Posts in Meandering Genius

Walmart Advanced Vehicle Experience (WAVE) concept truck

There is no “box” at Walmart

Meandering Genius Strategic Planning

Walmart Advanced Vehicle Experience (WAVE) concept truck Have you seen the new Walmart Advanced Vehicle Experience (WAVE) concept truck that is powered by a prototype turbine-powered hybrid engine with a trailer made almost exclusively with carbon fiber, which saves 4,000 pounds?

This is Strategy at its finest and has the world’s number one retailer leveraging their strength–their logistics network–and turning it up a notch.

Clearly Walmart was thinking way out of the box in designing this new semi truck–in fact it appears that they threw the box out in the trash.  Walmart isn’t in the truck building business?

True strategists look outside their realm and outside of what they do today as well as looking at what they are good at.  Recently I talked about the SWOT Assessment and had a lot of “know it all” input from fellow strategists saying that a SWOT is this and a SWOT is that.  Ladies and gentlemen, see the result of a great application of strategy based on a SWOT.  This is why I highlighted some simple tips for you to start using a SWOT effectively.

Heavy-duty trucks spend more time on the road than passenger vehicles, so improving their efficiency can have a major effect on emissions–and their owners’ bottom lines.  That’s why Walmart is getting into the truck-design business with the WAVE.  With its aerodynamic cab, the WAVE certainly doesn’t look like any other large truck currently on U.S. roads and doesn’t operate like one either.

Walmart’s design was achieved in part by placing the driver in the center of the cab.  The steering wheel is flanked by LCD screens–in place of conventional gauges–and there is a sleeping compartment directly behind the driver’s pod.  The WAVE features a range-extended electric powertrain, consisting of a Capstone micro-turbine and an electric motor.  To reduce weight, the entire truck is made of carbon fiber–including the trailer.  Walmart says this is the first example of a carbon-fiber trailer ever produced, and that its 53-foot side panels are the first single pieces of carbon fiber that large that have ever manufactured.  Like the tractor, the trailer was also designed for optimum aerodynamic efficiency.  It features a convex nose, which not only reduces aerodynamic drag but has the added of benefit of increasing cargo space in the trailer.

Take that Peterbuilt and Freightliner!  Ha!  And I thought the MAN Super Streamlined Semi-Truck was cool.  The MAN was designed by truck manufactures, not a super store retailer!

I’ll say it again; use your strengths to overcome your weaknesses.  Then turn threats into opportunities.  Walmart is known for their distribution system–it is what makes them Walmart and it is their biggest strength.  They focused on the threats to that strength and turned it into opportunity.  This is a perfect demonstration of a SWOT in action.

Dealing with the flamers on your blogs

Blogging Meandering Genius

Framers? Darn autocorrect!

Do you have those people that repeatedly flame on your blog? Practically anything and everything you talk about they take the other stance and infuriate you with illogical arguments and sometimes simply wrong information?

How do you deal with them?

I have two primarily.

One is on Facebook. There I tend to get a little political and very pro military with my posts. There is this one guy that almost always adds his two cents, which is totally opposite of the stance I’ve taken in my post. There for a while, he was reeling me into his discussion…argument. I was letting him get to me and I was going off. Then I got to the point where I would simply delete his comment on my post so I could ignore him.

The other is on LinkedIn. He’s a know it all on a strategic planning site that tends to read and comment on every one of my Saturday morning Think Big, Take Small Steps, strategic planning blogs. His comment are always in complete disagreement with my approach that I’m discussing, how his company does this and it’s the only right way, and supposedly he has peer-reviewed articles and that makes him a God. Again, I started off challenging him, but he’s way too arrogant to listen and simply fires back veiled insults across the Internet. I’ve noticed, because I read many of the posts on these groups, that he is like this to everyone, but never seems to share anything himself…just belittle everyone else’s posts. I guess because he’s peer-reviewed, which I’ve never found. Now, I ignore him.

I’ve had people tell me to simply unfriend or unlink to them. I have considered it. Of course, on LinkedIn that doesn’t work. He’s on the group so whatever gets posted, he reads…not being linked to him doesn’t matter.

