I was once asked to give a speech at the regional National Speakers Association meeting in San Diego about my approach for effective communicating.  Specifically, they wanted me to tell them how I give a speech.  My approach is simple. First, I offer up a concept that could help each person in the audience be a better manager, teacher, coach, or parent.  Next, I give an example or tell a story that relates to that concept.  I get people laughing.  I try to zero in on audience members as human beings and make my point in such a way that it triggers an emotional reaction for each person. Ultimately, I want them to walk out of the room with an idea they can put into action in their lives. Here’s an example of my approach: Introduce a concept that will enrich the life of each member of the audience.  "Of all the concepts that I have taught over the years, the most important is about catching people doing things right. There is little doubt in my mind that the key to developing people is to catch them doing something right and praise them for their performance."  The minute I begin talking about catching people doing things right, praising them and letting them know you noticed their good performance, the audience perks up. Everyone can relate to this topic in some way, both at home and at work, because everyone loves praise. Give an example that relates to the concept. After I talk to the audience about praising in a general sense, I warn people not to wait for exactly the right behavior to praise others—because they could be waiting forever!  "In the beginning, when people are learning something and are not top performers yet, you have to praise progress. For example, imagine that you’re trying to teach a child how to say, ‘Give me a glass of water, please.’ If she has never spoken before, and you wait for that full sentence before you give the child a sip of water, what have you got?  A very dehydrated kid, that’s what!  So what do you do?  You have to praise progress. First, zero in on the word water.  Repeat it over and over again.  Finally, the child will respond with something like ‘loller.’ When that happens, hug and kiss the kid.  Call his grandmother and get the child on the phone so she can say, ‘loller, loller, loller.’ While that’s not water, it’s not bad.  After a while, though, you will only accept water.  Why?  Because you don’t want your child going into a restaurant at 21 years of age and asking for a glass of loller.  So praising progress helps people move toward desired performance." Tell a story that shows other applications for the concept. "Is praising important in relationships other than with our children?  You’d better believe it.  Have you ever seen a couple in a restaurant in love?  Margie and I were at a French restaurant not long ago, where we spent three hours enjoying a marvelous meal and elegant atmosphere. On one side of us was a couple in love.  When one of them would talk, the other would smile and listen.  I don’t think they cared if the meal ever came. On the other side was a couple that obviously had been married for a while.  In three hours, I don’t think they said four sentences to each other.  He finally said, ‘How’s your meat?’  ‘Okay,’ was the reply, ‘How’s yours?’  I whispered to Margie, ‘That marriage is dead but nobody buried it.’  How do you get from hanging onto someone’s every word to having nothing to say?  It’s the frequency with which you catch each other doing things right." Summarize the presentation with tips the audience can put into action. "The key to keeping personal and professional relationships healthy is to constantly catch people doing things right, and praise them by accenting the positive.  When you accent the positive, you have deposits in your human relationship bank account with that person.  Now, if that person does something wrong, you can point it out without devastating the relationship." The example I’ve just presented demonstrates how, when giving a speech, I try to present a concept in human terms and involve the audience in a way that it stirs an emotional reaction in each person.  I try to relate the concept to something that is present in the lives of every audience member so they can feel the power of the concept.  Remember that your job as a communicator and speaker is to inspire and change people’s behavior, not just to share information. If you use this approach when giving a presentation, you will keep your audience interested and give them something they will remember—and be able to use—long after they leave the room.

Consider the following quote from the Wall Street Journal. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203686204577116691332544490.html "The U.S. military left Iraq in December with new technologies that are likely to change the shape of future wars. But some of the skills developed alongside are in danger of falling away, several people throughout the ranks worry." A critical part of moving forward to address world issues effectively is capturing the problem solving, expertise, and approaches of past experiences.  Solving new problems based on the solutions of similar past problems is pervasive in everyday human problem solving.  All reasoning is based on past cases and personal experiences.  Every field from an auto mechanic to chef to lawyer has a formal process for using past cases for instruction. Cases or project history can be leveraged in an operational manner as well.  Discovery Machine has developed a methodology for capturing expertise from past problem solving as an approach for best practice capture.  This is powerful because remembering past cases is natural.  Discovery Machine has made capturing and leveraging the past cases possible and sustainable.

