These concepts will be very familiar to people knowledgeable with continuous improvement and more specifically Lean and Six Sigma. However, you do not have to be a practitioner to understand or read the book. When trade terms are used the authors explains them in simple everyday language without losing a beat. Few people other than Dan could have provided a book of this sort. His experience with Lean coupled with many years of providing guidance on individual performance has given him profound insight. There may be others with his depth of knowledge but few that can transfer it into simple, practical and useable information. I found myself reading a “how to” book like a novel. I had to remind myself more than once to bend a corner or mark a page for future reference.

Dan is also not shy about crediting or highlighting others when it fits the application. He spends time discussing Personal Kanban and how he looks at applying it. My favorite part of the book was the part on living in your calendar versus your inbox. That comment in itself added a few more minutes of productivity to my day. His A3, Value Map and Information 5S were absolutely flawless.

Are you going to get 2 hours a day of time saving tips from the book? I doubt it. What you will get is more productivity and feeling better about what and how you accomplished it. It was my New Year’s Day read and I have picked it up every day since then. Not saying you won’t be able to put it down but at this point it looks that way for me.

Mark Graban on the Lean Blog had a interview with the author, Dan Markovitz that you might enjoy. I did. Dan Markovitz “A Factory of One

Related Information:
The SDCA Cycle Description for a Lean Engagement Team
The Resilience of PDCA
Lean Canvas for Lean EDCA-PDCA-SDCA
Successful Lean teams are iTeams

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These 2 mind maps were created from the audio version of Zingerman’s Guide to Giving Great Service. I think this book or audio should be part of any employee introduction and would recommend a trip to one of their Deli’s to see if they really walk the walk (Hint: they do). Zingerman’s also offer one of the best mail order catalogs on the planet.

Related Information:
In love with your products more than your customers?
Collection of Mind Maps
The Service-dominant Logic of Marketing: Dialog, Debate, And Directions
The Common Thread of Design Thinking, Service Design and Lean Marketing

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Research suggests five general stages in the process of person goes through when lost.

1. In the first, you deny that you disorientated and press on with growing urgency, attempting to make your mental map fit what you see.
2. In the next stage as you realize that you genuinely lost, the urgency blossoms into a full scale survival emergency. Clear thought becomes impossible and action because frankly, unproductive, even dangerous.
3. In the third stage (usually following injury or exhaustion), you expend the chemicals of emotion and form a strategy for finding some place that matches the mental map. (It is a misguided strategy, for there is no such place now: you are lost.)
4. In the fourth stage, you deteriorate both rationally and emotionally, as a strategy falls to resolve the conflict.
5. In the final stage, as you run out of options and energy, you must become resigned to your plight. Like it or not you must make a new mental map of where you are. You must become Robertson Crusoe or you will die. To survive, you must find yourself. Then it won’t matter where you are.

Psychologists who study the behavior of people, who get lost, report that very few ever backtrack. Though, that is the most reasonable and successful way to survive. Even staying exactly where you are is more prudent than blazing a path forward. However our eyes look forward into real or imagined worlds. The typical impulse of people that become loss is to panic. Why? It is because of the lack of a mental map that matches the environment they are in. If you had a mental map of where you just came from, you would simply turn around and go back to where you started.

Are you thinking recovery is just around the corner? Are things taking longer than expected? Are you scrambling for the next great idea? Is innovation panic? I question sometimes whether innovation is really the strategy for companies to survive during recessionary times. Instituting new mental maps, products or services may make things progressively more unfamiliar and mixed up.

Innovation may not be the key. Scott Berkun in his book Making Things Happen: Mastering Project Management (Theory in Practice (O’Reilly)) devoted a chapter to ‘What to do When Things Go Wrong” and pointed out an eight step process.

