Last month I did a blog post with the business topics most frequently covered here and within those topics, have now aggregated posts done around touch-screen technology (as a part of aforementioned business topic blog post) and Social Media links and commentary.
With this leaving Cloud Computing, Workplace Culture and Customer Service as other business areas of note covered here... I wanted to tackle first Workplace Culture... but, with the statement that it closely links to Customer Service.
The concept behind this coupling notion is that the helpfulness and attitude of a company's employees in many ways can be an indicator of how well those employees feel treated. Someone simply doing their job is one thing, but to do it exceptionally well often requires a combination of personal excellence (pardon the cliche) and a desire to exercise that on behalf of the company. This is going to be particularly true in a customer facing role where someone may not necessarily have to "delight the customer" in order to fulfill their job function.
So... blog posts done around workplace culture:
The most recent was last month and my post about Best Buy included pieces both about the retailer's success and it's People Management. The two things related? Probably...
In Nov 2009 I did a post titled "Employer / Employee Relationship BusinessWeek Pieces"... containing several links from the Nov 16 BW issue. These included both one about the (seemingly outstanding for both the employee and company) Microsoft health coverage and one about the pending talent exodus from companies where employees feel mistreated.
From Sept 2009, I linked to the annual BusinessWeek "Best Places to Launch a Career" and then in Jan 2009, did a post on Fortune Magazine's "100 Best Companies to Work For".
Getting outside the realm of "best places to work" lists, I did a March 2009 post around the Fast Company 2009 "50 Most Innovative Companies" List. Does a company being innovative mean that it's employees have a good work environment? Nah... definitely not, but it sure doesn't hurt as it's going to be tough for a well-intentioned and employee friendly firm to hold onto it's best employees if they're bored.
Two different blog posts about People Management at IBM... from Nov 2009 was a post about the 401K... and IBM's program offering to employees and from Mar 2009 was a post with two different pieces on IBM... one on training and one mentoring.
Finally, in October 2008 I posted a blog entry titled "Corporate Workplace Culture: the Good (Not the Bad or Ugly)." Within that was multiple links about (positive workplace example) companies like Microsoft, Netflix, REI, Costco and Google).
Lots of posts, even more links within those and I think it all comes down to a basic concept... companies that want to do well over the long run have to offer a solid product or service AND have employees that feel valued.
Short-term positive results can certainly be achieved without these employees, but sustainable excellence... not so likely.
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query workplace culture. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query workplace culture. Sort by date Show all posts
Monday, January 04, 2010
Monday, October 06, 2008
Corporate Workplace Culture: the Good (Not the Bad or Ugly)
While Corporate America often gets a bad rap (justifiably so) for the environment (not CFC-type environment, but employee mattering-type environment) it's people work in, there are some stories out there of companies that do it right...
In a September 2007 article, BusinessWeek ran "Netflix: Flex to the Max" about the efforts at Netflix to both attract and retain the best employees... through extreme "flexibility and responsibility" provided from CEO Reed Hastings on down.
Also, from September 2007, BusinessWeek published "How to Make a Microserf Smile" about the efforts at employee responsiveness done at the tech behemoth. Led by HR chief Lisa Brummel, Microsoft has fought gamely over the last few years to keep both it's star employees and overall moral up.
It's probably not necessary to point to Google as a company that treats it's employees well (given the legendary free cafeteria, child care, laundry, etc), but in it's March 2008 "50 Most Innovative Companies" issue, Fast Company has a piece about the perks enjoyed at Google, including an author and Presidential Candidate speaker series (pretty good stuff).
Finally (and more recently), Fred Kiel in his October 6, 2008 BusinessWeek opinion piece, tears apart the notion that employees are motivated only by self-interest. Kiel argues that rather than this, employees greatly value a workplace culture that trusts it's people (REI as an example) and gives them opportunities to advance (i.e. Costco Wholesale).
In a September 2007 article, BusinessWeek ran "Netflix: Flex to the Max" about the efforts at Netflix to both attract and retain the best employees... through extreme "flexibility and responsibility" provided from CEO Reed Hastings on down.
Also, from September 2007, BusinessWeek published "How to Make a Microserf Smile" about the efforts at employee responsiveness done at the tech behemoth. Led by HR chief Lisa Brummel, Microsoft has fought gamely over the last few years to keep both it's star employees and overall moral up.
It's probably not necessary to point to Google as a company that treats it's employees well (given the legendary free cafeteria, child care, laundry, etc), but in it's March 2008 "50 Most Innovative Companies" issue, Fast Company has a piece about the perks enjoyed at Google, including an author and Presidential Candidate speaker series (pretty good stuff).
Finally (and more recently), Fred Kiel in his October 6, 2008 BusinessWeek opinion piece, tears apart the notion that employees are motivated only by self-interest. Kiel argues that rather than this, employees greatly value a workplace culture that trusts it's people (REI as an example) and gives them opportunities to advance (i.e. Costco Wholesale).
Friday, July 30, 2010
"Delivering Happiness" by Tony Hsieh
Recently finished reading "Delivering Happiness" from Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh.
Good book... I wouldn't call it great, but definitely good and features insight into Zappos and the building of a company.
I first heard about the book from this extremely interesting Inc. Magazine piece from Hsieh titled "Why I Sold Zappos" (which I wrote about here). Regardless of whether or not someone reads the book, I recommend the Inc. story. Just an excellent tale of running a company in a desired way... and having to reconcile that with the interests of outside investors (which in this case were Venture Capital, but could also be shareholders of a public corporation).
From both the Inc. story and book, I've got quite a bit of respect for Hsieh and his approach... with additional credit going to the rest of the leadership at Zappos.
The book and what it covers
Hsieh was an extremely smart kid, and also one who had an interest at a young age in running businesses. His intelligence helped him get into Harvard and from there land a programming job at Oracle. After quickly becoming bored with corporate life, Hsieh quit to embark on running his own show.
What started out as a web design business turned into the banner ad company LinkExchange. Several months into the venture, Hsieh turned down half a million dollars for the company and then a few years later sold to Microsoft for $32M. Rather than remaining at Microsoft for a year to collect an $8M retention bonus, Hsieh realized he wasn't doing what he wanted and left the company.
He started an investment fund and early on put money into an online shoe website. Before long, the fledgling company reached a point of either failing or needing more investment. Hsieh then put in personal money and got actively involved in helping run things. It was certainly a struggle at times, but the company carried through.
If the first part of the book is the background of the author and what led to Zappos reaching it's current point, the second part is about many of the core beliefs that Hsieh and the other managements have made a part of Zappos. The evangelizing of Zappos was a bit much for my taste, but I can't take great exception with it... Hsieh believes in what he created at Zappos and wanted to write about that in this book.
Most interesting stuff for me
The decision was made to have Zappos be about the best customer service... as well as best workplace culture. I've written about these dual topics before and they're definitely easier said well than done well, but Hsieh seems to have genuinely built a company that tries hard to nail both goals.
This has been done through things such as a learning library of books that employees could borrow and more importantly, a general transparency within the company culture. Biggest manifestation of this openness is The Culture Book which is an actual unedited hardcover book with employees saying what the culture means to them.
I love this idea of an actual book with unedited content and this idea of transparency makes me think beyond just companies and to how the same openness can lead to effective writing (as I made note of in this review of "The Tender Bar" by J.R. Moehringer).
Back to Zappos... from reading the book (and particularly the Inc. Magazine piece), I think they probably made the best move possible with the Amazon deal, but suspect they would have preferred to continue on their own... which couldn't be done with Venture Capital investment looking to cash out and move on (an idea I wrote about in the same blog post in which I linked to the Inc. piece).
All in all, a good book about a guy that's built a solid company in what appears to be the best way he possibly could.
Good book... I wouldn't call it great, but definitely good and features insight into Zappos and the building of a company.
I first heard about the book from this extremely interesting Inc. Magazine piece from Hsieh titled "Why I Sold Zappos" (which I wrote about here). Regardless of whether or not someone reads the book, I recommend the Inc. story. Just an excellent tale of running a company in a desired way... and having to reconcile that with the interests of outside investors (which in this case were Venture Capital, but could also be shareholders of a public corporation).
From both the Inc. story and book, I've got quite a bit of respect for Hsieh and his approach... with additional credit going to the rest of the leadership at Zappos.
The book and what it covers
Hsieh was an extremely smart kid, and also one who had an interest at a young age in running businesses. His intelligence helped him get into Harvard and from there land a programming job at Oracle. After quickly becoming bored with corporate life, Hsieh quit to embark on running his own show.
What started out as a web design business turned into the banner ad company LinkExchange. Several months into the venture, Hsieh turned down half a million dollars for the company and then a few years later sold to Microsoft for $32M. Rather than remaining at Microsoft for a year to collect an $8M retention bonus, Hsieh realized he wasn't doing what he wanted and left the company.
He started an investment fund and early on put money into an online shoe website. Before long, the fledgling company reached a point of either failing or needing more investment. Hsieh then put in personal money and got actively involved in helping run things. It was certainly a struggle at times, but the company carried through.
If the first part of the book is the background of the author and what led to Zappos reaching it's current point, the second part is about many of the core beliefs that Hsieh and the other managements have made a part of Zappos. The evangelizing of Zappos was a bit much for my taste, but I can't take great exception with it... Hsieh believes in what he created at Zappos and wanted to write about that in this book.
