Strategy - Have You Hired a Million Monkeys?

“We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.” - Robert Wilensky

I was asked to observe a group of people today who have been tasked with solving a particular problem but who up to this point seemed unable to solve the problem despite the amount of time invested in it and despite glowing references of their past successes.

After watching them participate in a fascinating but pointless stream-of-consciousness session for about an hour (I was asked to observe, not participate), I asked my client if they had ever heard of the one million (or infinite) monkeys theorem:

A monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time, or an infinite number of monkeys hitting keys at random, will almost surely type a given text, such as the complete works of William Shakespeare.

When they indicated that they had, I commented that they were observing the theorem in practice and that if they had an infinite amount of time, they would eventually hit upon a solution.

They weren’t happy to hear this but they had asked me to tell them what they needed to hear and not what they wanted to hear.

More and more often I see people and organizations attempting to solve problems using random execution with no awareness regarding end goals, intentions, objectives, resource availability, resource leveraging, environ concerns, constraints, deadlines, etc.   Many people don’t seem to know why these elements matter (despite their vehement protests to the contrary) nor do they seem to know how to create the strategic and tactical roadmaps that illustrates how one gets “from here to there”.

It is certainly not for lack of available information.  We are overloaded and overwhelmed with theories, best practices, methodologies, frameworks and the like for how to solve most problems.

The reasons for inappropriate or inadequate problem solving are many and diverse.  A quick Google search reveals a bazillion theories as to why such problems exist and how to compensate for or nullify them.  I can cite a number of cute sayings, expressions, theories and cartoons (I am guilty of having done so on occasion) as to why this problem is still so pervasive.

But for all the explanations out there, there is something that I don’t see enough people talking about.

It’s in how problem solvers are evaluated and selected

For many organizations, their quick-hit interview or selection processes don’t objectively determine whether the person or organization being considered can actually solve problems consistently.  A candidate’s past performance in solving problems may be based on luck or specific context as much it was on process and knowledge and therefore asking a few questions or asking people to fill out an exhaustive (or exhausting) RFP often doesn’t differentiate between luck and predictable consistency.

It’s like the worthlessness of many of the “top x under x” designations that many people seem to tout, impressive sounding until you realize that for many of them, their ability to win the moniker was based as much on how well they self-assessed themselves as it was on any measurable criteria.

And so the next time you are selecting candidates to solve large, complex or high profile problems, you can entertain yourself with glossy brochures, slick presentations, self-professed “intellectual giants”, worthless, pie-in-the-sky “what was the toughest problem you ever solved” questions, goofy (pointless) “who’s the smartest hominid in the room” questions, questionable “one size does not fit all” psych evaluations or massive but often meaningless RFP processes …. or … you can pick up one of your toughest problems, march it over to a candidate’s facility, throw it on the table and observe how they tackle it.

Doing the latter will often provide better insight than the former as to whether you are hiring problem solvers or a million monkeys.

If you think you don’t have the time to do this, you might be kicking yourself at some point as you wait for words of wisdom to emerge from the monkey house.  While your problems won’t be solved, the upside is that you can pay them in bananas.  The downside is that some people may consider you (and not the people you hired) to be the biggest monkey of all.

And unless monkey business is your business, I don’t think the downside is what you really want.

What do you think?

In service and servanthood,

Harry

The Bottom Line

The quality and effort invested in your evaluation process must always be commensurate with the scale and impact of the problem you are trying to solve.  The crop you harvest is always reflected in the quality of the seeds that you sow and how you nurture them, not just the length of the growing season.

Client Notice

This blog was written with the encouragement of the client in question.  No clients were injured in the writing of this blog. :-)

Strategy and Degrees of Insanity

I have a new plan to make the world indebted to me.

Every time someone offers me a penny for my thoughts, I will give them my two cents worth and will then invoice them for the difference.

Sounds insane, doesn’t it?

But is it any more insane than the various forms of strategy that many people and organizations embrace?

Take for example, the intention of traveling from San Diego to 60 Madison Avenue in New York City and the need to produce a strategy and a tactical roadmap to get me from my point of origin to my destination.

How do some people describe the solution necessary to accomplish this?

Scenario 0 – No Formal Approach At All

It is surprising how many people and organizations still believe that the following is a strategy ….

Or this ….

Or this (wandering blindly, potentially causing them to look like the thing they are trying to pin the tail on) ….

Or this (in absence of everything else) ….

…. when relying on these alone usually produces this.

Hopefully someone else’s lack of appropriate strategy and tactics doesn’t put you on the sacrificial table.

