Everyperson's strategy

 There’s a popular phrase, “presentation is everything”. If something is presented in the wrong way, it has a good chance of losing a good deal of appreciation. While most people understand this from a physical perspective - great food that is just piled on your plate is less appreciated than decent food that is carefully presented - this is also true when presenting something written or oral.   When somebody starts off talking by saying, “this probably isn’t going to work, but...” or, “I’m sure there are better ways of doing this…”, expectations drop. Why should they waste their valuable time on something that even the person presenting it doesn’t think is any good. So why do people do this? Nobody likes being wrong. There is a lot of posturing and expressions whose sole purpose is to allow people to save face.  People feel uncomfortable making a statement that they don’t feel confident that they can back up. It is easier to hide behind an excuse than to be proven w...

 In the hi-tech industry, people tend to switch jobs very often. They find a position with slightly better pay or more interesting work and quickly jump from opportunity to opportunity. This isn’t always in the best interest of the employee or the company they are working for. Oftentimes, a conversation with your manager about what you are looking for is enough to get you what you want. A junior engineer came to talk to me about changing career direction and asked me to keep the meeting discreet. He was interested in a different type of position and asked me if I knew of any openings. I asked him if he spoke to his manager about this and he answered that he doesn’t want his manager to know until he finds something. He was afraid that if his manager knew that he was looking for something new it would affect the types of projects he got and possibly his bonus. He didn’t know if he would find something so he wanted to keep all his options open and not burn any bridges. A lot of people...

Have you ever been invited to a meeting in which you do not have any input into the agenda? Or where one side of the meeting tries to lord over the side? Telling them what to do and trying to determine the entire narrative? In battle terminology that is called taking the high ground, which is supposed to give you a distinct advantage. In this article, we will discuss how to level the playing field and why grabbing the high ground is not advantageous for you. Relationships should always be bidirectional,  with each side giving what is expected of them and taking what the other side has to offer. When done properly, the relationship should provide a win-win, where each side benefits. This is true in all cases even when there is an obvious hierarchical difference - whether it is personal, vendor/customer, employer/employee, partners and even competitors or any other form of collaboration. If there is no way to come up with a win-win, the relationship should be terminated. As examples:...

 Lately, I’ve had the pleasure of taking part in an hiring process for a position that my team had open. I reviewed a number of CVs/resumes and interviewed a number of people. I thought that I would share that experience with you and give you some advice about the CV and interviewing process. I wrote about the CV in my last article, “Looking for a Job”, what should go into a CV and how to frame it so that it fits what the employer is looking for. However, putting a bunch of keywords on your CV that you have barely touched will probably backfire on you. For an entry-level job, hiring companies generally understand that most the skills listed are educational and not necessarily practical. However, for anything after the first job, you will be expected to back up any skills that you put on your CV. In order to best prepare for an interview, it is worthwhile to understand the interview from the employer’s perspective. There is a popular term in the investing world, “Past performance do...

  Looking for a new position can be a very frustrating process. You have the right education and experience for the position you are interested in. You go to a job board or two and send in your resume to a number of positions that you feel qualified for and - nothing. Sometimes you get a rejection notice, sometimes they tell you that if you’re a match they will be in touch, and sometimes you don’t hear anything. How can you use strategy to better your odds? The first thing to understand is that job boards are often filled with posts by placement agencies. Placement agencies often enter fake jobs in order to get your resume into their files. So not every job that you see listed is an actual current opportunity. Placement agencies also are generally unfamiliar with the specific technologies that the hiring company is looking for. Because of this, they are looking for very specific key words and if there isn’t a direct match, they won’t forward it on even if you have experience with t...

 There is a common phrase, “the early bird catches the worm”. In business, the worm relates to market share. In this article, we will discuss three categories of market entry: first to market, latecomers and commodity (generic). There is almost a complete inverse relationship in all aspects of costs vs benefits between being the first to bring something to the market and a commodity offering. What are the advantages/disadvantages of each of these entry points? After learning about each category you will be in a position to determine which strategy to take. Keep in mind, that while this article specifically relates to market entry, it is true about any other aspect of life where there are different entry points. Development First to market - The first group to the market needs to be the most creative. They have to have a very deep understanding of the market that they are going into. They often have to do market research, invent new processes and experiment on pricing and support m...

 Gestalt - the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts. There are numerous methods and actions that can be used to tackle problems and accomplish objectives. Look at all your available resources and determine the proper combination of those to create an unstoppable force. Every job defines a basic list of requirements that a candidate needs experience or knowledge in to be considered qualified. However, that list is merely the tip of the iceberg in defining someone’s total qualifications. Every person is multifaceted, with various strengths, that come together to provide something unique. When you have a team of people the combinations of all the personalities and abilities are endless. This is similar to how there are only three primary colors, but when combined in different measurements, they can blend together to an infinite rainbow of colors.  The first thing we can look at is personality. Is there someone on the team who is more of an extrovert, likes attention and is...

 Have you ever thought about your relationship with your manager? This relationship is often the catalyst that defines your work experience and job satisfaction. Are you micro-managed or does your manager fire-and-forget? Or somewhere in between? This is a relationship that you want to take by the reins and lead, instead of letting it sitting back and allowing it to fester. The ultimate employee/manager relationship that you should strive for is more of a partnership where you and your manager work together to accomplish your mutual goals. In this article, we will discuss strategies you can use to do this. We’ve all heard of micro-management, a relationship in which a manager tells a worker exactly what is expected and verifies that the result meets the requirement. People in this situation often feel like minions or peons who really have no control over their environment and are not fully trusted to do their jobs properly. In certain circumstances and with certain people, this is ...