1. 1. Calm down: Nothing makes a situation worse than basing your actions on fear, anger, or frustration.
   2. Evaluate the problem in relation to the project: Just because someone else thinks the sky has fallen doesn’t mean that it has. Is this really a problem at all? Whose problem is it?
   3. Calm down again: Now that you know something about the problem, you might really get upset (“How could those idiots let happen!?”).
   4. Get the right people in the room: Any major problem won’t impact you alone. Identify who else is most responsible, knowledgeable, and useful and get them in together straight away.
   5. Explore alternatives: After answering any questions and clarifying the situation, figure out what your options are.
   6. Make the simplest plan: Weigh the options, pick the best choice, and make a simple plan. The best available choice is the best available choice, no matter how much it sucks (a crisis is not the time for idealism). The more urgent the issue, the simpler your plan.
   7. Execute: Make it happen.
   8. Debrief: After the fire is out, get the right people in the room and generate a list of lessons learned.

Though Scott’s plan is not a cure-all, it emphasizes the need to stay calm and build simple plans. One of the most effective strategies you can do is build value stream maps. Not for the typical Lean reasons or reducing waste but to create a current state map or a mental model for where you are today. I cannot emphasize enough the ability to accept where you are, what resources you have and if you know how you got here, you may be just fine in understanding how to survive.

As Laurence Gonzales states, “If we persist in bending the map until we can no longer deny the evidence of our senses, it can be terrifying. It’s not something that happens immediately. First it’s a sense of disorientation: “I’m not in Kansas anymore. “ Then the words start to become strange, landmarks are no longer familiar.” Do you need innovation to survive? It is one thing if you an innovative company already and have an existing mental map. It is quite another, if one does not exist. You may wake up and find out you’re not in Kansas anymore!

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Removing Uncertainty in your Decision Making
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• Allowing employees to telecommute (26%).
• Upgrading server infrastructure with the most energy-efficient technology available (16 %).
• Using mobile technology (15 %).
• Conducting live meetings that share resources over the Web such, as presentations (14 %).

"You have to take a hard look at your processes," says Dave Minker, president of CMIT Solutions, an IT consulting firm. "That helps you design a solution that works for you, and helps you realize greater efficiency and organization." Can smarter IT really do that? Yes. Here are six ways that low-cost computing can give your small business a lift:

1. Use what you’ve got. Chances are, the resources you need to start saving money with your technology are right in front of you. "For example, most businesses have Microsoft Office installed," says Neil Moodley, a managing director at FourThirds, a U.K. business consultancy. "That’s a good start. Most, however, could use it much more effectively." If users took the time to learn how to build a simple database in Access that tracks customers and orders or to learn how to export data from Access or Excel into Word for a mail merge or to understanding the features of Outlook to organize time and tasks, they could save lots of time and money. "These all need an hour of effort to learn, but once they are understood, huge piles of paper and binders full of orders can be archived away and processes big and small streamlined," he says.

2. Turn your PCs into phones. Nico McLane, a broadcast media consultant, says she turns to free Web-based services such as Skype or Free Conference to bring clients together and show off her products. "I target ROI on everything I do for myself and my clients," she says. "I use several tools in concert to achieve the exact type of virtual meeting I need to deliver, to educate potential clients on the power of these tools."  How much does all of this cost? Usually, nothing, since many of the products offer free trials. This can also save money on travel expenses, since virtual conferences often eliminate the need for in-person meetings. Travel and entertainment costs are typically the second- or third-biggest business expense.

3. Automate processes. Are you still doing invoicing, receiving, purchasing and inventory control the old-fashioned way-by hand? IT can help you automate those processes and save money. Automate your processes as much as possible and trim unnecessary overhead," says Loren Peterson, the vice president of global solutions for MCNi, which develops automation software that works with accounting applications used by small businesses. "The upfront costs are generally recouped with a few months of purchase."

4. Outsource when it makes sense. In most small organizations, there’s usually an employee who is responsible for IT, including office machines, copiers and interactions with the phone company. "The problem is, this person usually has another primary responsibility-the job they were actually hired for," says Brian Rosenfelt of CT Consulting of Independence, a firm that handles outsourcing for small businesses. "As the economy continues to tighten, companies are searching for ways to get more out of their existing employees, but we’ve found that these jack-of-all-trades are spending anywhere from 25% to 75% of their time dealing with [IT related] problems. By shifting resources, allowing your employees to do what they were meant to-and outsourcing the rest to a third party-you can save lots of money.