Most interesting stuff for me
The decision was made to have Zappos be about the best customer service... as well as best workplace culture. I've written about these dual topics before and they're definitely easier said well than done well, but Hsieh seems to have genuinely built a company that tries hard to nail both goals.
This has been done through things such as a learning library of books that employees could borrow and more importantly, a general transparency within the company culture. Biggest manifestation of this openness is The Culture Book which is an actual unedited hardcover book with employees saying what the culture means to them.
I love this idea of an actual book with unedited content and this idea of transparency makes me think beyond just companies and to how the same openness can lead to effective writing (as I made note of in this review of "The Tender Bar" by J.R. Moehringer).
Back to Zappos... from reading the book (and particularly the Inc. Magazine piece), I think they probably made the best move possible with the Amazon deal, but suspect they would have preferred to continue on their own... which couldn't be done with Venture Capital investment looking to cash out and move on (an idea I wrote about in the same blog post in which I linked to the Inc. piece).
All in all, a good book about a guy that's built a solid company in what appears to be the best way he possibly could.
Thursday, September 08, 2011
Inc. Magazine Speaker Event
Recently attended a speaker panel put on by Inc. Magazine here in San Jose and found it to be pretty thought provoking. The event was titled "Helping Businesses Grow Healthy" and put on by Inc. in conjunction with United Healthcare.
Information on the event from the Inc. website:
"Building a healthy workplace is a tough job. Leaders that promote and support wellness in the work environment reap the benefits of loyal employees and gain a competitive advantage. Hear from a panel of entrepreneurs that are implementing new workplace initiatives and have been recognized for their winning culture. Even if you aren't in a position to execute ideas at once, you'll learn about the small steps that make a difference for your employees and for the health of your company."
Moderator Kyra Cavanaugh, President and Founder of LifeMeetsWork
Panelists:
Tania Binder, Senior VP of Global Sales of TRX
Chris Mittelstaedt, Founder and CEO of The FruitGuys
Eric Ryan, Chief Brand Architect & Co-founder of Method; Co-author of The Method Method: Seven Obsessions That Helped Our Scrappy Start-up Turn an Industry Upside Down
My thoughts on the event:
1. The invite was very much appreciated and while I don't imagine running these events is a profit center for Inc., having them is probably very much in line with the message and value-add of the magazine.
2. It of course relates to the "Healthy Workplace" theme, but there seemed to be such an emphasis by the panel speakers on employee culture. This manifested itself in things from the the hiring process (was interesting to hear of the difficulty in hiring good people) to how employees are treated. Ranging from things like encouraging healthy living to asking workers what matters to them, this concept of employee treatment was a big deal to the panelists. Pay value of that to the company would be to both keep attrition low and have employees be more productive and better ambassadors for the business if they feel treated well and buy in to the company mission.
3. I found myself wondering how much harder it must be for leadership of a public company to have this same focus on employee culture. The long term benefit of a positive work experience is of course there for both public and private companies, but a publicly traded business is more beholden to shareholders and short term results. That whole mandate for officers of a public company to increase shareholder value... it can be a nebulous charter.
4. Was very impressed by the panelists from the perspective they each had an idea that they made into something. Eric Ryan from Method probably has achieved the most success so far, but all had interesting stories to tell.
My take away from their accomplishments was whether it be for a product, a company or a person in the workforce… an offering or value add can be a powerful thing and shouldn't be discounted. If someone has said offering, the goal then should be to find a place for that thing rather than simply trying to sledgehammer a product, service or candidacy as an employee into an existing slot that may not jibe with or appreciate it fully.
True, this may or may not be what the panelists were really trying to communicate (and it's presumed wisdom that trends towards the squishy), but anyone having taken the time to attend the event should take from it what makes sense to them.
Back to the statement made at the beginning of this post... thought-provoking stuff that I'm glad Inc. put together and extended the invitation for.
Information on the event from the Inc. website:
"Building a healthy workplace is a tough job. Leaders that promote and support wellness in the work environment reap the benefits of loyal employees and gain a competitive advantage. Hear from a panel of entrepreneurs that are implementing new workplace initiatives and have been recognized for their winning culture. Even if you aren't in a position to execute ideas at once, you'll learn about the small steps that make a difference for your employees and for the health of your company."
Moderator Kyra Cavanaugh, President and Founder of LifeMeetsWork
Panelists:
Tania Binder, Senior VP of Global Sales of TRX
Chris Mittelstaedt, Founder and CEO of The FruitGuys
Eric Ryan, Chief Brand Architect & Co-founder of Method; Co-author of The Method Method: Seven Obsessions That Helped Our Scrappy Start-up Turn an Industry Upside Down
My thoughts on the event:
1. The invite was very much appreciated and while I don't imagine running these events is a profit center for Inc., having them is probably very much in line with the message and value-add of the magazine.
2. It of course relates to the "Healthy Workplace" theme, but there seemed to be such an emphasis by the panel speakers on employee culture. This manifested itself in things from the the hiring process (was interesting to hear of the difficulty in hiring good people) to how employees are treated. Ranging from things like encouraging healthy living to asking workers what matters to them, this concept of employee treatment was a big deal to the panelists. Pay value of that to the company would be to both keep attrition low and have employees be more productive and better ambassadors for the business if they feel treated well and buy in to the company mission.
3. I found myself wondering how much harder it must be for leadership of a public company to have this same focus on employee culture. The long term benefit of a positive work experience is of course there for both public and private companies, but a publicly traded business is more beholden to shareholders and short term results. That whole mandate for officers of a public company to increase shareholder value... it can be a nebulous charter.
4. Was very impressed by the panelists from the perspective they each had an idea that they made into something. Eric Ryan from Method probably has achieved the most success so far, but all had interesting stories to tell.
My take away from their accomplishments was whether it be for a product, a company or a person in the workforce… an offering or value add can be a powerful thing and shouldn't be discounted. If someone has said offering, the goal then should be to find a place for that thing rather than simply trying to sledgehammer a product, service or candidacy as an employee into an existing slot that may not jibe with or appreciate it fully.
True, this may or may not be what the panelists were really trying to communicate (and it's presumed wisdom that trends towards the squishy), but anyone having taken the time to attend the event should take from it what makes sense to them.
Back to the statement made at the beginning of this post... thought-provoking stuff that I'm glad Inc. put together and extended the invitation for.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Employer / Employee Relationship BusinessWeek Pieces
Two brief interesting pieces around employees and the companies they work for from the November 16 issue of BusinessWeek.
The longer of the two is titled "The Return of the House Call" and details the Microsoft program that let's employees request an in-home doctor visit. From a financial perspective, it can actually reduce Microsoft expense in helping to bring down company costs for any unneeded emergency room visits by covered employees (should probably be noted that the Microsoft health care plan is apparently noted for being low-cost to it's employees).
The secondary, but still important impact of the program is in showing employees how valued they are by the company.
Very much tied to this latter concept, I thought the point raised in the extremely short "Are Your Employees Just Biding Their Time?" was a solid one. The concept is that there's a number of companies out there taking the current recession as an opportunity to squeeze employees and that could turn out to be counterproductive when the economy turns around. If an employee doesn't feel valued or treated fairly, it could well be a mass exodus of talent once other opportunities present themselves.
I find this whole idea of the employee / employer relationship to be a fascinating one and (keeping in mind things are always as they appear) it's interesting to read about and reflect upon the approaches taken by some large corporations.
I did a blog post in Oct 2008 titled Corporate Workplace Culture: the Good (Not the Bad or Ugly) which featured some positive employee treatment stories from companies such as Costco, Netflix, Google and yep... Microsoft and then another post in March of this year on People Management at IBM.
Just interesting... I think the point is that companies can squeeze employees under certain conditions, but I really question how sustainable the practice is over the long haul.
Just interesting... I think the point is that companies can squeeze employees under certain conditions, but I really question how sustainable the practice is over the long haul.
Sunday, January 02, 2011
2010 Blog Posts - In Review
It's now the New Year... time for new beginnings, new growth, new hair (probably not) and bunches of other things new. That said, one of the most popular things to do when considering The New, is to also look at The Old.
In terms of this blog looking backwards, the closest thing to the topic a year ago was one on the reason for the blog (among other things, to write about and link to great magazine writing) and a couple of different posts looking back on posts of said great writing.
Published here on back to back days in Jan 2010 were Workplace Culture Blog Posts and then Best Time Magazine Writing: Politics & The Economy. Following up a month later, Best Time Magazine Writing: Parenting & Family was posted... with bunches of interesting things linked to from each of these.
Looking at what's been written here since these posts (well, for simplicities sake since Jan 1, 2010), here's the content at a high level...
- 148 posts... with a minimum of 11 a month
- 30 posts with Time articles linked to and written about
- 28 posts with Sports Illustrated articles linked to and written about
- 14 posts with Businessweek articles linked to and written about
- 12 posts with Esquire (or Esquire blog) articles linked to and written about
- 11 posts with Fast Company articles linked to and written about
- 24 book review posts
As math would tell us, there were certainly posts done on things other than book reviews or pieces from these sources, but in terms of actual publications, the five noted above had quite a few stories of interest from the past year.
Whist I typically hate to forecast a post on the chance it doesn't get written, likely content for at least one future post this month will be some of the best (yep, highly subjective, but that's what the Internet in many ways is about) posts and linked to pieces over the past 12 months. So, you know... there's That to look forward to.
In terms of this blog looking backwards, the closest thing to the topic a year ago was one on the reason for the blog (among other things, to write about and link to great magazine writing) and a couple of different posts looking back on posts of said great writing.