One of the key steps to empowering people is to create autonomy through boundaries.  A problem in the past was the assumption that empowered people could do anything they wanted; they were in charge. That theory just doesn’t make sense.  A river without banks is just a large puddle—what permits a river to flow is its banks.  In empowering people, the banks are the boundary areas or guidelines within which people can operate. Top management takes a lead in providing these boundary areas.  They include the following: Purpose - Everyone needs to know what business you are in. Values - What are the beliefs that drive your behavior? Goals - What are the big picture, bottom-line goals on which everyone should focus? Roles - What are people being asked to do and contribute? Incentives - What’s in it for people if they perform well? Measures - How will people know what good behavior looks like? Boundaries could also include policies and procedures.  As I learned from coaching great Don Shula when we wrote Everyone’s a Coach—you first need to have a plan, and then you need to expect the unexpected and be ready to change that plan if necessary.  In football, an "audible" is when the quarterback or defensive captain changes the plan on a given play when he realizes it won’t work.  Shula emphasized that effectiveness at calling audibles begins with a plan. This concept was verified by two of our top consultants when they had a chance to observe the training of guide dogs for the blind.  They found that two kinds of dogs were disqualified from the program. The first kind, obviously, were the dogs who were completely disobedient—they wouldn’t do anything their master asked of them. The other kind of dogs that were dismissed, surprisingly, were ones that were completely obedient dogs—they would do whatever their master wanted.  The dogs that worked best were dogs that would do whatever their master wanted unless it didn’t make sense. Let me give you an example. The totally obedient dog and its master are standing at a street corner when the dog’s master says, "Forward." The dog looks to the left and sees a car coming at sixty-five miles an hour.  The dog thinks, "This is a real bummer," as it leads its master out into the middle of the road.  But a dog that is intelligent and allowed to think for itself can make a choice that best fits the given circumstances. Many organizations don’t seem to want their people to bring their brains to work.  How many times have you been in a situation where a front line employee said, "I’m sorry, but it’s our policy," when in your specific circumstances the policy made no sense? For example, one time when I was checking into a hotel, the woman behind the counter told me they had no rooms available until after 2:00 p.m.  I said, "That’s okay with me.  Could you please store my bags?" She said, "Fine," and asked me what else she could do for me. I said, "I need to cash a traveler’s check." "I can’t do that," she said.  "I don’t know what your room number is yet." "Why do you need my room number?" I asked. "I have to put it on the back of every traveler’s check." "That’s a good policy," I said, "but you have my bags.  It doesn’t make sense in this case." Her responses included "It’s our policy," "I just work here," "I don’t make the rules," etc.  Can you imagine a guide dog for the blind under those restrictions?  It would be a goner at the first busy street! Empowerment begins with boundaries.  There is nothing wrong with policies or procedures or other guidelines—empowered employees welcome them—but they recognize they can use their brains and call audibles when the policy doesn’t make sense.  Empowering people without giving them any boundaries can lead to disaster and failure.

If you were to look at a model of expert knowledge, you might expect to see some very complex calculations or something hard to understand.  After all, experts are very smart people and they accomplish tasks that the rest of us find difficult.  The reality though is that lots of time when you see the expertise, it doesn’t seem all that difficult or complex.  Often the expertise is just a relatively simple process with a few expert tidbits that make the process execute smoothly and accurately.  These expert tidbits represent how the expert looks at the situation from the right frame of mind, or as we say with the right mental model. Think of an example of an expert model that can plan a meeting.  We all know how to plan a meeting.  You just figure out who needs to be at the meeting, figure out when they can come and then schedule the meeting. Ah, but an expert meeting planner knows it is not quite that straightforward.  First you need to establish a meeting topic and agenda.  This information can be used to determine who really needs to be at the meeting and can avoid having unnecessary attendees that might derail the objective.  It also helps determine the required length of the meeting.  Now with the right list of people, you can go about finding a good meeting time.  An expert also knows that for a big meeting, you’ll sometimes need to think more about logistics.  But what is big?  5 people?  50 people? 500 people? Well, it depends on your perspective.  If the topic is a semi-annual review of company progress done on a webcast, 500 people may not be that big.  If the topic is a working meeting where you expect to accomplish something, 5 people is big and you may need to schedule a meeting coordinator to keep the meeting running effectively.  An expert knows how to deal with these differences and we at Discovery Machine know how to capture this knowledge from the expert and model it correctly.  Of course when we do capture it and a novice looks at the model, it ends up not looking that complex.  But the value is that the model of expert knowledge will always evaluate the breadth of the expertise captured which ultimately results in better results.

