It is critical to integrate these with the overall CRM system and "return to any store" policy in order to drive the sense that Blockbuster exists to serve it's customers in the way that will most fit into their busy lives.

Rating:

My "If I were CXO" experiment - Like it. I Think I'll do it again.

Current customer experience at Blockbuster - Garbage

"No, no, no, Lisa. If adults don't like their jobs, they don't go on strike. They just go in every day and do it really half-assed. That's the American Way." - Homer Simpson

Outsource your system integration to your customers? Brilliant!

I've got to hand it to Comcast (a.k.a. Comcrap). They figured out how to save millions in system integration. They chose not to do it and then force their customers to act as bridges between the groups and systems. How slick is that?

So after giving up on Comcast ever making a compelling bundle offer that doesn't contain at least $50 in hidden extra monthly fees (cable modem rental, HD upcharge, extra box fee, DVR fee. HD+DVR fee) I decided to call AT&T to try the U-verse bundle. I couldn't actually get U-verse, as it is not available in my area yet, but the bundle was still available with NO extra fees with DirecT
v.

Once everything was setup, I called Comcast to cancel my service and hit a series of obstacles that highlight how brilliant Comcast management is.

1. Organizational Fragmentation - Comcast customer service is totally separate from the organization that retrieves the equipment. They had no ability to schedule the pickup. They had no ability to transfer my phone call. They had no ability to email me the phone number. They had no ability to pass on a request to them. In other words, it was now my job to integrate the customer service and logistics teams.
2. No Continuity - After I successfully memorized and dialed the phone number (I was in the car but not driving), I scheduled the equipment pickup which was no picnic either. They refused to give me anything other than a four hour window and would not take a note for the driver such that I could leave the equipment in my screened porch. This is another stroke of genius by Comcast - when you make it as inconvenient as possible for people to end their service there are bound to be a couple of people who just give up ans stick with it out of some form of Stockholm Syndrome.
3. No Tools - After the equipment recovery person missed his window and showed up 1 hour late I happily handed all the equipment over to him. Choosing to be frugal and not give their employees wasteful tools, the equipment recovery person collected the two set-top boxes, manually captured the serial numbers on a form and gave me a copy of the paper receipt.
4. No Follow-through - Where other companies might blow a whole bunch of money and time actually tracking their operations, a brilliant analyst at Comcast noticed that actually not tracking returns was in the companies interest! If a former customer is upset at being charged for equipment they already returned, they'll follow up and hound us. If not, who cares! And given that equipment recovery is not integrated with billing they'll hound the customer by phone 3 or more times a day anyway to provide a "legitimate excuse". Genius I say!!!
5. Contemptuous Attitude - Start the calls off right! Comcast calls with an auto-dialer and shows blatant contempt for customer time by having the auto-dialer ask customers to hold for an "important business call". This sets the tone just right to make everything be coherent around the core brand message - "your time and money are not nearly as important as ours".
6. No Accountability - Narrative, Narrative Narrative! The Comcast team has it down! The only way to make policies and decisions like these stick is to be completely unapologetic and obtuse on the phone and make the customer wrong on every level. The phone reps had the story and they stuck to it - it was my job to track the repair, my job to prove that they had picked the equipment, and it was even my job to call the billing department to get the erroneous charge for "not returning the equipment" changed. Why on earth should it be Equipment Recovery's responsibility to close the loop? It is this narrative which enables a phone rep to be legitimately upset with the fact that customer's are upset or frustrated. When an employee does not acknowledge that they are "representatives" of the brand or of the corporation then, clearly, the customer is the one who is rude for being frustrated!
7. Plausible Deniability - Make sure your phone systems are easy to blame. Calls with Comcast were never pleasant in terms of the discussion, but what makes them even worse for the customer is that the auto-dialer is in control and calls would drop almost at random. As always, this serves the greater objective - now Comcast reps can honestly say: "I did not call you, the auto dialer did!" and "You keep hanging up on us!". i.e., "It's not Comcast's fault we keep calling you, It's the auto-dialer! It's you!"
8. No Empathy - By hiring barely literate people with chips on their shoulder who are unhappy with their jobs. The message will really be sent - "You are not a customer anymore. You are not worthy of respectful communication or empathy. Being upset that you are called incessantly early in the morning, or late at night and being asked by a machine to hold without telling you who is calling is not our concern - even if we picked up the equipment already. We will just keep calling you for weeks. We will choose not to listen. We will choose not the enter the receipt number into our system because you were frustrated or the call dropped after we got the number but before we said we were done with you. We will hang up on you because you are audibly frustrated - but don't worry, we will call back and start all over again!!! You will comply sooner or later! Resistance is futile! You will integrate us!"
9. Universally Low Expectations - Hire people who are in alignment with your brand. Make sure that they are ignorant of common business conventions. Make sure they are not accountable for their actions. Make sure that they are not grateful to be of service. This orientation will enable people to bluster on and hold forth on clearly specious arguments where precision and crispness of service delivery are of no importance at all. This false sense of self importance will further enable the phone reps to take personal offense at former customer frustration and will further solidify the organizations will to impose the company's responsibility onto the former customer.

