What Entrepreneurs Can Learn From the Love of a Good Chelsea Bun.

As my good friend David Noble recently pointed out my blog has not been very up to date lately and I therefore can’t have been very bored (see previous post).  He has a point, I have certainly not been giving myself time to pause and reflect enough lately.  Anyhow time now for a new blog about the creation of successful companies, arguably something I am more familiar with as an observer, as I had to run down my own company, or perhaps insights through bitter experience!  The framework for this and its inspiration has come from an article in this month’s Observer Food Monthly Magazine and an article about a married couples desire to “rescue” a failed bakery, “Fitzbillies” in Cambridge see here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/nov/11/fitzbillies-tim-hayward-cambridge

To me it reads like a business start up 101 and I have drawn from it a few insights as to how you succeed in starting up a sound business from scratch:

•  When you spot your dream you will know it. You will find yourself driven forward by an energy you never knew you had and one that tends to be lacking in other enterprises
• Things personal to us tend to fire our dreams the most – this is especially true if they also hold fond memories
•  Social media is useful for networking but it can also stimulate new ideas
• It pays to be well connected but also don’t be afraid to ask people in your network for help – most people love to help and are incredibly generous with their time often all we have to do is ask (there is a great book about this by the way: The Aladdin Factor)
• Be well planned, especially when it comes to organising your Business Plan and know your audience
• Acknowledge what you are good at and let others have the freedom to get on and do their part in your partnership
• You need a bit of luck but by creating a compelling and attractive environment luck is more likely to come and find you
• There will be dark times only strong relationships will survive this – try and work with people you like and can be open with

Not exactly rocket science, I guess but some great insights nonetheless.  I for one know that my reason for failing in running my own company is that I have not yet seen an opportunity that fires me up on an emotional level!

Let's Get Bored: Creativity from Boredom.

I do all I can to avoid boredom. I fill my time with actions and/or distractions.  My job is constantly busy and full of tasks; I devour social media, read continuously, play games and blog. It is all very interesting and I learn a lot from others but I think I am less creative as a result. My mind seems to abhor a vacuum and rather than fill it with musings and creative theory I tend to distract it with toys, gizmos, articles and arguments with crazies on the internet. 

I have two young kids and their minds dislike boredom too, but with less entertainment or distraction at hand they are much better than I at creativity. They turn a cardboard box in to a house, race about, sing just for the hell of it and find some inventive way to irritate each other. Whatever they are doing, and whether they are well behaved or not they are relying upon themselves for their own solutions and putting their mind to solving their need without turning to the "junk food" quick fix.

The issue of boredom has been around forever and we are taught that it is bad, idle hands are tools for the devil after all and anyone who is a man (or heaven forbid a lady) of leisure is frowned upon. In the middle ages it was described as "acedia" a very serious affliction that was defined by "a state of restlessness and inability either to work or to pray", even as the precursor to sloth - one of the seven deadly sins and an evil affliction to be avoided at all costs.  But I find that some of my best ideas have come from boredom. Moments of hanging around or just stopped and waiting.

         

So all this got me thinking do I need to repossess boredom? If I was frustrated more often, with nothing to do could I improve my creativity? But perhaps I was confusing boredom with thinking? And while I think that learning constructive ways to think such as a process of reflection, structured thinking and even meditation would be valuable, I maintain boredom is useful. Structured thinking requires planning. You need to set aside time to do it, prepare a quite place and decide a method and so forth. But boredom is unstructured. It happens to you in random and unplanned ways. In my case this tends to be mostly down to my daughters unwillingness to sleep or Southern trains working to the time table of “Middle Earth”. What I think boredom requires is simply for us to be slowed. It needs to creep up on us and display its self it then it requires us to sit with it awhile - not to pick up our Smartphone, grab the mouse or stuff in our headphones but rather to just sit and dwell a while. I am going to try this out. I think it is going to be excruciating at first but I think I will benefit by trying. If it all gets too much I can always fill the void by blogging about it. 