I believe the biggest addiction problem in the workplace today is the human ego.  When people operate from their ego, their behavior tends to be based on fear rather than trust. When people behave out of fear, they have a high need to control others and their environment and they have a win-lose orientation toward everything.  Even when discussing the weather they want to make sure you know that they know more about weather than you do. They broadcast a philosophy about life that states "I’m okay, you’re not." I discovered this addiction many years ago when my wife Margie was writing a book with Dr. Mark J. Tager entitled Working Well and studying what made a healthy work environment. One of the questions they asked people in their research was, "Can a bad boss make you sick?"  A lot of people said, "Yes."  They cited examples such as migraine headaches, ulcers, sleepless nights—even heart attacks and cancer. I became fascinated by people’s perceptions of bad bosses, so I started asking people around the country to describe the worst boss they had ever worked for.  The primary description I heard was that of a high ego-driven person.  The worst managers were described as poor listeners who were reluctant to share credit and always wanted to be in the limelight.  While a lot of people would think people with a big ego had high self-esteem, I found the opposite to be true:  Individuals who operate from their ego are usually covering up "not okay" feelings about themselves.  They try to compensate for feelings of inadequacy by overpowering others and controlling their environment. Why do I feel ego addiction is so harmful to the business community?  Because it is holding back progress in organizations.  Companies all over the country are having difficulties moving toward being the kind of organization they need to be to make it in this economy.  Companies today need to be customer driven, cost effective, fast and flexible, and continually improving.  To do this we need high-trust environments.  And yet, throughout the work world managers are hesitant to empower others and give them a chance to have more responsibility and take initiative to make decisions.  The people who are fearful and holding back support of these changes in business are those who are operating from their ego.  They fear loss of power and control. People who are hung up on their egos and who operate out of fear really need love.  Yet it’s hard to love these people because they don’t seem very lovable.  Instead, folks with big egos seem to be demanding, self-centered, and unsatisfied. They feel better about themselves when they can make others feel inferior.  Fortunately, their attempts don’t have to be successful.  As Eleanor Roosevelt once said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your permission." Just because someone has power doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a need to feel appreciated.  When was the last time you caught your boss doing something right?  When was the last time you gave your boss a hug?  I’m not necessarily talking about a physical hug—even a psychological hug can help.  Thank her for her support or for doing a good job on a certain task.  In my sessions I ask people who are parents whether their love for their kids depends on their kids’ achievements.  Rarely does a hand go up.  We love our children without any contingencies—it’s called unconditional love.  I think the same approach is needed in the workplace today.  We need to learn to trust and respect others, even if we sometimes have a problem with their behavior. If we can help everyone in the workforce feel good about themselves and raise their self-esteem, we’ll have more people willing to share power by permitting others to take initiative, make decisions, and let work teams be the main vehicle for decision making.  To overcome ego addiction, people have to get in touch with their own worthiness.  If it’s hard for them, others can help. Everyone in organizations should set a goal to maintain or enhance the self-esteem of the people with whom they interact, for the benefit of all.  Big egos can be tamed with the right amount of tender loving care.

I am having a lot of game exposure in the next couple of months. A couple of weeks ago I met Aneesh Chopra the White House CTO at an event where he talked about STEM, simulation, and games in Washington. I went to an Innovation Transfer Network meeting on Serious Games at Shippensburg University yesterday. My daughter asked to play Temple Run while we waited for the bus this morning.  I am going to the Game Developers Conference in a couple of weeks and then Discovery Machine exhibits at GameTech 2012 in Orlando, March 28-30. Where have we been and where will we go with computer games?   I am sure some geek built a cathode ray game in the 40s. Someone tried to build a game to play Chess in England in the 50s and could not get there.  My first game was Pong in 1973.  At Discovery Machine today, one side of our business builds behavior modeling AI for battlefield games like Bohemia Interactive’s VBS2 and VT MAK’s VR Forces.  We build AI for US DoD games. We build intelligent avatars and devices that have a complete life of their own.  You can talk to them and they talk back.  You can make them have a good mood or point your gun at them and their mood drops. Just search Free Online Games. It is actually a slow search because there are 184 million results. While games are fun and I cannot image the games my grand kids will play, some do waste our time. We all have spent 10 minutes trying to get all 9 stars on level IV in Angry Birds. That wasn’t a waste, I won! (note the mood thing) Games are here to teach too.  Games can teach you a language or how to play an instrument. Doctors surgery techniques. Soldiers how to fight. I consider the best games are ones that teach and are intelligent .  I will be seeing a lot of the latest games in the next few weeks. I will tell you what I liked the best. If you are going to GDC or GameTech, drop me a note so we can chat or play a game   jmcassey(at)discoverymachine.com

