Author: Shaun Coffey

Shaun Coffey is interested in future making and institutional building. He is an agricultural scientist who tries to integrate fragmented and sector-specific technical and scientific knowledge to address the wicked problems that characterise the real world.
Posted on

For greater effect – communicate your strategy in 6 sentences

Who says your strategy needs to be heavily documented?  Try doing  it in 6 sentences for greater effect.

Here is a little gem I recently rediscovered and one of the many notebooks that are a key part of my reflective and reflexive practice. The source is Jay Conrad Levinson, and my notes say it comes from something he wrote in in Entrepreneur, that was then quoted in Communication Briefings,  Volume 14 number 2, page four, December 1994 

I have tried to find the original source, but it appears not to be anywhere on the Internet, so I suspect it was from a print newsletter.  Given that it was 1994 that is not surprising.  Levinson was known as a guru of Guerrilla Marketing – and his work can be found here: https://strategiesforinfluence.com/jay-conrad-levinson-guerrilla-marketing/

The gem I rediscovered is about bringing clarity, precision, conciseness and parsimony to your stated strategies.  Levinson used an example from advertising to explain this.

To make sure your advertising as a clear purpose, state your strategy in six sentences.

  • Prime purpose. “The purpose of rainbow tours ads is to get people to call and write for a free video brochure.”
  • Prime benefit. “We will stress the unique and exciting places our customers can visit.”
  • Secondary benefits. “We will also stress the convenience and economy of our tours and the skill of our tour guides.”
  • Target audience. “We will aim our ads at adventurous male and female singles and couples, 21 to 34, who can afford our tours.”
  • Audience reaction. “We expect our audience to call or write to request our video brochure.”
  • Company personality. “Our ads will reflect our innovation, excitement, conscientiousness – and our warm, caring attitude toward all customers.” 

I will own up to not being guilty of actually having followed these rules since 1994. I lost the idea in my notebook. And, continuing with the honesty, when I look back over the last 25 years I have probably been guilty of a common organisational sin – that I’ve been over-planned and under-delivered.

A great deal of thought needs to go into your strategy if you are to capture it in 6 sentences. It’s not an easy task, and certainly not as easy as writing the long, verbose omnibuses that often masquerade as a strategy. It requires a depth of understanding that can be challenging, particularly in our seemingly time poor work environments.

But I can’t help think of how much more effective I might have been if I had used a 6-sentence strategy approach to my work?

Posted on

Narcissism: The good, the bad and the ugly

When self-confidence crosses a certain threshold it turns into narcissism.  Here are some ideas on separating the “healthy” aspects of narcissism from the “unhealthy” ones.

HealthyUnhealthy
Feels good about oneself, even if others criticiseNeeds constant reinforcement from others to have a sense of wellbeing
Copes with life’s many setbacks, allthough may be thrown off balance for a short timeReacts to the hurts and injuries of life with fits of depression or rage. 
Feels confident about his or her own talentNeeds to feel superior to everyone else, and seeks out recognition for that superiority
May be stung by criticism, but the hurt soon passesIncensed by criticism, and broods for long periods about it
Appreciates praise, but does not live for itHas an insatiable craving for adulation; seeks compliments to feel momentarily good about oneself
Self-esteem is unfluctuating, even after rejection, disapproval, or personal attacksReacts to rejection, disapproval or attacks with bitter rage or deep depression
Does not believe he or she is entitled to special or favoured treatmentFeel entitled to special treatment because they are not ordinary
Is sensitive to the feelings of othersIs insensitive to what others need or feel
Open to the possibility of being wrong: welcomes dissenting viewsClosed to other perspectives: surrounds self with “yes-people”

For useful resources see:

Confirmation Bias And the Power of Disconfirming Evidence  Farnam Street

Narcissistic Personality Disorder  Mayo Clinic

Posted on

Ten ways to kill innovation

Do you want change in your organisation, but it is not happening? You could be the problem. Here are some sure ways to stop innovation.

  1. Regard any new idea from below with suspicion – because it’s new, and because it’s from below
  2. Insist that people who need your approval to act first go through several other levels of management of get their signatures.
  3. Ask departments or individuals to challenge and criticize each other’s proposals.  (That saves you the job of deciding: you just pick the survivor).
  4. Express your criticisms freely, and withhold your praise.  (That keeps people on their toes).  Let them know they can be fired at any time.
  5. Treat identification of problems as signs of failure, to discourage people from letting you know when something in their area isn’t working.
  6. Control everything carefully.  Make sure people count anything that can be counted, frequently .
  7. Make decisions to reorganize or change policies in secret and spring them on people unexpectedly.  (That also keeps people on their toes).
  8. Make sure that requests for information are fully justified, and make sure that it is not given out to managers freely.  (You don’t want data to fall into the wrong hands).
  9. Assign to lower-level managers, in the name of delegation and participation, responsibility for figuring out how to cut back, lay off, move people around, or otherwise implement threatening decisions you have made.   And get them to do it quickly.
  10. And above all, never forget that you, the higher-ups, already know everything important about this business.

From:  R. Moss Kanter, The Change Masters, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1983.

Posted on

Chronic problems in organisations – community, business, government

When it comes to organisation of all types, there are some problems that seem to persist and persist and persist….

When I first started seriously studying management and leadership in the 1980s, people like Stephen Covey were in vogue.  In 1990, he identified chronic problems in organisations. I don’t see much different today. 

Take a look at this list, and ask yourself how well your organisation is doing and what you might do in your organisation differently.

Continue reading “Chronic problems in organisations – community, business, government”