Lewis Carroll expressed this conundrum perfectly in this insightful quote from “Alice in Wonderland”:

“ One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. “Which road do I take?” she asked. “Where do you want to go?” was his response. “I don’t know,” Alice answered. “Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter. ”

Scenario 1 – Irrelevance of Solution

Assuming a strategic intention and tactical roadmap exist, a solution may look like this and the owner will display it with great pride.

Unfortunately, the roadmap of China provides zero information of relevance to get me from San Diego to NYC although the details do look very impressive, especially to outsiders or people who have no context for the problem or the desired solution.

Scenario 2 – Overly Generalized View of the Goal

Some people have a general idea of the destination but define it too vaguely to hit it with any level of success.  They may also be ignoring the importance of knowing where they are starting from, thus missing critical contextual information.

Scenario 3 – Overly Detailed / Narrow View of the Goal

Or

Some people have such a myopic view of the destination that they can describe it in incredible detail but have no context for anything else of relevance around it which would help them get to the destination (and in this case, they still don’t have the context of where they are starting from).

Scenario 4 – Solution Too High-Level

Excellent.  I can now see where I am and where I need to go, but what happens in between, the strategic plan and the tactical roadmap, defining the most effective way to get to my destination when and how I need to get there, are invisible.

Scenario 5 – Solution Too Low-Level

I can now see the path that takes me from where I am to where I need to go.  Unfortunately, I am also overwhelmed with a lot of other details that mean nothing to me and in fact may make my journey much more resource intensive or complicated.

Scenario 6 – Improper Resources

Oftentimes when a solution is required that has quick timing requirements or other significant resource needs, many teams need one of these to implement their solution in an appropriate manner ….

…. but are given one of these (wrong delivery medium and / or inappropriate resource availability) while being warned not to let people down.

Scenario 7 – Improper Resources … Again

The converse of scenario 6 also exists, where the solution would have been satisfied with this ….

…. but is complicated when someone insists upon this ….

…. or this ….

…. driving the complexity, time estimates, costs and other resource needs up significantly and unnecessarily.

Scenario 8 – Over Planning

Don’t be like this city that was teased by The Tonight Show. :-) Eventually one must translate intentions and planning into action and results(positive ones, hopefully).

Scenario 9 – Communication

Assuming that a great solution has been designed, communicating it in such a way that it is understood and acted upon appropriately is an essential ingredient to success.

There are many other important elements!

The bottom line is this.

Intelligent strategy and tactical roadmaps don’t happen by accident and even once they are in-hand, having them doesn’t automatically imply that they are appropriate or adequate for the situation at-hand.

Using processes such as backcasting (click on the diagram below) or some other formal, structured, vetted process is essential to success in this arena.

To believe otherwise is setting yourself up for failure …. which inevitably becomes a success opportunity for someone else.

And no matter how beautiful the strategy looks, the following is always true:

"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results" -Winston Churchill

Which side of the failure / success equation would you rather be on?

Do you do what is necessary to accomplish this?

Are you sure?

How do you know?

Intelligent strategy and tactics are an art and a science. 

How do I know?

Offer me a penny for my thoughts and I will tell you. :-)

In service and servanthood,

Harry

Facts –The Downfall of Many Dreamers

A friend of mine once said that the best way to end a meeting that was going nowhere with a bullet was to suddenly yell “B I N G O and Bingo was his name-o” in the middle of the meeting.  Apparently either the humor of it or the fear that a nutbar was in the room provided more than enough incentive for the meeting to end quickly.

There is another way to kill a meeting or an extended email exchange (or to bring it back on track) when people are passionately expressing their dreams and ideas.

How do you do it?

Ask questions like “why”, “how do you know”, “do you have data to support that” and similar questions.  Equally powerful is the application of Carl Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit as described in his book “The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”.

There are many outcomes that can manifest once the questions have been asked - more permutations than be described easily here.

There are, however, some important elements that will manifest immediately.

1. Does the dreamer embrace the need to be strategically and tactically intelligent in converting their dream into reality and do they take action that demonstrates this?

2. Does the dreamer have the humility to accept that they may not have all the pieces and thus welcome insight from others or do they dismiss the questions with answers like “I just know”?

3. Does the dreamer get irritated that someone would dare interfere with their dream by introducing the notion of facts and realities or do they ignore the questions altogether and continue expressing their “dream to save the world?”.

The answer to these questions will go a long way to understanding how successful a new venture will be …. or will not be.

Equally important, the answers will speak volumes in terms of whether you should get involved or not - whether you should invest your gifts, talents, strengths, time, money or other resources or whether you should redirect your assets to something more rewarding for you, for others and for the planet-at-large.

