thingamy

managing trust

What?

Yep, the September issue of the Harvard Business Review has an article - "The Decision to Trust"  - with the angle of "explaining the mental calculations people make before choosing to trust someone".

Written by Robert F. Hurley, it is not a bad article in itself, it makes for a good analysis and offers many good points given it's starting point:

"Roughly half of all managers don't trust their leaders" stemming from a survey of 450 executives by the author. I have no problem in believing that.

Then Hurley goes on to describe his ten factor model for making a decision to trust or not.

That's when I protest. Humbly of course, but sternly.

In my view there is only one factor. One reality, nothing to manage at all, it's binary:

Transparency equals trust.

No transparency, no trust. Complete transparency, complete trust. End of issue. And there is nothing called "half transparency" - one snippet missing, then no transparency and no trust.

If I can see (or think I can, or would be able to) all of what my boss is up to, I'd trust him. Nothing to think over, nothing to manage.

If I know where my kids are and who they're with (and I know those kids) and I know his mobile phone is switched on - then I'm at ease.

If I can look over the shoulders and see whatever my colleagues are up to at any time, well, then I trust they're at it. And I can check if I get the urge to refresh my trust.

I could even trust a bandit if he was completely transparent. Obviously I would also know in what areas I could not trust him, like not giving him my credit card.

And the 50% who does not trust their boss? Of course, there is not much transparency in the current workplace model, organisational hierarchies are not designed with that in mind. I am actually more surprised that 50% actually trust their boss :)

Awast ye scurvy hierarchies! (I say again)

And when I'm at it - please, please do not complicate life when it is simple, it gets so complicated...

logo

What's all this about having a logo? Why the effort?

Going out on a limb to challenge my marketing inclined friends now - John, Hugh, waddyasay:

Every new start-up's first focus; create a cool and outstanding logo. Then of course fill a raft of C-level positions (but that's for another post, you know my views there).

Just spent a few days in San Francisco at the office 2.0 conference which had a whole range of new and cool companies showcasing and demoing their cutting edge products.

I still remember most of the products from the demo, obviously the basic functionality, and even the layout.

I still remember some of the names, but only a few.

But I really cannot remember any of the new logos...

OK, when revisiting the 57 logos on the Office 2.0 conference site I did recognise about two, and of course the Apple, IBM and HPs of this world.

But test yourself:

- What colours are used in the WebEx logo?
- Ditto for IBM, what colour. Sure "big blue", that's an obvious one. Ah, but not, at SAP TechEd IBM's logo (at their booth) was the usual one but in black and white!
- Coca Cola - what do their current logo look like? Honestly, I do not know! I said current BTW, not last year's or the one before that, or... Their classic bottle, now that's another issue, that one I recognise!
- What about Colgate Palmolive? Could you quickly draw their logo? I have no clue. Unilever, their logo please, quickly! But I can pick a Colgate toothpaste tube out in any supermarket with no trouble.
- Microsoft now - is it the word, is it some other logo I cannot recollect, or is it that flag thing? What colours and how are they placed in that flag thing? Or is that one for Windows only?

But do I recognise a Windows screen! Or a Gnome screen. Or an OS X screen.

And I would recognise an Alessi product, or a Marimekko fabric (Finnish textile/fabric design), or some Hartman luggage, or a Grohe faucet, or a USM Haller bookshelf (Swiss office furniture) - but I have no clue as to any of their logos!

I did not even remember all those names off hand, but I had a vivid recollection of what their products look like and even in what shop I saw them last!

The product is the logo. Unless the logo is an intricate part of the product it has little or no value, it can even be counterproductive. My humble view.
Diego, what would you say coming from the product design side?

Now I can hear the protests - we need something that can be easily recognised! To that I say; write the word Microsoft or Coca Cola or Pepsi in any font, in any colour, even penned by a five year old - recognition is immediate. Or walk past a shop window with any of the products mentioned above and you know immediately what you see with no help from name nor logo. That Italian design company, that German bathroom fixture thingie... you know precisely what even if logo nor name comes to mind.

Then I ask, why do all those huge firms redesign their logo so often? How many S.O./Esso/Exxon and Coca Cola and IBM logos have you seen? Is it some sort of evil plan to strengthen the brand through retraining and hard work on the onlooker's hand?