I have tried to debate the subject with them, but their views are almost purposefully opposite and so far from what I agree with that it seems more of a challenge than it’s worth.

Do you have flamers on your posts and blogs?

How do you deal with these people when they choose to use your avenue as their sounding board?

Do you think that they are honestly trying to add positive information to the conversation, or are they simply miserable people that want everyone to accompany them in their misery?

Skill requirements for today’s workplace

Meandering Genius 1 Comment

Information Technology skills have been in high demand over the past ten to fifteen years and countries like India have capitalized on this, leveraging their people’s desire to grow and their low labor rate.

IT will remain a high demand field into the future, especially with app development and miniaturization of electronics to get everything to the wearable market.

However, IT is a commodity today and the market of IT professionals has become over saturated with available talent, especially with business process outsourcing companies literally knocking down your door to get at your work.

This issue really pressures employees today, especially the Baby Boomers and Gen Xers, to fear daily for the job their doing today and future prospects. Let’s face it, almost anything repetitive is at risk of both outsourcing and automating. And, both options are cheaper and normally improve the service.

So, today, what are the things that are much more difficult to outsource and automate?

That would be Analysis and Problem Solving.

To gain a competitive edge in today’s job market, whether you’re in IT or not, is to build skills in data analysis and problem solving. IT systems can evaluate large pieces of data, if it’s structured, and data can be reported in predetermined manners, but the employee of today can truly demonstrate value if they have the skills of analysis and problem solving.

Additionally, these aren’t overly obscure skills for employees to learn that you have to earn through a degree or spend hours going to training. With a little bit of education, and a fair amount of common sense, you can apply these skills.

Also, these are the type of skills you can apply today in the job you’re doing. You don’t need to find a job somewhere that fits these skills…every job today needs these skills and often we outsource the job because it lacks these two capabilities.

So let’s look at these two items:

Analysis. If you haven’t heard the words Bid Data by now, you’re living under a rock. Companies today aren’t looking at just one piece of data to make decisions anymore, they are tying together everything they have in their company and whatever they can get their hands on to make much more informed decisions.

I’m not proposing you become a big data wizard…that is a specialized capability, although I think that is the new frontier in business. What we lack in most companies is armies of workers who can analyze the data they have in front of them every day.

This means they understand one of the most basic of tools most people have–pen and paper–and can organize and collect the right information to start to make decision. Additionally, workers today don’t need to know any in depth data analysis tools like Minitab that your local process improvement expert uses, but the everyday Microsoft Excel program is your powerful weapon in this new normal.

To properly analyze data, all employees today need to have a small, but effective tool bag to work from. They need to know things like affinity and tree diagramming…sounds difficult, but it’s a simple skills. This works well with data, information, and ideas. Additionally, there are seven basic charts that every employee needs to be able to create, read, and understand: bar chart, line chart, histogram, Pareto chart, control chart, box plot, and radar or spider chart. The Pareto chart is a type of histogram that combines both bar and line charts together. Pareto, box plot, and radar charts allow you to compare data for deep analysis. Control charts are much more powerful line charts. Along with this skill, you need to learn the anatomy of charts and how to use multiple axis’ to analyze and report data.

Lastly in the analysis realm, the employee of today’s workplace needs to know root cause analysis. It’s one thing to be able to review and report data, but to truly use data to dig to the root cause is powerful.

Problem Solving. The start of problem solving is problem identification. Being able to even see that you have a problem is the first step in problem solving.

Problem solving, to be effective, must follow a repeatable process. There are many problem solving approaches that people can learn, but understanding the core of PDCA is pretty powerful. Once you understand how all–and I do mean all–repeatable methodologies are based on PDCA, you’ll have cracked the base code on the problem solving system.

Another key component to problem solving, which is in line with following a problem solving approach, is to be able to establish and follow a project. A project is a series of steps that have a beginning and an end. Effective and efficient problem solving works best when performed in a project. Once you can think in project speak, you can plan out how you will solve any and every problem and you’ll be able to tell anyone how long it will take and where you are in the process of solving the problem.