This is true regardless of whether the dreamer is someone else ….. or it is you.

80% of dreamers will not appreciate the value of such questions and will reject them with varying levels of courtesy and respect (or employ the tool of choice for the passive-aggressive and the insecure ….. silence). The querent will require deep reserves of patience, strength, courage and a sense of self-value to withstand the number and intensity of those rejections.   The querent should take comfort from the fact that they will have saved themselves from participating in the reality that the 80% are doomed to mixed success at best or catastrophic failure at worst.

However, with perseverance, the querent will discover that the 20% who do embrace difficult questions produce valuable, long-lasting relationships built upon a strong foundation of trust, respect and mutually-rewarding results.

Warning 1: If you are the one being asked the questions and you feel a sense of discomfort over them, it is important to analyze the source of the discomfort.  Otherwise, your instinct may be telling you that you are in fact part of the 80%. The feeling of discomfort may actually save you if you allow it to change how you respond to the questions.

Warning 2: Don’t allow the need for facts and data to prevent you from dreaming.  The ability to dream big is essential to success.  However, once the dream has been cast, it is important to allow facts and data to play a major contributing role in the success of the result.

Does your dream or intention stand up to scrutiny?

How do you know?

In service and servanthood,

Harry

Addendum – Feb 26 2013

In a discussion of my blog on Facebook, “Ann” mentioned how two business partners of hers fall into interesting but complementary roles.  One is a dreamer and the other is always asking questions, sometimes producing what she described as “explosive” situations.  However, when two such sides can work together, the big thinker who can think outside the box and the querent, keeping the big thinker honest without constraining him / her, the results can be powerful.  When one side or the other becomes the dominant force, the results of the organization are likely to be diminished.  My blog was directed towards a singular person on top who preferred dreams and no data, an unhealthy balance.

Occupy Wall Street–The Wrong Approach

I have been watching with some concern about the growing number of “Occupy __Insert Name Here___” organizations that have sprung up in recent days in the US, whether it’s “Occupy Wall Street” in my old stomping grounds, Occupy Chicago or any of the other groups.

I am not surprised that people are protesting.  With the growing gap between the haves and the have-nots in America, a lot of people are becoming angry at certain establishments, whether it be large corporations or governments.  They are also becoming afraid of their inability to provide long-term sustenance for themselves and their families.

What worries me is the lack of understanding of how we came to be in this mess and how we will get out of it.

It is true that a number of people in the upper echelons of organizations had greed as their primary motivator as they manipulated a system for their own advantage.  Some, like the Bernie Madoffs in the world, did make their wealth illegally. 

However, many play completely within the rules to build their wealth and so if you want to protest against someone, you need to protest against the people who make the rules and not against the ones who benefit from the rules. 

In addition, there are many wealthy people out there who earned their wealth.  They didn’t step back and wait for a hand-out.  Many put everything on the line to get what they have, all the while playing within the rules.

So people can’t protest based on some “moral” grounds.  Morals are as much open to interpretation today as someone describing to a blind person what the color blue looks like.  There are many protestors who, if handed a million dollars, would suddenly “understand” and would stop protesting.  It is an interesting side of human nature that very few who benefit from the rules have an issue with the rules.

The other concern I have is that there are no actual leaders of these protests.  There are no real stated intentions outside of protesting against “the man” for the reasons of fighting their greed or their alleged intentional oppression of certain classes.

There is no strategy outside of “let’s try to tear the whole system down and see what we can come up with”.

The problem with this lack of a coordinated plan is that it is very similar to the strategy currently in place by many government officials as we wrestle with the current economic crisis.

The current random strategies being deployed, whether it’s the latest flavor of quantitative easing that didn’t work, a hastily concocted round of spending cuts and tax increases that will magically create a bazillion jobs or something else all show that hurried execution without long term strategic planning and smart tactical execution produces a big, complicated mess.

Such a big complicated mess requires careful correction and not additional hasty, random measures, otherwise it produces a larger mess that will continue to grow until it’s too large to fix.

But economics, like nature, is self correcting.  It will eventually correct itself, whether by our hand or by natural evolution.  This correction, which I have often referred to as the Great Correction, will be the great equalizer and will sharply narrow the gap between the haves and the have-nots.  I wouldn’t be surprised if this occurs within the next 9-12 months, with a few worrisome warnings along the way.

So when I look at the “Occupy XYZ” groups springing up, I have one observation for them.

If you want to be the change you wish to see, then do it intelligently, strategically and tactically.

Otherwise your non-strategic, leaderless, random execution is no better than the system you are protesting against and is not going to produce much of any substance.

