An Execution . . . [grin]
Dawud, Do I hear you laughing from sending this question? DAWUD MIRACLE asked me (and you),
What do you feel is necessary to create an effective strategy to promote a business?
I shall rise to the challenge. I shall not be intimidated . . . much.
Strategy and promotion in the last question. Strategy and execution in this one. I’m wondering whether you stay up all night thinking of how to make me work?
Strategy and Execution . . . or Strategy and Tactics
This is a place I could write a book by talking. After five minutes, my husband would say, “Honey, don’t make me live it.” Most publishing projects I’ve worked on, including those I’ve been in charge of, have gotten this wrong in some way.
It’s almost impossible to get the transition from strategy to execution/tacitics just right . . . it’s like becoming a person. In fact, this particular challenge is one of the reasons that I get so jazzed about business. I believe it has made me a better human being — granted, it can go either way.
The main problem that happens is best described this way.
The project is over. Time to do the prototype.
My best tactic is to spend 80% of my time in strategy. I fight myself and everyone on a project to plan deep and build protoypes that are highly defined and agreed upon. Execution is a breeze when everyone knows what the definition of “good work” is, what direction to walk in.
So the way I get from strategy to execution is really to have a strategy, one in which outlines in detail what we are building. The next step is to look at three things closely– People, Quality, and Resources — and how to manage them on a daily basis — Process (information flow).
I actually draw boxes to show how the project will move from one phase to another. In the boxes I write what people and resources I might need to shore things up. I make sure I know what information comes together when.
By the way, I’m no good at doing this in my head or alone. The people involved have to talk it out to make sure that there aren’t gaping holes. When we describe a realistic process, we build in 10% more time for that problem that no one ever expects that always comes.
If I have a clean desk and a schedule for those boxes, when a strategy is planned, I’m more than ready to hit the ground running.
And since this is a one2one conversation . . . and I’m inherently currious . . . to Dawud, (and you too)
I’m sending the question right back.
What do YOU feel is necessary to create an effective strategy to promote a business?.
If you’re reading this, I’d love to hear your answer too.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!
One2One is a cross-blog conversation. You can see the entire One-2-One Conversation series on the Successful Series page.
It’s interesting to note that most projects fail, but none are planned to fail.
When I started my latest project, JibberJobber, I had an idea, which led to a design. I found the right team members and we all got to work.
Communication was free and open, but there was more WORK than communication, partly because we had worked together before, partly because there was no learning curve to get to the first release, and partly because, well, my team members were all water-walkers.
Aside from knowing what we were doing, having the right team, understanding the end goal, having a target date (we gave ourselves 2 months), there was one super-huge critical key. Thanks to an early mentor for instilling this idea in me…
You can’t get hung up on every single little tiny issue. Too many people want to polish and polish and polish and polish… and while htey polish they realize the specs change, so they change and change and change, and polish and… and they never release. They never execute.
I would rather get something useable out quickly, making sure it’s well-tested, and then begin to collect user feedback.
I could have spent 2 years in design and development and QA with JibberJobber, but instead we spent 2 months. Now, after thousands of signups, we have awesome, valuable feedback that is helping give us design better than anything we would have come up with.
So there you go, a long comment to a great question.
Jason Alba
CEO – JibberJobber.com
:: self-serve career management ::
Hi Jason,
The best bet is in ithe middle. I’ve seen so many publishers start running too soon and have to rework things. So the other phrase was
Never time to do it right. Always time to do it over
So if you and I are in the same place. we’re controlling the leadership and that’s the issue.
Liz, I agree… I love the mantra “do it right the first time” as reworking really is quite ugly.
What I refer to in my other comment is doing “enough” and doing it “good enough.” I don’t feel this is cutting corners, or being shoddy. Rather, it’s getting to a certain point, and ready to go to the next point.
But never compromise on the quality… that is why your comments about spending 80% of your time in strategy (which, for me as a developer, means you come out with specs) is so critical.
Jason Alba
CEO – JibberJobber.com
:: self-serve career management ::
Right, Jason. I understand. I talk about whether additional work will add “quality or cost.” The point being that if customers can’t see it, then it’s not quality . . .
Brilliant. Simply brilliant. 🙂
Yeah, Chris! Brilliant when folks can stand to stay with you. A fight when they’re chomping at the bit. 🙂