I was talking recently with one of my old friends who is not a man of traditional religious faith. I asked him, "What is your comfort? What is a philosophy you live by?" And he said, "I have always tried throughout my life to do the right thing. I think of the Golden Rule as my faith. I only try to do to other people as I would like to have done to me and I always try to take that into consideration. If all the faiths around the world would practice the Golden Rule, the world would be a different place. I believe our role in life is to treat other people as if they were important individuals and treat them as we would want to be treated."  And I thought that was really powerful. A large part of being a servant leader and being there for other people is realizing that every human being is important. Even if another person mistreats us, it doesn’t do us any good to lower ourselves to their methods. The concept of turning the other cheek is kind of hard sometimes, but it’s all about not getting hooked into somebody else’s poor behavior. Perhaps it’s easier to just think of it as living by the Golden Rule. I found out from Colleen Barrett that at Southwest Airlines, the Golden Rule is a major part of their company culture and leadership philosophy. Colleen learned that early in her life from her mother, who was a great believer in the Golden Rule. So this week, as we go out and greet each other and greet customers and family members, just remember: Treat them as if it were you - how would you like to be treated? That’s a pretty great way to live life. I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving week.

I recently read an interesting article by Eric Beidel in the National Defense Magazine titled, "Avatars Invade Military Training Systems". In this article, Mr. Beidel discusses a current initiative to create a realistic avatar to represent every soldier in the Army. This avatar would be used for simulated training events and allow the soldier to become fully immersed in the synthetic training environment. A key component to the new approach is that the avatar will be realistic down to the physical attributes of the respective soldier. Things like hair color, eye color, physical endurance, skill levels, and more would be incorporated to match the soldier in real life. Realism is the key. A student learns nothing if there are no consequences and learn nothing if it is unrealistic to achieve the same results in real life. The question I ask in reaction to this is: what good is a perfect recreation of a trainee, without perfect representations of the training situation itself? Billions of dollars are spent across the military each year funding various training endeavors. Much of this funding has gone into live training events and pays live actors to portray real life events. The article discusses how the new approach tackles this dilemma by allowing an actor to play multiple characters in the simulation for trainees to interact with. That is the point where I begin to disagree. Yes, you could shave some costs by having one actor perform multiple parts in a simulated training event, but you are still reliant on a few key individuals. Plus, the approach is for an actor to play multiple parts which may lead to confusion for the actors themselves and cause them to incorrectly interact with students. That would deteriorate the training experience as it would contribute to negative training. Instead, I think the true solution is to create realistic, automated, intelligent characters. Discovery Machine offers this ability at a particularly low cost. Why pay actors, when you can create intelligent behavior models of expertise which are more realistic of the real world? Discovery Machine’s proven approaches are capable of doing just that. We work with experts to capture their expertise and then we leverage that expertise to control intelligent avatars in training events with artificial intelligence. In closing: Yes, I believe that realistic training is important and realistic representations of trainee skills should be incorporated into their personal avatars, however that is only half the solution. A truly realistic simulation requires realistic avatars controlled autonomously that are prepared to help or hinder trainees in the same way someone would in the real world.

I have a long-time friend named Walter Green who just wrote a book called This Is the Moment! Walter, in his 70th year, decided he would make a list of the people who really impacted his life at different stages. He had to locate some he had lost contact with, but over the year he traveled the country and met with 44 people to thank them and tell them how important they were to his life. I think the book’s real message is the enormous power of gratitude. Walter wrote this book to motivate all of us. Are there people in your life who have really made a difference? Have you reached out to thank them? Have you thanked your parents, friends, mentors—perhaps a teacher, professor, or colleague who had an impact on your life? Don’t wait to reach out. This is the moment. Yesterday, just one day after being inspired by Walter’s book, I had the perfect opportunity to put his idea into action. Every morning, our newspaper delivery person drives through our oval driveway and drops off the paper right at our front door so we don’t have to go to the end of the driveway to retrieve it. I’ve always wanted to thank her for this courtesy, and yesterday morning I saw her through the window just as she was getting out of the car to deliver the paper. I met her at the front door and said, "I just want to tell you how fabulous and caring you are, and what a difference you make, and how much we appreciate what you do," and I gave her a little money. Her face just lit up and she almost had tears in her eyes as she gave me a hug. She said, "You’re really special," and I said, "I’m not special. You are." This morning, tucked into the newspaper, I found a note from her. On the outside of the envelope was written: "To a great and loyal customer."  This is so consistent with what Blanchard research has found:  If you hire passionate people, they want to go out and take care of your customers. Then the customers become loyal and get excited about the company and tell others, and it keeps going back and forth—and that’s what makes a great organization. On the card inside it said: "Thank you, thank you, thank you. You made my day yesterday. I was flying high on a cloud of appreciation. Your recognition of my service to you has revived me. Thank you for taking the time to think about me."  Then she signed her name and phone number and wrote: "Please call if you ever have a bad or poor quality paper delivered." Isn’t that amazing?  It made me feel good to read her note. I hope this motivates you to reach out and thank people who have done special things for you—people who have made a difference in your life, whether big or small.  If we all took the time to do this, think of the difference we could make in the lives of others. So reach out and say "thank you." It’s such an easy way to make another person feel special, and it is guaranteed to boost your spirits, too.  Have a great week.