Rating time:

Disgustingly contemptuous policies and decisions that force former customers to be accountable for Comcrap's organizational fragmentation - CRAP

Myth: It's only fair to pay for quality first-run movies. Fact: Most movies shown on cable get two stars or less, and are repeated ad nauseam."

Human, all too human

My friend Staylo and I engage in many dialogues on many topics. But we rarely do so online for all posterity. He asked me to read his posting on leadership and comment on it. I really loved the post in that I found it distinct, insightful and nuanced. It was so well written that I found myself puzzled at what to say about it, other than simple praise.

While looking through his posts, I came across an older one on User Experience and the motives from which it arises.

The central point of this post is that the motives of many User Experience professionals are somehow less honorable because they are rooted in obtaining business benefit. While I find this articulation to be very well written and very well thought out, I see some subtle contradictions within the post and also choose to see some of the points from a slightly different angle.

First - I must disagree with the precept that the motive of honest enlightened self interest is somehow less honorable. This line of thought strikes me as pompous, self-righteous and inherently false. Mutually beneficial relationships are not superior because they are more honorable, rather they are superior because they are more sustainable, allow for the reaping of emergent benefits for both parties, they allow for the creation of additional beneficial relationships and ultimately allow both parties to benefit society at large in more meaningful and lasting ways.

When society continues on with the charade that self interest is dishonorable, we end up with the behavior that the post itself identifies as the most dishonorable - acting with disingenuous motives.

Being authentic with your motives is, in my opinion, necessary (although not sufficient) for being honorable.

Second - I must disagree with the precept that "When people are given a viable alternative to soulless, hollow, insincere, inauthentic, self-interested manipulation, they take it. Customers prefer the human, and so do employees". It is not that this is wrong, it is that it is not precise. I would reword it as such "When observant & sensitive people are given a viable alternative to soulless, hollow, insincere, inauthentic, self-interested manipulation, they take it. Observant & sensitivecustomers prefer the human, and so do observant & sensitive employees."

This may be provocative and controversial - but in my experience, many people float through interactions in a fairly careless fashion with an almost singular focus on short term self interest.

Lastly - The title of the post reveals the endemic contradiction with the whole line of thinking - "Being human is a competitive advantage". i.e., Be human, so you can gain advantage.

On the other hand, maybe I'm just too much of a functionalist.

Ratings:

Anomalogue Blog - like it.

Synetic Brand Blog - like it.

My friend Staylo - like him.

Leadership post - like it.

Not embracing enlightened long-term self interest as honorable an desirable - crap.

The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. - Friedrich Nietzsche

Who Da Man?

My good friend Staylo (http://anomalogue.com/blog & http://syneticbrand.com/) sent me the following fable:

The captain of a lost ship reasoned thusly:

“If I were at my destination I would no longer be lost. What separates me from my destination is distance. Distance is traversed through the rowing of my oarsman.

“If it is untraversed distance keeping me from my destination and the responsibility for traversing distance belongs to the oarsmen, it is obvious that my oarmen are to blame for our being lost!”

