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

Hard. Easy. What's the difference?

You ever watch one of those modeling shows and snicker to yourself when the model says: "Everyone thinks modeling is easy, but it is soooo hard!"? I'm a little embarrassed to admit it, but I'm beginning to think they're right. Imprecise, but right.

Several months ago, a colleague of mine said. "Sales is the hardest job. Convincing someone to part with money is the hardest thing to do in professional services." It is my belief that this is wrong. It is my belief that, for the most part, no one job is harder than any other or more important than any other. It is my belief that the job itself isn't hard, it's being great at your job that is the hard thing.

Doing a job well enough to "make it to the top" of any field is extremely hard given that "making it to the top" basically means finding a way to push your performance and abilities to a point where you can be better than more than 90-95% (and sometimes more in highly visible fields or fields where people's lives are on the line) of the rest of the population.

Being a brain surgeon or a rocket scientist isn't hard at all. It's being a good one that's hard. It's fairly easy to do a poor job at almost any discipline.

Professional services can basically be broken down into 3 components - sell the work, do the work, support the work. Some people like to articulate a narrative where one component is THE critical ingredient or one job is harder than the others. I'm just not buying it. I'm a big fan of the "three legged stool" model for professional services. Take one leg off and it's just a hunk of wood that is of very little use to anyone.

If you can't sell the work - nobody gets paid.

If you can't do the work - nobody gets paid.

If you can't support the work - nobody gets paid.

It's as simple as that.

RATING:

Elevation of disciplines or jobs at the expense of others - Garbage.

Looking through the lens of system dynamics where all parts are necessary but not sufficient - Like it.

"I'm normally not a praying man, but if you're up there, please save me Superman." - 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 of AT&T

This is the second in a new experiment for me. If I make it beyond 7, I think I'll make it to 30.

If I were CXO of AT&T I would:

1. Acknowledge risk - I would immediately recognize that AT&T must make a revolutionary improvement in customer satisfaction to prevent a significant amount of churn once the iPhone is available on Verizon.
2. Tend the root - Actions to improve the network would help, but they are not the root of customer loyalty. True loyalty transcends momentary transactional advantage. If AT&T is to stave off this near-term defection, it must act to win the hearts of consumers and then capitalize on momentum to win back the minds. The hearts can only be won if people truly believe that AT&T is committed to doing more than just short term talk. Start with saying what we mean, and meaning what we say in every communication (i.e., Be Authentic).
3. Spend like there's no tomorrow - Do the thing we've said we are going to do. Do "everything possible" to fix the network issues. People from government to private industry cavalierly use this phrase with no thought to the actual meaning. It doesn't mean "everything within reason" as most people seem to think. "Everything possible" means doing things at a breadth and speed that approaches recklessness. In order to win the hearts, a gesture must be made - improve the network in the most populous areas "overnight". Set ludicrous goals for improvement and throw enough money at them to make the impossible possible.
4. Simplify - AT&T bundled plans are industry leading. Capitalize on this and go further. Simplify beyond the realm of what consumers think is possible. Throw away concepts like the "triple play" and go for the "whole enchilada" $200 unlimited everything (TV, phone, wireless, data, internet, long distance, local... etc.). I don't know if the number is right, but the concept is incredible - and that's what AT&T should be shooting for: beyond credulity.
5. Be world class - make our core service offerings world class. I don't mean "be perceived as world class". I don't mean "look like we are world class". I mean actually "be".
6. Develop an innovation strategy - scour the enterprise for the best and brightest and find mechanisms to directly and in-directly incent innovation. AT&T lost something big when it lost Bell Labs. Bring that back.

Rating:

#2 (of my experiment) - still like it

intentionally not being #1 - 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

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

Paradox of Language

As my career has progressed one thing that can lift me up or conversely drag me down is the linguistic capabilities of my coworkers. My wide vocabulary and semantic orientation for precision drives some people batty and I have often been made to feel pretentious at best and elitist at worst for using "fancy words" (e.g., cognitive dissonance) in business conversations.

Over the last year my wife and I have watched the complete Tudors series on Showtime. While my wife is most fascinated with the drama, cinematography and history I can't seem to get enough of the linguistic pirouettes engaged in by subjects and nobility in discussions with governmental figures and the king.

As I have watched the fabulous dialogues unfold I have been ironically reinvigorated with my desire to use language more precisely in that I am at the same time vexed with the paradox therein - it's not what you say, it's what other people hear.

There is another paradox, however, that fascinates me even more; how language is at once the vessel to new rational understanding and the horizon that bounds our ability to conceive. It is both the device of perception and the blinder.