Discovery Machine, Inc. and other small businesses are saddled with extended reporting requirements concerning VC/Hedge funds/Private Equity ownership structures, a time for comment. It’s too bad the comments solicitation is on reporting, not the exposure to small business when Wall Street puts their hands on a smaller and smaller source of critical research funding. The SBIR Insider Newsletter recently reported on an "unusual and unexpected move", the SBA published in the March 20, 2012 Federal Register, a request for "Data Collection Available for Public Comments and Recommendations." The request states: "Send all comments regarding whether this information collection is necessary for the proper performance of the function of the agency, whether the burden estimates are accurate, and if there are ways to minimize the estimated burden and enhance the quality of the collection…" (see www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2012-03-20/html/2012-6702.htm) The SBA offers supplementary information including: The legislation extends and broadens a requirement for the Small Business Administration (SBA) to maintain searchable, electronic databases that include pertinent information concerning each SBIR and STTR award made through the programs. The legislation contains a new data reporting requirement from companies concerning their potential ownership by venture capital, hedge fund, and private equity firms. Additional data fields will be collected from applicants and awardees concerning applicant demographics and company information (such as number of employees, additional funding received).  These new data reporting requirements supplement demographic and company information already collected from awardees (such as women or minority owned, award amount information, research abstract, Principal Investigator’s name, etc). The legislation differentiates between data that is available to the public and data that is available to the government only. SBA is required to collect this information and report on it annually to Congress. The Insider notes "Nevertheless one must wonder why this issue is being broken out from the rest of the policy directive areas that will require public comment. Might it have something to do with the extended reporting requirements concerning VC/Hedge funds/Private Equity ownership structures and the like?" SBA’s Description of Respondents to this notice: Respondents include individuals, and small businesses, that are participating in the SBIR and STTR programs. Individuals and small businesses may be applicants and awardees. SBA wants your comments in hard copy via snail mail, not electronically! Comments must be sent on or before May 21, 2012 to: Mr. Eric Eide Innovation and Technology Analyst Office of Technology Small Business Administration 409 3rd Street, 6th Floor, Washington, DC 20416

The holiday season presents some different challenges for leaders.  Here is some advice I’ve found can help you to get the most out of this special time. Get in the holiday spirit.  It’s important for leaders to get into the holiday spirit.  It’s a wonderful time of the year when people want to feel good and connected to each other.  It is a time to capitalize on team building and allow workers to get to know each other better. Yet often managers end up acting like Scrooge by being too busy or demanding of themselves and of their people.  Bosses can really ruin the holidays by being grumpy, under stress and too demanding.  Try to be a little more lenient, supportive and willing to "go with the flow" in appreciating the time you have and the people you have to work with. Focus on what has to be done. It’s important during the holidays to be clear with everybody on their key goals.  What are the significant things that really have to get done during the holiday season to keep business running as usual?  It’s good to write down these goals so that people are better able to work harder earlier in the season if they are going to be less focused later on.  This is especially true if, for your business, the holiday season is one of the busiest time of the year. Be flexible with employees. Be more flexible in terms of the hours your people work, depending on their needs.  Is there a way they can have a couple of hours off so they can get some of their shopping done and make the time up later?  A lot of people have family and friends fly in and would love to have flexible work hours to accommodate them.  How could the company help employees save time?  For example, at our company, we have people fill out a form that allows them to mail their packages from our company. Avoid negative news. Don’t use the holiday season to give employees negative news.  It is not a time of the year to catch people doing things wrong, nor it is a time to accent the negative.  Instead, do your best to redirect employees without being punitive.  Save more substantive performance issues for after the new year.  And don’t turn what should be good news into bad news by poor timing.  For example, if you are planning to give employees extra days off between Christmas and New Year’s Day, tell them far enough in advance so that they can make plans for that time.  Otherwise, they might end up at home watching television and griping about you. Be sensitive to different religions. Be sensitive to those who don’t celebrate Christmas.  You might set aside some time when people could share information about their religious or cultural celebrations.  For example, one of our Jewish employees had people who wanted to find out more about the meaning of Hanukkah, the Jewish festival of lights celebration, meet him for lunch. Be creative about celebrating the season. Your celebration doesn’t have to be lavish for it to be effective.  You might want to do an activity rather than hosting a party where everyone just sits around and drinks.  It might even allow for more bonding to do something like caroling that allows for a shared experience away from the office.  Another fun group activity that we’ve done is to take the time for our work group to read Dickens’ A Christmas Carol together, giving each employee a role to read.  Activities such as these can help you avoid getting into the position where you have to worry about serving alcohol to people and having them drive home. Whenever possible, include families in holiday activities.  We had an artist come to our company one year during the holidays to teach everybody how to paint landscapes.  There were four sessions and everyone could bring their spouses, kids, and parents.  The artist dressed everybody up in French berets and artist aprons.  At the end of the activity she touched up the pictures and then we had them framed.  It was really a lot of fun. Have fun with celebrations. Think of fun ways to celebrate the season.  I love those parties where everyone buys a three-to-five dollar gift, numbers the gift, and then people pick numbers and open the gifts one at a time.  The person opening the gift has the option of keeping what they open or trading it for one of the already opened gifts. That can turn into a pretty lively time! You can also have people exchange funny cards that they have either bought or made.  You could even set somebody up to be a "Secret Santa," leaving anonymous gifts for random employees. Make the spirit last all year long. A few years ago, after the holiday season had ended, several of our employees at The Ken Blanchard Companies asked, "Why does the spirit have to end at the end of the year?"  From that question sprang an employee-run program called "Blanchard for Others" which sponsors local charities and hosts all kinds of fundraising events through the year. Each year they raise tens of thousands of dollars for charity.  We now have the holiday spirit year round. So get in the holiday spirit this year!  Go with the flow, lighten up, and enjoy this special time with your employees and with your families.