Published here on back to back days in Jan 2010 were Workplace Culture Blog Posts and then Best Time Magazine Writing: Politics & The Economy. Following up a month later, Best Time Magazine Writing: Parenting & Family was posted... with bunches of interesting things linked to from each of these.
Looking at what's been written here since these posts (well, for simplicities sake since Jan 1, 2010), here's the content at a high level...
- 148 posts... with a minimum of 11 a month
- 30 posts with Time articles linked to and written about
- 28 posts with Sports Illustrated articles linked to and written about
- 14 posts with Businessweek articles linked to and written about
- 12 posts with Esquire (or Esquire blog) articles linked to and written about
- 11 posts with Fast Company articles linked to and written about
- 24 book review posts
As math would tell us, there were certainly posts done on things other than book reviews or pieces from these sources, but in terms of actual publications, the five noted above had quite a few stories of interest from the past year.
Whist I typically hate to forecast a post on the chance it doesn't get written, likely content for at least one future post this month will be some of the best (yep, highly subjective, but that's what the Internet in many ways is about) posts and linked to pieces over the past 12 months. So, you know... there's That to look forward to.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Magazine reading notes 8: 2007 Jul-Dec
BusinessWeek – August 13
Mention of http://www.payscale.com/ where you can compare your salary with those in similar professions
Esquire – September
Profile of Sean Penn by writer Scott Raab… following the release of Penn’s move “Into the Wild”: http://www.esquire.com/features/seanpenn0907?click=main_sr
Mention of Conn Iggulden’s book “The Dangerous Book for Boys”
Time – August 20
Excerpt from “The Preacher & the Presidents” about Pastor Billy Graham and his interactions with various US Presidents… by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1651625,00.html
BusinessWeek – August 20
Short piece on the vulnerability of the levee systems around the Sacrameno-San Joaquin Delta area: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_34/b4047047.htm?chan=search
Personal branding piece about how to define yourself so it’s done for you by others: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_34/b4047419.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – July 23
Piece on widgets being used in social networking sites… most well known are those in the fairly recently opened to 3rd party applications http://www.facebook.com/: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_30/b4043071.htm?chan=search
Mention of http://www.etsy.com/... An online marketplace for handmade goods
BusinessWeek – August 6
Ranking of best global brands with sub-feature on HP and the “Computer is personal again” campaign
Time – August 6
Cover story about how boys in today’s society are both fine (as opposed to the fatalistic view held by many) and are doing many outdoorsy, boy type things from yesterday: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1647452,00.html
BusinessWeek – July 30
Short story on new “person-looking” search engines http://www.spock.com/, http://www.wink.com/ & http://www.zoominfo.com/
Website special report on switching careers
Addison Avenue Magazine – Summer
Article on raising money-smart kids. Includes: open a savings acct and then manage the use of that
Profile piece on Erin Gruwell the teacher behind “The Freedom Writers Diary”
USAA Magazine – Summer
Mention of http://www.freecycle.com/ where people can get rid of and acquire unwanted items
Sierra Club Magazine – July/August
Profile of Michelle Kaufmann who designs the “glidehouse” prefab home: http://www.mkd-arc.com/homes/glidehouse/
The Wave Magazine – July
Mention of Sunnyvale DIY shop http://www.thesawdustshop.com/
Time – September 17
Article about the high levels of lead exposure for many young children. Can purchase lead-testing kits and have blood tests screen for exposure: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1659704,00.html
BusinessWeek – September 17
Review of many of HP’s new Blackberry-competing smartphones: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_38/b4050065.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – September 24
Book review of “The Billionaire Who Wasn’t” by Conor O’Clery about Chuck Feeney, the founder of Duty Free Shoppers: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_39/b4051084.htm?chan=search
Article about the workplace culture at Netflix: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_39/b4051059.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – September 10
Profile of Microsoft HR head and the people management (aimed at employee happiness & retention) done at the corporation: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_37/b4049065.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – September
Inside Innovation section: http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/
Time – September 10
Cover story on national service and what’s occurring across the country: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1657799,00.html
Time – October 22
Joe Klein commentary on Merle Haggard and his returning the Democratic side: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1670520,00.html
Piece on Copenhagen’s program to give father’s paid time off after the birth of a child: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1670507,00.html
Time – October 29
Piece on Time’s “America: An Illustrated History” picture book
Review of “The Four Hour Workweek” by Timothy Ferriss
Esquire – October
Profile of Benicio Del Toro by writer Chris Jones: http://www.esquire.com/features/esquire-100/benicio1007?click=main_sr
Mention of band The Weakerthans by writer Chris Jones
Time – November 5
Time’s new political website: http://www.thepage.time.com/
Piece on the resurgence of kayaking as a pastime: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1675598,00.html
BusinessWeek – October 15
Special report on solar power being provided by Silicon Valley company Ausra: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_42/b4054053.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – October 22
Profile on Michelle Hernandez… former Ivy League admissions counselor who is now a college application coach: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_43/b4055063.htm?chan=search
Piece on healthcare advocates: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_43/b4055089.htm?chan=search
Fast Company – September
Piece by Robert Scoble on http://twitter.com/ and its impact as a communication medium
Cover story on Adam Werbach, former young head of the Sierra Club… now runs an environmental consulting company with Wal-Mart as its largest client: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/118/working-with-the-enemy.html
Story on founder behind http://www.mahalo.com/, a search engine with hand-built results to various search queries
Profile of Ashley Qualls, a 17 year-old who has built a million $ business selling MySpace design templates at http://www.whateverlife.com/:
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/118/girl-power.html
Time – various issues
Political blog: http://time-blog.com/swampland
Fast Company – October
Profile of HP VP Design Sam Lucente and his impact on and role in the company: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/119/streamlining-hp.html
Time – October 15
Piece on Nike’s new Nike Plus running shoe concept which melds music and an online experience into jogging: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1668469,00.html
Article on the new definition of fatherhood with many more Dads staying home to care for the kids whilst Mom works: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1668449,00.html
BusinessWeek – November 5
Piece on Bang & Olufsen and how its designers create new products for the company w/o much focus group input: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_45/b4057057.htm?chan=search
Time – November 12
Tech buying guide items: glo pillow at www.embryo.ie/glo/index/html
Time – December 17
Profile of young evangelical pastor Rob Bell and his appeal: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1692051,00.html
Esquire – December
Book recommendations from Esquire writers: “Grey Area” by Will Self; “The Mezzanine” by Nicholson Baker; “Winter’s Tale” by Mark Helprin; “Plainsong” by Kent Haruf; “Far Afield” by S.L. Price; “The Blade Itself” by Marcus Sakey
Profile on David Vann’s attempt to sail nonstop around the world… progress updates at www.esquire.com/tincan.