The biggest key to problem solving is being able to define the problem and the goal, without trying to solve the problem up front. Many of us think that we are really good problem solvers, because we jump into a problem once identified and immediately put a fix in place. I’m here to ell you that you are part of the problem. Learning true data-driven problem solving and applying it, is a skill. Fighting fires is not.

These two skills of analysis and problem solving are key in today’s workplace and they are also very absent! Both compliment each other and they are fairly easy to learn. Mastery is another thing, but with time everyone can get there. Be a data-driven problem solver and you’ll never fear again the threat of outsourcing and automation. You’ll have a skill set that you can apply in any job anywhere.

I am going to start a weekend blog much like my Think Big, Take Small Steps, weekly blog to focus on this topic. I will walk through both of these skills and feature a specific approach or tool. I plan to post this blog every Sunday and apply graphics and screen shots to help with the understanding. Follow my blog to keep up with the story.

What’s best for who…Lean, Six Sigma, Design for Six Sigma

Meandering Genius Process Improvement

Lately this item has come up for discussion. What is the best approach to process improvement, should we teach all, how much of each should you employ?

From a practitioner’s point of view, this matters, but in reality, out on the floor, managers and workers need Common Process Sense. Recently, one of the managers I work with went through Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt training which is much more Six Sigma than Lean. She had already taken Green Belt because that was all that was available, but that course overwhelmed her.

What she came back talking about we’re tools. That’s great, but I realized that she’s not going to be a practitioner, she needed real world ideas that she could apply immediately when she returned to her office.

I believe that true Lean has more common sense approaches, but they can be just as confusing, especially when they use odd names and such, like Huddleboards, Gemba Walks, Ohno Circle, 5S, A3, Hoshin Planning, etc. Let’s face it, true Lean requires a Rosetta Stone course to fully understand.

Long ago, the Air Force created the Air Force Quality Program. They had some very basic courses that focused on Awareness of the program, how to manage Teams and use Basic Tools. The Air Force program was around from about 1990 to 2000–about 10 years. The basic common sense training that I started with is what really got me involved. I understood it and was able to apply it every day.

These are the basic skills that people working on the front lines need to know…they need to be taught and then mentored through application.

Process Mapping. Everyone needs to know how to write down their step-by-step process so that anyone can pick it up and follow it. I’ve said it before that leaders tend to say “Map to X level,” but that’s based on a belief that process improvement practitioners are doing the mapping…no. Everyone that works in a repetitive process should have a process map that outlines every single step of the process written in narrative form and if it uses a computer, the narrative should include screen shots and file locations. If there are physical steps that need to occur, then photos of those physical activities should be included. In Lean you would call that Visual Work. No one can tell me that this is a waste of time for the person doing the work. Additionally’ no one but the people doing the work and the managers that manage the work need these process maps. You don’t need any special software to do this…you can write it down with paper and pencil or use a simple word editor.

Basic Workload Data. Now that I know exactly what I do, I can actually identify key workload data that I would like to capture. There are three things that I want to know…they never vary from process to process.

Time: What is the average time it takes to perform this process from start to finish. Every cell phone today has a stop watch, use it. Here is the very simple way that I recommend you time your process. Assign an individual that will time an individual that will perform the process. Don’t change these people until you’re done. Every day the process is performed, take three timings of the process every hour that the process is performed. Unless only one person does the process, collect timings from at least two people and a maximum of four if a lot of people perform the same process. Make sure the person timing is the same every time. This seems like a lot of work, but it really isn’t and if you don’t know the true average time it takes to do the process, you really have no idea what is happening. Add up all the timings and divide by the number of timings you have…simple average. Find someone that knows how to analyze data, preferably with Minitab, and have them analyze the data–they will provide you a great deal more information that you can use.

Volume: You need a way to collect the number of times that the process is completed. Also, you need to know by individual the number of times they performed the process if more then one person performs the process. Truly you want to know how many times the process is performed and the actual volume of the finished product that left the work center. The reason is to know how much rework occurred–in other words, they performed the process more times because of errors than the number of finished products that went out. But, for basics, you need to know how many times the process was performed or the total number of finished products from the process that went out. If you don’t know how much work you do every day, well, I really don’t know what to tell you. By combining the amount of work every day and the average time it takes to perform the process, you now know the productivity of your process. If you perform the process 1000 times in the day and it takes 1 minute to perform the process, then it takes 1000 minutes to perform that process. That’s 16.66 hours of work, which equates to just over 2 full time positions working 8 hours a day. If on Monday’s the volume doubles, then you know you need staffing that equates to about five people.