5. Get rid of obsolete technology. Perhaps the only thing that’s worse than not using IT to help your business save money is trying to use obsolete technology. Take a fax machine, for example. "Get rid of it," says Edith Yeung, who organizes the San Francisco Entrepreneur Meetup, a networking group for Bay Area entrepreneurs. Instead of using the traditional fax machine, check out eFax.com. You can save costs for faxing long distance, and you will also save money on paper and save the environment. The same thing goes for other obsolete technologies such as computer screens that use cathode ray tubes, or old software. These vintage technologies slow down your business and cost money in the form of higher energy bills. Get rid of them and it won’t just speed up your processes; it will save your company serious money.

6. Shift more of your business to the Web. Many small retailers have realized they can target incremental revenues by establishing a Web site to sell from, in addition to their brick-and-mortar store, says Les Cowie, the director of business development for Worldwide Brands, a company that online retailers directly with qualified wholesale suppliers.

But why stop there? Using nothing more than a PC and a broadband connection, your small business can leverage the marketing power of the Internet. Social networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter let you push sales at virtually no cost to your business.  For small businesses, IT isn’t a problem. It’s a solution. By taking advantage of the technology you already have, outsourcing what you shouldn’t be doing, upgrading and rethinking the way your small business uses technology, you can harness the power of low-cost computing for your company.

Used with permission from the Microsoft Small Business Resources. Christopher Elliott writes about business travel and mobile computing, and publishes a weekly travel newsletter . 

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Small Business Lean

Find out about Ankit’s 6 month challenge (found on www.TheleanWayconsulting.com) outlined below:  

Get Results For Your Business

1. We set goals for 6 months and we will review the goals together and come up with a plan
2. Once you agree to the goals then we updated our progress on KBZNZ radio show (optional)
3. You are satisfied or you don’t pay

Related Podcast::Small Business Lean

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In the past, Ankit has been a Lean consultant for Dell Inc. overseeing Dell’s Manufacturing, and Re-Manufacturing production processes in Lebanon TN.  Ankit helped guide the multibillion dollar plant in strategic planning, coaching executives at the plant, facilitating Kaizen events, and training Lean leaders at all levels of the organization.  Ankit is no stranger to the board room or the shop floor and has run several strategic initiatives as well as 100’s of Kaizen events

Ankit has also had several years of small business ownership.  He has owned a Liberty Tax Service, started his own online computer education company My Computer Buddies and has been a partner in a sandwich shop and a motel.  Ankit has guided a variety of small and medium size businesses ranging in services from veterinary clinics to tattoo parlors.

His experience to change and grow companies ranges from small businesses to multinational fortune 50 companies. Ankit has an Industrial Engineering Degree from Georgia Tech and lives in the Nashville TN area.  You can follow Ankit on the bloghttp://theleanwayconsulting.blogspot.com.

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I discovered a study (while reading The Blended Learning Playbook published by MoreSteam) by the Centre for Studies in Advanced Learning Technology of Lancaster University. It suggested that there is a wide use for networked learning for the following reasons:

• Students found a high degree of interactivity and flexibility when combining online tools with other virtual activities. 54% of survey respondents reported feeling more in control of their learning over time and location.
• The variation of interactive options(discussion forums, classroom activities, cats, study halls(encourage more interaction among students in situations where those opportunities did not exist.
• Students in organized blended programs experience more reflective learning, while facilitated deeper processing the material. They felt that they were better able to respond to content or afforded the opportunity to the sword it over time, rather than respond immediately, as is often the case in a traditional classroom environment.
• Recorded discussion and e-learning leaves a permanent record. In a classroom, when the instructor has finished their remarks, most of the instruction is also finished. When e-learning is used as the primary delivery mode for content, it can be re-access as often as a surrogate for refresher in just-in-time learning.
• Network learning provides richer opportunities for peer learning. Particularly in deployments where students are not co-located, tools like discussion forums and project management applications foster more communication within cohorts. Students find great value in the strength of their new network. 79% of respondents to this case study felt they had learned from the contributions of fellow students.

