Ten Ways To Make Leading Project Teams Less Unbearable

Thanks to John Foster!
I met this guy once who'd just been made team leader. He was a veteran of all kinds of projects. He'd been on dog projects and sucker projects, but he'd also been a star a couple times. All this made him determined to run this project right. He opened our first meeting by saying he hated long meetings. He smiled and said, "we've got a lot of work to do here, but we'll all be out of here in 45 minutes, and we're not going to miss anything." Everyone laughed sympathetically. The meeting went 2 hours. His next one did, too. Later they got a little shorter, but I'm not sure he noticed. He was too busy trying to run an adequate meeting to worry any more about running a perfect meeting. You can’t create a perfect meeting by decree.

Here are 10 tips for running better project teams.

1. Forget about running a meeting as though you rule it. Generally, the people on your team are at the same level as you. Nobody likes being lectured to about obvious things, furthermore lecturing that way reveals you as stupid. If something is obvious to you, it is obvious to other people, meaning simple solutions were tried a long time ago, and have failed.

continue reading Ten Ways To Make Leading Project Teams Less Unbearable

Colgate buys Tom's of Maine - will it work out?

Colgate is buying Tom's of Maine. No surprise a giant company wants Tom's. Little Tom's of Maine has been beating all the big boys in the rapidly growing "natural" category of personal care products, despite many companies spending more on advertising and marketing in this space than Tom's ENTIRE revenue.

Will this succeed? Will Colgate actual get what they want?

Tom's image and brand need to stay distinct --– or sales, and value to Colgate, will plummet. Easier said than done.

Tom's of Maine has a great brand/image -- but can they keep their phenomenally successful image as "The Hippie Tooth Paste Company," as some have called them?

Yes, Tom Chappell will stay on with the company and his family will retain part ownership. Colgate claims they'll be independent. Big companies always say that but it doesn't always play out that way in the medium or long term.

Here's what they need to succeed:

• Tom's needs to really stay as independent as claimed - perception as much as reality
• Keeping "Tom" involved, even as a figure head, is critical.
• Keeping the company in Maine. This includes manufacturing, sales, and marketing!

I've used Tom's products for probably 20 years, I live near the company, and have met Tom. I wish Tom and all well, but it will be hard! Then again, Ben and Jerry's has kept their "cool" and hippie image successfully --– anyone even remember that they've been bought out??

Hmmmm: Tom could help enormously by communicating directly to his customers (I should say fans) through a blog.

Airlines lose baggage - often

Last year 30 million checked bags were lost by the airlines - 200,000 permanently, says a report by SITA Inc., which provides technology solutions to the air transport industry.

No wonder people hate to check bags and often attempt and succeed in bringing an absurd amount of stuff on board. I try to never check anything, except on longer trips where I may have a lot of luggage. I accidentally had my laptop checked in an internal Russia flight last month and almost freaked out. Fortunately Russian airlines seem pretty decent, modulo safety issues (food's better too!)

SITA says it's getting worse, like airplane food. Delta even tried to feed me imitation velveeta, which itself is "imitation cheese food" or similar. It was disgusting!

Full article here. SITA does have a solution they are trying to sell.

3rd Annual Nigerian Email Conference

Nigeria is infamous for its email scams. The 3rd Annual Nigerian Email Conference makes light of that.

Or perhaps if I had attended, and learned that ALL UPPERCASE IS MORE EFFECTIVE, I WOULD HAVE SAID THE 3RD ANNUAL NIGERIAN EMAIL CONFERENNCE MAKES LIGHT OF THAT.

It begins:

"Write better emails. Make more moneys."

I am Mr. Laurent Mpeti Kabila, a senior assistant leader of the Revolutionary United Front of Sierra Leone.

I present to you an urgent and confidential request: I request your attendance at The 3rd Annual Nigerian EMail Conference. This is an excellent opportunity to meet your distinguished colleagues, learn new marketing techniques, and spend your hard-earned money. Attending this conference demands the highest trust, security and confidentiality between us.
Click here for more
(thanks to Bruce Schneier)

Tom Peters - 111 Ridiculously Obvious Thoughts

Tom Peters has a thought provoking and amusing 111 Ridiculously Obvious Thoughts on Selling (PDF format). Applicability is far beyond selling too!

My favorites include:

• "Strategy" overrated, simply "doin' stuff" underrated.
• Successful people are the ones who are good at Plan B.
• Lunch with at least one wierdo a month (I'm available -Ted)
• Don't waste your time on jerks.
• Little stuff is and always has been everything!!!!!!!!!!!
• Phones beat email.
• Shit happens. That's what they pay for for.
• Luck matters. So: Good luck!

8ooceoread guest blogging today

I'm guest blogging at 8ooceoread today, the folks who share my passion for business books, and an excellent place to read reviews and buy books.

The topic? Not surprisingly Blogging for Business - as part of my book promotion.

I'm having fun. First post (ooops, second post - I needed more coffee maybe?) starts:

"Driving to work naked and starting a Biz Blog with zero planning . . ."

$39 experiment - free stuff please

Imagine taking a roll of stamps. $39. 100 stamps.

Sending 100 letters to companies asking for freebies.

That's what Tom Locke did. And he wrote it all up here.
Tom, very amusing, very creative -- get a hobby dude :)

My favorite letter is to Hormel below. Did they send him anything - see his website for details.

Dear Sir or Madam:
I love your products. Well, I'm actually not too crazy about Spam. The meat is a little too... can-shaped... for my taste. It's a little creepy. Anyway. I am writing to you because I am a chili connoisseur, and I love your chili. Please send me all of the free chili samples you can, without getting yourself into trouble for giving away too much free chili to a guy like me. Thank you well in advance,
Tom Locke, chili enthusiast

The Virtual Handshake - FREE!