Defects: When you write down every single step in the process, you will probably run into this situation where there is an “if then” statement. If the product received is incomplete, then send it back; if the the paper printed is blank, reprint; if the expected block isn’t filled out, call so and so; etc. Normally, we just treat those things…those if thens…as part of the process. They are not. Those are “exceptions,” which are better known as defects. As you write down the steps, document these exceptions to your “clean” process and then create a way to collect the number of times that these exceptions occur. By simply looking at the totals for the various process defects over a period of time–maybe a month–you identify which ones are the most frequent. Common sense can tell you how much time each of these defects actually takes or how much impact these defects cause in your process. This gives you enough data to determine what you want to work on to improve your process. Otherwise, you might work on improving the wrong thing just because it’s easy or more glaring/visible.

Just think if everyone at the lowest level were doing this? Problems would be identified and solved at the lowest levels. Work would constantly be improved and everything would operate smoother in the work center.

Those experts in Lean and Six Sigma are there to help you analyze all this data you’ve collected around your process. They can help you build key charts to examine and analyze and they can recommend some just in time methods. If you run into a major process issue that spans multiple parts of the organization, they can develop a full blown process improvement effort and can facilitate everyone to solve the problem.

Bottom line, process improvement is simply business common sense with a fair amount of elbow grease thrown in. It’s the way you should act every day and you’ll take these basics to every job from here forward.

Are you leaning out the value of your call center?

Meandering Genius Process Improvement Strategic Communication

What is the focus of your call center? What are the metrics that you look at and what behaviors do these metrics drive?

Is your call center focused on answering calls quickly, providing a quick call turn over, and getting to the next call? If so, I hope that the sole purpose of your company is to answer questions for customers as quickly as possible.

If your company’s business to to do pretty much anything else, then you’re not focusing on the value of your call center and you probably are not looking at managing all your channels to drive the right calls to your call center.

See, many companies, as they’ve dealt with scalability and capacity issues, they’ve moved to a very lean model in their call centers. Many business process outsourcing firms have jumped on this opportunity to provide less expensive and very manufacturing-like processes around call centers. On shore, near shore, and off shore, there are people answering phones for all kinds of companies.

Because we have to answer calls and as we grow the number of calls significantly increase. Thus, we search for ways to deal with the increased call volume without significantly increasing our staff. Instead, we focus on really leaning out the operation, because it’s seen as not having value.

So let’s talk about that for a moment–value.

Value in a process is defined pretty much as, “what a customer is willing to pay for.” When a customer has a problem, question, concern, etc. with a company, they want to be able to pick up the phone and speak to a real person to resolve and respond to their issue. I know that as a customer, the value I expect and pay for is someone answering the phone and someone responding to my needs on the phone. So, if this is a value to a customer, are we diminishing it by forcing computer automated responses and focusing on getting them off the phone as soon as possible?

Let’s look at the “other type of value”–business value. Sometimes there are activities and steps in a process that aren’t of value to the customer, but are of value to the business. In other words, the customer won’t pay for it, but we clearly will. Again, unless your company’s sole purpose is to answer customer questions, anytime you have your customer on the phone is an opportunity to learn more about them, to deepen your relationship with them, to provide them advice, and to sell them other key products that they might need, but didn’t even know you offered.

Unfortunately, when you are focused on managing the call volume in a traditional lean approach, value tends to be over looked. Both value to the customer and value to the business.

What’s worse is that our other channels tend to drive the wrong kind of calls to the call center and not the right ones. Many times, your physical mail channel, your web channel, your mobile channel, your social channel, etc., deliver inconsistent and non-integrated messages. These create confusion and drive up call volume from concerned customers. Thus, the reason they’re calling is to clarify, complain, and the like. So, you see the call center as a necessary burden to literally deal with communication rework answering questions that should have been clear and consistent in all channels in the first place. When it’s seen as a burden, then you try to minimize the expense and time involved in it.