BusinessWeek – December 3
Website http://www.careerplanning.about.com/
BusinessWeek – November 15
Piece on the HP Innovation Office led by Seth McKinney and the efforts around the VooDoo PC: http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/nov2007/id20071114_289027.htm
BusinessWeek – December 24
Cover story on Google and the concept of cloud computing: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_52/b4064048925836.htm
Mention of http://www.payscale.com/ where you can compare your salary with those in similar professions
Esquire – September
Profile of Sean Penn by writer Scott Raab… following the release of Penn’s move “Into the Wild”: http://www.esquire.com/features/seanpenn0907?click=main_sr
Mention of Conn Iggulden’s book “The Dangerous Book for Boys”
Time – August 20
Excerpt from “The Preacher & the Presidents” about Pastor Billy Graham and his interactions with various US Presidents… by Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1651625,00.html
BusinessWeek – August 20
Short piece on the vulnerability of the levee systems around the Sacrameno-San Joaquin Delta area: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_34/b4047047.htm?chan=search
Personal branding piece about how to define yourself so it’s done for you by others: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_34/b4047419.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – July 23
Piece on widgets being used in social networking sites… most well known are those in the fairly recently opened to 3rd party applications http://www.facebook.com/: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_30/b4043071.htm?chan=search
Mention of http://www.etsy.com/... An online marketplace for handmade goods
BusinessWeek – August 6
Ranking of best global brands with sub-feature on HP and the “Computer is personal again” campaign
Time – August 6
Cover story about how boys in today’s society are both fine (as opposed to the fatalistic view held by many) and are doing many outdoorsy, boy type things from yesterday: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1647452,00.html
BusinessWeek – July 30
Short story on new “person-looking” search engines http://www.spock.com/, http://www.wink.com/ & http://www.zoominfo.com/
Website special report on switching careers
Addison Avenue Magazine – Summer
Article on raising money-smart kids. Includes: open a savings acct and then manage the use of that
Profile piece on Erin Gruwell the teacher behind “The Freedom Writers Diary”
USAA Magazine – Summer
Mention of http://www.freecycle.com/ where people can get rid of and acquire unwanted items
Sierra Club Magazine – July/August
Profile of Michelle Kaufmann who designs the “glidehouse” prefab home: http://www.mkd-arc.com/homes/glidehouse/
The Wave Magazine – July
Mention of Sunnyvale DIY shop http://www.thesawdustshop.com/
Time – September 17
Article about the high levels of lead exposure for many young children. Can purchase lead-testing kits and have blood tests screen for exposure: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1659704,00.html
BusinessWeek – September 17
Review of many of HP’s new Blackberry-competing smartphones: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_38/b4050065.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – September 24
Book review of “The Billionaire Who Wasn’t” by Conor O’Clery about Chuck Feeney, the founder of Duty Free Shoppers: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_39/b4051084.htm?chan=search
Article about the workplace culture at Netflix: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_39/b4051059.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – September 10
Profile of Microsoft HR head and the people management (aimed at employee happiness & retention) done at the corporation: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_37/b4049065.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – September
Inside Innovation section: http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/
Time – September 10
Cover story on national service and what’s occurring across the country: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1657799,00.html
Time – October 22
Joe Klein commentary on Merle Haggard and his returning the Democratic side: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1670520,00.html
Piece on Copenhagen’s program to give father’s paid time off after the birth of a child: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1670507,00.html
Time – October 29
Piece on Time’s “America: An Illustrated History” picture book
Review of “The Four Hour Workweek” by Timothy Ferriss
Esquire – October
Profile of Benicio Del Toro by writer Chris Jones: http://www.esquire.com/features/esquire-100/benicio1007?click=main_sr
Mention of band The Weakerthans by writer Chris Jones
Time – November 5
Time’s new political website: http://www.thepage.time.com/
Piece on the resurgence of kayaking as a pastime: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1675598,00.html
BusinessWeek – October 15
Special report on solar power being provided by Silicon Valley company Ausra: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_42/b4054053.htm?chan=search
BusinessWeek – October 22
Profile on Michelle Hernandez… former Ivy League admissions counselor who is now a college application coach: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_43/b4055063.htm?chan=search
Piece on healthcare advocates: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_43/b4055089.htm?chan=search
Fast Company – September
Piece by Robert Scoble on http://twitter.com/ and its impact as a communication medium
Cover story on Adam Werbach, former young head of the Sierra Club… now runs an environmental consulting company with Wal-Mart as its largest client: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/118/working-with-the-enemy.html
Story on founder behind http://www.mahalo.com/, a search engine with hand-built results to various search queries
Profile of Ashley Qualls, a 17 year-old who has built a million $ business selling MySpace design templates at http://www.whateverlife.com/:
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/118/girl-power.html
Time – various issues
Political blog: http://time-blog.com/swampland
Fast Company – October
Profile of HP VP Design Sam Lucente and his impact on and role in the company: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/119/streamlining-hp.html
Time – October 15
Piece on Nike’s new Nike Plus running shoe concept which melds music and an online experience into jogging: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1668469,00.html
Article on the new definition of fatherhood with many more Dads staying home to care for the kids whilst Mom works: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1668449,00.html
BusinessWeek – November 5
Piece on Bang & Olufsen and how its designers create new products for the company w/o much focus group input: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_45/b4057057.htm?chan=search
Time – November 12
Tech buying guide items: glo pillow at www.embryo.ie/glo/index/html
Time – December 17
Profile of young evangelical pastor Rob Bell and his appeal: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1692051,00.html
Esquire – December
Book recommendations from Esquire writers: “Grey Area” by Will Self; “The Mezzanine” by Nicholson Baker; “Winter’s Tale” by Mark Helprin; “Plainsong” by Kent Haruf; “Far Afield” by S.L. Price; “The Blade Itself” by Marcus Sakey
Profile on David Vann’s attempt to sail nonstop around the world… progress updates at www.esquire.com/tincan.
BusinessWeek – December 3
Website http://www.careerplanning.about.com/
BusinessWeek – November 15
Piece on the HP Innovation Office led by Seth McKinney and the efforts around the VooDoo PC: http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/nov2007/id20071114_289027.htm
BusinessWeek – December 24
Cover story on Google and the concept of cloud computing: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_52/b4064048925836.htm
Monday, December 07, 2009
Business Topics of Note & Touch-screen Technology
As part of my recent trend of looking back on what I've written, I wanted to specifically look at some of the business topics and companies that I've posted on and linked to.
From a perspective of what companies I've most frequently posted on, the following are those that I've written on the most: Hewlett-Packard, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Cisco & IBM.
More to the point of this post, though, below are some (but, not all) of the business topics I've posted on:
- Touch-screen technology
- Cloud Computing
- Workplace Culture
- Customer Service
- Social Media
Touch-screen Technology
For the purpose of looking at the first topic above, I wanted to expand a bit the field of touch-screen to also encompass handheld e-readers along with the more well known smart phones and personal computers. Touch-screen is a fascinating area of business that really came to the forefront with the iPhone from Apple and has huge potential for growth and ubiquitous adoption through multiple product manifestations.
Touch-screen & Apple
In Dec 2008 I did this post that linked to pieces on one of the pioneers in the field, Jeff Han and I've done multiple posts on Apple, the iPhone and associated App Store. The first was back in Aug 2008 on my new iPhone and then in Jan 2009 I linked to an article about digital books via the iPhone and in Nov 2009 did a post on the BusinessWeek apps cover story... with the whole field brought about due to Apple and the App Store. Even though the Cupertino-based company brought touch as a technology into the popular lexicon, they're certainly not the only player in the market anymore.
eReaders & Amazon
Amazon for several years now has been the dominant player in the online book market (among others) and their more recent foray into e-readers is a fascinating play that may bring huge advances to the book and magazine industry just as the iPhone did for smart phones.
In terms of the general subject area, I did a Feb 2009 post on written content online. Writing this pieced (which linked to a Time cover story on the topic) really showed me how desperately innovation is needed around written content online... and how Amazon could move things forward as a result of their Kindle e-reader. Whether it's via the Kindle or a forthcoming competitor Plastic Logic or any new entry from Apple, the market is ripe for innovation. Following up on this idea where two e-reader content containing blog posts I did in June 2009. The first linked to a Fast Company article and second linked to pieces from both Time and BusinessWeek.
Touch-screen & HP
The last two sections written covered touch as a general technology area and the iPhone and e-readers as a product area within. However, blog posts I've written also cover the good old fashioned (well, not really old fashioned) personal computer as a product area which uses touch.
This Feb 2009 blog post references Hewlett-Packard's recent success in the PC business (and links to other HP blog posts done here). HP has done well with the TouchSmart desktop PC, but what really interests me is the prospect of touch becoming a standard component of notebook computer displays. In a way, this seems to me to be a melding together of attributes from smart phones, e-readers, netbooks and full-size desktop computers. You wouldn't see smart phones go away, but the convergence of the various technologies is an interesting prospect.
It's tough to know exactly where this technology (or any technology, I suppose) will wind up, but there's a lot of good stuff out there and some very big companies committed to innovation around touch. Will be interesting to see where it all goes...
From a perspective of what companies I've most frequently posted on, the following are those that I've written on the most: Hewlett-Packard, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Cisco & IBM.
More to the point of this post, though, below are some (but, not all) of the business topics I've posted on:
- Touch-screen technology
- Cloud Computing
- Workplace Culture
- Customer Service
- Social Media
Touch-screen Technology
For the purpose of looking at the first topic above, I wanted to expand a bit the field of touch-screen to also encompass handheld e-readers along with the more well known smart phones and personal computers. Touch-screen is a fascinating area of business that really came to the forefront with the iPhone from Apple and has huge potential for growth and ubiquitous adoption through multiple product manifestations.
Touch-screen & Apple
In Dec 2008 I did this post that linked to pieces on one of the pioneers in the field, Jeff Han and I've done multiple posts on Apple, the iPhone and associated App Store. The first was back in Aug 2008 on my new iPhone and then in Jan 2009 I linked to an article about digital books via the iPhone and in Nov 2009 did a post on the BusinessWeek apps cover story... with the whole field brought about due to Apple and the App Store. Even though the Cupertino-based company brought touch as a technology into the popular lexicon, they're certainly not the only player in the market anymore.
eReaders & Amazon
Amazon for several years now has been the dominant player in the online book market (among others) and their more recent foray into e-readers is a fascinating play that may bring huge advances to the book and magazine industry just as the iPhone did for smart phones.
In terms of the general subject area, I did a Feb 2009 post on written content online. Writing this pieced (which linked to a Time cover story on the topic) really showed me how desperately innovation is needed around written content online... and how Amazon could move things forward as a result of their Kindle e-reader. Whether it's via the Kindle or a forthcoming competitor Plastic Logic or any new entry from Apple, the market is ripe for innovation. Following up on this idea where two e-reader content containing blog posts I did in June 2009. The first linked to a Fast Company article and second linked to pieces from both Time and BusinessWeek.
Touch-screen & HP
The last two sections written covered touch as a general technology area and the iPhone and e-readers as a product area within. However, blog posts I've written also cover the good old fashioned (well, not really old fashioned) personal computer as a product area which uses touch.
This Feb 2009 blog post references Hewlett-Packard's recent success in the PC business (and links to other HP blog posts done here). HP has done well with the TouchSmart desktop PC, but what really interests me is the prospect of touch becoming a standard component of notebook computer displays. In a way, this seems to me to be a melding together of attributes from smart phones, e-readers, netbooks and full-size desktop computers. You wouldn't see smart phones go away, but the convergence of the various technologies is an interesting prospect.
It's tough to know exactly where this technology (or any technology, I suppose) will wind up, but there's a lot of good stuff out there and some very big companies committed to innovation around touch. Will be interesting to see where it all goes...
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Wherefore the Blog... Again
Much of this post is a repackaging if not regurgitation of prior posts done, but for those of us not as smart as this guy (who I just read a section about in the book "SuperFreakonomics") or some other genius type, repetition maybe ain't such a bad thing.
