Well, that’s the Half!

What did we learn, and what does it mean?

For 25 consecutive weeks we have shared our Friday Few Observations for that week looking to help all of us process the latest inputs so that we can properly allocate our time and capital.

What have we learned?

Small little options to improve a process are everywhere and we expect them to be less than $20 a month.
Our winner in this category was the Wave AI Notebook which we use daily to record, transcribe, and summarize all our business correspondence via phone and video.

Larger solutions have slowed way down as corporate buyers are wary of moving too quickly when a much better deal may be available in six months.

To personalize this, think about buying a laptop today, are you sure it has the right NVIDA chip with the right memory from Micron?

Now think about if you had to buy 5000 laptops.

The pause is real and if you are planning your second half revenue goals, it is time to have some hard conversations internally first and then put the problem to your buyers and work through it together.

The corporate buyer will never tell you this unless they are prompted, and it is in their best interest to do so.

What does all of this mean?

If we are in a time where the small is getting adopted rapidly and the big is taking more time, break off a piece of your full offering that is snackable and use it to acquire more customers even if you are making less on a per customer basis.

It is natural during a time of uncertainty to be a cautious buyer and with a presidential election pending we think the uncertainty is going to increase in the back half of the year.

You can figure out how to improve your margins on the smaller revenue later and once you have an established business relationship with that new customer you can use your tactical empathy to learn what else they need help with and grow the relationship.

That is what we have noticed, what about you?

What are you doing with your one precious and amazing life on the longest day of 2024?

Our family app project took some solid leaps forward and while we have some competing ideas it is amazing how quickly we went from a product focus to thinking about how on earth we would get anyone in the world to know about it.

The Marketing Puzzle is going to take on a whole new dimension as these AI tools enable almost anyone to create a digital product.

Maybe the trick is to just make the app that you want and keep making it better and the more it helps you the more others might want to use it?

Seems like in Seth Godin parlance not only do you need to get your cow painted purple, that cow needs to start flying!

One thing we are noticing is that while lots of people are looking up at cows flying around in wonder the guardians at the gate of THE STATUS QUO are standing resolute.

Corporate buyers act differently than individual buyers much the same way you choose your next meal easily but if you were buying food for 50,000 people you would have to have a process to consider all the food needs at scale.

This is making enterprise sales motions a challenge as in a time of great change the easiest thing to do is not change, especially when there is the hint that if they wait the costs might go down further.

As we look at the second half of the year it will be interesting to see what plays out between the quick adoption of a cohort of individuals which might feel good but not move the needle vs the slower adoption of an enterprise which may or may not happen but when it does has as significant positive impact.

We heard a sermon the other day about David and Goliath and the preacher emphasized that David picked up FIVE SMOOTH STONES as he faced Goliath.

Our question for you is what smooth stones are you going to pick up as you look to kill the status quo you face?

Fun fact: Both of these images were made with DALL-E and when I asked to have the sword in David’s hand turned into a sling shot it came back with David holding a bow and arrow! Several iterations later it still wasn’t working so am using the original image with a small smirk 😊

​Have a great weekend!

Apple showed up this week and it sparked an interesting conversation in our household around needing new phones, iPads and even laptops, holy refreshes batman that is a lot of hardware.
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We also had a conversation with a person very close to Apple who said that making an app inside their store is getting easier and easier as they will write some of the code for you.

Think about having a machine that has the engineering fundamentals to allow you to focus on the creativity and customer nuance you are looking to achieve. This really empowers and encourages people to use their tactical empathy to understand what someone is struggling with and then deliver a solution that helps that person get unstuck and keep making progress.

10 years ago, when Amazon was dropping the costs to publish a book to the floor, we worked with our then young children to self-publish four books.

Amazon even gives you an Author Page.

The process of creating something was an important step for us to take together and this summer our aim is to have at least one app launched by Labor Day.

The conversations around the house are lively and just like the book, once you have your product launched you are desperate for a customer.

Yet while the book might have an edit or two, the app should evolve based upon user feedback and potentially get better as technology improves on the backend.

We won’t be retiring anytime soon on this venture but do believe the process of creating and iterating in the digital world is important.

What do you want to make?

We interview people for jobs on behalf of our clients on almost a weekly basis and offer up for free a host of career insights for professionals all along the spectrum of their working lives.

If you have anyone in your life who is graduating or is recently out of school, this article is for them, we hope it is helpful.

Think like a Start Up

Start up companies are looking for "product market fit" and so are you. However, you are the product, and the company culture is the market you are looking to fit.

While you need to understand the culture of where you are working and this involves being curious and using your tactical empathy skills, in this section we are going to focus on how you can best understand and position your skills to stand out in a sea of sameness.
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This diagram highlights the maximum impact zone which comes after you have a solid understanding of your strengths, your team player style and where those combined skills overlap with an employer’s needs. The greater your contribution the more likely you will achieve personal product market fit.

Individual Strengths
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It is important to tease out the subtle differences between something you are interested in and something you have a strength in. You can be interested in playing the drums and bang away in your garage or sing out in the shower to your heart’s content. Having a strength in something means you are valued in that area relative to others.

When you combine an interest with a strength you have the beginnings of building out your personal product. Interest will help you push through the time and sweat it will take to get your relative ability to others to stand out.

Good questions to ask yourself are:

1.      Where do you lose track of time?
2.      If you had two areas to spend your day, what would they be?

Team Player Style

Dr. Glenn Parker coined this phrase and has a simple diagnostic tool that provides some key insights for people that is often overlooked. The vast majority of us work with others in teams and all of us have built in dominant traits when it comes to working with others.

Having a lack of Team Chemistry is one of the biggest roadblocks in the workplace and many will say that they don’t know how to create it but they know it when they see it.

As an individual why would you leave this to chance?

Understanding how all 4 traits work together will give you the best opportunity to join the right team for you but also adapt as people on the team change. Parker’s four traits are:

1.      The Contributor
2.      The Communicator
3.      The Collaborator
4.      The Challenger

You can find the short survey here: Parker Team Player Survey

Style

The way you get your work done will also have a major impact on how many different places you can have success. Are you brittle and grumpy if things aren’t perfect, or are you affable and can still get your work done in a storm?

In a world where it is hard to distinguish between one person with a great college degree and the next, being flexible and having an easy-going manner can make all the difference.

It will be difficult for you to state this in an interview, but your references should be able to articulate it. Questions that will tease this out are:

1.      What does it feel like to work with you?
2.      What does it feel like to be directed by you?

These are not easy questions but as you do your own inner work it will help you understand others, and this improves your chances of landing the right job at the right company with the right people.

What does the Market Need Now?

Once you have your Interests Strengths and Style defined and added your Team Player Style traits you are ready to overlap those on the current market realities for employment. LinkedIn is the right place to showcase your skills and is also where you will want to start to build out your list of key influencers.

You will want to meet with these influencers to find the best job openings and then seek to earn their sponsorship for the position which is much preferred to mailing in your resume through a job board.

We outlined how to build out a network on LinkedIn in our Crucial Work Skills #1 post which can be found here: LinkedIn Networks

In a future post we will articulate how to use LinkedIn to create a short list of personal coaches who can 10x your ability to get in front of the right people to find the best job opportunities.

Thank you for your readership and friendship!
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Drew & Sara