How to Negotiate Down Your Notice Period After Resignation

I tried to point someone to a useful website link to help them negotiate their way out of a long notice period (six months), having just accepted a new opportunity elsewhere.  I was surprised to find very few constructive comments on the internet about this, so I decided to write my own post!  This comes from over 15 years of experience in helping Execs through resignation but I should also acknowledge the input from the training of Steven Finkle from my very earliest days of head-hunting.   Before entering in to the negotiation of resignation it is first worth reflecting on what you can expect when you resign – the best summary of this can be found in an old Wall Street Journal article (click here).  This article is essential reading and I don’t want to rehearse all the issues it explores so please read this before continuing with this post.

Once you have resigned (and not even hinted that you are willing to consider a counter-offer), you will find there are three stages in the resignation process.  Right at the start i.e. at resignation itself you must state the date you would like to leave – you must mark your line in the sand.  Once you have resigned you will experience three stages of the resignation process.  They are not dissimilar to Kubler_Ross’s stages of grief.  Firstly, as the article states, your current employer will bombard you with flattery, praise and anything else they can to woo you back in to the fold, including coffees with the most senior people in your business, lunches, "quiet chats" and so forth. 

Secondly, when this praise does not work, they will get angry and make it clear how disappointed in you they are. There will be a big letdown feeling.  Things are likely to get ugly and work will be a deeply unpleasant place to be for a while!  This passes, you just have to ride it out, when it does you will find yourself at the third stage, one of acceptance where the whole thing becomes a business transaction and you can negotiate your way out.  But you must not start this negotiation until you are at stage three.  I have seen it take, minutes, days and even weeks for stage three to arrive, the difference is dependent on the type of company and how stoic the candidate is.  However long it takes you must wait until your current employer feels full acceptance of the situation and is no longer being overly emotional or difficult about things before you can negotiate.

So assuming you are at this third stage refer back to the date you first mentioned in your resignation.  Point out that this is still a date you intend to leave on and provide a clear unequivocal reason as to how this is achievable.  Make sure this explanation is water tight by supplying solutions.  For every current live project show clearly how it will be taken forward and who overall can take responsibility for your current role.  In effect make certain you have achieved a full and clean handover.  Work yourself out of your job then keep pointing out to the decision maker on a regular basis (either HR or your old line manager) just how crazy it is to keep you beyond your preferred date.  You might also want to point out the cost of them keeping you when you are emotionally engaged elsewhere.

The most important thing throughout this process is to be absolutely clear on your preferred date and keep pointing it out, to remain consistently calm and not rise to any bait, to not appear in any way open to a counter-offer and most importantly of all to keep in regular communication with your new employer.  Do all this and I can assure you will be able to negotiate down your notice period.  At the very least the whole process of resignation will be more tolerable.

Good luck

Banning Facebook at Work

I am amazed that in 2011 this is even an issue frankly but it astonishes me how poorly some companies treat their workers.  I have no idea how companies truly believe they will produce more productive workers if they punish them, monitor them and generally treat them like children.  This rant has been prompted by a friend of mine who stated recently that he would no longer be posting on Facebook during the day as his employer was shutting down access.  My reply was:

“Companies that block Facebook or indeed any websites are so misguided. Why do they insist on treating people like children? Also do they not know of smartphones?  If someone is not working by being on Facebook they will continue to not work by doing something else, like spinning in their chairs or something. I guarantee productivity will not increase one little bit. People need to be motivated not hit with a big stick”

Rather than debate the whole motivation versus punishment issue I will leave it to Maurice Martin, director of server and cloud platforms for Microsoft UK, to close this off:

"I had assumed that if you want to be a leading technology department you are going to want to hire the best talent possible," responded Martin. "To do this you want to provide them with a flexible interactive environment where they can communicate in the way they do at home. I'm afraid this is done on Facebook," he added. "I find it strange that the kinds of IT departments that are trying to attract the best talent would be so traditionalist. It's an old prohibitionist approach, and it's an old way of thinking about our problems.  "If you turned off Facebook at Google or Microsoft, I think half the staff would revolt." Read more: http://www.computing.co.uk/ctg/news/2077597/leaders-forum-banning-facebook-strange-microsoft-chief#ixzz1WUxhxk6g 

Moreover, what company these days can do without using Facebook?  Given that the world is using Facebook to communicate companies need to be part of the debate.  Social Media monitoring must be a crucial part of any companies arsenal and the only way to monitor is of course to participate.  Proactive and forward thinking companies would use Facebook to evangelise their message to both recruit talent and to motivate existing talent.  I would be amazed if any of these companies ban Facebook at work: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacquelynsmith/2011/08/29/the-companies-doing-the-most-to-make-their-employees-happier/

Any how rant over........