Change your way of thinking…

You have your customer–the most valuable person to your organization–on the phone. Do you realize how hard it is to get someone on the phone these days? Take advantage of that!

Figure out what is driving your call volume and focus on eliminating the communications rework–answering something that should have been answered by another communication. Focus on other channels to drive the right call volume to your call center–volume that increases your relationship, understanding, and sales with your customer.

When you have the customer on the phone, don’t focus on answering quickly, getting them off the phone, and moving on to the next call. Focus on building your relationship, deepening your understanding of your customer, and providing them with information they didn’t have about your products so they might buy something else they need or want from you. Measure that–customer and business value of each phone call–and see how your behaviors around your call center change.

Simply put, the day you stop having meaningful conversations with your customers is the day that you go out of business. This will happen no matter how lean your call center is.

Is outsourcing destroying your culture?

Meandering Genius Organizational Commitment

Tell me again why you are outsourcing your work? Oh, yea, it’s cheaper. But what are you losing?

Over the years many US businesses and the US Government have been outsourcing their work. This outsourcing comes with a cost…

Businesses outsource for one or more of the following reasons:

1. Capacity: They cannot hire anymore employees because of the color or money, because of lack of space, or because of the limited duration of the work, but they need more capacity to get the current or future expected work done. Outsourcing provides scalability.

2. Capability: They lack a specific skill set within their current pool of employees, like strategic planners, process improvement experts, education and training, scientists, project managers, etc. This requirement, although normally needed for the long term, is often sourced for short term engagements. Normally these people come in to provide a service, but the business can’t afford what they really need so they tend to accomplish much less than desired or required.

3. Cost: It is cheaper to outsource work to a third party on shore, near shore, or off shore. Why, because they turn the process that you have seasoned and higher-paid employees doing into a manufacturing-like process with high turn-over potential because of a low pay. These companies operate on a margin that is extremely tight, so they are focused on leaning out the work as much as possible. This is seen as efficient, but doesn’t always end up as effective.

4. Not Core: Sometimes, an organization wants to focus on only the core work that their company does and turn to experts in the non-core space. For instance, accounts payable is something that every company has to deal with, but a single company can only be so good at it. A third party that specializes in accounts payable work; however, does this for many companies so they have expertise in this work and know all the industry-leading and innovative approaches to the work. Outsourcing to them allows the organization to focus on their products and services versus some other common process across businesses.

So, as you can see outsourcing has valid and perceived lucrative reasons. However, what is the one thing that you’re outsourcing when you turn over work that will never exist in this line of work again?

Your Culture.

Let’s say your company today is all internal employees. Everyone of them is working’ theoretically for the benefit of the company and specifically for your customers. They are, hopefully, focused on your mission and vision and delivering value that your customer expects.

Outsource that…

You will not get a third party to buy into your mission and vision. They won’t connect with your customer. They have their own mission–normally it’s to provide whatever services you desire because they can always hire more people when you can. Their vision is to get bigger off of your work and the work of others. Their customer is you and every other company that has outsourced to them…not your customer!

Yes, there are benefits to outsourcing–especially short term benefits–and the reasons can be valid and strong. However, every employee or potential employee that you replace is one that could be focused on delivering on your mission, meeting your vision, and connecting with your customer.

Even if your employees today are not doing those three things, that can be fixed. It takes leadership to drive those behaviors, but you can still get that from your employees. Outsource them and you’ll never get that from the third party.

Outsourcing is a short term solution with long term effects. Beware!

Television is such a time waster

Meandering Genius

When I was a kid, I remember my parents and I gathering around the television on Sunday evening to watch Disney. Boy that was exciting as a kid–Escape from Witch Mountain and Apple Dumpling Gang were two shows that I remember.

But, back then, we didn’t live in front of the television watching show after show. That’s how things are today.

Back in 1997 to 2002, I was stationed in Germany with the Air Force. We had very little channels–nothing like cable and dish here in the states. The big channel to watch was Sky out of England. Man those Brits have a odd sense of humor.

When I was over there, I found myself watching a lot of TV when I wasn’t doing something else…basically when I was home the box was on.

