Thought of the Day - Ready, Fire, Aim

Sometimes a theory or and idea keeps coming up over and over again and in those situations it is hard to ignore. Recently i kept reading about the benefits of the "Ready, Fire, Aim" approach, it was in books, on websites and in podcasts and it made sense.

Most people use the "Ready, Aim, Fire" approach. Only it normally turns into "Ready, Aim, Aim, Aim ... maybe Fire", too much planning and not enough action. On the other hand "Read, Fire, Aim" relies on action straight away, the results of which can be used to improve your accuracy. It is like firing a gun for the first time, you don't know whether the sights are set correctly or if the barrel is straight, therefore until you fire the aiming might not matter at all.


Something i have been meaning to take action on for a long time (like since 2004) is updating my WebCV into the modern age. It was originally built like a site from 1996; a pain to update, not very modern looking and rubbish for search engine optimisation, frankly it was an embarrassment. At various times since then i have bought and read books about web design, i have felt guilty for not updating it and once or twice i have even started to put something together. But it never quite got done, i spent too long planning and worrying about how difficult it would be and how long it would take to get it perfect. Even the most recent time i made a start in March i had a big elaborate plan, it was gantt charted out over 3 or 4 months but of course after a week i lost interest and nothing ever came of it.

On Friday evening i was listening to a podcast from SXSW where various entrepreneurs who were renowned for being 'fast' were speaking on the topic. These were people who had built the likes of Twitter, Blogger etc which are rather complicated pieces of software and the timescales they were talking about from picking a concept to first release were ridiculously short, months if not weeks. At this stage i began to feel rather embarrassed, my WebCV really isn't that complicated, i have most of the skills to update it, so how come they can launch huge brands in a few months and i can't even build a website?

The answer is simple; they set a short timescale to get something out there, it may not be complete, it may not be perfect, but it is something that they can then build on going forward. Programmers call this "release early, release often". It is better to get something out and get real customer feedback about what needs changed than it is to spend years building what you think customers want only to find it isn't actually what they want or the opportunity has passed.


With this in mind i decided that 12 hours was a reasonable amount of time to build a website. I set key tasks that had to be done and decided if something was taking too long that i would accept something that was ok, rather than taking longer and getting something that was perfect. It was difficult, first off it is the weekend so it was hard to avoid distractions and secondly i had forgotten most of the CSS i used to know. But after 11 hours of work i updated my WebCV and uploaded to the site.

I would be grateful if anyone who reads this could go and have a look at my WebCV and provide any feedback they can think of through the contact link. So far my list of things to do includes:

• Validate the xHTML and CSS against the W3C standards
• Improve consistency across browsers (IE7 and Firefox 3 are ok but i suspect it needs work on IE6, Firefox 2 and IE8)
  
• Sort out the padding and margins to get the spacing between the headings and text right
• Make a better header (the current one will do but its not great)
• Make the navigation tabs a bit less bland and angular
• Think of some ways to make it more visually appealing without being tacky

At least i have something out there, a base to build on. It is a much less daunting task to make lots of small improvements than it is to come up with something brand new and perfect first time. So remember; if you are procrastinating, if a project seems to big to know where to start, set a tight timescale and "Ready, Fire, Aim".


Idea from: http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2008/05/29/the-art-of-speed-conversations-with-monster-makers/#more-362

Thought of the Day - Metrics

I read an interesting article about metrics, specifically it was about metrics for software projects but the main rules are applicable to all projects.

A metric should be:
1) Informative (and ideally Predictive) - It should give relevant useful information.
2) Objective - It should not matter who is determining the metric.
3) Automated - The more work it takes to generate the metric the less likely it is to get used or recorded accurately.

Idea From: http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/IT-Management/Lies-Damned-Lies-and-Project-Metrics-Part-1/

Thought of The Day - Heroes and Planners

As has been pointed out by many people, everyone loves a hero and no-one notices a planner. By definition if you avoid a bad event happening no-one notices, the bad event didn't happen and because it didn't happen then maybe it wasn't possible for it to happen.

To borrow from The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb; imagine if in 2000 someone had made locked bulletproof doors on airlines mandatory, 9/11 would have never happened. Would that person have been given awards, recognition and admiration? No, instead he probably would have, at best been ignored, at worst been reviled by pilots and airlines for implementing a 'pointless' security feature.

This leaves me in an interesting quandary, i know it is better for the companies i work for to be a planner, however the incentives at work are all set up for hero's. Is the way forward to identify catastrophes before they happen, plan for what you can do when they do happen and then let them happen? I suppose the problem, even with delayed planning, is the full magnitude of the fuck-up is never realised so no-one knows how bad it could have been.

Thinking about it from the other side, how could you incentivise planning? How do you quantify what could have been and how likely it was to occur, even if it doesn't?