The product is the logo. Make a damned good product that stands out - do not mess with people's mind, let them focus on one thing, the product.

Focus on the ball I say.

The No Asshole Rule

This time Bob Sutton surprised me with his latest (coming) book - The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't - by raising a series of questions that I was not prepared for, and that I just love.

Quite a general interest read this time from the eminent business/management writer - hey my 15 year old picked it up and started reading it with great interest!

And kids should know all about assholes. Even if their "workplace" is less infested with hierarchies.

That is one of the questions that lingered all through the read - how does an asshole pick out his victims? As Sutton points to the workplace-asshole only pesters his boss in less than 1% of the cases, mostly picking his/her direct underlings. Easy prey as they are, and the asshole have little risk of retribution thanks to his/her position.

But then, what about among peers? What's common there?

Coupled that question with my own experience as I had a really hard time to remember any asshole I ever had to endure. Occasional asshole behaviour for sure (including my own I'm afraid, much obliged Bob for prodding me to give that one a serious thought!), even from nice people, good friends (still good friends) and of course the odd stressed bus/plane/train passenger - but not one certified long term asshole that I had the pleasure to know came to mind.

Hmm, first thought was of course "am I one of them?!". Ouch.
And that is a really great aspect of the book, kick your butt to think over you own behaviour - are you a certified asshole, an occasional one, do you handle assholes or do you add to the venom and stupidity? Most useful.
Luckily Sutton supplies you with a self-test (and then suggests that you better double check the results with somebody else) and many other clues - so I seem not to be a certified one at least. Hey guys out there, any other views on that?

Second thought would be that I never really had a boss. That explains a lot. OK, I did a few times prior  to and during studies, but I was so detached from the situation (never dependent on the job) I simply left if I was less than perfectly happy. Not much of a viable asshole victim I would presume.

Third is more of a question: As much/some of the certified asshole drive comes from competitiveness (the self-test questions is full of clues of that) I wonder if not some of the phenomena is a culture issue. Not armed with a single scientific proof I do have a hunch that the North American society do put competitiveness higher in all rungs of life than the European ones from where I hail. As said, it is just a question.

Still I have not known a single one. Then I remember I was never really bullied at school either, sporadically an effort was made, but nothing had to be endured.

That's when Sutton's chapter five came to my help with it's "survival tips" and the theme of "small wins" and "ignore and avoid".
Using the fact that most bullying happens downwards in the hierarchy and coupling it with the "seize bits of control" method as suggested in the book, I read between the lines that insecurity and lack of control can act as a magnet for constant bullying and certified asshole behaviour. Perhaps "control over you own life" as in reality and as displayed (dogs smell fear) would be the ultimate first line of defence.

Ahh, that's it. The few times I've been a victim for surprising asshole behaviour was when I was less in the normal control of things, actually a bad one in a board of directors situation came to mind when the winds were not exactly blowing my way, and I felt it and displayed it. A clear invitation to potential assholes, even the occasional one as in that case - and as Sutton suggest will happen over and over again, I certainly joined and enhanced the stupidity unprepared as I was.

Some of the examples in the book of companies/firms that have no asshole rule are excellent and definitely strengthens my belief that the company culture is what it's all about, no single rule will help, only a holistic, complete, no-room-for-doubt culture can work. And that applies to everything, not only keeping assholes at bay I would say.

I found two issues in the book where I have a tendency to disagree, perhaps not strongly, but still (another trait of good books in my mind):

In chapter 5 - Tips for Surviving Nasty People and Workplaces - Sutton suggests (among many methods) revenge as a viable and fair method with some hilarious examples. Still I react to that notion, for me revenge is infantile, crude and worst; an invitation to escalation of any bad situation. Sure, if it works it makes one feel good and you would have a great story to tell to colleagues, but perhaps not worthy of a highly developed culture or individual?

In chapter 6 - Virtues of Assholes. Some good examples are supplied, still I get this urge to argue that the examples given (in particular the chap who's boss of the firm that produced the thing I'm typing this on) are situational assholes, people who are so completely consumed by some ideas and tasks that combined with a definite lack of social skills it creates overwhelming asshole moments. Then I read the self-test questions where disdain, contempt and glee over the misfortune of others seems to be the driving force for the true certified asshole - and that is after all something completely different even if some of the results are similar. I think I could live with the first type, but definitely not with the last.