With that said, I wanted to look in this post at my blog writing as a whole and where I've been and why I've visited said place...
At the end of November I did a post on topics covered over the last year and a half and followed that up with a few additional posts looking back on stuff written. This included first one and then another post on some of the best magazine writing I've linked to and then got into the quite large category of... business.
First I looked for the business topics most posted on and linked to and came up with those below...
- Touch-screen technology
- Cloud Computing
- Workplace Culture
- Customer Service
- Social Media
In this business topic listing post I also summarized content around touch-screen technology and then revisited Social Media links with this post.
As for future blog writing I'll do... between posts about the other business topics, more "best writing" posts, additional books and magazine articles I'll read, and stuff I'll find on the worldly wide interwebnet of superhighway info... I think I'll continue to have as much to write about & link to as I can carve out the time for.
-----
If all of this above is the "where I've been", I suppose that means it's time to address the "why I've visited said place"...
The "wherefore the blog" section at the top of my blog was written over a year ago, but hasn't really changed. To whit... "The point is to write about stuff I find... well, interesting. If these efforts should help me transition from my current business program management type job to a business writing and creative type job then all the better. If not, then the original point of the blog holds true."
Starting with this baseline idea of writing about interesting things, two more tangible type aspirations then follow. The first would be to develop a significant (however I decide to define that) blog following & second to move towards work with a writing component to it.
-----
Around the significant blog following idea... I think just as the baseline goal of the blog is to write about interesting things (you know, interesting to me), the baseline cause of a significant blog following would have to be to first write an interesting blog about interesting things (not rocket science me thinks).
Beyond that, I do think there's things to consider and do in the following areas that might help develop a readership:
- Specific blog topic: One thing about this blog is that even though I've worked to figure out what I've written (perhaps ad nauseam as above illustrates), there's still a good number of things I write about and link to and not a lot of what I'll call "verticality."
In many ways, I envy someone like my friend Jim who wrote a blog on circumnavigating Australia with his two year old son. Specific topic, defined timeframe, well written and... lots of readers. Another example of this was the blog referenced in the movie "Julie & Julia"... with the blog being noted in this Wikipedia link (and I'm SURE it must to true to be written on the Internet) as being the first blog to be made into a movie. In terms of just blog readership, though, I imagine it grew in part because of a specific topic that would appeal to like-minded people who came across Julie Powell's blog about cooking through the recipes of Julia Child.
- Right place to host blog: Is Blogger the best place or is a change in order? I already own the URL I would want to use (same as my blog now, but without the "blogspot"), but I'd then have to decide between services like TypePad, WordPress, or something else (I notice the "Julie & Julia blog" was on Salon).
- Commenting on other blogs: I completely get that this is an excellent way to build readership, but two things have curtailed my blog surfing/searching/commenting to date. One is the lack of verticality (there's that word again) in my own blog and one is when given a choice between doing a surf/search for places to comment and actually creating blog content, I've almost always fallen on the side of content creation. Drat that job and life thing curtailing my available hours...
-----
In terms of the second aspiration (again, beyond the baseline "write about stuff I find interesting"), having a career with a writing component would be just... nifty. I've done enough writing over the last year and a half to know that I don't feel drawn towards truly creative or fiction writing, but it's then a question of what non-fiction writing could be done.
I do have the business background and MBA (in Sports Marketing which I now use not at all for work) and as the blog topics noted above show, do find business to be interesting... definitely not all business areas, but... some.
So, it stands to reason that I could write within interesting areas of business and my completely conjecture-based notion is there's a need for solid writing in the business world.
I think this is becoming more of a need than ever with new forms of Social Media (as previously posted on) becoming prevalent both as a method of person to person and more to the point here, business to person communication. Additionally, there's new and interesting fields like Entrepreneurial Journalism (which I understand considers different forms media will take going forward) out there.
Now, figuring out exactly to transition from my "like to write stuff" into working and writing in an area that I "like to write about"... therein lies the interesting question.
With that said, I wanted to look in this post at my blog writing as a whole and where I've been and why I've visited said place...
At the end of November I did a post on topics covered over the last year and a half and followed that up with a few additional posts looking back on stuff written. This included first one and then another post on some of the best magazine writing I've linked to and then got into the quite large category of... business.
First I looked for the business topics most posted on and linked to and came up with those below...
- Touch-screen technology
- Cloud Computing
- Workplace Culture
- Customer Service
- Social Media
In this business topic listing post I also summarized content around touch-screen technology and then revisited Social Media links with this post.
As for future blog writing I'll do... between posts about the other business topics, more "best writing" posts, additional books and magazine articles I'll read, and stuff I'll find on the worldly wide interwebnet of superhighway info... I think I'll continue to have as much to write about & link to as I can carve out the time for.
-----
If all of this above is the "where I've been", I suppose that means it's time to address the "why I've visited said place"...
The "wherefore the blog" section at the top of my blog was written over a year ago, but hasn't really changed. To whit... "The point is to write about stuff I find... well, interesting. If these efforts should help me transition from my current business program management type job to a business writing and creative type job then all the better. If not, then the original point of the blog holds true."
Starting with this baseline idea of writing about interesting things, two more tangible type aspirations then follow. The first would be to develop a significant (however I decide to define that) blog following & second to move towards work with a writing component to it.
-----
Around the significant blog following idea... I think just as the baseline goal of the blog is to write about interesting things (you know, interesting to me), the baseline cause of a significant blog following would have to be to first write an interesting blog about interesting things (not rocket science me thinks).
Beyond that, I do think there's things to consider and do in the following areas that might help develop a readership:
- Specific blog topic: One thing about this blog is that even though I've worked to figure out what I've written (perhaps ad nauseam as above illustrates), there's still a good number of things I write about and link to and not a lot of what I'll call "verticality."
In many ways, I envy someone like my friend Jim who wrote a blog on circumnavigating Australia with his two year old son. Specific topic, defined timeframe, well written and... lots of readers. Another example of this was the blog referenced in the movie "Julie & Julia"... with the blog being noted in this Wikipedia link (and I'm SURE it must to true to be written on the Internet) as being the first blog to be made into a movie. In terms of just blog readership, though, I imagine it grew in part because of a specific topic that would appeal to like-minded people who came across Julie Powell's blog about cooking through the recipes of Julia Child.
- Right place to host blog: Is Blogger the best place or is a change in order? I already own the URL I would want to use (same as my blog now, but without the "blogspot"), but I'd then have to decide between services like TypePad, WordPress, or something else (I notice the "Julie & Julia blog" was on Salon).
- Commenting on other blogs: I completely get that this is an excellent way to build readership, but two things have curtailed my blog surfing/searching/commenting to date. One is the lack of verticality (there's that word again) in my own blog and one is when given a choice between doing a surf/search for places to comment and actually creating blog content, I've almost always fallen on the side of content creation. Drat that job and life thing curtailing my available hours...
-----
In terms of the second aspiration (again, beyond the baseline "write about stuff I find interesting"), having a career with a writing component would be just... nifty. I've done enough writing over the last year and a half to know that I don't feel drawn towards truly creative or fiction writing, but it's then a question of what non-fiction writing could be done.
I do have the business background and MBA (in Sports Marketing which I now use not at all for work) and as the blog topics noted above show, do find business to be interesting... definitely not all business areas, but... some.
So, it stands to reason that I could write within interesting areas of business and my completely conjecture-based notion is there's a need for solid writing in the business world.
I think this is becoming more of a need than ever with new forms of Social Media (as previously posted on) becoming prevalent both as a method of person to person and more to the point here, business to person communication. Additionally, there's new and interesting fields like Entrepreneurial Journalism (which I understand considers different forms media will take going forward) out there.
Now, figuring out exactly to transition from my "like to write stuff" into working and writing in an area that I "like to write about"... therein lies the interesting question.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Frequent Blog Tags: "Customer Service", "Social Media" & "Work"
On the heels of an earlier this month post on blog tags used, this missive takes a look at a few of the topics frequently tagged... Customer Service, Social Media & Work.
Looking at the first two, after Customer Service (tag search hyperlinked to) is provided either well or poorly, Social Media (tag search also linked) then comes into play. It's a fairly obvious point, but there's just so many avenues for either happy or dissatisfied customers to make their voices heard.
Work as a third tag topic is referenced in different ways on this blog. I write about it as something which can potentially be: fulfilling, important, or (perhaps even better) calling to mind a Patrick Swayze Roadhouse clip.
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Back to the first two topics noted, my favorite theory around Customer Service (is it weird to have one?) relates to work... the theory that outstanding Customer Service is provided by employees who feel well treated and like where they work. I've done a few posts with Workplace Culture as a blog tag and feel pretty strongly that there's something to this idea of where one works contributing a great deal to how one works.
I've had enough bad experiences at various Noah's Bagels to suspect that it may not be a great job. Flip side of that is based on the typically outstanding service I've gotten at multiple Jamba Juice locations... I'm guessing it's a good place to be employed. I can't imagine the money is that different for similar jobs at the two chains so me thinks there's something from Corporate causing the difference in employee behavior.
Interesting... Work linked to Customer Service, on the heels of Customer Service linked to Social Media. Now, we just need to have employees blogging, tweeting and doing Facebook posts on their jobs.
Oh, yeah... that already happens.
Looking at the first two, after Customer Service (tag search hyperlinked to) is provided either well or poorly, Social Media (tag search also linked) then comes into play. It's a fairly obvious point, but there's just so many avenues for either happy or dissatisfied customers to make their voices heard.
