Hey, happy Monday!
Today is the 326th day of the year. 2021 is at 89%.
Put like that it is really ruthless, sorry.
And if it makes you anxious, know that this is not the intention; in fact, if you will read on you will discover the benefit of quantifying the world.
Numbers have this cold, logical, disarming beauty.
That’s right, there is no malice. The numbers make us honest and pragmatic.
Since I learned to look at things this way, I stopped relying on motivation.
Motivation comes and goes. Today there is, in an hour maybe.
What can you do then?
Count on a system. Designed to defuse theM-Bomb and be free.
Free to be unmotivated but not to self-sabotage what you really want.
I have collected my notes and packaged them carefully in the next paragraph. You can apply them to life and business and any nuance in between. I am sure you will find something good in them. Anytime click reply and let me know.
Good work!
STRTGY IS SUCCESS IN PROGRESS…
● PROCESSES / System Thinking
People at the center. Yes, but of what?
It is easy to say “in our company we put people at the center,” and in fact I always believe that. They are all at the center of a big mess!
Information that is missing, answers that are not coming, no one knows what the next step is….
When activities depend solely on the skills of a few people, there is no center, rather the responsibility è dispersed throughout the organization.
People are truly at the center when there are documented processes that everyone can follow and, unlike bureaucracy, that everyone can improve.
They are really at the center when, for example, they can go on vacation momentarily delegating some of their activities without blocking the company or having to have their laptop with them.
People are at the center when work is not.
If you think you can’t even hire an intern because you would waste more time teaching him or her what to do, for example, you are not at the center of the company, you are simply in an awkward position.
The good news is that you don’t need diagrams and complicated software to be a little freer than you were yesterday.
How can you avoid solving the same problem twice?
You have to think at the system level. Go to the source and make available to everyone the exact sequence of steps to solve it each time.
Imagine the time saved and the impact on the quality of your work if everyone could have a system that made it impossible to make mistakes.
A good system allows three magics:
- It makes the work delegable and scalable. From that moment you don’t have to do it anymore!
- It makes the work improvable. If you want a different result, you don’t have to have different people, you have to improve the process.
- It makes the work less risky. Whatever happens will be independent of people.
Managers do not manage people. Managers manage systems, which people use to succeed.
● PROCESSES / Pro Tips
The 3 Minute Checklist
Every time you do something for the second time:
- Open Chrome and type in the address bar doc.new
- Write a bullet point in the middle of the page retracing the steps of the activity you just completed. Take a maximum of 3 minutes. Write it in a rush; it doesn’t have to be pretty.
- Go back to the top of the paper and put a title on it as if it were a question a colleague might ask you (E.g. If you run an ecommerce: “How to partially refund an order.”).
- You don’t have to do anything else. With this system even saving is automatic! You can move the file to a folder shared with your team so everyone can search the Drive search bar as if it were a large FAQ Library.
If you pick up this little daily habit in the blink of an eye you will have documented hundreds of processes allowing you and your team to rely not just on motivation, but on a series of winning steps.
● PROCESSES / JTBD
Wow! There are more than 800 registrants for the first Italian conference on Product Management. November 26, online and free.
I will speak at 4:45 p.m. to explain in detail the process for build a roadmap with mathematical precision using the Job to Be Done theory..
Before and after me a lot of very interesting talks and workshops with Kate Leto, Gabriele Giaccari, Jacopo Romei, Susanna Ferrario, Lorenzo Cassulo, Felice Pescatore, Giovanni Puliti, Matteo Aliotta, Luca Mastella, Giacomo Chinellato.