So the captain ordered his navigator and all his officers to report immediately to the galley. He called the oarsmen before them, rebuked them and had them flogged. Then every man, officer and crew alike, grabbed an oar, and together they sat straining in the dark, rowing and rowing and rowing and rowing across the distance.

After some discussion, I sent him the quote below:


"It is the greatest houses and the tallest trees that gods bring low with bolts of thunder. For the Gods love to thwart whatever is greater than the rest. They do not suffer pride in anyone but themselves"

I'm not sure if Herotodus knew of "The Man" but it sure sounds like it to me.

I see the main idea is to relate the "Gods" to "men in power", e.g., The Man. One of the main signatures of The Man is to crush the bright lights of those whom they can in order to illustrate what "power" is to them (not intelligence, merit or any other aspect worthless to them). The Man seeks to reward those he can control and dominate and will be forever limited in this fashion because he is mortally afraid of being seen as "less than" the ones he is accompanied by.

Staylo more so thought the quote was about hubris and pride in men and spoke about the tower of Babyl. I can see his point, but I like to think my interpretation is more the intended one.... Or maybe I'm just obsessed with the concept of the man...

In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell posits that people who let their outlook be impacted by a sense that those in power (e.g., the Man) can crush them curtail their likelihood of achieving success and leading an impactful life.

Herein lies the safe zone...

1) Acknowledge that The Man exists and navigate accordingly

2) Acknowledge that The Man only has power over what you grant him and act accordingly.

Ratings:

1) Denial of the Man - Garbage

2) Fear of the Man - Garbage

3) Fight the Power (intelligently) - Like it

PS - Big props to my man Brant Barton for one of my favorite Halloween costumes ever. He showed up in a 3 piece pinstripe suit with vampire fangs - i.e., The Man!

Well, it's 1 a.m. Better go home and spend some quality time with the kids.

The Long OW!

Brandon Schauer, one of my past Sapient co-workers, now works at Adaptive Path and is relatively well known in UX circles for his thought leadership. One of my favorites is The Long Wow. In brief, "the long wow is a means to achieving long-term customer loyalty through systematically impressing your customers again and again."

Well, true to my nature, I feel compelled to point out the flip side, which I call the long OW. In brief, the long OW is a means to achieving long-term customer hatred through systematically disappointing your customers again and again.

Where long wow companies like Apple and Nike continually look for ways to express to customers how much they appreciate them through phenomenally well designed, user-centric products and services. Long OW companies like Blockbuster, the cable companies and phone companies seemingly look for ways to contemptuously exploit their customers through products and no-service processes that are equally well designed, except that the products and no-services are dollar-centric.

I understand the mindset and organizational culture that drive the long OW companies to make decisions like these. Like many American cultural aspects they are all focused on $ tomorrow. What they fail to see is the long term lasting hatred consumers have for them and the taint these business practices have on their brands that can't be washed away.

Blockbuster is the perfect case study for this. I know, I know... I pick on Blockbuster quite often... But THIS IS EXACTLY THE POINT! Neither I, nor other consumers have forgotten the YEARS of gouging we suffered from the late-fee nazis in Blockbuster management. Even when Blockbuster's Click & Mortar offering is VASTLY superior to every online only offering - people still choose netflix. The people who still patronize Blockbuster do it only begrudgingly and silently hope for the day when a online & meat-space combo retailer will offer something better so that they can stick it to the man REAL GOOD!

Cell phone companies and the Cable companies have paved the way for this type of business model for decades! The Cable companies were first. Having regional monopolies, the combination of easy money and little competition has created crappy behemoths of companies who really could not give a rat's ass about how much consumers hate them. Maybe instead of focusing on churn, they should focus on the root cause - the legacy of contempt they have shown for their customers.

How can the leaders of these companies not get it? Consumers generally feel that all the options suck it's up to them to choose the one that least sucks for them and their lifestyle.

My recommendation for these purveyors of contempt is to either:

1) Go for a "truth and reconciliation" approach in which you actually try to make legitimate amends with people who despise your organization. If you decide to do this one, you have to do more than say "sorry", you have to show you mean it. See my past blog entry on this topic for more information.

-OR-

2) Prepare for an upstart with a clean reputation to come and eat your lunch.