I never realized how much time I spent in front of that machine. I never realized what I was missing in Germany because of it.

When I moved back to the states in late 2002, I decided to stop watching most television. Eventually I stopped watching all television shows…I don’t even watch news. One might think its odd since we have six televisions in the house and we’re thinking about getting a seventh. But aside from big sporting events, the television stays mostly off.

That is, except for cable movies and Netflix movies. I do watch the television to watch movies…that’s pretty much the reason I even pay for satellite TV.

The thing is, I notice when the television is on, even for a movie, I get nothing constructive done.

When I stopped watching TV shows, I found I had all the extra time in my day (evenings mostly). This allowed me to go back to school, to read and write, and to travel. These things I wouldn’t do because there is always some show on that you have to watch to keep up with the story and to talk about it at work the next day.

Recently, I have watched a lot of the Olympics. For me, a lot is very little, but I have seen how less has gotten done around the house because of the TV being on.

Up until I moved all the furniture out of my office and started to remodel it, if I turned on the television while working on the computer, nothing got done on the computer. I am definitely more productive in my office without the TV on, even if it is a movie I’ve seen ten times.

Are you an avid television watcher? Do you have several shows that you have to catch every week that keep you in the house and in front of the box? When you sit down to dinner, is the TV taking over conversation?

If so, try this for a month…unplug.

That’s right, unplug the televisions in your home for one month. Just turn them off and pull the plugs from the wall.

Notice what your day is like…notice the free time you have without the television.

You will find it a challenge and you’ll probably be pretty darn bored, but this will be a good experience for you. I suggest that be prepared with a house project, like working in the yard or a dedicated hobby that you can fill the space with.

Let me know if you choose this challenge and how it goes.

We don’t need no stinking burning platforms

Change Management Meandering Genius Process Improvement

Burning PlatformThe first step in change management is to define the “burning platform.” If you’re waiting for the platform to catch fire, you’re too late.

We’ve become a nation of reactionists instead of a preventionists. We’re constantly looking to identify a burning platform so we can put it out instead of spending our time making sure the fires never start to begin with.  What’s worse is that if we can’t define the burning platform because the fire hasn’t reached our room, we tend to ignore the fact that the smoke alarms in the house are going off.

If you really want to be successful, you need to stop looking for the burning platform and start looking at what your company does good today and what you can do to make it even better.  They say that Good is the enemy of Great and I believe it has to do with the fact that we wait for something bad to happen and until that time it’s “good enough.”

On top of that we’ve become a nation of hero worshipers, recognizing the fire fighters who wait until the house is burning down and then jump in to put out the fire.  Instead, we should be focused on those that do well at preventive maintenance and never have a house fire in the first place.

What this amounts to is that we need to live in a world of constant change where readiness to change is how we exist–we thrive on change through constant improvement.  This doesn’t mean that something won’t go wrong from time to time, but the more preventive we’ve been, the better we’ll be to react to the issue.  More than likely, we simply won’t experience the issue in the first place.

The problem is that leaders are often too blind to prevention and its value.  When something goes wrong, they can see the tangible impact of the fix, the money that was saved, etc.  Prevention is hard to measure and thus leadership devalues it.  I have worked on several projects that were focused on measuring this unmeasurable item–prevention and preparedness.  I’ve done this because, all too often, those that are getting ahead of problems are often challenged by the hero worshiping leaders because they don’t see them adding any value and simply costing the company money.

The fact is that these leaders need to get a clue about leadership and vision.  Constantly managing to the problem breeds poor leadership discipline.  Leaders need a strong discipline to stay ahead of problems and they need the courage to recognize those people who prevent the fire versus those that put them out.

Recently I was sitting in an event where a team was getting recognized for solving a problem that they did nothing to prevent.  When the problem finally flared up, they reacted quickly and put the operation back on track.  This team was honored in front of everyone as the shining example for all to model themselves after.

The fact is, if we don’t change this nation of reactionary thinking and hero worshiping, we’re going to end up being full of a bunch or arsonists putting out the fires they create.  Because, in the end, what gets measured gets done and if you’re only going to recognize me if I solve a problem, then by God, I’m going to create the problems to solve.

