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November 26, 2003

Happy Thanksgiving!

FC Now will be a little quiet tomorrow, Thursday, because the office is closed for the Thanksgiving holiday. (I might come in Friday.) Until our full team returns in early December, be sure to let the people that you're thankful are in your life know that you appreciate them. Here's to a restful Thanksgiving.

While FC Now's taking a breather, I'd like to gauge what people think of the blog. Is there too much, too frequently? Just the right amount? Room for even more material, resources, and tools? Let us know what you think of the blog activity by taking the Fast Company poll. Cast your vote and add a comment to expand, if you'd like.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Posted by Heath Row at 4:11 PM | Add Comment

On Social Capitalism II

FC Now reader Jaki Scarcello's comment on the recent entry about integrating corporate responsibility into day-to-day operations is worth a read.

In fact, Scarcello proposes a two-question filter leaders can use when making decisions:

• Does this decision reflect the values we have established as our operating rules?
• Will the outcome of this decision keep us on the path we need to travel to reach our vision, the future we want for this organization?

Posted by Heath Row at 3:15 PM | 2 Comments

A Rose by Any Other Name...

In the Wall Street Journal today, Jared Sandberg considers the workplace importance of remembering your colleagues' names. I've fallen prey to that challenge myself. Interns come and go, and heck if I can remember the name of every intern we've had here at Fast Company.

But the most embarrassing instance happened just a couple of weeks ago. While working on a project with our interim Admaster Dave Cluett, I turned to Dave and said, "Dave, what's your last name?" (That's my dodgy way of fessing up that I didn't remember his email address.) "Cluett," he responded. Thing was, I knew that. I just blanked. Sorry, Dave.

Posted by Heath Row at 10:04 AM | 1 Comment

On the Baldrige

Congratulations to the recent winners of the Baldrige National Quality Award, announced yesterday. Applicants are judged on leadership, strategic planning, customer and market focus, information and analysis, human resources, process management, and results.

Posted by Heath Row at 9:54 AM | 1 Comment

Slow Food, Fast Company

If you celebrate Thanksgiving, chances are you've started to look forward to the holiday spread and time with family. In today's USA Today, there's a lengthy look at the Slow Food movement. The article considers the growing trend of slow, fresh, and local food -- and how producers are banding together to promote the concept by highlighting specific farms, markets, and restaurants.

Posted by Heath Row at 9:29 AM | Add Comment

Rest in Peace

Eugene Kleiner, co-founder of Fairchild Semiconductor in the '50s and an early advocate for Silicon Valley as a business-development region, died last Thursday. In the '70s, Kleiner helped found the seminal VC firm Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers.

Posted by Heath Row at 9:01 AM | Add Comment

November 25, 2003

The (Ro)Bot-tom Line

King's College of London has installed a robotic receptionist that will greet visitors, offer directions and events information, and dole out fashion suggestions. The optimist in me is happy about the money I'll save on secretary's day. The pessimist in me wonders what other business functions might eventually be filled by robots. Business people, rise up! Reclaim your jobs from the robots!

Posted by Heath Row at 2:10 PM | Add Comment

Taking a Stand Against Spam II

We've all been frustrated working with a person or company at one time or another. We're all irritated by junk mail and spam. But no matter how persistent telemarketers may have been, this is not the best way to release consumer frustration.

Customer service representatives are trained to handle angry customers. Perhaps we need to flip that around and consider some anger management. How can we better work with slow-to-respond customer service representatives?

Posted by Heath Row at 1:53 PM | 1 Comment

In Decision

This summer, Christopher Lang, co-founder of the Open Collaborative Leadership Organization at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, wrote an essay expanding on how to improve decision making.

Starting off by addressing potential bottlenecks in the decision-making process, Lang describes the imaginative, experiential, inferential, and evaluative aspects of decision making, as well as specific strategies to overcome hurdles along the way.

Posted by Heath Row at 1:06 PM | Add Comment

Procrasti-Nation II

In the spirit of structured procrastination, Lynda Cardwell recently wrote an article about balancing priorities on schedule. Her two topmost suggestions include triaging your tasks and identifying the rhythms of your work week.