All in all a most enjoyable read, a source for many thoughts for a long time and even a kick in the butt to be much more aware of own (hopefully rather rare) stupid behaviour moments! And that makes it worth it, so look forward to February 22 next year, just go out and buy it.

Now I have to give the book back to my kids...

random notes from SAP TechEd

Wow, awesome.

A large, established, competitive firm opened up it's doors to a bunch of non-vetted and definitely uncontrollable bloggers. And not only it's doors, they gave us full freedom to roam, ask, poke - no restrictions.

I think some of the "press handlers" were a bit uneasy at some of the press meetings, I mean when you invite people like Dennis, James and David you get somewhat unexpected questions in a somewhat more frank form than they're used to... a good sign though that they stayed behind and kept the discussion going after the classic press people left the room. Kudos to the PR/Press department for opening up!

It was not a corporation we met, it was people, smart, engaged and open people - herewith a big thank for spending time with us and being so open to Marilyn, Craig, Mark, Mark, Amir, Charles, Frank, Frank, Bill and many, many others. And Thomas of course.

And then we found a firm which does a damned good job, executes proficiently, who's serious about what it does and which does many things right. Respect I say.

Myself, having a direct interest in the enterprise software space, albeit with a slight twist (or perhaps twisted sight some may say) poked around, queried, discussed and never stopped. Much appreciated, SAP has earned a few stars in my book now.

For more helicopter view of what we learned I'd rather refer to Dennis, James, Prashanth and David - I'll stick to my very own personal views in the light of my take on and interest in enterprise software.

I'll stick to a much more biased analysis, a kind of SAP vs. thingamy tack (just had too!) so here goes:

Marketing departments are marketing departments (sigh), but I would suggest that the SAP strategists put on the critical hat and re-read some of the stuff, there might be things to challenge, or be challenged by:

"World of business is driven by change" found it's way into a promotional video snippet before the first keynote. Me, I would suggest to my potential customers that they "drive the change". More fun and often more profitable to be leader than follower. Sun Tzu and Game Theorists would agree with me - the one who prompts the reaction is in control...

Defending their "pre packaged" approach they have stuff like "Should the prime rate ever come in al dente, we'll make one kind of software solution" - come, come I say, strategies springs out of the same question "What value to deliver to what customer and how to be different" leading to same business model task "how to use resources to deliver that value and keep some yourself". If your software was designed to develop from that end and not from the nitty-gritty accounting or inventory end of things, then the software would be one kind. But we do know where SAP comes from.

Then I tried to get my messy head around the immensity of SAP and understand why it is so complex, even tried to understand if I'm completely off piste when I say that it should be possible to simplify. Really simplify.

So here's my rough and simple take on that:

Organisational hierarchies as model + acceptance of applications + event or transaction based processes = huge complications.

Let me expand...

Organisational hierarchies, I see these as having one single purpose - to deliver the workflow, implement the business model. Organisational hierarhy is a model in itself developed in times when we had no IT and based on human nodes and their old-hat communication modes.
Using IT to model a model that was modelled using non-IT methods must end up rather... eh... messy.

Applications are true mashups of tasks. Your word processor is used for creating an offer, make a report, order a widget, whatnot. Having "workstations" like this for multiple tasks creates much back and forth, loss of flow, messy data and of course - complication again.

Event- or transaction-driven workflow is interesting as it produces two sets of data objects per task - one order and one report / sheet/ document. 23 tasks and you have 46 data objects - hello reconciliation and be embraced by much complexity. As Frank mentioned to me, Berlin had 12,500 forms, now with SAP's help they pared it down to 3,500. Well gentlemen, take 21 unique objects and you can build a few billion different forms... or use one object only to drive the flow, well... hint, hint.

Take three sources of complexity and mix'em up, well, it gets hugely complex. And complexity inevitably leaves "white spaces".

Funny thing, or rather quite sensible thing, SAP uses those white spaces to their own advantage creating a Partner Ecosystem in the same swat - effectively enlarging their salesforce and powerbase tremendously.