So leaders, put away your fire extinguishers and pull out your pocketbooks, because you need to start paying for prevention versus recognizing reaction.  Stop looking for burning platforms and start preventing fires.

Selling yourself, not products, through blogging

Blogging Meandering Genius

Last night I was on a free teleconference regarding becoming a successful speaker. The actual title was How to Become a Highly Paid Speaker Quickly. It was a hour and a half presentation and the first 30 – 45 minutes were some tid bits about being a good speaker. Then the teleconference evolved into a sales pitch for their speech coaching service.

Blogging is just like that teleconference. Its a free service where you can provide information that people might find interesting and valuable. As a matter of fact, yesterday’s blog on Blogger’s Block turned out to be extremely popular, so I thought I would continue to talk about blogging for a while.

However, there are three kinds of blogs, which are free information shared to people:

1. Blogs fully dedicated to selling a product or service, which pretty much are nothing but wordy advertisements. These blogs promise when you open them up to provide good information, but are really fully focused on providing you information on what they can do for you in regards to that information.

2. Blogs that are informative to a point, but then (normally at the bottom), become an advertisement. These blogs give you some information–enough to get you interested, but not really enough to do anything with the information. Then they hit you with the “if you want to learn more or how to do this, this is why you should contact us.”

3. Blogs that share information openly without holding back information. Simply put, they’re giving the recipe away for free. Yes, they might have some contact information at the bottom, but they’ve really shared the whole story and held nothing back to sell to you.

These approaches are all forms of what has become known as Content Marketing. It’s marketing, even if you didn’t know you were doing it, because the marketers have coined what you’re doing and they are packaging it up to sell–even though many of your have been doing this for a while.

The problem is that Content Marketing is really what cause blog type 1 and 2. I’m sure you’ve fallen into the trap of opening a blog that looked really cool by its title and first paragraph only to be fully disappointed by the blatant marketing of the body. Much like the teleconference I was in yesterday.

Last night I was looking for information on how to become… However, what I got was, an appetite wettener for what I wanted and then a how to buy their service.

So, let’s talk about true Content Marketing.

Content Marketing is about selling your capability by “giving it away.” Many bloggers out there today have been “giving it away” for years and inadvertently selling themselves without even focusing on the act. That is true Content Marketing.

When the likes and follows blew up yesterday after my Blogger’s Block article, that told me that many people were interested in information about blogging itself. Hence, I figured I would write another blog about blogging. Why, not because I want to sell my services as a blogging mentor or something like that, but because I want more people to enjoy, share, like, and follow my blog.

As a blogger, your focus should be on selling yourself and you should provide stuff that your readers find interesting. That interesting stuff is called Content and getting more and more people to read your blog is called Marketing.

Yes, it is that simple.

One thing that the presentation did share with me, before it went marketing crazy and I hung up, was that when speaking, you have to be genuine. Genuine speeches are what attract listeners and genuine and genuine blogs attract readers.

That’s why I’m blogging about blogging again today. Yesterday, my Blogger’s Block blog received a lot of attention’ so I wanted to continue with what you might want to read.

I’m not doing this to attract followers and get you to buy something, but to share information and hopefully learn something back in the process.

True Content Marketing is just that. Anyone can openly share information–Content–with their readers. Hopefully their readers will find their content interesting and continue to come back and read their blog. Better yet, they will follow them and share what they’re saying to others. This is true Marketing without selling anything.

Somewhere in there, someone is going to read their blog and be at the point that they need help in that area. They will see, through their multiple of free blogs, that this company or person is really good and knowledgable at whatever they’re talking about. Then they’re going to contact that person and see if they can get their help. Or, someone who has been reading these interesting blogs has a friend that has a need and they’re going to share the name of the company or person that has been providing all these great blogs.

Anything in the 1 or 2 category of blogging is nothing but marketing and no one is going to follower share that. Even if you want to ultimately sell your services or products, be genuine in your blogs.

I’m not the all knowing expert in blogging, but I am pretty darn good at strategic communication. I wouldn’t want anyone to really ask me to be a “blogging coach” or something like that, but I can definitely help companies build and implement strategic communication plans.

