7/3/2015–Four learnings this week that contribute to an effective proposal:
- To think “outside the box” you need a box.
- Interns are expected to arrive at valuable conclusions which couldn’t be discovered by the company’s current staff.
- Knowing your audience goes beyond addressing the concerns they’re supposed to have and on to interests the really have.
- It may be more effective to always address problems/projects from the “big picture” before considering details or a framework.
Thinking outside the box
Identifying the current box allows you to know when progress outside of it is made. Without the parameter “chronological events” in movies, Tarantino doesn’t know his work is outside the box. It involves as simple work as writing down a single “important” quality of the current system and imagining altering or removing that quality while keeping the rest of the system constant. For example, any restaurant developer assumes he or she must create a menu. The “inside the box” solution is creating a menu. To think outside the box may be to imagine a restaurant which didn’t create a menu. Maybe it outsources menu creation. Following this idea, maybe it allows customers to make the menu, it could be an online contest of uploaded recipes, the most popular of which get made next month. To figure out the box, look at what’s common among the current players. In a short time, you could identify a few ways to deliver the same value in novel (faster or cheaper) ways–or deliver more value.
Delivering unique value
I’m struggling to deliver an “outside the box” solution because I’ve never developed the skill. But I learned this week that it wouldn’t make financial sense to pay me to come up with a solution they could themselves. I’m not replacing someone, which would call for me to be effective in the same way as whom I replace. I’m an increase in cost, and am expected to disproportionately increase value. The compromise of “fresh thought” and “fitting in” is finding new solutions while respecting culture and core strengths of the company. For my company, this means leveraging relationships at work to develop novel solutions which maintain respect for customer satisfaction and for employee development.
Respecting your audience’s interests
Preparing any communication should involve tailoring the message so it addresses the interests of the primary audience, rather than objective reason. Further considerations of this leads to the reality that it’s not always clear what the audience cares about; and it can be a hidden trap to tailor a message to what they’re “supposed” to care about (based on job title, role, etc.). I almost made the mistake of trying to persuade based on what someone’s supposed to care about this week. Luckily, I was behind schedule and the deadline got pushed back. It’s just one more reason relationships are the second most important thing at work (after results).
Consider the “big picture” first
As a “detail oriented” person I naturally execute well when given clear direction, but I struggle to create the vision/big picture. Previously, I saw the two sides of the coin as equally valuable and just personal styles. However, time may determine if one is better to promote than the other. I started to solve my projects by building a project management spreadsheet, and my “vision” was to be outlined in a clear “who/what/when” chart. But those are counter-productive to an intern who hasn’t grasped the big picture view of what the intent was. Thus, halfway into my internship I have mostly blank frameworks which I should only now have begun creating. That’s the danger of being detail-oriented when I don’t yet know what details these people want or care about. Further, as a relatively external adviser, the execution–where details matter–is better left to the problem identifiers anyway. Once I see the situation the same as the company, I can then make recommendations on the type of people/roles best suited to execute “if they have that type of person”. As my boss said, “tell me what type of work needs to be done, and I’ll figure out who is best to do it and when.”
The other harm my detailed nature caused was overlooking some details as I focused on others. Each person naturally has things that matter to them more than other things. Thus, I reviewed the project I was given a month ago and saw that I have totally missed a clearly–written instruction. Simply due to my tendency to frame work within departments–and how each group relates to others–I missed the request to talk to my own department and focused on bench-marking with other groups in the company. Had I zoomed out at first, I would’ve seen the project as it is–the big picture of “where we are now, where we should go, and how others have gotten there.” My natural tendency and detail-orientation made me miss the 1st part.
QOTW–“Present to your team, not to a buttoned-up talent council.”–Barb (smart, as it’s the same primary audience–Laura is both my team and talent council)
?FNW–Is there time to catch up? Barely!
11/22/2017 review–First, identifying the box at the beginning is a great practice for innovation. Design thinking is the practice I’ve heard most recently that attempts this. Part of it includes identifying the parameters that exist and removing any which are not absolutely required for the solution.
Second, I wouldn’t still say replacing someone means I’m expected to deliver value the “same way” as the person I replaced did. Rather, I’ve found that I’m left to deliver value in whatever way I can, novel or not.
Third, nothing is more valuable to the presenter than knowing the primary audience’s interests. The valuable lesson I learned here was that learning what their interests actually are requires a closer look than simply knowing what they do. Fortunately, it’s relatively easy to get people to open up to you by asking just a few genuine questions; “genuine” here means relevant questions you’re truly curious about. You don’t have to worry about looking sincere when you’re sincerely looking.
Finally, I definitely still feel that understanding the big picture before planning execution is smart. I think Simon Sinek is famous right now for a collection of books and videos on the “why” being the proper place to start. I guess it it’s true that, without an identified purpose, execution is aimless, by definition. Now I’m curious what’s been written in the past. Bossidy and Charan wrote the book on execution, and I would bet money Drucker wrote something on starting with purpose decades ago…