IWC Shaffhausen and Blancpain get paid for immensely complex watch movements, SAP ditto, but an IWC watch is indulging in luxury while run your business systems should not pay for such luxury or what?

Disclosure time: Thingamy skips the organisational hierarchy leaving all workflows to be delivered by the system, rips the tasks out of the applications and puts them where they belong in the flows and lets the things/objects drive the flows with objects to represent one on one (data to real world object) to build any form, sheet, document, report you want when report-time comes.

In the Wednesday keynote Shai Agassi revealed that they introduced the BI Accelerator, in essence moving the complete database into accessible memory thus increasing speed 100 fold. Good thinking I say! Of course we've been there since our inception six years ago... in addition we built our own OODB straight into the core so we look at even more than the 100 fold.

Governance, Risk and Compliance. Good stuff, and most important of course. Spending some time at one of their "pods" with that heading I found that SAP is taking much of the same path as we're taking (with thingamy), except we focus a bit more on absolute true history of objects and true transparency as that in itself delivers instant ethics and moral. Hey, even a thief would think twice before stealing in front of everybody. In fact we build more on this "look over the shoulder" thinking instead of pre-set flags and walls as SAP does.
No bad idea to have flags, but it requires much management of specific rules - and no rules are ever completely fool-proof either. Methink it has a slight tendency towards creating a false feeling of security - sounds nice, not so efficient in reality as any wall, fence or rule has holes. So we'll stick to the notion of real historical truth transparency as it prepares us for the next regulation as well, whatever it is.
Where we are identical is the importance of process - do not offer temptation, good thing that this is easily fixed by process.

SAP has in my mind one big advantage in the world of middleware and SOA - they have a core, a platform in it's heart. Many will disagree with me here, but if you have one place for much of the raw data and apply logic to it on the outside you loose less and have more power. Too bad that it covers so few of the processes a business is made out of.

But hey, those whitespaces is what creates their grand Ecosystem!

That core by the way is not very young, thus it may lack a few built in standards - support for XML-RPC in the core for example (as we do of course). That makes for many bespoke interfaces to the outside world. But what can they do? They've got what they have and that is that.

Just have to love the SDN and BPx communities, well done SAP. Of course the BPx (now 50,000 members after only a few weeks, SDN has 700,000 +) interest me, the bridge between business and IT as they said.
Luckily I was introduced to Marilyn who's responsible for the BPX community - and not being able to keep mum I gave her a quick intro to our rather radical take on processes (thing driven / ball is the game instead of event / transaction driven). Marilyn being in the market for provocative messages wanted me to join the community, to which I was flattered of course.
Mark though, soon found out that I might be a tad too close to becoming a potential competitor dragged his feet - which I do understand! BTW, challenged him to mention one business function that thingamy could not cover... for a beer... the bet is still running :)

As a wrap up, completely sticking my neck out now - the question you may ask, if I'm right, or even half right, or a quarter right, would SAP be able to change and go more in the direction I'm pointing to?

Sure they could, but it would mean rethinking and ditching their core, kill the Ecosystem and live with lower margins (I'm asking much, much less). It's been done before, sometimes it must be done - but the investors with less than five, six, ten year patience would not be happy... ;)

the game follows the ball

A three hour pit stop time on the French Riviera between San Francisco, Idaho (don't ask) and Amsterdam...

Many thanks goes out to Ismael who did an amazing job with Office 2.0 - and have to mention Julia (found no link) who was there wherever I looked at all times in full control of all aspects with an amazing air of detached leadership.
Good stuff guys!

Many cool products to be seen, all nicely summed up in the flash demo session.

Not wanting to do any ranking, but the products that I still remember were all some strain of collaboration tools.

I am a tad preoccupied with process, mostly because it enables records and allows methodology to better whatever you need to do. 
Thus I inevitably ran the products I saw through a mind-based theoretical flip to proper process run solution instead - like in "how would I have designed that in thingamy".

In theory I succeeded each time.

I can hear the protests now. Collaboration is creative, collaboration gives freedom, collaboration is what we want - pooh on you to suggest structured process restricted collaboration!