 When developing a strategy, there are 2 opposing concepts that must be balanced - Risk and Reward. There are two known philosophies to take into account when determining the methodologies: “The best offense is a good defense”.  “The best defense is a good offense” Understanding these 2 philosophies and when each is appropriate, is a key factor in determining a plan of action. Generally speaking, risk and reward are proportionate - the greater risk a person is willing to take (potential loss), the higher the potential for reward. For example, there are different bets you can make at a roulette wheel. If you have $1000 to gamble and pick a specific number to bet it on, you have the opportunity to win $35,000, whereas if you pick red/black you only have the opportunity of winning $1,000. In both cases, the odds are that you are going to lose, but the risk is much greater when choosing a specific number. When choosing an objective, you have to understand what you want to accompli...

 Aspiring managers often go to business school to learn valuable leadership methodologies. They then go into industry to apply those methods with varying levels of success. The theories that are learned in school generally have to be adapted to specific situations, and shouldn’t be assumed to be a “one size fits all”. Methods that worked wonderfully in one situation may completely fail in another. Before asking a new team to do something, a leader must learn the landscape. They should generally focus on evolution as opposed to revolution. A small change can often make a huge difference, whereas a huge change can throw the entire group into chaos. As a software engineer, I often reviewed code and could not understand why something was coded in a specific manner, that looked like a foolish way to do it. It was only after changing it to what looked normal, did I find out that the standard method didn’t work for whatever reason, and in order to implement the feature, a weird workaround...

In our last article, we discussed using other people’s resources to overcome the bottleneck that budgets and resources present.  Today we’re going to talk about partnering with the enemy. Enemy is a strong word for a team that you find yourself at odds with, though it may often feel that you are at war with them. There is an obvious conflict with competitors, as you fight for every customer. This type of conflict is excellent for the market; it should help create a competitive environment driving innovation and cheaper prices. You have to be very careful when approaching an external competitor with a proposal to work together in certain areas because there are numerous laws protecting consumers for collusion and price fixing. That doesn’t mean that competitors can’t partner together for specific initiatives. The term for merging competition with collaboration is coopetition. Instead of going head to head with competitors on everything, often it’s worthwhile for both sides to define...

Resources are often seen to be one of the largest bottlenecks in getting things done. Whether it be budget constraints, infrastructure, number of people on your team or not enough time during the day. Have you ever thought of what you could accomplish if you had unlimited resources? In his book, “The 4 Hour Workweek”, Timothy Ferriss describes methods of streamlining your work and using virtual assistants to handle the daily grind. That method may work great for specific kinds of work, but for most of us it is not very practical. However, there is a lot we can learn from the concepts he wrote about. The resource limitations mentioned above can be mitigated by using other people’s resources. We’re not talking about tapping into their water or electricity and stealing, but rather making strategic agreements that will bring about a win/win for both sides. The first thing you want to look for is areas of either duplication or parallelism in other groups. Are they doing something similar to...

In our last article, one of the challenging co-workers we mentioned is the one who takes credit for your work. This is an incredibly frustrating situation that is so difficult to deal with without looking petty. It is often cited by women, minorities and junior associates as something they deal with regularly, but it can happen to anyone. Situation 1: You’re participating in a meeting, brainstorming about how to overcome a challenge the department is facing and you make a suggestion. The suggestion is quickly dismissed. Ten minutes later, someone else makes the same suggestion and suddenly everyone thinks it's the best idea since sliced bread. Situation 2: You’re working with a group of people on an important task. You stayed up all night finishing it and after the team reviews it and gives the OK, someone sends it to the boss. In the upcoming company meeting, the boss gives a glowing commendation of the task and singles out one of the team members, thanking them for a great job an...

Strategy is a methodology used to achieve a goal in the face of obstacles. A lot of obstacles are internal or self-contained - what do I need to do to put myself in a position to make my goal achievable. This is similar to what our previous articles have been discussing, and it's easy to miss the fact that you are overcoming a challenge. These obstacles require discipline, but are relatively easy to plan and understand whether you are capable of overcoming them or not. The other kind of obstacle is external, where there are forces working to prevent you from accomplishing your goals.  There are times where direct confrontation is the best move, but in an office situation that should be the exception and not the rule. In martial arts, there is a common saying “use your opponent's strength against him.” This is also true when using strategy to overcome opposition. You’re never going to be able to bring all people onto your side, but you can learn how to use a good strategy to neu...

In our last article, we reviewed how to strategically use an inclusive process to make group decisions. This both empowers and grants ownership of the decision to the entire group. In this article, we will discuss one of the major aspects of the open decision making process: enabling dissent. This article is a compilation of ideas from a number of my colleagues at Red Hat, in an open forum discussion we had on the subject. Dissent is super important in open decision making. You don’t want to be surrounded by “yes-men”, people who always agree with everything you say. You already know everything that you’re saying and what you believe to be the best path forward. However, you also know, or should know, that your knowledge, experience and visibility of the entire picture is limited. What you really need are perspectives from people with knowledge, experience and visibility that is complementary to yours to help round out your view of the complete picture. People who will bring up som...