Work as a third tag topic is referenced in different ways on this blog. I write about it as something which can potentially be: fulfilling, important, or (perhaps even better) calling to mind a Patrick Swayze Roadhouse clip.
-----
Back to the first two topics noted, my favorite theory around Customer Service (is it weird to have one?) relates to work... the theory that outstanding Customer Service is provided by employees who feel well treated and like where they work. I've done a few posts with Workplace Culture as a blog tag and feel pretty strongly that there's something to this idea of where one works contributing a great deal to how one works.
I've had enough bad experiences at various Noah's Bagels to suspect that it may not be a great job. Flip side of that is based on the typically outstanding service I've gotten at multiple Jamba Juice locations... I'm guessing it's a good place to be employed. I can't imagine the money is that different for similar jobs at the two chains so me thinks there's something from Corporate causing the difference in employee behavior.
Interesting... Work linked to Customer Service, on the heels of Customer Service linked to Social Media. Now, we just need to have employees blogging, tweeting and doing Facebook posts on their jobs.
Oh, yeah... that already happens.
Saturday, June 02, 2012
Business Topics of Interest (& Companies) Written On So Far
Since self-publishing a few months ago my blog compilation book, I've been thinking about its content... basically ruminating on what exactly I've been writing about for these last four-odd years.
The book was segmented into six segment areas (1. Writing 2. Work 3. Sports 4. Business 5. Everything else & 6. Book reviews) and of these, Business in particular can be segmented down further into sub-segments. To this whole "identifying business topics posted on idea", I've actually done it previously... with posts (hyperlinked below) on the following areas:
1. Workplace culture (which at least for me includes the area of customer service)
2. Touch-screen technology
3. Social media
4. Business concepts of "special" & "simplicity"
5. Cloud computing (linked here is the tag search result)
Well, it's been a few years and few hundred blog posts since many of these business topic area posts, so it's probably high time to look again at interesting (you know, to me) business topics posted on. All of the above areas still hold true to me as important and interesting and there's a few new concepts I've posted on that seem to carry a bit of heft:
6. Business tools (particularly data analytics) – There's a lot of fascinating work being done in the areas of big data as well as business tools with some of the companies involved that I've written on here including Tableau Software, Palantir, HP (through Autonomy & Vertica acquisitions), Tibco Software, Clearstory Data and Asana (less data analytics and more business productivity for Asana).
7. Information availability and dissemination – This to me is the step beyond Social Media to more purposeful information sharing (yea, just social is still sharing, but I'm thinking about more productive purposes (and including education in the mix). Organizations I've posted on that come to mind first are Twitter (allows for instant feedback and sharing of opinion), LinkedIn, Amazon (customer opinion sharing), Salesforce, TED, and Khan Academy.
8. True innovation – There are some very interesting and pretty revolutionary things being done in business today with companies and concepts I've noted previously including Rearden (business incubator started by Steve Perlman that includes DIDO wireless technology... with Perlman being someone that's talked of the need for true business innovation), Augmented reality (Google glasses and Layar as examples), and Manufacturing innovation (with 3D printing, DNA fold origami and Pacific Biosciences having been written about here).
9. Written delivery of information – This business topic (with a Time cover story on it noted in this post) screams Amazon with its delivery innovation as well as gorilla in the room heft needed to push said innovation.
10. Innovation in sports – I've written about and linked to a lot of solid sports writing on this blog, but what fascinates me in relation to sports business is technical innovation (with much of it designed to enhance fan experience (and consequently sell more stuff). Some of the companies I've blogged about include MLB Advanced Media, Pac-12 Conference (headquartered in San Francisco), Sportvision and its FIELDf/x system of cameras, Cisco and Red Bull (particularly through its Red Bull Media House).
11. User interface - It's a fascinating topic (and one somewhat linked to that of "special" noted above), this idea of how a product or service is built to be used by consumers. Along these lines, there's companies I find that do exceptionally well in some areas of business that seem to falter when it comes to user interface. Examples of this include Amazon (how their Kindle for iPhone app doesn't seem to allow searching through the Amazon catalog), Twitter (feels like it offer better options around retweeting and sorting feeds) and Netflix (with it's insistence on pretending a title simply doesn't exist if not currently available in the streaming catalog). Again, all good companies and services... but, ones who could have better user interfaces (and corresponding user experiences).
12. Interesting products - It's a bit of a catch-all category to be sure, but I've tried to write about here companies creating products or services that have a new approach towards existing business areas. Some companies I've previously noted here are Square, Nest (for their thermostat), Airbnb, and Kickstarter.
With all of these business areas now noted, it occurs to me that I've also written about a few interesting approaches to business...
13. Narrow market targeting and entry - The idea was written about by Evan Williams (linked to in this blog post) and focused product targeting and entry is basically a company figuring out the smallest possible problem possible (going narrow) and going after that.
14. Creating brand new markets - Concept is deciding what you would buy and creating a product from that and a front of mind example of a company creating markets that didn't exist previously is Apple. As was written about in a Businessweek piece I linked to in this post, it creates a situation of difficulty for competitors because consumers will likely stick with the company that created the market unless there's a truly revolutionary alternative product.
There's certainly much more that could be written about each of these companies and concepts, but lots of interesting things going on in business.
The book was segmented into six segment areas (1. Writing 2. Work 3. Sports 4. Business 5. Everything else & 6. Book reviews) and of these, Business in particular can be segmented down further into sub-segments. To this whole "identifying business topics posted on idea", I've actually done it previously... with posts (hyperlinked below) on the following areas:
1. Workplace culture (which at least for me includes the area of customer service)
2. Touch-screen technology
3. Social media
4. Business concepts of "special" & "simplicity"
5. Cloud computing (linked here is the tag search result)
Well, it's been a few years and few hundred blog posts since many of these business topic area posts, so it's probably high time to look again at interesting (you know, to me) business topics posted on. All of the above areas still hold true to me as important and interesting and there's a few new concepts I've posted on that seem to carry a bit of heft:
6. Business tools (particularly data analytics) – There's a lot of fascinating work being done in the areas of big data as well as business tools with some of the companies involved that I've written on here including Tableau Software, Palantir, HP (through Autonomy & Vertica acquisitions), Tibco Software, Clearstory Data and Asana (less data analytics and more business productivity for Asana).
7. Information availability and dissemination – This to me is the step beyond Social Media to more purposeful information sharing (yea, just social is still sharing, but I'm thinking about more productive purposes (and including education in the mix). Organizations I've posted on that come to mind first are Twitter (allows for instant feedback and sharing of opinion), LinkedIn, Amazon (customer opinion sharing), Salesforce, TED, and Khan Academy.
8. True innovation – There are some very interesting and pretty revolutionary things being done in business today with companies and concepts I've noted previously including Rearden (business incubator started by Steve Perlman that includes DIDO wireless technology... with Perlman being someone that's talked of the need for true business innovation), Augmented reality (Google glasses and Layar as examples), and Manufacturing innovation (with 3D printing, DNA fold origami and Pacific Biosciences having been written about here).
9. Written delivery of information – This business topic (with a Time cover story on it noted in this post) screams Amazon with its delivery innovation as well as gorilla in the room heft needed to push said innovation.
10. Innovation in sports – I've written about and linked to a lot of solid sports writing on this blog, but what fascinates me in relation to sports business is technical innovation (with much of it designed to enhance fan experience (and consequently sell more stuff). Some of the companies I've blogged about include MLB Advanced Media, Pac-12 Conference (headquartered in San Francisco), Sportvision and its FIELDf/x system of cameras, Cisco and Red Bull (particularly through its Red Bull Media House).
11. User interface - It's a fascinating topic (and one somewhat linked to that of "special" noted above), this idea of how a product or service is built to be used by consumers. Along these lines, there's companies I find that do exceptionally well in some areas of business that seem to falter when it comes to user interface. Examples of this include Amazon (how their Kindle for iPhone app doesn't seem to allow searching through the Amazon catalog), Twitter (feels like it offer better options around retweeting and sorting feeds) and Netflix (with it's insistence on pretending a title simply doesn't exist if not currently available in the streaming catalog). Again, all good companies and services... but, ones who could have better user interfaces (and corresponding user experiences).
12. Interesting products - It's a bit of a catch-all category to be sure, but I've tried to write about here companies creating products or services that have a new approach towards existing business areas. Some companies I've previously noted here are Square, Nest (for their thermostat), Airbnb, and Kickstarter.
With all of these business areas now noted, it occurs to me that I've also written about a few interesting approaches to business...
13. Narrow market targeting and entry - The idea was written about by Evan Williams (linked to in this blog post) and focused product targeting and entry is basically a company figuring out the smallest possible problem possible (going narrow) and going after that.
14. Creating brand new markets - Concept is deciding what you would buy and creating a product from that and a front of mind example of a company creating markets that didn't exist previously is Apple. As was written about in a Businessweek piece I linked to in this post, it creates a situation of difficulty for competitors because consumers will likely stick with the company that created the market unless there's a truly revolutionary alternative product.
There's certainly much more that could be written about each of these companies and concepts, but lots of interesting things going on in business.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Wherefore the Blog... again
Much of this post is a repackaging if not regurgitation of prior posts done, but for those of us not as smart as this guy (who I just read a section about in the book "SuperFreakonomics") or some other genius type, repetition maybe ain't such a bad thing.