However, my purpose in this is to not sell that or any other service. My purpose is to share my opinion on blogging and using blogging to sell yourself, not something else.

As always, as all bloggers should do, I ask for your thoughts on blogging and content marketing. If you don’t want to comment’ but like the blog, please like it, follow me, and share this to others. I won’t mind.

Dealing with blogger’s block

Blogging Meandering Genius

If you plan to write regularly, even once in a while, you may run into writer’s block and not know what to write about for the day. In boll going, I call that blogger’s block.

Since I blog daily and six out of seven of my blogs each week aren’t planned, blogger’s block could be a real issue. When you are coming up with a new idea to write about every day, then this issue can hit you at any point.

If you are prone to blogger’s block, then here are some ideas on how to deal with it. As always I welcome your thoughts and inputs.

The first thing you can do is actually draft up a list of topics for a period of time…say a week. Let’s assume you blog daily…on Wednesday, sit down and write ideas for Monday through Sunday. Every week you are preparing what you’re going to write the following week. Having a list of blogging ideas and topics can help you generate your blog without thinking about it. My weekly blog, Think Big, Take Small Steps, is planned for several months out with an outline of different topics. I have the title and the subtitle, which provide me with enough information to write do each weekend.

Sometimes, writing needs to happen when you have time every day and when you won’t be bothered. I’m up early every morning–4:30 during the week–and I write my blogs over coffee while my wife and the dogs are still asleep. Having a similar time of the day to write when you’re blogging helps you think and possibly research topics.

If you tend to have a lot of time at only one time during the week, consider pre-writing several blogs when you have the time and prepping them to go out. Remember, it’s best not to blog more than once a day, but you can schedule blogs or have them ready in draft to send. This way you have a blog a day (or so), but you are only writing a few times a week.

Having trouble coming up with ideas? Here are some ideas that might help you generate ideas…I think it’s much easier to generate ideas when on the computer, but every day I write on my phone or tablet.

Have a set of topics or categories that you like to blog about and know something about. For me, I try to focus on blogging and writing itself, process improvement, employee engagement, change, human capital planning, strategy, and other things like that. Having a set of categories in my head helps to come up with ideas on the fly.

If you have an idea, put it in a google search engine and search for images related to that work or phrase that represents your idea. Add that picture to your blog and then center the message and your thoughts around the picture that represented the idea you started with.

I have four quotes and proverbs applications on my phone. In the morning, I like to read each one of them for the day. I haven’t written about anything I’ve read yet’ but the ideas get my mind moving so that I’m more stimulated to write. You could use these type of devices to generate your ideas.

There is a month each year where many bloggers participate in this A to Z blogging event. For 26 days, every day, but Sunday, they post a blog corresponding to the letter of the day. There is no reason what you couldn’t apply this technique to every month and make sure that the letter of the day ends up in your title each day.

As an active and longtime Toastmaster, we always researched the word of the day. Everyone was required to use the word of the day in there speaking to practice extemporaneous speech. You can get a word of the day from apps and from the computer and blog to that every day…or just the day you are trying to get over blogger’ block.

One of the last ideas, is to write about the very thing that your are fighting against–blogger’s block. Honestly, I wasn’t dealing with blogger’s block, but I was thinking about ways that I might deal with it and thought this would be a perfect blog to share and discuss. If you are suffering from a block, then talk about it…discuss why you think you are having a block. Maybe there’s a story in there after all and you just couldn’t see it.

That gets me to my last point…almost like I planned this blog ahead of time. Sometimes, it just helps to start typing and then the words start to flow. Except for my weekly strategy blog entry, I never know what I’m going to talk about day to day. Additionally, I never know what the blog looks like or how it’s organized. However, when I start writing that first paragraph…the one that everyone is going to see, I start thinking about the structure of the blog and the main points. Even with this blog, I put it together roughly as I started writing and formulated it’s I wrote. For me, this gets my mind moving in the morning.

Dealing with blogger’s block, is a personal thing, but there are many ways that you can prepare or deal with it on the fly. Who knows, maybe these tips will help you move from a weekly blogger to a daily blogger.

Looking to hear from you on the subject.