Book Notes - The Art Of War For Managers

The Art Of War For Managers by Gerald A Michaelson [2001]

Summary:
“Know the enemy and know yourself and you will never be defeated.”
Interplay of strategy and tactics; strategy is the plan, tactics are the implementation.
Information and speed are the key to winning.
Attacking head-on is rarely the best approach, find your niche and expand from there.

Notes:
Page 3: A plan that is not written down is no plan at all, a simple written plan is best.
Page 4: Unlike Tzu’s constant factors for the battlefield in business they are much simpler, you must study:
1. The ‘mission’ of the company.
2. The outside factors (industry/economic trends etc).
3. The marketplace.
4. The leaders.
5. The guiding principles.
Page 13: It is important to for start-ups to have sufficient reserves to ride-out downturns and to tide them over between launch and profitability. As they say; “Profit is king, but cash rules” you can survive without profit but you can’t survive without cash.
Page 27: Have two types of edict; instructions and orders. Instructions are issued as guidelines, to be followed if practical. Orders are to be followed immediately and to the letter but can only be given by someone on the ground in the situation. This prevents stupid decisions being made above.
Page 29: Fundamental principles of business:
1. Organize Intelligence
2. Maintain Objectives
3. Establish A Secure Position
4. Keep On The Offensive
5. Plan Surprise
6. Think Manoeuvre
7. Concentrate Resources
8. Practice Economy Of Force
9. Keep It Simple
Page 31: Strategy always comes before tactics, while a good strategy might succeed even with poor tactical execution, a poor strategy even with superlative tactics will almost never succeed. It is therefore important to make sure that you are heading in the right strategic direction before you determine tactics.
Page 32: “Boil the ocean” appears to be a reference to one strategist’s suggestion for how to get rid of German u-boats in the second world war.
Page 38: Customer input is a vital operational measure, it is key to improved performance and winning. Use of balanced scorecard suggested to keep track of financial and non-financial, lagging and leading measures.
Page 44: The use of extraordinary force to ensure victory, this can be applied on a macro level; a company focusing all efforts to ensure that they take a market or on the micro level; a person focusing all of their effort on a particular task.
Page 51: Keep your products secret until the last minute, it removes the ability of your competitors to plan a response. Apple does this particularly well.
Page 63: Reference to Tyco going from $2b to $30b in 6 years, ironically it was under the CEO who ended up in jail. Book probably written before those events.
Page 67: The rule of three: never make more than 3 points in any one communication, if you make more some of the points are likely to be forgotten. Keep it simple and direct.
Page 77: 5 faults of leadership:
1. Recklessness, which leads to destruction,
2. Cowardice, which leads to capture,
3. A hasty temper, which can be provoked by insults,
4. A delicacy of honour, which is sensitive to shame,
5. Over-solicitude for his men, which exposes him to worry and trouble.
Page 91: Acknowledging the role of known standards of performance so that the leader can be perceived as impartial and can set discipline to achieve standards.
Page 93: The importance of going to the gemba for managers to inform their intuition and knowledge of the real situation.
Page 95: It is important to have direct communication with the people on the ground, often information is filtered as it goes up the chain which means you might not be getting all pertinent information. Create relationships with a select few people further down the chain so that you can get direct information.
Page 110: Information on personal survival and career paths.
Page 169: Summary of key concepts.

Quotes:
Page 6: “If the only tool you have is a hammer, everything will look like a nail.”
Page 14: “While we have heard of stupid haste in war, we have not yet seen a clever operation that was prolonged.”
Page 22: “To subdue the enemy without fighting is supreme excellence.”
Page 39: “Where everyone decides everything, no one decides anything.”
Page 65: “Do not do what your enemy wants, if for no other reason than he wants it.”
Page 72: “The key to success is what the customer wants, not what you can do.”
Page 78: “When was the last time anyone said; ‘I wish I had waited 6 months longer to fire that guy’” – Jack Welch
Page 81: “Logic sounds most convincing to the presenter; it is in the emotions of the receiver that positions are changed.”
Page 101: “Know the enemy and know yourself and you will never be defeated.”
Page 112: “Too often, the absence of conflict is not harmony, it’s apathy.”
Page 116: “When you can win and retain good relationships, only then can you become strong.”

Thought of the Day - Time Constraints

Today i happened across an advert for possibly my ideal job - Business Design Consultant with IDEO, the daddy of all creative consultancies. There was only one slight problem, the closing date was the 25th of April ... today.

It was 20:30 and my first reaction was; "stuff it, not enough time, why bother". Then it occurred to me that my CV would probably only need minor tweaks and really 3.5 hours should really be plenty to draft a cover letter and project report. So i whipped up a plan with some tight deadlines and set to it. Turns out i didn't even need until midnight, i finished 30minutes early!