In fact, if you get too disruptive, you will probably draw the military in to establish law and order and by then, your claims regarding the lack of freedoms or excessive amounts of chaos in one of the greatest nations on earth will actually manifest.

The only difference is that you will have created it.

And by then, your opportunity to influence change will really be diminished.

So I respect the passion and intention of the Occupy Wall Street group.  Once the passion is focused strategically, tactically and collaboratively with an eye towards real solutions, only then are real solutions possible.

Otherwise, we slip deeper into the mess we are in.

And that doesn’t help anyone.

In service and servanthood,

Harry

PS - A Conspiracy Spin

For those that like a good conspiracy theory (and the Occupy Wall Street group probably has people who embrace conspiracy theories), think of this.  Mayor Bloomberg predicted a couple of weeks back that if we weren’t careful, we would start to have demonstrations and / or riots in the streets.

Did Mayor Bloomberg or a colleague:

a. Predict the current situation using his years of political and business experience?

b. Accidentally inspire someone to actually start the demonstrations?

c. Plant some organizers amongst the rioters in order to start the demonstrations, with intention to create trouble for some reason?  (See my blog “Reading the Fine Print” for one suggestion).

Only hindsight will tell us for sure. :-)

PPS – CNN Speaks to Protestors

This was an interesting bit on CNN.  Yes, I know the conspiracy people will say that the media is part of this …. but this is an interesting piece worth watching.

Sometimes You Have to Know When To Quit

Many of us remember our younger days when we were immortal and untouchable, taking on the world at any cost while daring the world to try and stop us.

Back in the 80s, I was one of those rebellious types, having not learned the subtleties and nuances of tackling problems where the reward wasn’t worth the risk.

In one example, a friend of mine who was a tribal chief on a reserve in Canada happened to mention to me that much of the violence on the reserve was as a result of a certain well-known large union that was responsible for running guns, drugs and other contraband through the reserve, which straddled the US-Canada border.

Being young, untouchable and immortal, I set about researching this to bring an end to what I thought was an outrageous series of actions on the part of this union.  Everything was going great and in fact, I managed to prove that there was significant truth to the story.

It was going great until one day, a member of this union called me at my desk in a Government of Canada office, addressed me by name and indicated that he had all the evidence that I needed.  In fact, all I had to do was give him my home address and he would deliver it personally.

This event, being before the days of the web, online directories and such, was quite intimidating.  In addition, as a consultant, my name wasn’t associated with the phone and yet he managed to contact me anyway.  He knew that it probably wouldn’t take much to scare me off and he was right.

Some months later, having forgotten my lesson, I became aware of a large-scale disappearance that had occurred in Western Canada some years before and once again, I was off to the races, determined to figure out what had happened to these people.

I called the RCMP in Ottawa and started to explain the nature of the information I sought when the operator interrupted me and said “I know exactly who you need to speak to”.  A moment later, I was connected to the person in charge of federal investigations for this type of situation and as I started to explain my story, he interrupted me and told me he was quite familiar with it.  He asked for my contact information and promised to call me back with the information I sought.

A little later that day, he did indeed call me back and informed me that the story had turned out to be a hoax.  Ever the inquisitive person (but with less common sense then), I asked him if the file was still open with the RCMP.  When he indicated that it was, I reminded him that if it were a hoax, the RCMP would have closed the file and since the file was still open, it couldn’t be a hoax.  In fact, I went on, now feeling full of myself, I would use whatever it took to get access to the information.  His response was “I told you this is a hoax”.  With my heels dug in, I again repeated “I understand what you are saying but this is in contradiction to your policy of closing files that are known hoaxes”.  He angrily replied, “Look, I’m trying to tell you something. You are not to pursue this further.” and he hung up.

Once again, it took an implied threat to shut me down (or to shut me up). :-)

Truth is, it took a few threats before I smartened up enough to not put myself or my family at risk by doing something stupid that I had no expertise in and that truly offered no measurable return commensurate with the risk.

Returning to the present, when I think about some of the business proposals that people have presented to me in recent months, the scenarios remind me of me back then.  The overlaps are uncanny:

1. Diving into areas where the individual has no area of expertise (or any business to be poking around in).

2. People with so much ego present that they are unwilling to admit that they have no idea what they are doing.

3. Having no measurable, valuable end goals defined, with the hope that if enough noise and activity are generated, good things have to occur as a result.  “After all”, as one person told me, “Good things always happen to good people”.

4. Containing astronomical risks, with no limit to the disaster that can be created for many people while at the same time, containing minimal potential reward at best.