After our successful work with the US Navy, US Army, and a number of commercial US firms; Discovery Machine is investing in expansion for an international customer base.  Discovery Machine will be exhibiting internationally for the first time at the International Training and Education Conference (ITEC) in stand C141 at the ExCel Center in London on May 22-24th.  I am excited at the opportunity to show our artificial intelligence software to potential international customers. ITEC is Europe’s leading exhibition and conference for international military training, simulation and education. At ITEC, we will showcase our current product offerings.  Highlighted among them will be the VBS2 Behavior Modeling Console, the latest version of the Maritime Console, and a variety of other AI based knowledge capture solutions. Dr. Todd Griffith will be presenting to an audience, at the Innovation Showcase at ITEC, on how Discovery Machine works and the benefits of our AI approach. We are also working to set up meetings with key NATO members. So if you are looking for the biggest Modeling and Simulation show outside of I/ITSEC in the US, think about coming to ITEC. As an exhibitor, if I invite you then you get a 10% discount. If you have any friends in Europe who might be going to ITEC, please tell them to stop by and get a demonstration of Discovery Machine’s solutions.

This is the time of year when a lot of people get stressed. You know—running around, making sure they have every present bought and everything done for holiday and new years parties and all that. The holidays can turn into a burden rather than a blessing. This is supposed to be the season of joy and love, not of trouble and hassle. Stress is a major problem this time of year because people have so many "to do" lists. They forget why they’re doing it and get too much into the doing. Too often this time of year we’re human doings rather than human beings. I just want you to check yourself, as I need to check myself as I run around and try to get things done at the end of the year, that I’m a human being, not a human doing.  It doesn’t mean that you can’t get things done and crossed off your list—just don’t make "list accomplishment" the goal of this holiday season. Make LOVE the goal of the season. Reach out to everyone you talk to and wish them the greatest holiday—the greatest Christmas—the greatest New Year. Just tell them you care about them. Maybe you couldn’t find right present for someone. Perhaps you should sit down and write that person a note about how much you care about them and let them know you’ll send them something after the holidays. Sometimes during this time of year, I like to go through my phone directory and call people I haven’t talked to in a while, and just tell them I care about them. That, to me, is a joyful thing to do this time of year. So what can you do to make this a joyous time, rather than a hassled time? Have a wonderful Christmas day. Life is a very special occasion if you keep your "to do" list in perspective.