Change the Default

Studies have shown that when you ask a question in a different way, or rather more specifically, you alter the default settings you get a different result. For example a study in the US has shown that when you change organ donor choices from “Opt in” to “Opt Out” you move participation levels from 40% to 80%. But (see this month’s Wired) this also has application in business. Amazon set defaults on your account so you can click once to buy for example. So powerful is this that it has been shown people would prefer to shop at Amazon than have to input their data again elsewhere, even if elsewhere is cheaper. The default of “One Click” is so powerful. In fact Amazon goes further and lures you in further by offering you free postage for a year if you pay c.£49.00, thus rendering you a more dedicated shopper - not only buying more but not going elsewhere in order for you to make the most of your free postage. Similarly Facebook sets various defaults on your account so that they collect a huge amount of data AND make it all available to advertisers (and in some cases everyone else too)! Lethargy and/or ignorance prevent people from amending these default settings.

So how can business more generally make use of this? How can we create choices for our customers so that using us is the default and/or the easier option than going somewhere else? It would be trite to answer that this simply comes down to excellent delivery and or keen prices so that our customer don’t want to go elsewhere. In my view “setting the default” goes much deeper than this and is also subliminal or not in any way obvious to the client. In other words certain standards, settings or modes of behaviour are established as the norm such that the client doesn’t even realise that they are being treated in a particular manner but it creates loyalty and higher spend.

Further to this there are other smaller settings you will have as a business that can be immediately altered to be the new "default" and quickly enhance your offering and/or return. I remember for example at a previous employer we had a clause referring to our rebate period, I recommended a new default, no rebate and moreover, don't mention it at all! Result was that clients hardly ever thought to ask about it. The new default was set.

This blog has been in gestation for some time and I have been trying to theorise the various applications of this but I felt it was time for me to just get it out there for others to apply.....

Microsoft and Facebook - the web numbers they finally wanted?

OK I might be somewhat behind the curve here but I note that Microsoft are making successful in roads in to the Web space.  Not that they haven’t tried this before of course or indeed had some success (Bing, X-Box Online etc) but they have failed to make the big impact that you would expect and given the amount of money they have thrown at it.  But then they have a pretty poor record of breaking out of their PC world – take for example to doomed Kin project.  The Facebook tie up is highly likely to be their breakthrough to the heady word of a fully integrated Microsoft on-line experience.

As per an earlier post a use Linked In quite a lot as a communication tool with candidates.  But recently (partly as I am searching for a VP Social Media for a major brand) I have been using Facebook to contact candidates.  Not only have I been getting a very high hit rate I have also been able to contact prospects and attach documents to my message.  They in turn have been able to reply with a Word document CV attached to the Facebook message. When you open the attachment it does so as a Microsoft Online App thus providing full online document management akin to Google Docs.  You then choose to download the document if you wish to your harddrive.  Linked In does not allow attachments via it’s messaging facility.  Add to this the approaching Skype / Microsoft deal and integrated Video chat in Facebook and it would seem that Microsoft have finally managed to make mega deals and expensive forays into the Web pay off – well assuming they find a way to monetise all this of course!

This means that Microsoft are a little way off the world that Google are moving towards with products like the Google Chromebook but now you can start to get a grip on the fact that it is now possible to run Microsoft and not need a hard-drive.  Cloud facilitates all of this of course and Microsoft’s Cloud service is yet to hit the big numbers but it does all seem to be coming together.

Fathers with Daughters and "That Horrendous Quote"

I had lunch recently with the awesome Exec Coach and friend Lee Chalmers and she quoted a particularly alarming statistic.  In fact when she sent me the relevant article the email was entitled “That Horrendous Quote”.  Well she is right because as a Father of an Infant School aged daughter it is indeed one of the most horrendous quotes I have ever encountered, in fact I believe it is one that challenges any father of girls to examine the way they are parenting. So here it is:  

"Twenty-five percent of young American women would rather win America's Next Top Model than the Nobel Peace Prize. Twenty-three percent would rather lose their ability to read than their figures". 

