Learning from Dogs

An example of how we really do own our lives.

We were invited to our friend’s 25th Wedding Anniversary on Saturday, 21st November.

English pub

It was in a local pub and they had invited many friends, some of whom we had not seen for many years.

One friend had started his own architect business, built it up over the last 10 years and, although he had lost a large amount of work because of the recession, things seemed to be picking up.

I mentioned that my work had dropped off dramatically since the summer. He said:

Well, Jon. You can make your own mind up what you do. You can either decide you’re going to go bankrupt or you can decide that you’re going to succeed –  in spite of everything.

For some reason, that short conversation had a huge impact on me and I realised that it really is mind over matter and once we make our mind up about something, good or bad, it tends to happen.

By Jon Lavin

A recap on some important messages.

One of the great benefits of being a team of authors is that we, too, are learning from each other.  So on that theme I wanted to review some of the Posts that have been written by my fellow authors as a reminder of some powerful motivational ideas.

Sir Ranulph Fiennes

When asked about his approach to climbing Everest at the third attempt in May 2009 and, at age 65, the oldest Briton to do so, he captured the full spirit of separating actions from goals when he said:

Plod forever! Don’t expect to get there. Don’t think there is going to be a top to this mountain. Just plod forever!

Watch the video.

Read more about these examples

Never give up is so much more than just a cliché.

Regular readers will know that fellow LfD author, John Lewis, has been posting regularly on the subject of remarkable people.  I have found them inspiring, to the extent that I’m going to depart from my usual safe area of economics and tell a personal story.  It’s a story of family dynamics, the power of sibling bonds and why hope and trust in the future, especially for young people, is so, so important.  I have called my story the Power of Words.

—–oooOOOooo—–

I can hear it like it was yesterday, resonating in my head, crowding out the doubts and negative thoughts, filling my mind with possibilities:  yes, I CAN do it!

Then ....

I was in my junior year of college and had no idea what I was going to do with my life.  It was becoming quite a burden.

Because I had always been good in school, i.e., the “smart one,” everyone had expected so much of me when I went to school.  I really envied my older sister; she had always been the pretty one, the popular one, the one who got invited to the prom by not one, but three young men.

And, it seemed to me at the time, she was so lucky because no one expected her to go out and conquer the world after high school.   She didn’t go to college; she went to secretarial school and studied to become an airline attendant instead.

I envied her in every way possible!  But at least I had something: I was “the smart one,” or so I thought!  Years later, my sister went back to school to study psychology.  She earned a 4.0 [four straight 'A's. Ed] and was invited to continue on to earn her Ph.D.  I’ll be darned if she wasn’t the smart one, too! And she is a wonderful and thoughtful person to boot! But I digress.

Read more of my story

What does Bill Gates admire about Warren Buffet?

On this blog about integrity, and in these difficult economic times, it is particularly poignant to note that Bill Gates cites Warren Buffett’s integrity. This was during a recent event at Columbia Business School in New York City, see below.

While many of the questions from MBA students and the answers from Gates and Buffett are not new, Buffett’s brief witty and topical comments provide considerable insight into his thinking.

It is particularly interesting to get a sense of how the world is viewed by people with their perspective. When asked about the outlook for America, both Gates and Buffett answered that it is very good. Warren Buffett even offered any of the MBA students $100,000 in return for 10% of their future earnings. Later, he increased the offer to $150,000, if they received training in personal communication skills!

Watch them together on CNBC at Columbia Business School, New York City on November 12, 2009.

Maybe you are interested in further information about Warren Buffett, if so you are not alone. The BBC, among others, have taken a strong interest in him recently.

You might like to read and view some recent stories on the “Oracle of Omaha” including:

• his words of wisdom
• a recent interview
• his best investments
• the Washington Post’s debt to him
• his recent investment in railroads

Despite a setback in 2008, Warren Buffett’s long term investment success is without question.

By John Lewis

Here’s a great role model – and she’s 16!

Jessica Watson is a teenager.  She is hoping to break the record for the youngest person to sail solo, non-stop and unassisted around the World.  Whatever modern materials and technology can do to make sailing easier, sailing solo for weeks on end is grindingly tough at any age.  She’s a wonderful example of the next generation!