Her recommendation to chart tasks seems more effective and efficient than the standard high-medium-low prioritization approach I take to my to-do list. You can prioritize by slotting tasks into a two-by-two matrix featuring

• Urgent and important tasks Dealing with a product recall or completing due diligence before an acquisition can be approved
• Not urgent but important tasks Developing key business relationships and drafting a plan for how your company will respond to the changes you foresee taking place in your industry 18 months down the road
• Urgent but not important tasks Taking impromptu phone calls from sales reps or fielding a request from a subordinate to help make arrangements for next week's unit party
• Not urgent and not important tasks Surfing the Internet or gossiping around the water cooler

While I encourage FC Now readers to remain hydrated -- and keep reading FC Now -- I think I might try using this approach for awhile.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:52 PM | Add Comment

November 24, 2003

1984? No, Animal Farm

I just can't get unstuck on my latest rant about respect, doublespeak and corporate honesty.

This article really took the cake: Tyson Creates Office of Animal Well-being.

What's missing for me is that unlike the PTSA I belonged to in high school, no chickens are represented in the staffing of the office.

Posted by at 8:40 PM | 1 Comment

Procrasti-Nation

I'm guilty of this myself: Structured procrastination. It's not that I put off deadlines. And it's not that I forgo work for activities not related to my job at work. But sometimes, especially immediately preceding crunch times, I find myself doing work for work's sake. Make work, if you will. I'm working, but I'm not working.

Aaron Swartz recently wrote an interesting item about procrastination and its role in the workplace. Though aimed primarily at programmers, I found it resonating with me, as well.

We'll happily do the work we're putting off if there's a more important task we can put off by doing it. It's not anything intrinsic to the task, but the outside importance of the task that makes us procrastinate. But what possible reason could we have for putting off tasks that are important? For creative work, tasks that are externally motivated are done less creatively than those that are internally motivated.

What do you think? Is there something here? What role do you think procrastination plays in your work life? In your organization?

Posted by Heath Row at 6:03 PM | 4 Comments

Rose-Colored Google?

In today's Boston Globe long-time technology reporter Hiawatha Bray poses an interesting question: "Do you hate Google yet?"

Comparing the ever-innovative Web upstart to Microsoft, of all companies, the article suggests that Google may soon join the ranks of the too big, too powerful, and too successful.

What do you think? Is it possible to be too successful? Or is growth all about how you go about growing? I'd say that Google's business practices to date are a far cry from Microsoft's, yet as FC Now reader Rayne reminds us, perhaps Bray's asking the wrong question.

Instead of "Do you hate Google yet?" maybe we should continue to ask, "Will Google remain true to its ethos?"

Posted by Heath Row at 1:22 PM | 6 Comments

In the Past Lane

Today in 1998, AOL bought Netscape.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:54 PM | Add Comment

Fast Company in the News

Here are some recent media mentions of Fast Company:

• Fast Company Reports on "Wal-Mart You Don't Know": The Arkansas Business Journal remarks on our recent feature
• Are Book Clubs the Next Big Thing?: Bob Rosner, a forthcoming FC Now guest host, interviews Charles Decker, host of our book discussion group
• Good Morning Silicon Valley: Columnist John Paczkowski remarks on our recent FastTalk voting results

FC Now reader Jeff Jarvis previously commented, "It would be quite cool if you not only gave links to media mentions of your stories but to Weblog links and comments."

Point well taken. I do -- just not in these roundup entries, which are oriented toward print and other mainstream media. I also follow trackback pings, as well as Technorati, Popdex, Blogdex, and Daypop citations. If someone posts a lengthy, thoughtful response to a Fast Company story or FC Now entry, I'll link to it and reply in kind. Case in point: My pointer to a recent Dave Pollard blog entry. Or my reference to a Company of Friends member's report on a CoF event.

All that said, so many blog citations are just that: headline, link. Maybe someone will add a brief comment like, "Good article." Those, I won't highlight. But longer, more in-depth, and thoughtful commentaries -- posts that also propel the conversation -- will find their way back here as they hit my radar.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:07 PM | Add Comment

November 21, 2003

SimpleBites: Seattle Insights II

Thanks to FC Now reader -- and Seattle Company of Friends member -- Curt Rosengren for pointing out that fellow CoF member John Porcaro also posted a report on the recent gathering with past FC Now guest host Bill Jensen.

John's report touches on four topics addressed by Bill at the event:

• The awesome one-page summary
• Emails that get read and acted upon
• How to delete 75% of emails
• Getting the budget you deserve with less effort

A PDF from the event is also available.

