driving by rear mirror - or not (practical thingamy example #1)

[Dept. of transparent sales pitches]

Later in the week I'll be visiting a potential end-user, a media company, graciously invited by a system integrator to discuss some run-your-business solutions.

The other day Mike (the SI chap) gave me a list of "needs" that they might have, a fairly standard list:

Track ideas
    - Develop
    - Store
    - Cost
Monitor projects
    - Expenses
    - Resources
Hold contacts data
    - Targets
    - Opportunities
    - Partners
    - Contractors
    - Suppliers
Manage staff information
    - Timesheets
    - Holiday
    - Expenses
Manage Resources
    - Booking
    - Engineer time
    - Meeting rooms

Ouch, straight into the "application trap" :)

Command and control, post-fact monitoring, rear-view mirror driving.

Let's turn heads and look over the bonnet - structure the flow by focus on creating value and making control less of an issue.

Funny enough, a Business Plans is "how to use the resources to create value and keep some of it myself" - so a shift from rear-view mirror driving by hindsight control to forward looking is truly Business Planning.

So, let's tweak the above design requirements for a system accordingly:

Enhance the creation of ideas
    - Make it easy to add ideas, invite creativity
    - Enable co-creation
    - Build intellectual property value (ideas)
Enhance the creation of opportunities
    - Build intellectual property value (client knowledge)
    - Build intellectual property value (methods, technology)
    - Create potential links between clients, ideas, technology...
    - Invite clients into the process, create co-ownership
Execute better
    - Commercialise by matching ideas, clients, and abilities
    - Legolise costs to enable feature value choices (pricing included)
    - Chart physical constraints / availability - people, places, stuff
Become better by instant feed-back
    - Capture and report use of places real time (cost, where, what, when)
    - Capture and report use of people and suppliers real time
    - Capture and report use of stuff real time

See, create value by bettering product as #1, even see reporting as a means to get better.

In short a Value Creation System, VCS  - and fuhgettabout CRM, PIM, ERP, etc. etc. ;)

Mailed the ideas to Mike on a Saturday who responded with "Ach you're a nightmare... " :)

We're both looking forward to the meeting though!

[Note: Dunno if they'll throw me out, might step on some control and command toes - or usher me out laughing, but so what... :D I'll keep you posted!]

[Update: Yep, another good meeting :) Value creation and flow framework instead of after-the-fact control was well received. As was (hey, did not even have to mention it) the fact that modelling your Business Model is never a waste of time, quite on the contrary!

Parting words were "we'll have a lot of deal breaking questions next..." to which I said humbly "..to which I have good answers etc. ;)".
Plan, given satisfactory answers, is to use the no-method, agile implementation opportunity of the system for some little processes - plonk it in, try it out, then expand.

And next week we'll have more meetings with other interested firms etc. - and a new branch (enhanced database mechanism) - so times are interesting indeed :D. More to come...]

Comments

[Luca]

VCS, hmmm...
Tht's a VERY NICE acronym. As somebody heavily involved with industrial processes everywhere, what you just said sounds like "the key".

Rock on, Sig!

[sig]

Hehe, was pretty happy with it - but still looking forward to the day we have no acronyms to confuse us :D

[Bjorn]

Since you took the trouble of listing the initial "needs" and your rewrite you might want to share how the actual meeting went.

Thanks

[sig]

Bjorn, little update added!

Thanks for reminding me - and will keep on reporting - including the times we're thrown out :D

(Smart people those guys and gals, no stuffy title-centric-defend-hierarchies there!)

[john]

Have been busy lately and was unaware that I'd inspired a series of posts. Having read them, I was still struggling to grab the concept fully (due again to my not speaking the language of programmers for want of a better phrase).

But this post and the subsequent one about potential client meetings have for me been more revelatory - as you suggested before, once someone sees what thingamy actually does it will become much easier for them to grasp the concept.

So I'd suggest that more examples of "pitches" combined with key elements being related back to the your posts about what thingamy is NOT (a good approach by the way in my opinion) will add to everyone's understanding.

For me, the phrase internal corporate wiki has slammed into my head - does that capture any of it?

[sig]

John, good to hear! And yes, not too far from an "open internal corporate wiki" was the thinking.

I agree fully: Thingamy is an idea, and approach, a way to do things first and foremost - with a product to implement - thus painting the detailed images of the approach in practice is the right thing to do.

Now, blogging openly what one is planning before a meeting with a client is obviously not "what one is supposed to do"! But why not I say... allows me to play with the ideas, even get a helping hand, and if meeting goes wrong (which can happen of course!) then I'd better include that and learn in full openness ;)

Here I should quote Scott Adams when talking about giving speeches to large crowds: "If I’m going to embarrass myself, I want witnesses, and lots of them. The entertainment value seems wasted if only one person notices."

Suspect the day a potential client throws me out you'll get that here...

BTW, the client in question in this post responded afterwards to the SI with this: "if we could get a system going that looked like what Sigurd blogged that would be fine" :D

[john]

Phew - I'm not as dumb as I was beginning to feel! And I'm not surprised that the client reacted like that - all that should matter to them is that they get a solution that improves their life/business. If they start telling you how to get there, then maybe they're a client you can do without.

[Jeff the Poustman]

"If they start telling you how to get there, then maybe they're a client you can do without."

Good point John.

I'd add that if *they* start telling *you* how to get there, aren't roles being reversed? I'd have thought you generally bring in an outside voice so you can get input. Unless they were just hiring a programmer to code their pre-existing notions.

I wonder if that isn't often why consultants are hired. Ouch.