Jessica left Sydney Harbour on October 18, 2009 sailing her sloop Ella’s Pink Lady. Her course is an estimated 23,000 nautical miles requiring her to be roughly 230 days at sea.

As was said, this is no mean feat for any person. Read more about her on her website and her Blog.

Wish her luck and fair winds.

Creativity, Integrity and commercialism – are there conflicts?

This is guest post from Magnus Dennison.  Magnus is a Cinematographer who, together with his wife, Katja Roberts, runs a film production company in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the North-East of England. Their company is called Meerkat Films.  Magnus writes about integrity in film making.

I am going to write about film producers who have made creative choices to ensure their films are commercial successes. My question is whether these films lose their integrity when the motivation for making them becomes financial.

A little about my background. I am an independent film producer working in the UK and don’t profess to be an expert on these matters; the views expressed here are simply my opinion.

I will start by presenting one of my favourite films: ‘The Lives of Others’ (2006) directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. The team has, in my opinion, made one of the most powerful films of the decade. But more interestingly, they have made many choices that have preserved the integrity of the story at the risk of reducing commercial viability.

It is obvious why they have done this; they are passionate about the artistry and the integrity of the film, more than the financial gain. The film is very slow paced and the tension builds so gradually you’re almost unaware of it until you are completely engrossed.

Read more of this guest post

Market research for sales people

Yesterday, in part two of this three-part Post, we looked at two real-life examples of how listening to your market works.  In this concluding part we examine some practical methods for sales people.  (By sales people I also include those who run their own business because there is no better sales person than the person who runs their own enterprise!)

1. Empty your mind of all your pre-conceived ideas as to why your customers buy your product or service.
2. Start off by listening to the reasons why a recent customer bought from you.  Ideally in person but if not, then by telephone.  Never by email!  I’ll leave it to you to think how you might do that – easy in practice.  Comment if you want to explore this aspect.
3. Listen to sufficient number of customers so that you feel you have a representative view.  I guess what you are looking for is the Pareto relationship – what are the 20% of reasons/motives that generate 80% of your sales.  You should be able to end up knowing what are the differences that make the difference (between you and your competitors.)
4. Just like Guy Watson of Riverford, knowing why a customer buys MUST also include knowing what use that customer is making of your product/service.
5. Negotiate with as many customers as possible the opportunity to stay in touch – at whatever frequency makes sense to both sides. Again, think about how you stay in touch – personal visits may be unwieldy but phone usually is acceptable.  Not via email!
6. Once you know why people become customers then you need to know what their experience is when they are accustomed to using your product or service.  This is key!  Think what you felt like when you bought your last car.  Full of the thrill of a new experience and the anticipation of enjoying your ‘smart’ decision.  Now think how you regard your car today after the reality of the cost of ownership, a few unplanned service issues and when it now feels much more like the utility vehicle that it really is.  If the original sales person doesn’t know how you feel today then there is no way that the sales person’s next sales proposition can be modified to keep you as a client.
7. Staying in touch allows you to anticipate future needs of your customers – the key to all business success.
8. Understanding your customers means that you can build loyalty – and loyal customers is the key to business profitability.  If at all possible get hold of a copy of Prof. Fred Reichheld’s The Loyalty Effect.
9. Use the relationships you build with your customers to seek their ideas as to what their future needs may be, how they would like to see your products and services evolve and who, and why,  they regard as your potential competitors.
10. Finally, as in the first point, keep an open mind and never assume.  Remember the old ditty – if you assume you make an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me’.

By Paul Handover

Market research for sales people.

Yesterday, I started a Post on undertaking market research, from a practical point of view. It continues.

To me, there are very significant advantages in being a small business and one of the most important benefits is that it is so much easier to really know what your customers want.  Here’s a fascinating extract (p.139-140) from Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers.

In 1889, Louis and Regina Borgenicht boarded an ocean liner in Hamburg bound for America.  Louis was from Galacia, in what was then Poland.  Regina was from a small town in Hungary.  They had been married only a few years and had one small child and a second on the way ……

….. They had enough money to last a few weeks, at best.