MoreSteam also put a small chart in the book explaining Blended Learning which I thought could serve as an excellent outline for a content marketing strategy. I have used parts of it below to outline the reasons for developing a content marketing strategy:

• Less expensive, more flexible and more effective
• Don’t believe design integration of live and online materials and methods
• Designed to have scheduled meetings with trainers, technicians and sales.
• Rooted in best practices as identified in adult learning theory
• Designed to be delivered as needed and in harmony with work schedule
• More scalable, allowing redirection of personnel resources
• For a variety of experience and levels of technical savvy
• Highly interactive exercises and activities
• Opportunities for team members in leadership to manage project workflow and receive Information on demand

Blended Learning is being proven as a very effective way of learning and for the adult population it may be the most effective way of learning. I encourage before developing a content marketing strategy of your own to review some of the principles of Blended Learning. MoreSteam is a great resource and offers a wide variety of resources at www.moresteam.com

If we are talking about Blending, I have to include a Will it Blend Video in lieu of a picture: How about one for marbles?

By the way, how blended is your marketing?

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Big Book of Marketing Ebook

Podcast: Big Book of marketing from Atlas Air to Boeing

Related Posts: Lean Marketing House

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A marketing theme is defined as a central marketing idea or message, or even a product benefit or feature, that is known to have maximum appeal to a targeted market segment. I put together a flash video that describes the themes that drive the Business901 marketing philosophy. Click on the picture below and it will allow you to manipulate the cube and listen. In the right hand corner is a drop down screen that gives a brief overview of that particular section.

Can you describe the theme that  drives your marketing?

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THE SEVEN FASCINATION TRIGGERS
MYSTIQUE – Why we’re intrigued by unanswered questions
LUST – Why we’re seduced by the anticipation of pleasure
ALARM – Why we take action at the threat of negative consequences
POWER – Why we focus on people and things that control us
VICE – Why we’re tempted by novelty and “forbidden fruit”
PRESTIGE – Why we fixate on rank and respect
TRUST – Why we’re loyal to reliable options
Each trigger adds a different type of attraction. Mystique, as we know, adds curiosity. Trust adds
stability and comfort. Lust adds warmth and humanity. Power adds respect, or fear. Alarm adds a
sense of adventure, or immediacy, or even danger. Vice adds irreverence.

6701 Fascinate –

Long been a fan of ChangeThis and I encourage you to subscribe. I have for over 5 years and maybe longer, can’t remember. And I still look forward to their issues. This book is available at Amazon: Fascinate: Your 7 Triggers to Persuasion and Captivation.

ABOUT CHANGETHIS: ChangeThis is a vehicle, not a publisher. We make it easy for big ideas to spread. While the authors we work with are responsible for their own work, they don’t necessarily agree with everything available in ChangeThis format. But you knew that already. ChangeThis is supported by the love and tender care of 800-CEO-READ. Visit us at 800-CEO-READ or at our daily blog.

Related Posts; Is your customer willing to pay for your marketing?

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How is your book different than other business books?

There are three aspects of my work that I think make it unique in the highly competitive business book market.

First, it is a practical ‘how to’ book not just a theoretical approach. My book shows the reader how to implement the concepts that I advocate in very simple terms. It is a book at “playing field” level, not at the 50,000 foot level. From my observation, most other business improvement literature discusses the theoretical appeal of taking a particular course of action but doesn’t really give the reader a specific roadmap to follow to successfully implement them in their organization.

Second, the ideas I present to the reader have been ‘road tested’ in the real world. I have successfully implemented them in businesses varying in size and complexity. As experience shows there is a big different between an idea that conceptually should work in an organization and an approach that actually does work in the human dynamics that pervade every human enterprise. My readers can be confident that if they choose to go down the BE DiFFERENT path success awaits!

Third, my book is different from others in that the BE DiFFERENT ideas I advocate include all of the critical functions of an organization. I offer ideas to thrive and survive in the areas of business strategy development, marketing, sales and customer service. Most books that I have seen focus on a specific area of expertise, like marketing for example, and give the reader a vertical slice of high level guidance. My book, on the other hand, provides in handbook fashion detailed guidance in each of the critical functions of an organization; possible only because of my broad background as a successful business executive.

I hope you enjoy the Business901 podcast.

