Posts tagged as:

performance

January 22, 2010

Face time

If you can work from anywhere, which many can these days, why go out of your way to get somewhere to do that work? Why waste time commuting? Why break that time quickening moment to get out of your pajamas’s and go somewhere?

If office face-time drives you nuts,

If your boss wants to see you because they are a control freak,

If your peers want you within arms reach because they want to socialize,

If your staff needs you to be there to work out every detail in a meeting or you just can’t trust them,

Then change something fast.

Make a drop in center rather than an office for those collaboration sessions, socialize over lunch or dinner together, and if all else fails change jobs or loose the needy peers and un-trustworthy staff.

Do something because your wasting the one finite quantity you have – time.

January 21, 2010

Round and round we go

Interesting discussions yesterday.

The scourge of “busy” versus “important” and the plague of “that’s the way we have always done it” have reared their ugly heads.

Outcome, not quantity is what matters.

Test everything daily, where suspect, change, re-engineer, rip it up. Nothing is sacrosanct.

The world is ripe with so many possibilities. It is a shame to waste precious time chasing your tail, doing something just because that is the way you have always done it and worst yet, feeling satisfied with what you do just because how busy your are.

December 9, 2009

Google Groups Joins Google Apps in Battle for the Enterprise

More collaborative power from Google and a great summation of the value proposition of their solution and the speed of their improvements over-time.

From the ReadWrite Blog

From the ReadWrite Blog

Meetings

A while back I wrote about meetings being outdated, but I think this nails it far better.

From the 37 Signals Blog

From the 37 Signals Blog

November 16, 2009

Droid (Android) gaining faster than iPhone?

via Droid Does Deliver: Flurry Uses its Analytics to Measure Week 1 Sales.

Droid sales of 250,000 units during its first week from a standing start and in just one country, is a strong result for Motorola and Verizon.

… Android does have an edge over iPhone app usage, with the average Android session length at four minutes vs. two minutes for iPhone apps.

… each subsequent Android handset launch increases competition for Apple.

… a sharp increase in new Android project starts by application developers within its system, a 94% jump in October compared to September.

… Droid signals the beginning of a viable platform alternative to the iPhone as Android builds critical mass.

… the consumer has never had more choice and innovation in the mobile industry.

November 15, 2009

The worst things startups do

From the worst things startups do at Scobeleizer

I think he saved the best points for last in his list (below) but click the link to read the whole thing, fantastic post:

“10. You say yes too often, particularly in engineering decisions. Look at Posterous (the video embedded on this blog). They have a blog publishing tool. But are their comments threaded? No. Will they be eventually? Yes! Why didn’t they do them threaded up front? Because they set priorities on other things that mattered more. That’s actually a good sign for a startup: if you have only four engineers you can’t do everything. If there’s one thing I like about Evan Williams, founder of Blogger and Twitter, is that he doesn’t try to do it all. In fact he prides himself on NOT doing things. It takes great leadership to say “no, Scoble, you can’t have more than 500 members on a list.”

11. Startups pick old technology because it’s familiar. You’re a startup, you should be picking the best of breed for everything you do. If you are using Microsoft Office “just because” then you are making a mistake. Have you considered Jive, SocialText, Zoho, Google Docs and Spreadsheets and Wave before making your choices? Have you really looked at ways to make your small company more productive? Or you just going with the same stuff your dad’s company used?

12. You don’t change direction fast enough. Every startup should be looking at its direction every month or so. Are things going according to plan? If not, fix them. But sometimes you just made bad assumptions about what the market would want from you. That’s OK! But don’t take a year to change directions, change quickly and you’ll have a chance to save the company.”

November 11, 2009

The Best Service Is No Service

A while back I picked up The Best Service is No Service: How to Liberate Your Customers from Customer Service, Keep Them Happy, and Control Costs by Bill Price and David Jaffe which is based upon their experience with customer service at Amazon. The premise of the book is that if you’re in the online game your customers don’t want to talk to you or interact with you. They want to get what they want, anytime they want, with no need to “touch” you in any unplanned way. The goal being customer service eliminates itself rather than staffs up to process more volume. Another one of those ah ha moments where you say to yourself why didn’t I think of that.