…..Louis and Regina found a tiny apartment on Eldridge Street, on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, for $8 a month.  Louis took to the streets, looking for work.  He saw peddlers and fruit sellers and sidewalks crammed with pushcarts.  The noise and activity and energy dwarfed what he had known in the Old World.  He was first overwhelmed, then invigorated.  He went to his sister’s fish store on Ludlow Street and persuaded her to give him a consignment of herring on credit.  He set up shop on the sidewalk with two barrels of fish ….

….. By the end of the week, he had cleared &8.  By the second week, $13.  Those were considerable sums.  But Louise and Regina could not see how selling herring on the street would lead to a constructive business…..

….The answer came to him after five long days of walking up and down the streets of Lower East Side, just a he was about to give up hope.  He was sitting on an overturned box, eating a late lunch of the sandwiches Regina had made for him.  It was clothes. Everywhere around hi, stores were opening – suits, dresses, overalls, shirts, skirts, blouses, trousers, all made and ready to be worn.  Coming from a world where clothing was sewn at home by hand or made to order by tailors, this was a revelation.

Borgenicht took out a small notebook.  Everywhere he went, he wrote down what people were wearing and what was for sale – menswear, women’s wear, children’s wear.  He wanted to find a ‘novel’ item, something that people would wear that was not being sold in the stores.  For four more days he walked the streets.  On the evening of the final day as he walked toward home, he saw a half dozen girls playing hopscotch.  One of the girls was wearing a tiny embroidered apron over her dress, cut low in the front with a tie in the back, and it struck him, suddenly, that in his previous days of relentlessly inventorying the clothing shops of the Lower East Side, he had never seen one of those aprons for sale.

This is such a wonderful example of what understanding your market is all about. Louise was sufficiently smart to know that selling herrings, while lucrative in the short term, was not the long-term answer. He was sufficiently patient to watch and not jump to conclusions until the answer was clear. He was sufficiently tough to keep at it until he had his answer.

Now let’s jump back to Riverford Organics. Here are the words of Guy Watson.

a cooking odyssey Monday 26th October 2009

As you may have guessed, I am a vegetable bore. Twenty five years ago when I sowed my first leek I was fairly well adjusted but now my wife reckons I can turn any conversation to growing, cooking or eating veg within seconds. The box scheme was founded on the invigorating but dangerous assumption that my obsession was, at least partially, shared by customers.

This year I set out on a cooking odyssey to understand how others use or don’t use our vegetables. I cooked in village halls, in my bus, on the beach, in tents in Wales, on stage at WOMAD [World of Music, Arts and Dance, Ed] but most of all in customers’ homes. The experience has been fascinating (for a veg bore), frustrating (you are all so different) and humbling (there is life after vegetables).

My abiding impression is that most of you do share an enthusiasm for our veg, but that we need to make it easier for you to incorporate them into often busy lives. According to our customer survey last year only 5% of you find it really easy to use your box and 32% struggle. However fresh and tasty, local and minimally packaged, fairly traded and sustainably grown those carrots and beans are, if you are struggling to use them we will lose you in the end. (My underlining)

Our mission for the coming months is to make life with a box easier. There will be a few minor changes like less clods of mud but mostly we want to do this by cooking with you; both virtually and in person. We plan to team up with around 100 like-minded professional cooks who are inspired by our veg and on a par with our chef, Jane Baxter, when it comes to cooking them. They will work part-time with us and our customers, inspiring, teaching, demonstrating, creating recipes. We plan to run initiatives including affordable cookery classes and demos in homes, workplaces and community venues; lunch clubs, supper clubs and cooking clubs and a recipe exchange for customers. We have already run some pilot events and now we really want to get going.

get involved

Would you like to improve your cooking, help others improve theirs or do you know a cook who might want to work with us? If you’d like to get involved, email riverfordcooks@riverford.co.uk with your name, contact details, postcode and what you are interested in and we’ll let you know what is going on in your area.

The underlined sentence is the key. Without this insight, Guy would have had no way of knowing what was influencing his sales figures. And if sales were continuing to grow then this potential loss of business would have remained deeply hidden from sight. Only getting out there and mixing it with your customers revealed this problem, potentially a serious problem.