First off forget the words "American" we know this affects us all.  So who is responsible for the environment where our daughters are told that pink is best, being a princess is a positive aspiration and looks are more important that your thoughts?  The Rolling Stones said “.... after all. It was you and me” and it is indeed all of us, it is society that has done it and will continue to do it too.  The only hope we have is to give our girls extra focus support and attention and help them to understand that “being Woman” is actually a very cool thing indeed or as my daughter put it at the weekend “I am powerful because I am a Girl”.  In fact my daughter is quite an exceptional person, clearly I am bias, but she does seem different to some other girls – refusing to wear a dress to her Nephews wedding, being the only Girl at her school who managed an exception to the uniform policy of “no shorts” for girls and passionately spurning anything Pink.  In fact I am not sure where this has come from, as I am not aware of specific things we have done as parents to create some of these outcomes, obviously we have done something

Now here comes the problem, my daughter’s positive attitude, strength of mind and clarity of purpose is leading to her being labelled as a “tomboy”.  It infuriates me and also highlights just how ingrained sexism is and how up against it our young girls are.  The message they are being given is “conform to our vision as to what little girls should be like or we will label you as other”.  It is not her peer group that does this alone but rather genuine and very well meaning Teachers, Playgroup workers and other Parents – in fact any adult who feels in a position to comment.  Rather like the carte blanche right right people feel they have to touch an expectant mothers belly, everyone feels they have the right to pass comment on a  child’s behaviour.

So what now?  Well I don’t have all the answers but what I do know is that responsible "Fathers of Daughters" carry a burden probably more complex and onerous than any generation before them.  We are in an age where "Woman as sex object" is so engrained in our culture that it is impossible for our daughters not to be measured by it.  We are no longer the sole bread winner who swans off and leaves all this complex stuff to the Women either – at least I hope you don’t.  My view is that it is time for us to man up, get real and feminise our thinking.  Teach our daughters what is great about being a women, build positive dreams for them, point them to positive role-models (ditch the Models) and make sure that the stuff we are feeding them is congruent with what we want for them.  In sum let’s stop parenting little girls and start taking care of the future Woman.  Now all we have to do is give thought to what we do about the changing world that our Sons face.

Living Authenticly Online

I have recently signed up to Branchout a Facebook application that is in essence a new take on Linked In.  I signed up because I felt I should – it’s take up has been rapid – and because Linked In has been an essential tool for me for years.  I guess I am worried I might miss out if I don’t join.  But it has made me feel uncomfortable.  To date I have tried to compartmentalise my on-line life.  Linked In is essentially my Professional realm, Facebook is for friends, Foursquare a mix, Twitter: I have two different accounts, I game via platforms such as Empire Avenue and there are countless other platforms I comment on and/or rant to!

It is exhausting keeping so many compartmentalised worlds!  Moreover the whole thing can’t possibly be sustainable.  As my good friend Tony Fish (my online Soothsayer) warns our Digital Footprint is so vulnerable and ultimately uncontrollable anyway, but he might take umbrage to such a flippant summary of his view.  My Facebook security is only as good as the security my Facebook connections apply and I cannot stop someone from tagging me for example and I certainly can’t stop every security oversight such as a friend forgetting to log off from a shared computer in a Cafe or whatever.

Add to this, as a friend pointed out to me today, there are some conversations and or views we hold that we would never wish to see online.  The problem is of course that we cannot be certain that present company can be relied on not to voraciously blog our inflammatory views or comments!

This leads me to believe that the only answer is to be fully Authentic online.  No more “Facebook Tim”, “Linked In Tim” and so forth, just Tim.   So while I do not expect to be boring my Linked In network with my review of The Vaccines gig or School Reunion photos nor do I propose discussing a Core Networks with my family, I do not think there is any place for a view and/or comment that I could not comfortably share with any Network.  If I don’t choose such a position the internet will choose it for me in time anyway.