Rating Time:

Long Wow companies - Like them.

Long OW companies - Garbage.

Tell em' Large Marge Sent Ya!

American Brandstand

Brands are strange enigmatic beasts that are omnipresent in our daily lives in more ways than most people think. Most people who live in a commercial society are familiar with organization-based brands. Some people are also highly tuned to individual brands of well-known personalities. I sometimes refer to certain aspects of my life or personality being “on brand” or being harmonious with “brand Fish”.

Just as many people are aware of brands, both organizational and personal, many people and organizations are unaware with how to care for and enable a brand. It’s actually a lot more simple than many people think, but the problem is that simple does not mean easy or pain free – simple means lacking complexity.

How I care for and engender my personal brand are grounded in my upbringing. Growing up, there were things my parents taught me by explanation and then there were things they took for granted that I would absorb from their example and the culture around me. The value of standing for something fell into the latter category.

The reason why it has fallen into the "took for granted" category is sort of interesting - it emerges out of my Jewish heritage. Being raised as a Jew on Long Island meant I grew up hearing Holocaust this, Anne Frank that, Elie Wiesel the other! One of the key parts of these stories and lessons was that amidst all the horrendous tragedy that befell the Jews and many other minorities, there were some things to be learned – in the forms of perseverance, courage and the respect for life. Some of the greatest bravery displayed was by people who had the courage to do what was right by hiding Jews from the Nazis while risking the well being and safety of themselves and their families.

As I grew up, finished school, and got a job that I turned into a career, the stories gave me a sense of honor and continuously affected my everyday work and life choices.

When I became a father, however, things changed subtly. My engrossing responsibility to someone other than myself took the highest priority in my life and for some time I was conflicted on how to think about this in the context of my upbringing. After some thought I figured it out - it was not that my principles had become luxuries, my principles had remained the same, I just now had new "input" into the decision-making process. My questions then became, "How do I apply my principles to this new situation?" and "Where does 'protecting' them become forsaking my values and heritage?" The answer for me became that if, in the act of protection, I cease to be a figure they can admire and trust, then that "protection" is not something that actually serves their best interests. I believe that my children are best served by seeing me behave in a manner that is consistently honest and forthright – regardless of context.

Reader – “Whoa! Is this crazy dude ever going to get around to talking about company brands or what?”
Blogger – “Patience please.”

Being a person of deeply ingrained principles, tradition and devotion, I have stood fast on many "small battles" that seemed to hold precedent and consequence within them. Over time, I have refined this approach by improving my ability to actually see looming precedent in balance with long term interests and goals.

These sorts of decisions where short and long term interests seem to be at odds are the same sorts of conundrums that face many companies and organizations every day. The difference between sustained greatness and short term success is in part tied to the fortitude of the organization's members, the clarity of purpose and the ability to see the decision points as they actually are.

My point is this - companies who are willing to compromise who they are at the most core level are NOT protecting shareholder value as some of the decision-makers proclaim. In many cases they are actually compromising the value proposition that the organization holds to the public and ultimately short-changing the both the shareholders and the community at large of the long term promise of the organization (i.e., THE BRAND!).

Blogger – “Comically enough, this matches up with all the data and data-oriented conclusions of the phenomenal business books Good to Great and Built to Last by Jim Collins.”

Many people think a brand is a logo. It is not. There are some more-educated people who think a brand is a promise (what an organization says it stands for) - they are half right. There are still some other educated people who believe that a brand is an emotional context held by the customers, employees and partners who are served by the organization when thinking about the organization (what people believe an organization stands for – see The Brand Gap by Marty Neumeier) - they are half right as well.

Blogger – “Almost there!.”

It is my belief that the brand is a two-sided coin - the promise and its reflection, the perception. In order for an organization to be of sustained value to others, it has to define its promise clearly and live up to it every day so that the beholders of the promise can see it for both for what it is and what it aspires to be. In this manner, individuals can have relationships with the organization on something other than price - because to many individuals TRUTH HOLDS VALUE!!!

Blogger – “Wait for it…”

Just like truth holds value in how my kids look at me.

Blogger – “Wow! I wasn't sure if I was actually gonna get there!!!! Thanks for sticking it out.”