Hang on a sec I say, process is nothing but sequence. One thing after the other. One mail follows the last one. You say something, I respond, then you quip back, etc. If not in sequence it becomes rude. Hey even soccer, football, squash, baseball are sequence-based.

The game follows the ball.

Just like sequence-process-workflows in thingamy, the ball is the object that you want to add value to. The game follows the ball.

Process is an OK animal, and as it delivers accountability, framework and riverbeds for flows - why not go there?

random tourist notes

A bit busy these days, currently at the Office 2.0 conference in San Francisco... what I'm doing there you ask?
Well, hmmm, being a bit against the concept of applications and seeing them being delivered online instead does not do it for me have to admit.

But Ismael is doing a grand job, and getting a iPod Nano with all the conference information on it instead of yet another stupid bag with papers was a superb twist!

But it is a great opportunity to see lots of new faces and meet many that I've been communicating online with for long. Nothing is like a bit of face to face with a beer in hand!

Next week will be SAP TechEd in Amsterdam - then with a couple of days digestive thinking I guess I'll be able to post something of use.

So I'll limit this to some random tourist observations while waiting for the next presentation.

I do like San Francisco a lot!

Nice airport, not much traffic there, and an actual working and comfortable public transport system to get one into town - the BART. Almost Swiss-like that part.

Until I was to buy the ticket: Being a geek-in-training I had a hard time finally admitting I needed help to buy the ticket, but I had to. Here's how that one works - handy if you're ever going here:

First find the fare from the printed sheet on the wall - in my case $ 5.15. Then you find the bill-change machine on the other wall to split your 20 dollar bill into four 5 dollar bills.

Then you feed the machine with two of those, then push the field on the screen that says "deduct a quarter", that will spit out a quarter. Repeat 19 times. The punch the field "deduct a nickel", repeat two times as it spits out two nickels. Now you're at 5.15 so you can choose "print ticket". That was easy was it not? Intuitive or what?

Random note number two: Now I know where European trams go when they die, they go to San Francisco! Really cool 50 year old trams from Milano including nothing but Italian signs - "Uscita" instead of "Exit" and all. Suspect the locals will get real multilingual after a while, nice touch!

More randomness and hopefully more interesting software observations to follow :)

Mt Ventoux

We made it up the hill! And SAP showed muscles (and nimbleness I must add)!

Thomas and Dean drove down from Walldorf on Friday and we met up in Bedoin on Saturday morning - nice temperature (23 C), some clouds, all in all perfect cycling weather.

A quick glance at the mountain did indicate a hat of clouds though, but nothing could stop us now.

First few kms were flat (5% flat), then the 10%s hit us...

Dean decided to find his own pace early and let Thomas and myself go ahead, smart chap Dean. As you can see from the video, everything was fine, 10km/h and smooth pedaling as Thomas and I chatted along.

Soon the chat petered out, then yours truly petered out... and suddenly we were all by ourselves. Not a bad idea, now that all focus was on breathing anyway.

Worst steepness passed, 6 kms left, fog. Wind. Cold fog. 10 degrees Celsius. Focus on leg survival.
Unperturbed, Thomas powered on while I was more into counting snow-drift-markers, slowly, slowly.

Until I heard voices up there somewhere to the right in the white nothingness and I knew I was home, on the top, energy back!

Thomas did the 1,614 vertical meters and 21 distance kms in 1:49 - extremely respectable that (Armstrong managed just over the hour)! I came in 15 minutes later, and Dean a chat and a quick change to warmer clothes later.
Dean and Thomas rolled the way down while I joined the broom wagon for a more civilised ascent.

Being smack in the middle of wine country we just had to do some on-the-farm shopping, and of course the local bike shop chap could tell us that there was a coop, but a Ferme St Pierre a few kms down the road had good! wine. And he was right of course - Paul Vendran himself pottered around and handed over glasses and bottles in a most unhurried manner :)

This will be repeated good folks, suspect we'll do it late spring - and we're open for suggestions - the wiki will remain open.

So no excuses that you're not "in shape", you have more than eight months to get there! And Hamish, no more amusement parks for you for awhile!

Many, many thanks to all of you who donated to the Warchild charity! And you, you know who, whip out that credit card now and go here, some kids will thank you.