Why aren't they doing what they know is right?

The team had a reputation for not delivering. They appeared to need mentoring and structure to overcome their obstacles. 

However, after taking a closer look it became clear some team members knew exactly what their problems were and why they were not succeeding.

The more important / difficult task is overcoming why teams do what they do.

Relentless pursuit of improvement

It's important to improve the products we deliver. Increased efficiency comes through continuous improvement.

However, change is distracting. Change is accepted because the cost of disrupting production is worth the productivity gain.

There's an opportunity for technology/software products that deliver functionality such as communication/messaging, video/audio, news/blogs with a user interface that changes infrequently.

Once you've learned how to play music on your computer / mp3 player, you may not want/need the interface to change. Swiping up vs down and single vs double clicking may not add enough value for those only interested in getting music into headphones.

There will always be segments of society intrigued by and driving change. It's important to innovate. At the same time, some functionality may not improve with change, and the number of people interested in stability for simple daily tasks grows daily with an aging connected population. Updating a design or UI because it needs to be refreshed or looks outdated may not be reason enough for everyone.

Why learning to unicycle is not easy

Learning to unicycle is of course not impossible but it's not easy either.

It's hard because there are several things to do all at the same time. You can't really think much about them because you can't stop peddling. There's no time to ponder. It's all feeling and reaction.

It's hard because there's so much advice on how to do it, but much of what people write relates to what they got hung up on. Once they got the hang of "that one thing" the rest was easy. It's not the same for everyone, so advice is relative and not absolute.

It's hard because speed is needed to balance. On a bike speed is mitigated by brakes and handles. On a unicycle, speed is determined by how you pedal, and if your pedaling isn't smooth your body has to react to counter balance accordingly. If you press hard on the pedal, you better lean forward. If you get distracted and stop pedaling, you best not be leaning too far over the wheel. It's not a natural feeling to commit to pedaling fast enough to get your balance without any ability to direct the unicycle or stop without stepping off the front.

On a unicycle, theory only gets you so far.

Moving Strategic Goals Forward

Opinions about the way things should be are everywhere. The world is filled with good ideas. Strategic thinking is all about imagining what doesn't exist but should. The world has no shortage of strategic thinkers.

Strategic planners / actors are much less common and for good reason. It's not simple to make a significant/meaningful change. However, a simple strategic plan is the place to begin and an invaluable guide for course correcting.

Brainstorm
Write down all the good ideas regardless of whether they are long term goals or short terms tasks.

Sort the ideas based on whether they can be done in less than a month.

Use the Five Whys analysis technique to determine the underlying strategic motivation for the idea.

Plan
Create a list of tasks to be completed in the coming month that brings the strategic ideas closer to reality. Be specific about the success criteria for each task. Some of these tasks will be taken from the original brainstorming list and some will become obvious when thinking about how to break longer term objectives into something achievable in a month.

Review
Weekly - Review the monthly plan and identify what needs to be done in the current week to achieve the monthly objectives.

Monthly - Honestly assess the degree to which the tasks from the previous month were accomplished. Assign a score (0 to 5) for each task.


Publish
Share the results of the monthly review with someone. Work with an advisor or colleague -  not alone (in a vacuum).

Price should be based on value, not effort

Recently, a consultant stated that the proposed price to the customer was excessive. The assertion was the price should be based on the time/resources required to produce the product. That is logical/reasonable but it's incomplete. Price should be based on the value to the customer and alternatives in the market place. Value based pricing is nothing new, but it's surprising how many people in a position to set pricing fail to follow it.

It's not gouging customers if they're willing/able to pay for the service/product. Gouging is when people have no other options and are desperate. Being paid for well developed/delivered services and products is called conducting business.

Getting Important Work Done

Important work happens in between the urgent.

No doubt, people with skills are needed to solve an urgent crisis when customers are unhappy. Staying focused for minutes/hours/days isn't hard while a fire burns in front of you.

However, persistent people are needed to accomplish strategic objectives. What we spend our time on when nothing is urgent determines whether we prefer to be a firefighter or a chief. There's nothing right/wrong with wanting to be a firefighter or a chief. However, each requires a different focus, and it's essential to understand the difference. It's easy to get caught in the trap of acting like a firefighter while wanting to be a chief.

Normalizing Data in Excel with Index/Match

Spreadsheets are powerful/friendly because they don't constrain how we structure our data.

However, this sometimes results in the same information appear over and over in a column because it applies to every row.

For example, if we had a worksheet containing training hours it might look something like this.

Training

Date	Class	Employee ID	Employ Name	Department

The problem is the name of the employee and department have nothing to do with training. Nevertheless, it will be repeated for each row.

If you've used Excel's vlookup, you're likely thinking this solves the problem. It does, but there's a better way using Index and Match. It might appear more complex at first, but vlookup can bring its own complexity.