Monday, February 23, 2009

Leveraging Your Expertise

Talking with a friend today over lunch, we were discussing the frustrations and enormity of creating change in the workplace. Especially when one is still young, ambitious, and full of ideas.

When any young professional comes out of school, they are often in for a rude awakening of how little change or efficacy they have.

They quickly learn that they must wait. Wait for the day for the baby boomers to keel over and retire before they can make their strike.

Going to work for a large, top heavy organization (especially government) one's spirit for change gets slowly eroded as they must wait 20 odd years or so before they have moved up the ladder enough to actually create the change the wish they want to see.

Unfortunately for most people - by the time they reach that run on the ladder, they're tired, cynical, and stuck in their ways. The enthusiasm and idealistic spirit is gone, replace by the countdown to retirement.

So what to do?

Besides quitting your job and going to work for a smaller organization who may give you that leverage (hard to do in a recession), you must consider three pillars of leveraging your influence in a large organization:

1. What is the probability of success of your idea? (Is there a market for it)
No one can totally predict the future, but providing quantifiable ways ofs to determine the probablity of success is a large reassurer for your skeptical, risk averse colleagues. Using the known to make the unknown more palatable is key for getting people on side.

2. Is your idea worth doing? (Executability)

Even if the sucess seems high, remarkable ideas are never short of hard work. Theres time, risk and effort involved, and no one likes to waste time on projects that go nowhere. Remember: it's easy to come up with ideas, but the execution is a whole different ball game. Just because you may great at generating ideas doesnt mean theres a market (see #1) or worth spending scarce resources on.

To combat the exeuction problem, determine each of your stakeholder's worldview so you can provide them with a "what's in it for me?" incentive. Some people are all about numbers, others about cool design, while other people are in love with raising the visibility of the organization or themselves.

3. Are you the right person to champion the idea?

Leaders aren't born. They're made. And leadership comes in all different types. You need to build your champion status in advance prior to putting forth your ida. The bigger the idea the more personal brand equity you will need to be taken serious. It's a given that everyone has a personal brand, but you would be surprised how few go about managing themselves to be viewed as experts in their field

Yes, you can always put yourself away for endless years at grad school and other accreditiated programs, but there are many other ways of becoming credible that don't involve thousands of dollars, and ridiculous admission requirments. Instead try creating a blog, volunteer for projects that are in line with your expertise, write an e-book, teach a course for free, offer free advice on business network forums, or even become an active member in your chamber of commerce. They key is that there are an infinite ways to become an credible source, you just have to consistently and authenitcally display it.

Barring all that, you could just become an independent consultant :)

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

You Will Be Punished

  • You will be punished for not getting the job because of your counter intuitive, holistic, marketing views.
  • You will be punished if you think outside the box that goes against the grain of your colleague's thinking - or worse, your bosses.
  • You will be punished for speaking out at your weekly meeting for questioning the team's motivations.
  • Society will punish you if you deviate away from a formal education path (you're too risky)
  • Your peers will punish you for being "too different" or "weird" because of your creative thinking
  • You will be punished for speaking out, as those who speak out seek change, and it's much more easy to label them a sh*t disturber then entertain their ideas.
  • Being idealistic is definitely punishable. Pragmatism must rule the day.
  • Don't have the necessary credentials to meet the artificial barriers? Punishment will be swift.
  • Challenging your peers thinking, and promoting a higher standard of thinking is highly punishable by shunning.
  • By being risky, and focusing on niche ideas, you are asking the mass market to forever punish you.

With it being so easy, safe, and convenient (in the short run) to embrace the status-quo and blend in with the crowd, are you really sure you want to be an entrepreneur or agent of change?

Remember, you will be punished.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Why People Don't Buy From You

Whether your a profit 100 company, struggling political party, or ambitious (arrogant) entrepreneur, knowing why people are passing you up for the competition is critical to your survival.

1. They don't trust you.

Who knows why. After all you thought you had a good story to sell. But maybe that's your problem. Too much inward thinking instead more outward thinking. Authenticity matters, and you can't build trust without your target market actually thinking your the real McCoy. Which brings us to number 2.

2. Don't know what's in it for them

People don't buy drill bits, they buy holes. They don't buy insurance, they buy peace of mind. If you do a poor job of communicating, you don't deserve to make the sale.

And above else....

3. People rarely buy. They're often sold.

Buying is a logical/rational process - lowest price and convenience is the name of the game.

Being sold is an emotional/sensual experience - one involving another human, creating a relationship and thus loyalty.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Attracting that special someone online


The secret to building a great website/online profile is all about what you want your prospect to do, when they arrive at your site.

Want them to take immediate action on something? Try using arousing stimuli.

Want visitors to stay longer? Adorn your pages and links with very pleasing/enjoyable things to do to encourage browsing.

Oh and keeping your mind out of the gutter helps too.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Making it easier to work with clients

1. Realize you are selling - you need to be formal and overt about this.

2. Ask lots of questions - not everybody needs a retro style toaster or can afford your monthly subscription. Figure out who your real customer is by qualifying your prospects with targeted questions to avoid wasting your time with tire kickers.

3. Creating a review cycle - If you are selling custom products or services, build in sufficient time for review. That way you never have to tell the client that the choice is between making a change or busting the schedule.

4. Build In Milestones - this way the client understand the consequences of not sticking to the agreed terms.

5. Maximize your authenticity - work very smartly to ensure you are the real deal to your client, so that they are likely to believe what you say.

6. Keep the conversation focused - talk about work, not your personal feelings or the process. You would be amazed at how bogged down you can get with too much off topic chat.

7. Ask the obligating question: If I do xxx, will you be able to buy it then? And make sue to list everything as part of the xxx.

8. Invite feedback - ask "what else" a lot. Make sure you get both positive AND negative feedback. This is not the time for warm pats on the back.

9. Establish a written trail for everything - everyone hates the paper trail, so get really organized with a project management system to keep track of every critical detail.

10. Step by step selling is key - start by getting their buy in, then on your side, and then their signature.