How to do it, or at least my interpretation of how to do it:

  • Capture all touch points between you and the customer.
  • Classify the why or reason for the touch. Keep the options simple, less than 30, refine over time.
  • For each reason identify the cause, it is the causes your going to go after, not how to handle more touches faster, but rather what caused the touch and how do I get rid of it.
  • Create a touch index, a rolling 6 week total of all touches over some measure of your volume of business. Chart it. It should be driving down, especially if your volume of business is driving up.
  • Some touch reasons take longer to resolve or require multiple touches to close them. My recommendation is go after these first – things that take time and more than likely allot of back and forth are the most frustrating for your client and the most expensive for you. Once these are closed than go after the volume one touch reasons and close them in order of highest to lowest volume.

This approach should build momentum. It is likely going to be hard to get rolling because everyone is so busy fighting fires but as they put out the cause of the fire they should find more and more time to invest in proactive prevention rather than reactive customer service.

Pretty simple. I wish I could take credit for the insight. And like everything, hearing it second hand from me doesn’t do the system any justice at all. Get the book!

November 10, 2009

Why do people build software like it was a bathroom?

I have been alive for over 17,000 days. Generally speaking I have used a washroom in one form or another let’s say at least 5 times per day. That means that I have had a washroom experience at least 85,000 times in my life. I’m going to renovate my bathroom. When meeting with the contractor I have experienced so many washrooms that I can easily describe what I want, and guess what, so has she and if I picked the right person she not only uses them but has also built many, many as well. Very easy to describe the entire project, get a quote and easy to evaluate progress. Doesn’t always go perfect but at least there isn’t allot of debate about the fact that the room should have a toilet.

Why then do we take this same approach to building software? To building something that we likely haven’t experienced before, can’t describe well, and we’re not too sure how it should work. And then we need to have someone build it who probably has had the same or least experience and on top of that they have to try and decipher what we want. Why also does our fear of not getting what we want drive us to get greedy and ask for everything? Dumb. If you have 10 things your software should do, use an 80/20 rule. Build 2, evaluate deliverables daily, when done, use the software and experience it fully, revisit the remaining 8 items and I think you will be surprised to find that they no longer apply, you now have a new list of 10 things you want to add. Don’t get dumb and go for all 10, do 2, repeat, enjoy. Stay regular. Couldn’t help the pun.

November 5, 2009

Meetings are Outdated

The old way; a complex topic needs to be discussed and the agenda holder wants everyone to come together to review because it is too complex to resolve any other way; a meeting is called, which takes considerable time to coordinate attendees, time, place and agenda; all come together; usually someone is late so you wait; whoever called the meeting presents their topic; whoever is loudest takes it from there; all throw comments in as they hit them; others stare at the ceiling; and round and round it goes; usually no one is comfortable reaching a conclusion because whatever was presented is new to them and they need time to think; meeting is adjourned to be reconvened later and typically no decisions are reached. You can easily lose a day to this type of event.

The better way; a complex topic is shared via a wiki, video, shared doc, google wave (I can’t wait!) and everyone is asked to give it some thought and post their conclusions when ready to make a contribution; sometimes the topic is hostile or the frequency of back and forth clarifications are too many so sometimes a meeting is needed, preferably video or conference call and as a last resort physically with preferably no chairs to get too comfortable in; whatever hostility or confusion was present is quickly resolved because all involved are well versed on the topic; decisions are reached and meeting is adjourned.

I don’t understand why anyone accepts being called to a meeting to discuss a topic that is too complicated to present for review beforehand. Who in their right mind is going to walk into a room, get hit with something complicated and try to reach a conclusion on the fly. And probably spend hours debating it. It just doesn’t make sense to me. We have so many ways to communicate complex information quickly, easily and cost effectively and we have the means to collate responses when best for those who are considering the information to respond. When they have thought it through, reflected, and have something to weigh in on and quite possibly they don’t have an opinion so they can opt out and not get distracted by whatever is happening.

