Getting The Biggest Bang For The Buck

So I had the opportunity to sit in on a colleague teaching a class in Performance Improvement. 

One tool that I really liked from the class was the Impact-Effort Matrix. 

To determine project worth doing, the matrix has the:

Impacts (Vertical) – Improved customer satisfaction, quality, delivery time, etc.

Effort (Horizontal) – Money, Time, etc. 

The best bang for the buck are the projects in upper left (“Quick Wins”) that have a high impact or return for not a lot of effort. 

In contract, the projects that are the least desirable are in the lower right (“Thankless Tasks”) that have a low impact or return but come at a high cost or lot of effort. 

This is simple to do and understand and yet really helps to prioritize projects and find the best choices among them. 😉

(Source Graphic: Andy Blumenthal)

Risk In The Eye Of The Beholder

Should I do it or is it too risky?

 

That’s a question we ask ourselves many times a day.

 

– Open our mouths at work or keep a lid on it.

 

– Run to catch that train or bus or slow down and go more carefully.

 

– Eat that greasy burger and fries or opt for a salad and smoothie.

 

– Invest in that highflier stock or put your money in the “G” fund.

 

The Wall Street Journal presents risk management as both quantifiable and qualitative.

 

For example, a MicroMort (1 MM, and sounds like micro fart) is “equal to one-in-a million chance of death.”

 

An average American has a 1.3MMs chance of a “sudden, violent end” on any given day.

 

However, climb to the base camp at Mount Everest (at 29K feet), that’s over 12,000 MM, base jump at only 430 MMs per jump, parachute 7 MM, and go on a roller coaster at only .0015 MM.

 

So there you have it–statistics tell the risk story!

 

But not so fast, our risk calculations also take into account our qualitative values. For example, we tend to lower the risk in our minds of postpartum depression (10-15% or higher) because we value having a baby.

 

Similarly, we tend to think driving (1 MM per 240 miles) is safer than flying (1 MM per 7,500 miles) because we believe we are in control of the automobile, as opposed to a passenger jet flown by a couple of pilots.

 

The result, “Scariness of an activity isn’t necessarily proportionate to its risk.”

 

That means that you can easily make a mistake and underestimate risk, because of your personality or cultural and social biases.

 

Rock climb at your own risk…BUT do you really understand what that risk even is or are you driven to do something overly dangerous and maybe stupid. 😉

 

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Cloud $ Confusion

It seems like never before has a technology platform brought so much confusion as the Cloud.No, I am not talking about the definition of cloud (which dogged many for quite some time), but the cost-savings or the elusiveness of them related to cloud computing.

On one hand, we have the Federal Cloud Computing Strategy, which estimated that 25% of the Federal IT Budget of $80 billion could move to the cloud and NextGov (Sept 2012) reported that the Federal CIO told a senate panel in May 2011 that with Cloud, the government would save a minimum of $5 billion annually.

Next we have bombastic estimates of cost savings from the likes of the MeriTalk Cloud Computing Exchange that estimates about $5.5 billion in savings so far annually (7% of the Federal IT budget) and that this could grow to $12 billion (or 15% of the IT budget) within 3 years, as quoted in an article in Forbes (April 2012) or as much as $16.6 billion annually as quoted in the NextGov article–more than triple the estimated savings that even OMB put out.

On the other hand, we have a raft of recent articles questioning the ability to get to these savings, federal managers and the private sector’s belief in them, and even the ability to accurately calculate and report on them.

– Federal Computer Week (1 Feb 2012)–“Federal managers doubt cloud computing’s cost-savings claims” and that “most respondents were also not sold on the promises of cloud computing as a long-term money saver.”

– Federal Times (8 October 2012)–“Is the cloud overhyped? predicted savings hard to verify” and a table included show projected cloud-saving goals of only about $16 million per year across 9 Federal agencies.