5. The belief that gut instinct alone supersedes all the other laws of nature, including strategic planning, tactical execution and collaboration with others.

6. The fact that it will take a disaster or to be seriously kicked around a few times before the person finally understands that the whole thing is a potentially dangerous waste of time, energy and resources.

That’s not to say that really wild ideas shouldn’t be followed through to explore the potential of real success.

But when such an opportunity arises, know the difference between a great idea containing measurable end goals, smart strategy, sharp tactics, collaboration and excellent execution (all backed up by relevant data and analysis) versus an idea that is backed up merely by the belief that this is the best idea and I am the only person smart enough and passionate enough to do something with it.

Sometimes you need to know when to quit … or better yet … when to not start at all.

Otherwise, someone may be showing up at your door to deliver the news personally … and it probably won’t be good news.

In service and servanthood,

Harry

My Corporate Christmas Gift

It is a common tradition during the holiday season to send customers, prospects, colleagues and friends some variation of a Christmas / Hanukkah / Happy Holidays-type card.

While many of my friends will be receiving the same this year (in e*form of course), for some I want to do something a little different.

I’m thinking this year that I will buy a set of pocket dictionaries, tear out all the pages except for two and send those instead.  It will definitely be of more value to them in the long run.

The two pages will contain the definitions of two words, strategy and tactics, because a lot of people still do not understand the difference between the two.

On the inside of the cover, I will write the following quote:

"Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat." - Sun Tzu

Yeah, I’m a little agitated … mostly because I am witnessing great opportunities go down the drain because people don’t understand the importance of both.

Here is how the Oxford Dictionary defines and contrasts the two:

strategy - the art of planning ….

often contrasted with tactics - a plan for directing operations and movements

In essence, strategy defines the measurable intentions and outcomes (the big picture) and the process of defining the steps necessary to manifest them while tactics includes the detailed components of the plan and how the plan is executed.

Common sense, right?  I thought so too … however …..

Despite the overwhelming amount of knowledge in the world that defines them and describes how to create them, people still confuse the strategy (which defines the end goal) with the tactics (the means to the end) or choose not to define one or both of them before setting out on their corporate journey.

For example, I know of one organization that has aspirations to be a major player in a specific space.  They have no measurable outcomes or intentions at all.  Their “trusted strategy advisor” tells them that the strategy for corporate success is based on how they define their website, right down to how the HTML will be structured to make best use of SEO (search engine optimization).  When you ask them what the organization actually wants to accomplish and by when, they don’t know.  When you ask what their exit strategy is, who their competitors are, who their markets are, etc, they have no idea.

They’re too busy defining the website rollout, without having any idea how the website contributes to the as-yet undefined ultimate objectives and intentions of the company.  So they have confused random execution (poor tactics) with strategy.

Another organization has decided that they are going to roll strategy and tactics together into one package, trying things at random without any measurable outcomes and intentions while hoping at some point to randomly land on success.  Why are they trying this hybrid role of tactics and strategy?  Because they were told that it is impossible to create a plan with measurable outcomes – the best way to achieve your outcomes is to try a lot of things until you are successful (success, in their case, not even being defined until it happens, after which you can define it).  Uhhhhhhh ….. huh?  They have skipped strategy altogether.

Anyone want to take any bets on the success potential of these two organizations?

I agree – which is too bad because they are both onto fantastic ideas.

By skipping the need for strategic planning or by assuming that “my strategy is to start doing stuff and hope it comes together”, they are doomed to lackluster results at best (if they last that long) or failure in the worst case scenario.

If one doesn’t use strategic planning to know where the organization is going and how / why it should get there, then one shouldn’t even start out on the journey.

Once one has a strong strategic intention in place, then one must turn towards creating intelligent tactical roadmaps to bring that strategy to fruition.

All that’s left then is smart execution of the tactical roadmap. :-)

It’s like driving from New York to San Diego without first consulting a map or GPS but knowing that the drive should take 5 days.  It is pointless to set out, drive randomly for 5 days and then stop and look out the window to see where I am.  I have a greater chance of NOT having arrived than I do of being able to breathe the sweet Pacific breeze.

And that is now how I like to travel!

In service and servanthood,

Harry

PS Moving From Strategic Planning to Tactical Roadmaps

Many people struggle with how to create the tactical roadmaps necessary to manifest their strategic intention.  My website contains a complimentary diagram that explains the use of backcasting, a process growing in adoption that helps organizations create the tactical roadmaps necessary for sharp execution of their organization, rather than to randomly knock a plan together and hope for the best.   Please click here to obtain a copy. 

To your success.