For a limited time, you can download The Virtual Handshake free!

If you like it, it's worth buying and probably even cheaper than printing it out. Printed books are much more covenient for reading on planes, in the bathroom, and while lying down on the couch.

It's also worth checking out The Virtual Handshake Blog

(I know someone will ask, so: there are no plans to offer Blogging For Business for free. It would be an interesting experiment however, and I'm open to exploring it in the future).

Book Review: The Virtual Handshake

The world is changing and so is business. The Internet, and various "Web 2.0" technologies, for lack of a better (or even good) name, are rapidly becoming an integral part of business and life.

The Virtual Handshake doesn't attempt to get you entirely up to date -- that's impossible, but up to speed -- that's far more valuable.

If you don't have any trusted colleagues you've never met in person or maybe not even talked to over the phone, you need this book. Even if you've spent a quarter of a century online like I have, you need this book. I learned a lot, and still refer to this book often. (If your secretary reads your email to you and you dictate answers, I suggest you either retire or call me at 603-231-8782 ASAP.– You need help catching up). Basically, you'll benefit from this book.

After reading The Virtual Handshake, and I strongly suggest you do, you'll understand the basics, importance, and success guidelines of social software. You'll be up to speed in perhaps the most critical area of business change in our lifetime. The CURRENT wave of the Internet, and probably more important than the original commercialization and popularization of the Internet.

Hey, what's more interesting, the Big Bang Theory or How Life Came About?? This is the "How Life Came About" part and you'll learn about things like virtual communities and social networking, but far more importantly,– you'll know what to do. Actual steps you should take --– and plenty of case studies to help you understand their importance. Guidelines to harness the power of these new whateveryoucallthem.

Hint: be yourself, act responsibly, and remember you are the same person both online and offline and don't forget it!

There is a lot of valuable information in this book. Plan to read it, enjoy it, and then study it. And plan on concrete benefits.

Postscript:
For a limited time, you can download The Virtual Handshake free!
It's also worth checking out The Virtual Handshake Blog.

Backronyms, like Podcast & SOS

What's Podcast stand for? Personal On Demand Broadcast?

How about SOS? Save Our Ship?

NO NO NO! These are Backronyms!

Podcast is created from the words iPOD and broadCAST.
SOS was simply chosen as a distress signal as it's easily recognized in Morse Code

What's a Backronym? From Wikipedia:

A backronym or bacronym is a type of acronym that is constructed to match the letters of an actual word appropriate in some fashion to the topic at hand. The word "backronym" is a blend of back and acronym and was coined in 1983.An acronym is a word created from the initial letters of a phrase: Random Access Memory becomes R.A.M.. Some authorities distinguish between acronyms and initialisms, using the term acronym only when the use of initials has been assimilated and the initials are pronounced as if they were letters of an actual word, for example RAM.

See the full Wikipedia definition.

This one definitely made me laugh out loud!

Stories, Business and Careers

Just ran across this great article, A one-minute story may be key to a storied career, by Penelope Trunk.

Definitely reinforces my experiences. Just don't make the stories too weird :) True, believable, and not too bizarre work well.

Here's an excerpt:

When someone asks "What do you do?" a one-word answer will put your career on ice. You need to have a story. When you want to establish a connection with someone, a story provides social glue.

When you want to impress someone, a story is more memorable than a list of achievements.

Wikipedia hit one million articles!

Wikipedia has just hit one million English language articles! Impressive for a volunteer based project, especially in 5 short years.

Wikipedia, although not perfect, is my favorite online encyclopedia. I visit almost daily to look up something. Over 3.3 million articles in 125+ languages - more than impressive, nearly unbelievable!

If you've never visited check it out. I often even look up words in Wikipedia I know just to get their take on it.

Thanks to Elsua for the heads up!

Maybe I was wrong about sales?

I always thought my business weakpoint was sales.

I like marketing - done right it is pretty interesting as I wrote about here.

But sales, I hate sales, it reminds me of used car salesmen, low forms of life even compared to amoebas, lichens, and viruses. And I've always thought I was HORRIBLE at sales.

Yes, my business depends on sales. I'm essentially a one man shop, although I often hire industry experts to help me on specific projects (i.e. friends I know and trust who really know their stuff and who are pretty much self-managing).

If I don't sell, I have no income. No one sells for me. No keynotes, consulting, training or coaching sales - no income. And despite selling lots of services, I always considered it a weakpoint. Something about "closing the sale."

Maybe I've been wrong all along and I'm actually OK? This excellent Guerilla Consulting article says I'm not such a dummy after all. After all, I'm NOT selling used cars. The close of a sale for me means a beginning - the beginning of the work. Unlike the sale of a used car, the client/sucker/buyer does not drive his 1976 Purple Gremlin off into the sunset (note to international readers - the Gremlin is a legendary horrible car, and ugly too!).

Key point of the article? Don't close the sale. Let the client close it - if they don't it may not be right for them.

Postscript and afterthought: Maybe the reason I've always thought I was so horrible at sales is that I've worked with some gifted salesmen in the past?

MS Search to beat Google

Supposedly in six months Microsoft's forthcoming search engine will be "more relevant in the U.S. marketplace than Google," according to Neil Holloway, Microsoft president for Europe, Middle East and Africa reports Reuters.

The goal is to go beyond finding mere URLs to finding the actual information. Interesting.

I wish Microsoft well. A better search engine is good for all of us, but I'm not sure where Neil gets his crystal ball, and I don't imagine Google is sitting still waiting to be surpassed.

I think I'll make some of my own predictions if I may: I think I'll lose 20 lbs and get in the best shape of my life, write a sequel to Blogging for Business, star in a major motion picture, and do something to increase world peace. Oh yeah, I'd like a new car too and maybe a fan club!