– CIO Magazine (15 March 2012)–“Despite Predictions to the Contrary, Exchange Holds Off Gmail in D.C.” cites how with a pilot of 300 users, they found Gmail didn’t even pass the “as good or better” test.

– ComputerWorld (7 September 2012)–“GM to hire 10,000 IT pros as it ‘insources’ work” so majority of work is done by GM employees and enables the business.

Aside from the cost-savings and mission satisfaction with cloud services, there is still the issue of security, where according to the article in Forbes from this year, still “A majority of IT managers, 85%, say they are worried about the security implications of moving to their operations to the cloud,” with most applications being moved being things like collaboration and conferencing tools, email, and administrative applications–this is not primarily the high value mission-driven systems of the organization.

Evidently, there continues to be a huge disconnect being the hype and the reality of cloud computing.

One thing is for sure–it’s time to stop making up cost-saving numbers to score points inside one’s agency or outside.

One way to promote more accurate reporting is to require documentation substantiating the cost-savings by showing the before and after costs, and oh yeah including the migration costs too and all the planning that goes into it.

Another more drastic way is to take the claimed savings back to the Treasury and the taxpayer.Only with accurate reporting and transparency can we make good business decisions about what the real cost-benefits are of moving to the cloud and therefore, what actually should be moved there.While there is an intuitiveness that we will reduce costs and achieve efficiencies by using shared services, leveraging service providers with core IT expertise, and by paying for only what we use, we still need to know the accurate numbers and risks to gauge the true net benefits of cloud.It’s either know what you are actually getting or just go with what sounds good and try to pull out a cookie–how would you proceed?(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Smart Cats Aren’t Afraid to Innovate

It’s really hypocritical that on one hand we put innovation on a pedestal, but on the other hand, we tend to nix new ideas.

The Atlantic (July/August 2012) has an article called “Let’s Cool It With the Big Ideas.”

The author, P.J. O’Rourke, rails against innovation, saying: “I don’t have a big idea, and I don’t want one. I don’t like big ideas.”

Let’s just say this article by O’Rourke proves his point and not only about big ideas.

Unfortunately, like O’Rourke, many in our society seem to have a love/hate relationship with innovation.

We love new ideas when they work to our benefit–like having a smartphone perhaps–but we fear the worst about failing and people seem to loathe change of any kind until it’s a “proven entity.”

Hence as O’Rourke points out the derogatory feelings and sayings about new, big ideas:

– What is the big idea?
– You and your bright ideas.
– Whose idea was this?
– Me and my big ideas.
– Don’t get smart with me.

The last one is really the clincher with it all–without new ideas and the bravery to explore them, our “smarts” really do go out the window.

This is reminiscent of when the great Library of Alexandria burnt to the ground almost 2,000 years ago, destroying many of the “new ideas” of the philosophers, scientists, mathematicians, poets, and playwrights of the time, leaving us for centuries stuck in the Dark Ages!

Sure, new ideas are threatening to old ways of thinking and doing things, but we are an evolving species–stagnation is death.

According to Harvard Business Review (October 2010) in “How to Save Good Ideas“–a more enlightened article here, explains how to counter fearful and destructive people “who try to kill ideas” using “fear-mongering, delay, confusion, and ridicule.”

Some of the suggestions to counter the naysayers:

– When they attack you for “dictating” a new idea–you can explain that there is a vetting process, but like with a train conductor, we need to provide direction for our people.

– When they say, no one else is doing this–for any new idea, someone has to be the first to try it, and we have the capacity to innovate and succeed.

– When they criticize your timing–acknowledge that you can’t do everything and the poor projects should be weeded out, but promising new ventures should proceed.

From a leadership perspective, we cannot shove new ideas down people’s throats, but rather we need to explore ideas openly and honestly. Leaders should explain the imperative for change, explore organizational and market readiness, look at costs and benefits, mitigate risks, and help people in adopting and adapting to change–and this last one can be the most difficult.