I can hear it now. How do you team build, get to know each other, have face to face time, etc. etc. You get together to do just that. You socialize, have lunch, stop for a chat, whatever means of socializing with your coworkers that you prefer. This is good stuff. But it isn’t the forum for complex information processing and decision making and from my perspective meetings aren’t the best forum for it either.

October 30, 2009

What Service Isn’t

Air Canada cancels their 5:30pm flight at 9pm. Not the night before, three and a half hours after it was supposed to leave.

They have no one there to tell everyone what to do. So you give up and leave. You find a cab. You find a hotel. You call reservations, wait on hold for one and a half hours, while paying US roaming charges I might add, and they rebook you through Chicago, which now turns what would have been a 2 hour flight into a 6 hour journey. The person you are talking to has no idea if they will cover your hotel expenses or how to submit your claim.

You show up the next morning and you discover that you have been booked on United and United is charging you to check a bag and get a seat. You hand over your credit card. Why I am paying additional charges to have Air Canada fly me out I have no idea.

You arrive in Chicago and your flight has been canceled from Chicago to Toronto. You walk up to Air Canada and say I need a flight. They say your with United and you quietly explain that no your are not. They insist that you go to United Customer “Service” (I use the term loosely) and there you find a line of 30 people and they are moving 1 person about every 5 minutes. You do the math. You call Air Canada reservations, wait on hold for an hour, while still in line, and still paying US roaming charges, and they say okay we will rebook you on a flight. They tell you see the agent and they will give you a seat and will re-route your luggage. Why the first Air Canada agent I walked up to didn’t do this in the first place is beyond me.

You go see the Air Canada agent again, line up again for another 30 minutes, and he can’t fit you on the plane, but he is the first customer focused person you have seen so far and realizes that you have been through a very messed up situation. He upgrades you to business class free of charge. Thank you! Why I am so happy at that point I have no idea but my joy was short lived. I then ask about my luggage. He explains he has no idea and that he shouldn’t even book me if I have luggage with United. I stare dumb founded. He says no worries he will ignore it. I still ask “how do I get my luggage”? He suggests I go to United baggage claim, see if I can find it, and if I can go back out through security, go to the ticket counter, check it, go back through security and all will be good. I say your kidding?

As of this writing I have given up finding the luggage and am just hoping that they don’t cancel my next flight. This is not customer service. Problems happen but it is how you deal with them that creates opportunities. If the flight had been canceled and Air Canada accepted responsibility and guided me through getting home I would have been impressed with how they dealt with a tough situation and I would have chosen to fly with them any chance I have. Instead they have made their problem my problem and at every step made the situation worse. I now know why they are once again heading for bankruptcy and it has nothing to do with a recession.

–

Update from Toronto. Yes I made it. No luggage though. Surprised? No. I go to Air Canada to file a claim. They say no can do, go to United. I go to United and they say, and I quote “They can’t just keep sending people over like this.” and they send me back to Air Canada. Air Canada tries to balk, I say no way, and after a day and a half of trying to get home it was pretty obvious that I was about to go postal. They say okay we will file your claim. Once again I am happy. But why? Why am I happy that this really messed up situation has been finally accepted by someone and they will do something about it. Happy that I am leaving with no luggage and no idea when I will get it. Because they won’t make any promises. Crazy. A couple of minor tweaks in this whole thing and I would be talking about how well they dealt with a bad situation. Instead I am dumbfounded with how dysfunctional they are. Porter Airlines here I come.

Seriously though, this is not service, if your organization moves responsibility for what you provide to your client what purpose do you have in the value you create for them? None. And if they realize they are paying for nothing, then they will go elsewhere as fast as they can. Right?

← Previous Entries