Sometimes, A Hug is All We Need

I was in Causeway Bay yesterday when I saw a chap holding up a sign in the middle of the street saying "FREE HUGS". I thought, that's perhaps the best idea I have seen for the longest time! A friend of mine pointed me to a few YouTube videos (definitely watch this one) and I learned it's in fact part of a global campaign. Take a look, tell me if it doesn't bring a smile to your face!

"Free hugs is a real life controversial story of Juan Mann, A man whos sole mission was to reach out and hug a stranger to brighten up their lives."

User Participation Means User Loyalty

This is called a Tune'N Radio, designed by a Dutch firm called wouter Geense Design Studio. I came across this product from a design magazine called "Design 360°" (July 2006). This is an AM/FM radio that invites user participation. Namely, you need to find a suitable object around your house to be used as an antenna. You need to open up holes on the side as the speaker grill. You need to fix some small items into the knobs so that you can turn them properly. So some user might use a bent wire hanger as the antenna, proceed to punch a 'smiley face' set of holes for the speaker grill and wedge in small bits of playing cards, coins or small keys to use as knobs. Different users will have different designs. Some radio might end up being pretty, others might end up being less so. Yet the most important thing is: it's going to be the user's own personal design. They own it. It's an expression of who they are. It becomes less a "Tune'N Radio" but more of their very own creation. THEIRS. UNIQUELY THEIRS.

So here's a worthwhile goal for all product designers: how do you solicit user loyalty by inviting user participation? How do you trigger users' emotional involvement? How do you make it so that your users take your products, get involved in their "production" (by sticking in their personal objects in Tune'N Radio's case) and call them their own? How do you allow your products, be they merchandise or services, to be an extension of who your customers are?

We have certainly came a long way from Mr. Ford's "in any color, as long as it’s black", it's now "any way, as long as they consider it their own". At least I know this much: if this is ten years ago, not a lot of people will ever consider buying a radio with no antenna, no grill and no knobs!

Generate a Return for Your Company

My friend and I had lunch at the Peak yesterday, and he was giving me a ride back home afterwards. We passed by a ritzy block of apartments and he said "This is where we put up one of our expats, costs about $150,000 a month (USD 19,404)". I observed that the company must regard him as a heavy revenue generator as his total compensation package must be a considerable amount. "Oh we don't think this way ..."

Why not?

"Well, it is hard to quantify."

That may be the case, but why don't they "think this way"? Shouldn't that be the first thing they think about? If the lucky chap were to run his own business today, I am sure he will be thinking that constantly. Can I generate a return on my cost? Can my company generate a return on me? I am not talking about merely breaking even either, I am taking about generating enough positive cash flow to keep the business afloat, to generate returns for shareholders and to reinvest into the business. If not, why should the company continue to invest in me?

We may work for other people's business, but we should think like owners. You might not be the owner of the business that you work for, but you are certainly owners of the business called "You". "You" are a business that sells services and generates a return for your employer. Like any other businesses, you won't be in business too long if you don't generate a good return for your customers.

The Most Important Thing is that You Care

I need a desk lamp, so I took a walk at the local mall. There's this young lady standing by a bank of desk lamps. She greeted me nicely. When I ask about the lamps, she handed me a pamphlet and proceeded to describe the range of choices she has. She was nervous but I sensed that she's really trying to do a proper job. I made a quick decision and decided to buy one. She explained that she need to get it from the storeroom and she ran off. After a short while, she ran back and breathlessly apologized for not having that particular model in stock. I then asked for another model and off she went again. It was rather hot working in the "Indoor Lighting" section as you can imagine and she's already starting to sweat. She struggled back with a big box. I was about to thank her and make a move over to checkout when she suggested that it's best to test the lamp first. So she got the box on the floor and struggled to get the lamp out. A lot of struggling and apologizing ensured as she popped a light bulb in and hunted for a free electrical socket. When she finally got around to it, it didn't work, so she ran and got me a brand new bulb from another rack. When all is said and done she carried the lamp over to the checkout counter for me and wrote out a sales ticket. She then forgot what the price was and I walked back (it was a short enough distance) to take a look. Finally, she handed me her copy of the sales ticket by mistake until the cashier alerted her.

All in all, she is probably the most inexperienced and clumsy salesperson that I have ever met. However her saving grace is that she cared. Her sincereness and eagerness to do a good job really came through. She made me feel that she honestly cared.