Serious Game is a term which is gaining great stride within the professional community.  Industries ranging from defense to healthcare; emergency preparedness to engineering; have all embraced the moniker and it has led to an increasingly useful training sector in serious gaming.  But what really is a serious game? If we break apart the term into two fundamental parts, serious and game, things become more clear.  The Merriam-Webster online dictionary (http://www.merriam-webster.com) provides a few useful definitions of each.  I have included a few noteworthy definitions for each term below: Serious:    "requiring much thought or work" "of or relating to a matter of importance" "not easily answered or solved" Game: "a procedure or strategy for gaining an end" "a field of gainful activity" "any activity undertaken or regarded as a contest involving rivalry, strategy, or struggle" All of the aforementioned definitions resonate true when we begin to talk about a serious game.  Creating games to train people is not new, but with increases in technology, the true benefits of their application can now be harnessed.  In that regard, the above definitions hold very true.  A serious game is practical because it does challenge the person playing.  Yes, they are still playing a game, but they are doing so with a purpose.  They are doing so in an effort to learn something important that will protect them and will cause them to be more productive at a task in the future. By taking advantage of a serious game, it provides people with an opportunity to repeat situations which are difficult to answer and require hard work and thought.  Plus, there is the added benefit of competition!  It is my opinion that most people are notoriously competitive, and in the world of serious games, that is not a bad thing.  Compete, compete, compete; and win or lose, every trainee learns. Discovery Machine sees the importance of serious games and is addressing the needs of the industry.  As a software company which creates artificial intelligence solutions, Discovery Machine creates serious games which produce great results.  What makes Discovery Machine’s approaches work is straight forward: work with an expert and harness their expertise, use that knowledge to create realistic simulated-scenarios, and deploy the scenarios into training simulations to make state-of-the-art serious games.  Serious games work if they are built correctly, so why not stop and pay attention to the details.  The key to being successful is to deploy the knowledge of experts, but how often does anyone stop and ask them how they think?

It’s getting to be about that time when people talk about New Year’s resolutions. What do you want to do differently in 2011? What would you like to be different in your life a year from now? Just a couple of suggestions on New Year’s Resolutions: Don’t make too many of them. I’ve known some people who say, "This year I’m going to lose weight, exercise more, stop drinking, cut down on the amount of meat I eat," and so forth, and they don’t even want to get up in the morning—it’s too overwhelming! So pick one, maybe two things that you’re going to focus on. Several years ago, Bob Lorber and I wrote a book called Putting the One Minute Manager to Work. We talked about having a PRICE project. I like using that model for my New Year’s resolutions. P is for pinpoint. What is the thing you’d like to do? Is it lose weight, is it exercise more? Identify what you want to work on and be specific. R is for record. What is your present level of performance in that area? Get on the scale if you want to lose weight, or write down your present level of exercise so you have baseline data. Then with that, you can compare it with where you want to go, which involves the next step: I is for involve. Gather all the key people in your life who can really help you and see if you can set a realistic goal. That’s the difference between what you’ve recorded, where you are now, and where you’d like to go. See what kind of help you can get from this group because it’s hard to stick to resolutions and you’re probably going to need a little help. What are they going to do to cheer you on? What are they going to do to hold you accountable? Plan it out and get agreement on your goal or goals. C stands for coach. That means getting underway with your resolution—getting the coaching you need and the cheerleading, the supporting, the redirection. Let other people help to keep you in line. As I say, if you could do it by yourself, you would. E stands for evaluate. That’s the end of the time period when you have achieved your goal, or moved toward your goal, and you look back and evaluate how you did. What could you have done differently? What went well? Any forward progression toward your resolution is worth celebrating. Track your progress and plan your future strategies. What will you pinpoint next? So think about what’s going to be different next year. What are you going to be smiling about next December? Take care and have a terrific 2011!

