I always like when someone suggests, "I won't be able to do it".

The other day I was in the middle of something and overheard someone say, "He won't be able to finish it tonight" — I was so energized by it!

And here comes the context...

I have acquired some property and building anything permanent is a few years off; in the meantime I want to set up a "Glamping" site so we can enjoy the call of nature in relative comfort, as well as have many of the amenities that make up modern life.

Glamping /ˈglæmpɪŋ/ :

noun: a form of camping in which participants enjoy physical comforts associated with more luxurious types of holiday.  Word Origin — blend of glamorous + camping.

This will involve a large festival tent, queen sized bed, a wood stove, bathroom facilities (including a shower with hot water), an outdoor kitchen and sitting area, as well as available solar power. The only thing that will be lacking is running water  — I suppose I will have to rough it.

As with everything you have to start at the beginning, and in this case the beginning is a platform for the festival tent to rest on. In this particular case the whole thing is meant to be semi- permanent, so the plan is to make the platform out of nine 6' by 6' sections, bolt them together, and put decking on top... this offers the option of dismantling the platform to move at a later date — It was a conscious decision to compromise some stability for portability. I needed 54 (2" x 4" x 6') pieces of pressure treated wood, a bunch of wood screws, a chop saw, and a drill to build what would make up the frame of the 324 square foot platform. Each section would consist of two 2" x 4" x 6' pieces and four 2" x 4" x 69" pieces (3" cut off a 6' piece).

The assembly process started at about six o'clock on a Friday night.

As you can appreciate the first couple of sections took time to assemble as we worked out optimizing the process; overall it wasn't a difficult activity but rather repetitive and definitely tedious. As my helpers began to fade into the background and as talk of having dinner started, I overheard someone utter the words, "He won't be able to finish it tonight". Ultimately, after a quick dinner, I found myself alone in the garage finishing the remaining sections. By ten o'clock all nine sections were complete, the person who suggested that I wouldn't be able to finish all the sections was long gone, and I was now ahead of schedule; attaching the nine sections the next day would be a relaxing activity.

Was any of this difficult? Not really, but it was an exercise in advanced planning, having the right tools, and the desire to get it done. What was said became the motivator to "get it done ahead of schedule".   

In the end, my little project offered up the components for getting something done —

• Planning (this includes a time and event schedule).
• The right tools (or resources).
• The desire to do it. 
• The motivation to get it done.

It seems motivation is the fuel that makes something happen, and for me, when someone suggests, "I can't do something", it seems to be motivation of the high-octane variety.

Don't ask me why.

iamgpe

Sales versus Marketing... a narrative that is getting old.

The other day I was trying to explain the Sales and Marketing function to a friend who is a hard core "finance guy"; as I went about doing so, I couldn't help but flippantly say —

"When things are going well (meaning revenue) Sales gets the credit; when things aren't going so well Marketing gets the blame" 

We both laughed... but surprisingly not that hard.

I could not help but think of a conversation between a seasoned commercial leader and a marketing manager where I heard the manager say, "I understand what you are saying from a sales perspective but marketing is different, and we are going to do this..." As I was listening to the marketing manager I actually screamed in my head, "No, no... nooooo. The commercial leader is correct, and you are not different... focus on the customer, the customer's needs, and work together to generate revenue!" 

I should point out why I have earned the right to have an opinion on this topic. My career (30 years and counting) has been in both Sales and Marketing (almost 50-50), and I have received my fair share of credit and blame; for right or for wrong, I feel I have some insight worth considering. Academically, marketing is the business discipline that encompasses "Product", "Price", "Place" and "Promotion" (The 4 Ps); within the "Promotional Mix" is the sales channel... and make no mistake, this channel is extremely important — Why you may ask? It's because sales is one of very few groups in business that has an intimate and personal understanding of the customer, and is able to communicate complicated messages to generate revenue.   

And for anyone who doesn't think revenue is king, you should go ask any investor(s) you have to offer some insight regarding this point.

In my mind, the only thing that is different between Sales and Marketing is the levers available to each group, and maybe the degrees of separation their activities can be from revenue generation. The objectives of Sales and Marketing are the same — Engage with the customer, offer the appropriate product(s) and/or service(s) to meet the customer's need(s), and generate revenue. I very much appreciate the complexity to do all of this, but in the end it does boil down to this.

Many years ago a Sales Leader* was at a marketing retreat and was asked to speak about the relationship between Sales and Marketing. He was elegant, insightful, complimented his marketing partners, and offered insights on the sales team. At one point he compared sales to a "brochure" that talked back, had opinions, and offered ideas. He went on to say that some in marketing see themselves as "the great orchestrators of all things marketing, and frankly don't like rebuttal from one of their channels". He very eloquently suggested that this was the wrong perspective and that the sales team was a wealth of customer insight and ideas, and it's crucial to work together for success. Besides he went on to ask, "Don't we all have the same objective to engage with customers, offer the appropriate product(s) and/or service(s) to meet the customer's need(s), and generate revenue?" Fifteen years later his perspective still resonates for me —The narrative should always be Sales and Marketing.

So if your narrative is Sales versus Marketing, I strongly suggest you work to change this because no one wins when there is a dysfunctional relationship between Sales and Marketing, It's hard enough to generate revenue at the best of times.. just ask anyone in either Sales or Marketing. And if you're asking how to go about changing the narrative, I suggest you start with Sales and Marketing Leadership because in the end this is a leadership issue... on both sides. 

Let's not even get into those finance people who ask us about our latest expense report.

iamgpe

* His title was Sales Leader but in reality he was just a Great Leader... full stop.

Sometimes when the building is on fire...

Wouldn't it be great if "everything" worked out perfectly one hundred percent of the time... all of the time?

Well we know that doesn't happen; the same as we know that "everything" doesn't work zero percent of the time. On average I would say the range is somewhere between 60% and 80%; yes it may venture below or above once in a while, but this is a pretty good range on a daily basis. I also know I'm not presenting any science or hard data to support what I say, but I suspect you are probably thinking to yourself, "That sounds about right". 

As I suggested, sometimes it goes "really right", and the celebrations and accolades commence... but sometimes it goes really wrong, and that is a much different story — Anger, blame, despair, confusion, finger pointing, did I mention anger, and of course frustration. Sometimes it is just so broken it can't be easily fixed.

A number of years ago, in one of my various professional iterations, I found myself involved with a very messy transition where two fundamentally different companies were coming together; different systems, different cultures, different products, and different leadership philosophies — There were many things going on and much to do. In one of the more trying periods of this transition, a leader was offering a perspective on the situation to his team and was trying to alleviate the growing state of frustration in the group. He was the king of the analogy, and as he was offering insight as to how to work through the situation he said,

"Sometimes when the building is on fire you let it burn and move on to something that you can fix."

By no means was he advocating giving up or not taking on the difficult challenges — What he was saying was sometimes when it is so broken (or dysfunctional), it is best to recognize it for what it is, minimize it's impact, and move onto something you can fix. By doing this you:

• Identify and escalate the really big issues and problems in which good resources are being thrown after bad. This forces the need to step back and reassess the situation.
• Keep people focused on situations that can actually be fixed, and in doing so "move the needle forward".
• Prevent people from focusing on the negatives, and get them looking towards the positive energy of accomplishment.
• Remind everyone that it's all about prioritization and almost always about the net gain. In the end some fires will rage on, but more will have been put out.

It also should go without saying that you should not play with fire unless you have to because if you aren't very careful you can get burned.

Prevention, as they say, is everything.

iamgpe