For those that are comfortable with the status quo or afraid of what change may mean to their jobs, status, and security–there are times, when reassuring and working together can move people and the organization forward, but there are also times, when perhaps the person-organizational fit may no longer be right, and it is time to part ways.

The way we do things today–no matter how comfortable–is not the way we will always do them.  Times change, challenges build up, opportunities emerge, and as survivors, we either adapt or fade into the annals of history.

“There is more than one way to skin a cat,” but if we are cool to new ideas, the cat will most definitely get away from us–and it may be for good.

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Ivo Kendra)

To Die or Not

Yesterday, I read in the Wall Street Journal (7-8 July 2012) about end of life decisions.

With healthcare costs spiraling out of control, driven especially by the care given to those in their final year of life, as a society we are confronted with horrible decisions.

When do you do “everything possible” for the patient’s survival and when do you make the call to “pull the plug.”

The article was about one man specifically–age 41, I think–who needed a heart transplant–which was expensive but successful, but then infection and complications set in over the course of the year and resulted in doctors removing part of his lung, his left leg above the knee, his gallbladder, and with the patient eventually living off of a ventilator.

The medical staff described the patients wincing in pain and the horrific image of at times with the tube down his throat, his screaming with no sounds coming out.

Doctors and the hospital’s ethical counselors spoke with the parents of the man (as his wife had divorced him prior) about discontinuing care.

Part of the conversation was about the practically futile attempts to keep the man alive, the pain of the patient, but subtly there was also the notion about the high cost of care and the patient having reached Medicare limits.

When the father was told that the nurses were having ethical questions about treating the man, the father wanting to keep his son alive at virtually all costs said, (rather than his son being taken off of the medical care he was receiving) maybe these nurses who had an issue with it shouldn’t be working on his ward!

The patient died within the year and at a cost of something like $2.7 million dollars (and the man leaving behind a 9 year old son himself).

There is no question that we want to provide the best care for our families and loved ones–they mean everything to us.

But when does the greater cost to society (i.e. the greater good) outweigh the benefits to the individual?

Yes, can we come up with hard and cold actuarial calculations about what a person contributes into the system, how much value they bring the world, what the anticipated cost is to keep them alive, and what are the chances of success–and then we can draw a line of what as a society we are willing or able to spend to save this person.

That is very matter-of-fact–objective, but practically devoid of feeling, compassion, and hope.

What if the calculation is wrong and the person could’ve been saved, lived longer, at lower cost, and/or would’ve been a great contributor to society–how do we know how to really figure individual life and death decisions.

And what of the cost–the meaning–to the family that relies and loves this person and needs him/her–the cost is priceless to them.

But what about others who don’t, can’t, or won’t receive proper care because others ended up taking more than their “fair” share–aren’t they also human beings deserving as well of proper care–and to their families are they not also invaluable?

From an ethical standpoint, this is one of those horrible dilemas that plague our consciousness and to which answers do not come easy.

An almost insane question– but can we be, in a sense, too giving to an individual, too generous societally, and with some things trying too hard to be ethical?

Like we are seeing now with the financial decline of the European Union and the frightening fiscal challenges ahead for America–how do maintain the traditional “safety net” (Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and more) without bankrupting the system and underlying society itself?

In essence, what happens when in our effort to be humane to people and give them a basic standard of living and care, keep our country safe, drive research and innovation, and secure human rights and democracy around the world–we overextend ourselves.

Like many a great society before us that flourished and then declined and even disappeared–do we get overconfident, overly ambitious, and ultimately become self-defeating?

No one–a family member, a compassionate and caring human being, and especially an elected politician wants to say “no” when these decisions hang over us.

But the reality is we will soon be faced not only with the life and death decisions of today, but also generations of built-up overspending and borrowing to finance generous, and yes even corrupt, spending habits.

This will affect present and future generations requiring harder and longer work lives to get a lower standard of living and care, and could even result in our noble society’s decline.