Posted by Heath Row at 8:24 PM | 11 Comments

When Conferences Call

If you regularly schedule conference calls with remote colleagues, distributed teams, and other partners, you might want to rethink your teamwork tactics. According to a recent RoperASW/Tandberg poll, less than half of respondents pay attention during conference calls. And what they do instead is quite interesting -- and occasionally alarming.

Are conference calls productive? Do you have any conference call tips or tactics? Add a comment and share your ideas.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:39 PM | 18 Comments

Rest in Peace

J.P. Williams, the Bank of America executive who created the forerunner of the national bank card in the '50s, died Nov. 8. Thousands of entrepreneurs who funded their startups using credit cards are forever in his debt.

Posted by Heath Row at 10:20 AM | Add Comment

November 20, 2003

Gifting Back

In the December issue of Fast Company, already mailed to subscribers, on better newsstands everywhere -- and soon available online -- Christine Canabou, Alison Overholt, and Linda Tischler recommend some holiday gifts -- and opportunities to give back.

Mark Hurst of Good Experience goes even further. His newly released Uncle Mark 2004 Gift Guide & Almanac is a well-designed and wittily written primer to the finer points of holiday present selection. Including technology tools as well as lower-tech tchotchkes, it's a handy read for people looking for well-designed products and services.

Posted by Heath Row at 5:32 PM | Add Comment

Coaching Goes First Class

Matthew Rochte, coordinator of the Coaching Company of Friends group, distributed an article from The Economist to members of that special interest group today.

Under the headline "Corporate Therapy," the magazine considers the uptick in executive coaching and addresses why senior leaders seek external mentors, how coaches work, and the aspect of "derailment coaching," or mentoring as intervention. But in the end, The Economist deems coaching's ROI unclear: "Rigorous analysis of so touchy-feely an activity is probably impossible."

In the October issue of Fast Company, Ryan Underwood detailed how Cisco found a coaching partner that could offer a consistent coaching method and the capacity for big projects. Even in Cisco's case, there are some questions about coaching's impact on its business -- and its coaching partner.

Posted by Heath Row at 4:15 PM | Add Comment

Spirit at Work

FC Now reader Don Miller emailed me a pointer to a recent article in the Christian Science Monitor about business leaders working to infuse their organizations with spiritual values.

It's not a new movement, but it continues to emerge, evolve, and expand. The piece addresses several new networking organizations and associations addressing spirit at work, as well as companies focusing on the value of values.

Patricia Aburdene, who coauthored the Megatrends books, offers several reasons for this renewed activity:

• The enormous stress people are under due to the economic and security crises of the past two years.
• Demographic data revealing a mushrooming segment of "cultural creatives" for whom values trump money and other trappings of success.
• Business leaders with their own notion of personal transformation or a spiritual path now bringing it into their institutions.
• A convergence of the movements of social responsibility and spirituality.

Posted by Heath Row at 3:48 PM | 2 Comments

SimpleBites: Seattle Insights

Bill Jensen, who recently contributed to FC Now as a guest host, met with members of the Seattle Company of Friends group earlier this week.

Local CoF member Curt Rosengren reports on the event -- and members' conversations with Bill.

Posted by Heath Row at 3:35 PM | 1 Comment

Would You Hire This CEO?

In the November issue, Fast Company turned the tables on five top execs -- and asked them to answer questions from their own companies' standard job interviews. Only one leader rated well, and the others largely failed to impress. See who got the call -- and who got culled.

Posted by Heath Row at 2:52 PM | Add Comment

On Social Capitalism

In the new edition of Pegasus Communications' newsletter, Leverage Points, Kali Saposnick interviews Steven Rochlin, director of research and policy development at the Center for Corporate Citizenship at Boston College, about integrating corporate responsibility into day-to-day operations. The interview concentrates on the strategic value proposition of social capitalism, as well as how to best link theory and practice.

He also poses three important questions:

• How do you build a strategy for corporate citizenship that is aligned with the rest of the business?
• How do you embed that strategy in the practice of all functions?
• How do you infuse it into the values and culture?

Posted by Heath Row at 2:45 PM | 4 Comments

File Under: Bad Idea

Talking garbage cans: Just what we need to keep the city streets clean.

Posted by Heath Row at 2:11 PM | Add Comment

Productivity Scene

In Pure Content, Play's team blog, street team member Dave Dec says:

Unemployment is up, but so is productivity. If I hear one more CXO or journalist/analyst say the reason is because the low performance employees are being weeded out I'll scream.