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Website: Be Different or be dead

The Book: Be Different or Be Dead, Your Business Survival Guide

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Why Aren’t You Earning More? – Article by C.J. Hayden: In a national survey of independent professionals, almost 50% of the consultants, coaches, and other professionals declared that they were currently not earning enough to meet their expenses. This result shouldn’t be surprising, since according to the U.S. Small Business Administration, more than half of all small businesses fail in the first year and 95% fail within the first five years

How to Get Beyond Networking Small Talk – Article by Frank Traditi: You’ve decided to take the plunge and make networking a regular practice. You’ve picked the organizations or events where you want to go, and you start to meet people. You’re doing a good job of breaking the ice with a creative opening line or two, but then what happens?

Seven Ways to Build Marketing Relationships – Article by C.J. Hayden: “Relationship marketing.” “Word-of-mouth advertising.” “The future of marketing is one-to-one.” “People like to do business with people they know, like, and trust.” You’ve heard these adages many times before. But what does it really mean to build relationships with people in order to sell something?

Get Clients Now! Action Worksheet in Word – Tool by C.J. Hayden: If you’d like to fill out your Get Clients Now! Action Worksheet on your computer instead of on paper, you’ll find this Word version of the worksheet handy. You can download the file, fill in your action plan, and update as often as you’d like.

Great article resource, Get Clients Now Answer Center

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By Palo Alto Software, Inc.

Often you may hear about what a business plan consists of. While including the necessary items is very important, you also want to make sure you don’t commit any of the following common business plan mistakes:

1. Putting it off: Don’t wait to write a plan until you absolutely have to. Too many businesses make business plans only when they have no choice in the matter. Unless the bank or the investors want a plan, there is no plan.

Don’t wait to write your plan until you think you’ll have enough time. “There’s not enough time for a plan,” business people say. “I can’t plan. I’m too busy getting things done.” The busier you are, the more you need to plan. If you are always putting out fires, you should build firebreaks or a sprinkler system. You can lose the whole forest for paying too much attention to the individual burning trees.

2. Cash flow casualness: Cash flow is more important than sales, profits, or anything else in the business plan, but most people think in terms of profits instead of cash. When you and your friends imagine a new business, you think of what it would cost to make the product, what you could sell it for, and what the profits per unit might be. We are trained to think of business as sales minus costs and expenses, which equal profits. Unfortunately, we don’t spend the profits in a business. We spend cash. So understanding cash flow is critical. If you have only one table in your business plan, make it the cash flow table.

3. Idea inflation: Plans don’t sell new business ideas to investors. People do. The plan, though necessary, is only a way to present information. Investors invest in people, not ideas.

Don’t overestimate the importance of the idea, particularly the importance of the uniqueness of the idea. You don’t need a great idea to start a business; you need time, money, perseverance, common sense, and so forth. Very few successful businesses are based entirely on new ideas. A new idea is much harder to sell than an existing one, because people don’t understand a new idea and they are often unsure if it will work.

4. Fear and dread.

Doing a business plan isn’t as hard as you think. You don’t have to write a doctoral thesis or a novel. There are good books to help, many advisors among the Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs), business schools, and there is software available to help you (such as Business Plan Pro, and others).

5. Spongy, vague goals: Leave out the vague and the meaningless babble of business phrases (such as “being the best”) because they are simply hype. Remember that the objective of a plan is its results, and for results, you need tracking and follow up. You need specific dates, management responsibilities, budgets, and milestones. Then you can follow up. No matter how well thought out or brilliantly presented, it means nothing unless it produces results.

6. One size fits all: Tailor your business plan to its real business purpose. Business plans can be different things: they are often just sales documents to sell an idea for a new business. They can be detailed action plans, financial plans, marketing plans, and even personnel plans. They can be used to start a business, or just run a business better.

7. Diluted priorities: Remember, strategy is focus. A priority list with 3-4 items is focus. A priority list with 20 items is something else, certainly not strategic, and rarely if ever effective. The more items on the list, the less the importance of each.

8. Hockey-stick shaped growth projections: Have projections that are conservative so you can defend them. When in doubt, be less optimistic.

Source: bplans.com

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Over 45 essential business tools and services.

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New software by the makers of Marketing Plan Pro is available here. It runs on the Adobe Air platform meaning that it’s PC and Mac compatible. It will also be updated as more tools are added.

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