The result is we not only face individual life and death decisions every day, but we also are facing a potential existential threat to our way of life.

Expect gut-wrenching decisions over the next decade(s) and prepare for life to change in painful ways for all of us–on and off the deathbed.

While no one wants to face these questions and make the hard decisions, this is exactly what will need to happen–sooner or later.

Fiscally-speaking, there is no longer one way to freedom, but through a collective fight to secure our nation’s future.

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

The Truth About Lying

House MD said it first “Everybody lies; the only variable is about what.”

This weekend’s Wall Street Journal (26-27 May 2012)–states that research confirms this as truth.

“Everyone cheats a little right up to the point where they lose their sense of integrity.”

According to the article–“very few people steal to a maximum degree, but many good people cheat just a little here and there.”

They pad their billable hours, underreport their earnings to the IRS, claim higher loses on insurance claims, pocket a little from the cash register, walk out of the store without paying, copy test answers, plagiarize someone’s intellectual property, and the list goes on and on.

Already in the Ten Commandments, we see the fundamental precept of “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.”

Yet according to the research, people’s dishonesty is enabled by their disposition to:

– Rationalize away the crime.

– Overshadow it with previous immoral acts.

– Excuse the behavior by stating that everyone does it.

– Minimize the significance of the wrongdoing.

– Claim it is necessary or for the greater good.

Interestingly, factors that we would think would have a big impact on dishonesty, don’t–such as either the amount of money to gained or the probability of being caught.

Apparently, the cost-benefit calculus is not the driving factor in wrong-doing, but rather the absence of “moral reminders” and of enforcement/supervision is what creates the fertile ground for people to do the wrong–whether because they can, for the thrill of it, or because in their minds it “levels the playing field.”

Everyone has the capacity for evil and to do wrongdoing, but the vast majority of the people with the right moral guidance will do mostly the right things.

“Except for a few outliers at the top and bottom, the behaviors of almost everyone is driven by two opposing motivations”–these are greed and fear.

One one hand, greed drives people to push themselves and work hard, but it can also be used to go overboard to the point of acting dishonestly–to take what is not theirs and to lie about it.

On the other hand, fear of losing our integrity keeps people’s unbridled desires in check and perhaps even motivates us to give back to others, but fear can also can inhibit people from giving it their all.

The ongoing interplay between greed and fear long known to drive financial markets are the underpinnings for our own moral tug-of-war.

Balancing greed and fear is a powerful embrace that can propel humankind powerfully forward with drive and motivation or undermine its very existence through inhibition and dishonesty.

Reading the article and the underlying research was upsetting to me to see that so many people can be swayed seemingly so easily to have such little integrity.

And while most situations in life are not “black and white”–they are complex shades of gray–people can be tempted to rationalize even when they really know what they are doing in misguided.

This is the ultimate personal challenge for all of us–to maintain our integrity in the face of all temptations and readily available excuses out there.

G-d speed in making good moral and productive choices.

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Gerard Stolk)

>The "Right" Way to Introduce New Technology and Enterprise Architecture

> I came across some interesting lessons learned on rolling out new technology (from the perspective of franchisers/franchisees) that apply nicely to user-centric enterprise architects (adapted from The Wall Street Journal, 26 November 2007):

1) Partner with the user–“if you can get a franchisee really excited about the new technology, it’s a lot simpler to get it rolled out…if I can convince you, and you can see the difference, you will be my best spokesman.”

2) Testing it first–“finding a guinea pig…we have a lot of people telling us they have great concepts. We want to see that it works with our customer base, our menu, our procedures first.”

3) Show the cost-benefit–“an enhancement may look promising, but if its payback is years away, the investment may not compute.” Why fix it, if it ain’t broke.

4) Keep it simple–“most franchisees are focused on their business, not technology…so they’re not looking for something to complicate their lives.” Also, focus the solution on the operators in the field and not on the headquarters staff, who may not be completely in tune with the realities on the front lines with the customers.