With that said, I wanted to look in this post at my blog writing as a whole and where I've been and why I've visited said place...
At the end of November I did a post on topics covered over the last year and a half and followed that up with a few additional posts looking back on stuff written. This included first one and then another post on some of the best magazine writing I've linked to and then got into the big 'ol category of business.
First I looked for the business topics most posted on and linked to and came up with those below...
- Touch-screen technology
- Cloud Computing
- Workplace Culture
- Customer Service
- Social Media
In this business topic listing post I also summarized content around touch-screen technology and then revisited Social Media links with this post.
As for future blog writing I'll do... between posts about the other business topics, more "best writing" posts, additional books and magazine articles I'll read, and stuff I'll find on the worldly wide interwebnet of superhighway info... I think I'll continue to have as much to write about & link to as I can carve out the time for.
-----
If all of this above is the "where I've been", I suppose that means it's time to address the "why I've visited said place"...
The "wherefore the blog" section at the top of my blog was written over a year ago, but hasn't really changed. To whit... "The point is to write about stuff I find... well, interesting. If these efforts should help me transition from my current business program management type job to a business writing and creative type job then all the better. If not, then the original point of the blog holds true."
Starting with this baseline idea of writing about interesting things, two more tangible type aspirations then follow. The first would be to develop a significant (however I decide to define that) blog following & second to move towards work with a writing component to it.
-----
Around the significant blog following idea... I think just as the baseline goal of the blog is to write about interesting things (you know, interesting to me), the baseline cause of a significant blog following would have to be to first write an interesting blog about interesting things (not rocket science me thinks).
Beyond that, I do think there's things to consider and do in the following areas that might help develop a readership:
- Specific blog topic: One thing about this blog is that even though I've worked to figure out what I've written (perhaps ad nauseam as above illustrates), there's still a good number of things I write about and link to and not a lot of what I'll call "verticality."
In many ways, I envy someone like my friend Jim who wrote a blog on circumnavigating Australia with his two year old son. Specific topic, defined timeframe, well written and... lots of readers. Another example of this was the blog referenced in the movie "Julie & Julia"... with the blog being noted in this Wikipedia link (and I'm SURE it must to true to be written on the Internet) as being the first blog to be made into a movie. In terms of just blog readership, though, I imagine it grew in part because of a specific topic that would appeal to like-minded people who came across Julie Powell's blog about cooking through the recipes of Julia Child.
- Right place to host blog: Is Blogger the best place or is a change in order? I already own the URL I would want to use (same as my blog now, but without the "blogspot"), but I'd then have to decide between services like TypePad, WordPress, or something else (I notice the "Julie & Julia blog" was on Salon).
- Commenting on other blogs: I completely get that this is an excellent way to build readership, but two things have curtailed my blog surfing/searching/commenting to date. One is the lack of verticality (there's that word again) in my own blog and one is when given a choice between doing a surf/search for places to comment and actually creating blog content, I've almost always fallen on the side of content creation. Drat that job and life thing curtailing my available hours...
-----
In terms of the second aspiration (again, beyond the baseline "write about stuff I find interesting"), having a career with a writing component would be just... nifty. I've done enough writing over the last year and a half to know that I don't feel drawn towards truly creative or fiction writing, but it's then a question of what non-fiction writing could be done.
I do have the business background and MBA (in Sports Marketing which I now use not at all at work) and as the blog topics noted above show, do find business to be interesting... definitely not all business, but some areas.
So, it stands to reason that I could write within business and my completely conjecture-based notion is there's a need for solid writing in the business world. I think this is becoming more of a need than ever with new forms of Social Media (as previously posted on) becoming prevalent both as a method of person to person and more to the point here, business to person communication.
Now, figuring out exactly to transition from my "like to write stuff" into working and writing in an area that I "like to write about"... therein lies the interesting question.
With that said, I wanted to look in this post at my blog writing as a whole and where I've been and why I've visited said place...
At the end of November I did a post on topics covered over the last year and a half and followed that up with a few additional posts looking back on stuff written. This included first one and then another post on some of the best magazine writing I've linked to and then got into the big 'ol category of business.
First I looked for the business topics most posted on and linked to and came up with those below...
- Touch-screen technology
- Cloud Computing
- Workplace Culture
- Customer Service
- Social Media
In this business topic listing post I also summarized content around touch-screen technology and then revisited Social Media links with this post.
As for future blog writing I'll do... between posts about the other business topics, more "best writing" posts, additional books and magazine articles I'll read, and stuff I'll find on the worldly wide interwebnet of superhighway info... I think I'll continue to have as much to write about & link to as I can carve out the time for.
-----
If all of this above is the "where I've been", I suppose that means it's time to address the "why I've visited said place"...
The "wherefore the blog" section at the top of my blog was written over a year ago, but hasn't really changed. To whit... "The point is to write about stuff I find... well, interesting. If these efforts should help me transition from my current business program management type job to a business writing and creative type job then all the better. If not, then the original point of the blog holds true."
Starting with this baseline idea of writing about interesting things, two more tangible type aspirations then follow. The first would be to develop a significant (however I decide to define that) blog following & second to move towards work with a writing component to it.
-----
Around the significant blog following idea... I think just as the baseline goal of the blog is to write about interesting things (you know, interesting to me), the baseline cause of a significant blog following would have to be to first write an interesting blog about interesting things (not rocket science me thinks).
Beyond that, I do think there's things to consider and do in the following areas that might help develop a readership:
- Specific blog topic: One thing about this blog is that even though I've worked to figure out what I've written (perhaps ad nauseam as above illustrates), there's still a good number of things I write about and link to and not a lot of what I'll call "verticality."
In many ways, I envy someone like my friend Jim who wrote a blog on circumnavigating Australia with his two year old son. Specific topic, defined timeframe, well written and... lots of readers. Another example of this was the blog referenced in the movie "Julie & Julia"... with the blog being noted in this Wikipedia link (and I'm SURE it must to true to be written on the Internet) as being the first blog to be made into a movie. In terms of just blog readership, though, I imagine it grew in part because of a specific topic that would appeal to like-minded people who came across Julie Powell's blog about cooking through the recipes of Julia Child.
- Right place to host blog: Is Blogger the best place or is a change in order? I already own the URL I would want to use (same as my blog now, but without the "blogspot"), but I'd then have to decide between services like TypePad, WordPress, or something else (I notice the "Julie & Julia blog" was on Salon).
- Commenting on other blogs: I completely get that this is an excellent way to build readership, but two things have curtailed my blog surfing/searching/commenting to date. One is the lack of verticality (there's that word again) in my own blog and one is when given a choice between doing a surf/search for places to comment and actually creating blog content, I've almost always fallen on the side of content creation. Drat that job and life thing curtailing my available hours...
-----
In terms of the second aspiration (again, beyond the baseline "write about stuff I find interesting"), having a career with a writing component would be just... nifty. I've done enough writing over the last year and a half to know that I don't feel drawn towards truly creative or fiction writing, but it's then a question of what non-fiction writing could be done.
I do have the business background and MBA (in Sports Marketing which I now use not at all at work) and as the blog topics noted above show, do find business to be interesting... definitely not all business, but some areas.
So, it stands to reason that I could write within business and my completely conjecture-based notion is there's a need for solid writing in the business world. I think this is becoming more of a need than ever with new forms of Social Media (as previously posted on) becoming prevalent both as a method of person to person and more to the point here, business to person communication.
Now, figuring out exactly to transition from my "like to write stuff" into working and writing in an area that I "like to write about"... therein lies the interesting question.
Sunday, June 11, 2017
The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg
The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg was a really interesting book that I picked up after previously reading and writing about Smarter Faster Better also from Duhigg.
The Power of Habit covers how habits are a powerful driver of automatic behavior, and contains a few different concepts from Duhigg that stood out to me... with underneath those, stories from the book used to illustrate them:
1. Habits follow the principle of (A) cue, (B) response, and then (C) reward.
2. Habits can be changed by replacing them with new ones.
3. Making one habit change, if it a keystone habit, can lead to other changes.
4. Belief that a habit can take hold is essential to the success of that.
5. Organizational habits can form in the same manner as individual habits.
6. People respond to familiarity, both in what they like and habits they form.
7. Habits form best when there's a social tie that helps enable it.
Tony Dungy-coached football teams – recounts how Dungy would have players in a game focus on simple execution, or response, done well when they see certain game situations, or cues... which brought to mind for me a quote from Arizona Cardinals coach Tom Moore around focusing on “the relentless execution of fundamentals.”
Household cleaning product Febreze – around Procter & Gamble positioning Febreze usage as the final thing done after cleaning, with it as a sort of reward a more powerful motivator than if the positioning something to avoid a negative in the elimination of odors… an idea that made me think of towards rather than away motivated people.
Pepsodent toothpaste and the introduction of it – covers Pepsodent entering the market a hundred years ago with both a clear cue and reward for usage of the product. In terms of the cue, it was noted that people should pay attention to the film on their teeth they can physically feel with their tongue prior to brushing. Additionally detailed was the physical reward, to the point of a craving, which comes when the film gone after brushing and the mouth has a distinct post-brushing feeling from a citric acid ingredient in the toothpaste.