The reason production is high during low employment is fear. People produce at unbelievable rates when they fear losing their jobs. These same CXO-level folks know this. I'm not here to say, "wait until the economy gets better and I'm outta here." What I am saying is people, even super-producers -- can only work in this fear for so long without re-evaluating what is important.

The truly creative managers are those who see this trend of fear and instead of embracing it wish to change it. Capture the high productivity, but breed soul into the job. Make it a relationship worth pursuing for the long run. Truly commit, not just to stockholders, profits, or owners of family owned businesses, but to your workforce. Make them a part of your team before other creatives discover your employees' high production and start an affair to remember -- and leave you for the new romance.

Fear. It's not a word often used at work. But what do you think: Does fear drive productivity -- personal and organizational? And if so, what are you afraid of?

Posted by Heath Row at 2:04 PM | 1 Comment

The Brand Called... You Again?

Fast Company reader "David" recently remarked that our 1997 feature The Brand Called You is "a typical example of the breathless crap" for which the magazine is known.

Feedback like that fascinates me. One, I don't reread articles published seven years ago and criticize ideas that were then valid if they aren't as useful now. The world turns. And two, if the Brand Called You is so passe, it's interesting that the Hollywood Reporter recently covered celebrity branding.

Seems the idea still has legs, even if the tenor of the times has changed.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:47 PM | 4 Comments

Lunch Hunch II

In a recent interview with Wired magazine, Bill Joy gives a hint to the strategic implications of lunch: "The ideal project is one where people don't have meetings, they have lunch. The size of the team should be the size of the lunch table."

Posted by Heath Row at 12:31 PM | Add Comment

Calculating Balance

MSN Careers offers a quick quiz that may help answer the question, "Are you making time for you?" The 10-question exercise, which indicates where you stand in terms of work-life balance, isn't terribly useful as a problem solver, but the questions it poses are thought provoking. For example, I was caught off guard by "I tend to think of myself only in terms of my responsibilities to others."

Posted by Heath Row at 11:43 AM | Add Comment

Leading Readers

Supachai Panitchpakdi, director general of the WTO, recently shared his deserted-island reading list with USA Today. Among his must-read titles:

• Petrosian's Best Games of Chess 1946-1963 by Peter H. Clarke
• Development as Freedom by Amartya Sen
• On History by Eric Hobsbawm
• Sophie's Choice by William Styron
• Hayek's Challenge: The Intellectual Biography of F.A. Hayek by Bruce Caldwell

What's on your leadership nightstand?

Posted by Heath Row at 11:38 AM | Add Comment

Taking a Stand Against Spam

In August, Keith Hammonds uncovered the dirty little secret about spam. Now, the Guardian reports that some spam recipients are starting to fight back against email conmen -- particularly people behind the Nigerian money scams -- publicly outing them in what's been called the Net's first blood sport.

One site documenting this activity, 419 Eater, encourages spammers to send their targets photographs of themselves holding up signs with the target's supposed name. Some even send their passports. The fake names are funny in an infantile way -- some may not be work safe -- but overall, the service saddens me. Not only are spam cons criminal, the conmen fall prey to the very misled trust they're trying to use to weedle money out of their victims.

While organizations such as the Anti-Spam Research Group continue to find technical solutions, perhaps this kind of vigilante justice is also effective. If anything, it shows that turnabout is sometimes unfair play.

Posted by Heath Row at 11:15 AM | Add Comment

November 19, 2003

The Wal-Mart You Don't Know III

In an hour-plus, Fast Company Senior Writer Charles Fishman will participate in WBUR's "On Point" program. Joining Alan Sanderson, an economist from the University of Chicago; Harley Shaiken, professor of labor and the global economy at the University of California Berkeley; and host Tom Ashworth, Charles will discuss the "Wal-Marting of America," as well as our December feature The Wal-Mart You Don't Know.

At 8 p.m. ET, you can listen in online. If you're unable to tune in or participate in the phone-in Q&A portion of the program but would still like to ask Charles questions about the piece -- and the stories behind the story -- leave questions by adding a comment to this post. Then, given time and opportunity, Charles will respond to readers right here in FC Now.

Posted by Heath Row at 6:31 PM | 4 Comments

Leading Logistically

In the past, Fast Company has looked at how logistics and shipping companies such as Con-Way Now, Federal Express, UPS, and Yellow Freight System use GPS, respond quickly, work with their staff, and remain competitive.