The Quickest Way to Relax

Do yourself a favor this week. When life gets a bit too busy and things are not going your way, drop everything and get out of the building. Don't worry, just get out, it will only take about 10 minutes.

Walk to a relatively open space and look up.

Take a look at the skies ahead. Take a long good look. Look at the blue, the smooth glassy blue. Look at the gradient of colors and feel the immensity of it. Notice the clouds, floating serenely in all shapes and sizes, painted with bold strokes across the skies. Feel the air on your skin. Breathe it in. No really, real deep breaths that you move your tummy out and not your chest. Please give yourself the moment, and breathe.

Concentrate on the moment. Live the moment. Be aware of everything around you - look, feel and listen. Be aware of yourself being alive at the moment, in the world. Life is the moment between two breaths. Breathe in some more, feel the air rushing into every nook and cranny of your being. Breathe out some more, imagine yourself breathing all your worries away.

Smile.

How to Get Promoted

One of the most valuable currency in advancing our careers is influence. Our ability to influence people and therefore events, to gain cooperation and understanding, to negotiate common objectives and to draw resources is a powerful engine in our drive towards our business objectives. Influence might arise from formal titles and positions, but yet, formal titles and positions doesn't guarantee influence. Formal power might generate grudging compliance but well honed influence musters genuine commitments. The best type of influence arise from carefully cultivated business relationships. The best type of influence is grown from a consistent eagerness to help others and it stems from politeness and respect for others.

Often times we find ourselves thinking that we don't have "the power" to achieve certain objectives as if every job post comes with a list of powers and capabilities much like computer role playing games. Yet there are those amongst us who can get things done, in spite of their positions. The key difference between us and them is that they go into the world aiming to make things happen. They look for ways to get things done while the rest of us wait for some higher powers to either clear the way for us or to bestow us with some formal power. They talk, they negotiate and they influence. They assume "power" and they get things done. These are the same people who are most likely to be promoted since they have already assumed a higher post.

The limits to our influence is often in our heads. We need to be careful that we don't use "I can't" as an excuse for us being too lazy to work things out ourselves. We are often our own worse enemies on our path to career success. Seek to "promote" yourselves and you will be promoted ahead of others.

You need to Timeout

My weekdays, like yours, are nonstop meshes of emails, phone calls, meetings and conversations, business and casual. My attention is continuously "time sliced" between my computer screens, my desk phone, my Blackberry, my cellphone, and the occasional human faces.

We've got to call timeouts from every now and then. I don't mean the annual family vacation that you spent months planning. I mean scheduling a "timeout" morning at least once a week. We need to schedule it in, because otherwise you know it will never happen. For me, my "timeout" mornings are my Saturday mornings.

Take a morning out for yourself, away from any communication devices. Find a small cafe on a quiet street and have a slow breakfast alone with your favorite book, magazine or newspaper. I like to take a notebook (you know, the actual paper type) along as well.

Sit down, sit back and take a look at :

• Your neighborhood: look around, see the people, hear their chatter, breath the air.
• Your city: the latest news, the prevailing social issues.
• The world: the latest topic of interest, the emerging trends, and possible opportunities
• Your relationships: with your family, your friends, and your colleagues. Reexamine certain incidences that might have occurred during the week. What should you do in the week ahead?
  
• Your life: your job, your interests, things that inspires you. Do you need to do any sort of realignment?
• The "moment": be here and now. Clear all the chatter in your head, really live in the present. Take in the sounds, the smells. Live it.

Have a great week ahead.

Compassionate Managers

I am a true believer that a manager's job is to understand her employees, know their strengths, weaknesses and motivations, develop their abilities to the fullest, each in their own way. However, reality is, if you have a sizable department, there are bound to be employees whose personalities are not quite in sync with yours. In which case you might be inclined to pay more attention to those employees that you find more agreeable and thus doing your company a disservice. Sometimes therefore it takes a bit of extra effort to span character differences so that you can fully study each employee. Oreo Delight's new post on "Compassion" suggests that may be what some of us are missing is a bit of "genuine compassion"? Quoting from this blog post, Dalai Lama defines "genuine compassion" as unbiased. I of course agree that more genuine compassion makes the world a better place, at least it will make us much better managers!