Standing for something - Like it.
Purporting to stand for something - Garbage.

We don't need to build the Bentley... or do we?

It's been a while since I've been inspired. Some recent experiences have pushed me to the keyboard once again.

Lately, I've been seeing a common myopia (HAH! SEEING! MYOPIA! That's a joke son! Don't you get it? I'm too fast for you! You'll never learn nothing with your nose in a blog boy!) . The people who typically surround me are overachievers and we all seem to share a passion for excellence in what we do. This is not so strange. What is strange and interesting is that when we ask for something from others and have certain constraints (like time or money) we seem to lose some ability to empathize with the passion for excellence from the other party.

In a past life, we called it "building the Bentley syndrome" - the endemic need in groups of overachievers that nothing but their best work was remotely acceptable. In trying to lead teams of overachievers, I am constantly faced with this problem... and I think I have made some sort of break-through.

I've tried the "redefine" approach where "best" is subjective and requires a balance of all constraints to little avail.

I am loathe to try the "dictatorial" approach where my option is the only option. I feel that this option is doomed with people who bristle at authority.

Well, maybe break-through is a little strong. Gained some new insight is more appropriate. Maybe what people need is a little understanding and empathy. All the people around me want to create "remarkable" solutions and feel that shortcuts and delivering to managed expectations is not very remarkable. When challenged on their approach the replies basically come to this - it
is always easy to do something poorly. I agree with this sentiment - but my new retort will be, I understand your need to do your best work. I empathize with the need to shine. Please understand that even work that is half-assed by your standards will more than likely be better than anything the client has dreamed. Please empathize with the fact that the quality of work you are capable of delivering when you are not tying up every loose end will definitely exceed what the client is willing to pay for. Sometimes, if we deliver crisply, we leave clients wanting more. And over time, that delivery focus will lead to trust and partnership. That shared trust and context will allow us to do our best work and get paid appropriately for it.

Understanding & Empathy - Like em.

Lick the lollipop of mediocrity and you'll suck for life!

Mediocrity in and of itself is a contradiction. Why? Because most people and organizations who accept and endorse mediocrity get results that are actually below mediocre.

This is not surprising at all for me. When faced with the combination of low expectations and an actual desire to not achieve excellence, motivation goes out the window.

How did this happen? Growing up, did our parents, teachers, and coaches say "Good enough for government work"? Not mine. Mine, and the role models of many other people I know would say things like "If it's worth doing, it's worth doing well!" or "Effort beats talent when talent shows no effort." Many people still vociferously aspire to achieve greatness or to produce great results but their numbers across many disciplines appear to be in decline. Where did this desire to just get by come from?

Did it come from our cultures denigration of competition? Could be... We live in a society where "everyone's a winner", and "all children are special". This nonsensical crap gives people nothing to shoot for. Why try when all results are viewed as equal? Of course some self motivated souls still identify with the concept of doing anything less than your best is cheating yourself and that the reward is in the doing, but the implicit message of the role models of today must bear some responsibility.

Did it come from the disillusionment with the establishment? Could be... Our parents and our peers grew up where many people believed (erroneously) that their employers actually cared about them as people, that they were a part of some bigger vision and that a "job for life" was just that. When corporate corruption, treacherous leaders and over-eager downsizing became prevalent many from generation x and beyond have a different view of what the relationship between an employer and an employee should feel like.

Did it come from the complete destruction of accountability? Could be... My parents forced me to come clean no matter the implications. You were responsible for your actions and you accepted the consequences. How many role models in our society (all the way up to the president - and not just the last two administrations either) do their little verbal dances around any and all allegations no matter how trivial or how critical. Parents now actually lie and endorse lying to their children to avoid punishment or to gain reward that they are not entitled to.

In the end, I'm not sure where it comes from, but I can see where it leads to. The USA will more than likely continue its social, artistic and economic decline and as I said at the beginning, it won't stop at mediocre. Aiming for mediocre doesn't work. High expectations will more than likely get people's best effort out of them. Medium or low expectations often get the same thing - whatever they believe is the absolute minimum necessary.

Mediocrity = Crap.