Today, Wired News reports that FedEx is stepping even further into the future by opening a new Institute of Technology. There, researchers will study artificial intelligence, computer engineering, the life sciences, and psychology to develop new technology and further ensure that FedEx is able to deliver customers the world on time.

Posted by Heath Row at 6:09 PM | Add Comment

Collaborate, Compete, Cooperate

Leaders such as Yahoo!'s Tim Sanders and smartRay's Troy Tyler extoll the strategic value of "co-opetition," or working with your competitors -- not against them.

In a recent newsletter, MarketIdeaShop's Lois Carter Fay describes the reasons why she often cites, compliments, and recommends people -- and companies -- who are ostensibly her rivals:

• It gives me more products to sell.
• I have a larger sales force than I would have without affiliates.
• My credibility is enhanced by being associated with stellar competitors.
• My competitors can provide excellent content for my electronic magazine, which makes my job easier and my ezine more interesting to my readers.
• I can provide articles to my competitors to use in their ezines, expanding my reach to their subscriber base.
• My sales increase and my profitability rises.
• I can learn from my competitors (and they from me) because they have different skill sets and experiences than I do. In other words, we can mentor each other.
• If I am swamped or need help, I can call on my competitors to help me serve my clients.
• If my competitors are swamped or need help, I can sell my services to them or their clients.

Posted by Heath Row at 3:10 PM | 1 Comment

Leading Learning

Technology & Learning magazine recently rounded up what they consider the top 10 innovative online learning projects in America. While the projects concentrate solely on school use, the examples given might contain ideas and tools that can be used in corporate training and development programs.

Posted by Heath Row at 2:17 PM | 1 Comment

Lunch Hunch

Lunch. It's part of almost every work day. Whether you pack your own, frequent several nearby eateries, or work in a building with a cafeteria, lunch is an under-explored and largely unappreciated aspect of our work experience.

Sushi Finder is an online service that can help add some wasabi to your work week. Including restaurants in more than a dozen urban areas in the U.S., Sushi Finder enables searches by cross street and neighborhood.

The site also offers sushi tips and a way for people to recommend their own favorite sushi spots. Kampai!

Posted by Heath Row at 1:24 PM | Add Comment

The Wal-Mart You Don't Know II

In response to Fast Company's December feature about Wal-Mart, Dave Pollard diagrams what he terms the "Wal-Mart Dilemma." So doing, he considers the role of regulation as an intervention that can help slow the race to the bottom."

The answer is not to blame the Wal-Mart shopper for buying imported goods there, because in the vicious red cycle it's all they can afford -- they're paradoxically forced to perpetuate the cycle and sustain their own and others' poverty. And the answer is not to blame Wal-Mart either: They're doing what their corporate charter dictates, using their immense buying power (they sell a quarter trillion dollars worth of goods each year) to increase earnings per share, and in the process they have introduced some unarguably beneficial innovations into their, and their suppliers', business processes.

The answer is to recognize that 'free' trade laws need to be limited to goods and services that cannot be reasonably produced domestically, and pressure politicians to reimpose duties and other regulations on those goods and services that can.

What do you think? Is regulation the answer?

Posted by Heath Row at 1:13 PM | 6 Comments

Behind the Scenes

My colleague Dan Cederholm, who helped get FC Now going several months ago, was recently interviewed about the ideas behind the design and architecture of Fast Company's Web site -- and why we decided to focus on Web standards. It's an interesting look at how we do what we do online.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:45 PM | Add Comment

Investment Projection

Civilian Capital, an online underwriter and brokerage firm, is organizing an IPO for the movie Billy Dead, to be produced by Ethan Hawke. Planning to raise almost $8 million for the film by issuing 900,000 shares of preferred stock of Billy Dead Inc., the firm's efforts mark the first time a film project is open to general investment.

"Traditionally, film financing has held many filmmakers captive. Whoever controls the money, controls the film," says Barry Poltermann, Civilian's founder and CEO. "By bringing films to the public marketplace, our goal is to create a new 'non-studio' source of capital and provide filmmakers with more artistic freedom."

David Bowie encouraged people to invest in his future recordings about six years ago. Are there other examples of people being able to invest in individual innovators and leaders -- or their creative output?

Posted by Heath Row at 12:40 PM | Add Comment