About half way through the work i realised that if i had found the advert earlier i would have procrastinated or forgotten or not really worked on it until now. So really having a very challenging time scale was probably beneficial to me. Unfortunately we can't rely on serendipity to bring tasks to us at exactly the right time but it has convinced me that Goldratt is right in Critical Chain. What i really need to do is work out how to manufacture that tight deadline, that stress, so there is a cut-off to each task and i don't continue tweaking for longer than is required.


Ok so the chances of me getting the job are virtually zero, but i would have always wondered 'what if?' if i hadn't applied. The worst that can happen is i don't hear back from them, anything above that is gravy. If they call me i can ask what i could do to develop more, if they interview me i get a free trip to London to the meca of creative consultancies and while it is a million to one shot, i might even get a job out of it.

Thought of the Day - Student Syndrome

“Parkinson’s law dictates that a task will swell in (perceived) importance and complexity in relation to the time allotted for its completion.”

Sounds a lot like the 'student syndrome' discussed in Critical Chain. My question is how do you artificially shrink the time you allocate to tasks; do you postpone them until just before the shrunk deadline or do you do them now with a set end time ... Both have motivational issues and it sounds like the Start Early Vs Start Late debate in project management.

Therefore the question becomes; how do you determine the Critical Chain in your life so that it doesn't matter when you start the non-critical tasks?

Book Notes - Critical Chain

Critical Chain by Eliyahu Goldratt [1997]

Summary:

Key steps to improving project management:

1. Cut safety out of individual process steps

2. Redistribute safety into a project buffer

3. Identify the critical chain (longest list of dependant events)

4. Add feed buffers to the non-critical paths to protect the critical chain

5. Monitor the progress closely and focus on the steps that will impact the project buffer

6. Look for resource contentions, if there are any resource bottlenecks; schedule and buffer them like you would a manufacturing bottleneck.

Other key notes:

The cheapest option is not always the best, pay for focus and reduced risk.

Create unrefusable offers for your suppliers or customers (See Its Not Luck).

Notes:
Page 11: "teaching by open discussion" How is it possible to do this in all situations? Can you predict adequately where the discussion will go? How do you prompt people in the right directions without giving the answers? How do you keep classes to time?
Page 24: The Golden Triangle - Cost, Time, Quality OR Budget, Time, Features.
Page 25: U2 project as an example of something that beat the golden triangle.
Page 37: Common causes for delays;

· Unrealistic timescales to start with

· Forced to chose the cheapest vendors

· Key stages started too late

Page 41: Managing projects is all about managing uncertainties in terms of timescales, costs and specifications, risk management and planning.
Page 44: How long does it take to get from A to B - tailed distribution, shortest possible time to do anything is zero, longest possible time is virtually infinite.
Page 45: What is a persons objective in a project? To be considered a reliable person. Therefore they will never budget the median, it means they have a 50% chance of being seen as unreliable. On the other hand if they finish early they can always pad the work to fill the time to the estimate and still be seen as reliable.
Page 90: You can cut costs in any department and impact the whole (make the chain weight less) but you can only improve the throughput in the weakest link (make the chain stronger). Cost cutting projects can be focused anywhere, capacity increasing projects should only be focused in the constraint. However cost cutting projects should only be undertaken once the throughput is met.
Page 92: look for policy constraints in the business.
Page 97: There are no compromises in the accurate sciences. If one person measures something at 20g and another person uses a different method and gets 30g, they don't decide it must be 25g. One or both of the methods must be wrong, they cannot both be right.
Page 98: Conflicts are the result of faulty assumptions, if there is a conflict there is always an assumption that can be challenged.
Page 124: Student Syndrome; we fight for extra safety time only to the waste it.

Page 126: The evils of multitasking; the lead time is extended for each step even assuming that there is no negative impact due to having to get up to speed with the individual parts again.

Page 172: Three steps to getting a project back on track:

1. Persuade people to cut lead times

2. Remove Milestones for individual tasks

3. Frequent reporting of lead times and issues

Page 218: If there are resource conflicts (constraints) the Critical Path becomes the resource therefore you must buffer the process steps after the resource constraint.

Page 235: Identify the resource constraint for the whole programme and schedule that resource like you would schedule a production constraint, base the other projects (start and finish) around the constraint and insert a “bottleneck buffer” to protect the resource.

Page 242: Dollar-Day investment strategy instead of payback period or NPV, don’t fully understand, try listening to Beyond the Goal and coming back.

Quotes:
Page 8: "Smart people learn from their own mistakes, wise people learn from the mistakes of others."
Page 38: "The lower the level of the person the more the finger points internally rather than externally."
Page 40: "Uncertainty is what typifies projects. It is the nature of the beast."
Page 62: "Companies are so immersed in the mentality of saving money that they forget that the whole intention of a project is not to save money but to make money."

Page 121: “A delay in one step is passed in full to the next step. An advance made in one step is usually wasted.”

Page 188: “The probability of a piece of bread falling butter side down is directly proportional to the price of the carpet.”