Tomorrow the concluding part of this three-part Post in which we examine some very practical ways of listening to the market.

By Paul Handover

Market research for sales people.

John’s Post yesterday on Riverford Organics nudged me into writing this Post, something that has been in the back of my mind for ages.  My topic is understanding your customers or more properly described, understanding your market, because the word ‘market’ feels a better description of the objective: knowing why your present customers bought, what they like and dislike so you have a better idea of the buying intentions of your potential customers.

The term ‘Market Research’ is not a difficult or uncommon phrase (a Google search returns 132 million links!) but, in practice, it is one of those terms that is very tough to pin down as to what it means as a set of practical tasks.  Let’s try a few quotations from a Google search (this time only 6.6 million links!).

…. research that gathers and analyzes information about the moving of good or services from producer to consumer …
The systematic collection and evaluation of data regarding customer’s preferences for actual and potential products and services …
A study of consumer groups and business competition used to define a projected market.
The collection and analysis of data obtained from a sample of individuals or businesses relating to their characteristics, behaviour, attitudes …
…the activities undertaken by an organization to determine the nature of its customers and competitors, as well as the demand for its products or services along with the features that customers prefer in similar products or services. …

ad nauseum …

For something that is a critically important component of business strategy, such a wide variation in definitions is totally unacceptable.

Now it’s important that you know where I am coming from.  Since 1966, I have been working as a business-to-business salesman.  Since 1978, I have run my own companies but have still seen my only competence as that of a salesman.  (Technically I ‘retired’ in 2007 but still keep my hand in through mentoring and coaching.)

In the early 80s, as my first company, Dataview Ltd, was growing rapidly, I became a chartered member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing. I thought that marketing was a skill I needed to know more of. But, to be frank, apart from a nice certificate and a glossy monthly magazine, it’s difficult to recall any life-changing experiences from that relationship.  Marketing seemed to be about medium to large businesses – not correct but that was the impression given.

Back to the theme of this Post. Read more about market research for sales people

Another quick look at Riverford Organics and a lesson for all.

Further to my post on Guy Watson of Riverford Organics, in the mini-series on remarkable people:

A couple of Saturdays ago (October 24), we had a great time out at Wash Farm, the home of Riverford Organics.

Our five year old son enjoys eating sweetcorn. Recently, having carried the weekly veg box from our doorstep to the kitchen calling “Riverford coming through!”, he was then delighted to report: “there are three sweetcorns”, there having been two in previous weeks!

On Saturday, he marched into a field of sweetcorn and, as if he had done it for years, went straight to a plant and, explaining what he was doing, tested the crop for size and ripeness and picked it by breaking it off like an expert. He then handed it to me and proceeded to pick many more of them. When I asked him how he knew what to do, all was revealed: “I saw it on the telly!”.

As luck would have it, I encountered Guy Watson at the event and it was great to shake his hand and offer a few words of congratulation on what he has done. Of course, he has no idea who I am!

Their customer service is great; and now they are embarking on more market research to understand better how their customers use their products! [See the relevant edition of their newsletter here!] [The subject of a Post on Market Research coming out soon. Ed.]

Although I am not an expert, I know enough to know that this is remarkable. To think about how customers are using the product, to measure it, to go into customers homes and find out what they are really doing with your products: this is at the pinnacle of good customer research!

No doubt there are others, but I have only ever heard of one other company who paid so much attention to customers in their homes. It was Intuit, the highly regarded US software vendor which, for decades, has consistently beaten Microsoft at providing accounting software. Their representatives would wait in a shop for a customer to buy their product and then request permission to travel with them to their home to record exactly what experience they had with installing and using it!

Final report from the day at Riverford: the event on Saturday was “Pumpkin Day”, its primary purpose being to buy (and have carved) your pumpkin for Hallowe’en. There was a competition to guess the weight of a (largish) pumpkin; I guessed by comparative lifting of the pumpkin and of said five-year-old son, and based my estimate on information from his mother about his most recent weight! Guess what? I have just heard that I won! So a case of (organic, of course) red wine is now expected to materialise alongside this weeks box of vegetables!

By John Lewis

P.S. The Riverford Blog is a good read