Alcoa and how the aluminum company thrived – tells the story of how new CEO Paul O’Neill in 1987 came into his first public meeting and proclaimed a focus on workplace safety, while O'Neill also noted that it would be an indicator of habits across the institution. Duhigg covers how O'Neill saw that the company had bitter feelings between unions and management and viewed safety as an important goal everyone could agree on. Additionally, safety was a keystone habit, a simple and clear goal that could be measured easily, but also have execution towards it spread throughout the entire organization as for there to be zero injuries, it meant everything had to be working correctly. Part of the focus on safety involved management making the statement over and over that people throughout the company should feel free to speak up about things that they see that are important, and the positive by-product of this was as people would freely make suggestions around safety, it emboldened them to also highlight other things which they felt would improve the company. The focus on safety was a keystone habit, and from that grew a more positive company culture.
Alcoholics Anonymous and what’s caused it to be effective – Duhigg writes of how what AA espouses is very habit-based, and it focuses on replacing the routine for alcoholics from drinking to another activity. When someone faced with a cue that previously would have caused them to drink, the new routine is around meetings, sponsors, basically something other than drinking. Additionally noted in this section is how an important component of someone replacing a routine is to for them believe they can be successful at it, particularly in times of great stress. This belief can come through different forms and one that's covered is having an individual or group model to emulate that’s been successful. The thing to keep in mind as Duhigg writes of it is that a routine can’t just stop, but can be replaced by something else.
Michael Phelps and triggers and habits – covered here is how Phelps reacts to certain triggers, or cues, in advance of or during a race, and then his response. He’s practiced so long at what he’ll do that successful habits win the day. Part of this is how a successful reaction to a small cue which leads to a minor reward is a small win, something accomplished that builds on itself, very much related to this idea of belief building.
Starbucks and the habit of success – detailed by Duhigg is how the company extensively trains employees in how to react when difficult situations arise... with one Starbucks approach for dealing with angry customers the LATTE method: listen, acknowledge, take action, thank them, and explain why the problem occurred. Duhigg notes how these angry customers are like cues, inflection points that then should lead to specific responses, with those much more likely to occur if they’ve been anticipated and prepared for, through either formalized training or even just writing out what situations might happen and how to react. In terms of habit-building, it’s mentioned in the chapter that much of this training is around the keystone habit of willpower, which comes in finite amounts, so the training to build up willpower is important both because it’s hard to have in situations of prolonged stress and when you increase willpower in one area, that spills over into other areas of life. Also noted in this chapter is how self-discipline can be turned into an organizational habit and if people feel a sense of control about something, no matter how small, it means they need to exert less willpower to get through their day successfully and can be happier and more productive.
Rhode Island Hospital and the London Underground – covered by Duhigg here is, similar to how in the section on Alcoa, there should be an organizational culture where people at any level feel free to speak up about things they see. This organizational habit of openness can eliminate or at least mitigate the effects of internal fiefdoms and rivalries between groups and Duhigg notes in the stories of malpractice at the Rhode Island Hospital and the London Underground fire that a crisis can provide the best opportunity to change an organization, as it's then that change seen as most urgently needed.
Response to the song Hey Ya! and starting an exercise routine – Duhigg details how people like things that are familiar to them and in terms of music, notes how people didn't react favorably at first to the song Hey Ya! because it was so different than other music on the radio, and in order for the song to become popular, DJs would play it in between familiar songs. Duhigg also describes exercising and how people will often respond to the idea of doing it as being something done with friends, a familiar bonding activity.
The Montgomery bus boycott and Saddleback church – in this section, it's noted how community ties, both strong and weak (which extend further than strong ties), helped galvanize people behind Rosa Parks at the beginning of the Montgomery bus boycott, a key event in the Civil Rights Movement. It’s also covered how this principle of both strong and weak ties being beneficial applies to job seekers and how the church Saddleback grew in large part through the groups that people would gather in within their homes, basically a combination of strong ties in small groups and weak ties while in a large church setting.
Duhigg in the book does a solid job of covering how people and organizations have the control to remake and replace habits and the key as he spells it out is to: identify the routine, experiment with rewards, isolate the cue, and have a plan.
The Power of Habit covers how habits are a powerful driver of automatic behavior, and contains a few different concepts from Duhigg that stood out to me... with underneath those, stories from the book used to illustrate them:1. Habits follow the principle of (A) cue, (B) response, and then (C) reward.
2. Habits can be changed by replacing them with new ones.
3. Making one habit change, if it a keystone habit, can lead to other changes.
4. Belief that a habit can take hold is essential to the success of that.
5. Organizational habits can form in the same manner as individual habits.
6. People respond to familiarity, both in what they like and habits they form.
7. Habits form best when there's a social tie that helps enable it.
Tony Dungy-coached football teams – recounts how Dungy would have players in a game focus on simple execution, or response, done well when they see certain game situations, or cues... which brought to mind for me a quote from Arizona Cardinals coach Tom Moore around focusing on “the relentless execution of fundamentals.”
Household cleaning product Febreze – around Procter & Gamble positioning Febreze usage as the final thing done after cleaning, with it as a sort of reward a more powerful motivator than if the positioning something to avoid a negative in the elimination of odors… an idea that made me think of towards rather than away motivated people.
Pepsodent toothpaste and the introduction of it – covers Pepsodent entering the market a hundred years ago with both a clear cue and reward for usage of the product. In terms of the cue, it was noted that people should pay attention to the film on their teeth they can physically feel with their tongue prior to brushing. Additionally detailed was the physical reward, to the point of a craving, which comes when the film gone after brushing and the mouth has a distinct post-brushing feeling from a citric acid ingredient in the toothpaste.
Alcoa and how the aluminum company thrived – tells the story of how new CEO Paul O’Neill in 1987 came into his first public meeting and proclaimed a focus on workplace safety, while O'Neill also noted that it would be an indicator of habits across the institution. Duhigg covers how O'Neill saw that the company had bitter feelings between unions and management and viewed safety as an important goal everyone could agree on. Additionally, safety was a keystone habit, a simple and clear goal that could be measured easily, but also have execution towards it spread throughout the entire organization as for there to be zero injuries, it meant everything had to be working correctly. Part of the focus on safety involved management making the statement over and over that people throughout the company should feel free to speak up about things that they see that are important, and the positive by-product of this was as people would freely make suggestions around safety, it emboldened them to also highlight other things which they felt would improve the company. The focus on safety was a keystone habit, and from that grew a more positive company culture.
Alcoholics Anonymous and what’s caused it to be effective – Duhigg writes of how what AA espouses is very habit-based, and it focuses on replacing the routine for alcoholics from drinking to another activity. When someone faced with a cue that previously would have caused them to drink, the new routine is around meetings, sponsors, basically something other than drinking. Additionally noted in this section is how an important component of someone replacing a routine is to for them believe they can be successful at it, particularly in times of great stress. This belief can come through different forms and one that's covered is having an individual or group model to emulate that’s been successful. The thing to keep in mind as Duhigg writes of it is that a routine can’t just stop, but can be replaced by something else.
Michael Phelps and triggers and habits – covered here is how Phelps reacts to certain triggers, or cues, in advance of or during a race, and then his response. He’s practiced so long at what he’ll do that successful habits win the day. Part of this is how a successful reaction to a small cue which leads to a minor reward is a small win, something accomplished that builds on itself, very much related to this idea of belief building.
Starbucks and the habit of success – detailed by Duhigg is how the company extensively trains employees in how to react when difficult situations arise... with one Starbucks approach for dealing with angry customers the LATTE method: listen, acknowledge, take action, thank them, and explain why the problem occurred. Duhigg notes how these angry customers are like cues, inflection points that then should lead to specific responses, with those much more likely to occur if they’ve been anticipated and prepared for, through either formalized training or even just writing out what situations might happen and how to react. In terms of habit-building, it’s mentioned in the chapter that much of this training is around the keystone habit of willpower, which comes in finite amounts, so the training to build up willpower is important both because it’s hard to have in situations of prolonged stress and when you increase willpower in one area, that spills over into other areas of life. Also noted in this chapter is how self-discipline can be turned into an organizational habit and if people feel a sense of control about something, no matter how small, it means they need to exert less willpower to get through their day successfully and can be happier and more productive.
Rhode Island Hospital and the London Underground – covered by Duhigg here is, similar to how in the section on Alcoa, there should be an organizational culture where people at any level feel free to speak up about things they see. This organizational habit of openness can eliminate or at least mitigate the effects of internal fiefdoms and rivalries between groups and Duhigg notes in the stories of malpractice at the Rhode Island Hospital and the London Underground fire that a crisis can provide the best opportunity to change an organization, as it's then that change seen as most urgently needed.
Response to the song Hey Ya! and starting an exercise routine – Duhigg details how people like things that are familiar to them and in terms of music, notes how people didn't react favorably at first to the song Hey Ya! because it was so different than other music on the radio, and in order for the song to become popular, DJs would play it in between familiar songs. Duhigg also describes exercising and how people will often respond to the idea of doing it as being something done with friends, a familiar bonding activity.
The Montgomery bus boycott and Saddleback church – in this section, it's noted how community ties, both strong and weak (which extend further than strong ties), helped galvanize people behind Rosa Parks at the beginning of the Montgomery bus boycott, a key event in the Civil Rights Movement. It’s also covered how this principle of both strong and weak ties being beneficial applies to job seekers and how the church Saddleback grew in large part through the groups that people would gather in within their homes, basically a combination of strong ties in small groups and weak ties while in a large church setting.
Duhigg in the book does a solid job of covering how people and organizations have the control to remake and replace habits and the key as he spells it out is to: identify the routine, experiment with rewards, isolate the cue, and have a plan.
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