This conundrum became apparent while watching the Tudors in that I was stunned how lords accused of treason, and royalty seeking fealty could use language in such a precise manner that enabled verbal jousting of a form we rarely see today. What was equally apparent is that we have lost something in our culture - nuance.

In our constant endeavor to use terms and language accessible to the common man and shunning orators who use complex concepts and ideas as "too intellectual" we have lost the ability to see subtle yet important differentiators in topics in culture, art, business, relationships, politics and everywhere else.

The English language has an intrinsic beauty in its unique ability to differentiate between concepts so close that they can seem one and the same but have chasms of difference in meaning when applied. The English speaking populace used to pride itself on it's ability to break new ground and find new conceptual understanding through the use of language and dialogue.

The very construct that we use to break through our boundaries and create new communicable understanding is also the barrier that we must break through if we are to mature our intellectual capabilities as a species. This is apparent when we talk about how certain concepts or cultural idioms are only understood if you can truly think in a particular language. Some words do not have equivalent translations between languages. One mildly famous but erroneous example is Schadenfreude (which actually has an English equivalent - epicaricacy).

So what? Who cares?

It is my opinion that the inevitable result of the dumbing down of our cultural linguistic capabilities is the rise of anosognosia (meta-incompetence - the inability to discern competence from incompetence) in that when you lose the ability to describe the difference between things you begin to lose the ability to see the difference between things. One unexplored consequence of this trend is that deception will increase as those with a greater command of the language will be able to dupe those with only surface level understandings.

I beg all of my readers/followers (are there more than 3 of you now?) to fight back! Do not succumb to the penchant for simple un-nuanced language. Rather, educate your listeners and readers such that they may begin to see discernment as a valuable skill to protect themselves from deception and chicanery.

Rating:

The Tudors - like it

Nuanced Language - like it

Aspersions of elitism for using nuanced language - garbage

"How is education supposed to make me feel smarter? Besides, every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain. Remember when I took that home winemaking course, and I forgot how to drive? " - Homer Simpson

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

King of Eight

I sent the above video to one of my co-workers the other week as I was trying to explain some stuff to him. He is a good amount younger than me and we have some highly similar personality traits.

We both have a professional and personal approach that seeks to "define the moment" rather than "be defined by circumstance". This amongst many other aspects puts us in the category of "Eights" as defined by the Enneagram of Personality.

In talking with my comrade about the characteristics of the eight, he basically referred to personality typing as "new-age" and followed up with some disparaging profanity (very typical thing for an eight to say).

As we talked more, about the original subject and beyond, he has lowered his guard a little bit and sought out more career and professional advice from me and another of my network.

I've been very happy about this for a couple of reasons:

1. I get a lot of self actualization out of being helpful in a meaningful way to other people


2. I like watching other people move out of self-imposed mental constraints to break-through to a new way of seeing


3. I'm very happy that my professional relationship has turned a corner in a way that enables us to be personally more in-tune with each other

My dad had an aphorism that he used to quote:

He who knows not what he knows and knows not what he knows not is a fool; avoid him.
He who knows what he knows and knows not what he knows not is a student; teach him.
He who knows what he knows and knows what he knows not is a wise man; follow him.

In later years I tacked a corollary on it:

He who knows that he is at times a wise man, at times a student and at times a fool is amongst the wisest of all men

I love teaching, and I love learning. I'm very happy to be an eight and at the same time, I strive to be humble enough to know how god laughs at the plans of mice and men (as the king of eight finds out at the end of the video).

Rating -

Life long pursuit of learning - like it

That's it! You people have stood in my way long enough. I'm going to clown college!

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!

Resolution Schmesolution

'09 is here. So are new year's resolutions.

Lose weight? Exercise more? Not for me.

I've had the same set of resolutions since 1989. Well, technically not exactly the same.

1989-1994

• Always remember it's only school.


• Eat more ding-dongs

1994-2009

• Always remember it's only work.


• Eat more cake

The changes... Well, I'm not in school anymore. And I never really ate any ding-dongs at all, so I decided to go easy on myself and make it more achievable by going with the more generic "cake".

My deal with resolutions is that - if you need a specific event to commit yourself, then you probably don't really want to do the thing you are committing yourself to. If you want to lose weight, go on a diet... TODAY. Not 3 weeks from now on your birthday.

Rating:

Resolutions - Like them
New Year's Resolutions - Garbage


PS - Yes, I'm Writing about New Year's Resolutions just before January ends. At least it is not February.

Party for your right to fight!

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.