Imagine you are working on a project and you discover a monumental breakthrough - a more productive process, an alternative technique, a way to delight customers, or a manner to convey a concept to trainees. You run to the white board or your computer to write a note to document this colossal idea.  Your enthusiasm is skyrocketing and you want to share it with your whole team so that everyone can be enlightened.  You know the whole organization will be better off now because of this vision you have just documented. Fast forward 6 months…  Where is your monumental breakthrough?  Who is using your idea?  How has your organization changed for the better?  Is your idea in a file folder on your laptop?  How often do you recall your breakthrough?  Did your idea reach any of the potential you had dreamed for it?  Odds are it did not and instead is wasting its true potential where every you left it. A recent article by Daniel Rasmus in iPhone Life Magazine starts with, "Our brains are wonderful devices for keeping track of information. They are also remarkable sense-making machines, finding patterns in seemingly disparate bits of data. In the information age, however, and in the burgeoning knowledge economy, we find our brains outstripped by their own inventions, their own discoveries, and their own creations."  http://www.iphonelife.com/issues/2012January-February/ManagingYourBrain Storing your knowledge as best practices has become increasingly popular.  Personal knowledge management systems like Evernote http://evernote.com/index.php are becoming popular as a technique to supplement our own brain power.  Perhaps a tool that is always with us - on our phone, our laptop, our tablet - will help us capture ideas, store them in an organized fashion and retrieve them when relevant.  Discovery Machine takes this one step further. When we organize our own items - whether it is files, scraps of papers, bills, discoveries, or project documentation - everyone has their own personal style.  We organize our lives according to the processes we perform.  We develop personal best practices and the best practices provide the context in which the information or artifacts come into our lives.  Whatever best practice is taking place in our heads serves as the context to trigger and retrieve that artifact in the future. To give you an example, have you ever walked into someone’s office that is a disaster area, yet that person can always find what he is looking for?  Your colleague stored the artifact in the context of a personal best practice he was executing and as a result his brain could recall where to find the relevant artifacts for the current situation. Personal and organization knowledge management are not very different.    Knowledge is formed while executing a best practice.  Knowledge will more likely be leveraged if it is remembered under similar circumstances.  Best practices influence the way we leverage scraps of papers, notes, trip reports, project plans, and presentations. Often, continuous improvement efforts include the capture of best practices.    That is important because best practices define the common processes to an organization and provide the context for retrieving relevant information.  Often, all a continuous improvement effort needs is a better way to retrieve the right knowledge at the right time for every member of your organization.  Discovery Machine has a way to facilitate this. Start using your best practices to organize knowledge.  Next time you have an idea, make a note, or create a new document think about the best practice in which you are creating the artifact.  That is the best index to retrieve it in the future. Discovery Machine’s knowledge capture methodology is based on the notion that expertise is organized around best practices.  The Discovery Machine modeling tool will help you capture best practices and help your organization deploy continuous improvement efforts.

Earlier this month Rick Shindell (SBIR Insider) published a very informative article on SBA Rule status and actions we all can take to influence the evolution of new SBA structural initiatives. In particular Discovery Machine, Inc. finds the change to allow VC funded "units/divisions" to qualify as small businesses and compete for STTR and SBIR funding troubling. One would hope that this new structure will not force many small businesses to be taken over by controlling entities and lose their identity and stifle the creativity and independent thinking that has been the driving force behind sustainable job creation. Rick’s article is quoted, below, for reference. "SBIR Insider Newsletter - SBA Proposed Rule, Request for Comments May 15, 2012 Dear SBIR Insider, There has been a lot of SBIR action going on behind the scenes at SBA as work continues on the SBIR and STTR policy directives. Most of the SBA’s work has been behind closed doors with federal agency SBIR program managers and the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) officials. To quote my grandmother, "There has been much to talk about, but nothing to say." For the last several weeks her idiom was correct, but now things are a changin’. We are seeing action and it is time to get you up to speed. As mentioned in previous issues, the SBA’s time sensitive mission for SBIR & STTR is the creation of Policy Directives (PD) which serve to guide the running of these programs. In our February interview with Sean Greene (SBA’a Associate Administrator for Investment, and Special Advisor for Innovation), he described the flow of PD creation, and today the first major milestone has been met. On May 15, 2012 the SBA has published (in the Federal Register) its first proposed rule for size standards relating to SBIR/STTR. The reason for publishing a proposed rule is to solicit informed public comment on the rule, which will be considered by SBA before they publish a final rule. This is your chance to make a difference, and you have 60 days to do it (we’ll explain later). This rule is limited to the areas of: A. Definitions and Programs Subject to Size Determinations B. Ownership and Control C. Affiliation D. When SBA Determines Size and Eligibility E. Certification of size and eligibility F. Initiating a Protest or Request for Formal Size Determination G. Time Limits That Apply to Size Protests Although the scope of this rule may seem small, it is tremendously important and complex because it speaks to allowing (for the first time ever) a small business to be majority owned by non-small business entities, and still compete for programs reserved for small businesses. In essence, this rule is established to comply with the new SBIR reauthorization law (Section 5107 of PL 112-81) that allows (under defined circumstances), that a small business may be majority owned and controlled by multiple Venture Capital Operating Companies (VCOC), Hedge Funds, and/or Private Equity Firms, and still be eligible to compete for SBIR/STTR funding. SBA has taken a careful approach to make sure these new rules are limited to SBIR & STTR only, not other small business programs. However, our non SBIR small business readers should look at these rules to make sure they see no slippery slope that could affect other small business programs. Another issue is that of foreign (non domestic) ownership. If the small business is majority owned by foreign entities, they would not be eligible. Of course this could be sticky even with minority ownership by foreign concerns in areas of national defense and ITAR. The SBA has worked hard to make this proposed rule easy to read and even easier for you to comment on. Although your comments cannot reverse the congressional intent of the law, it can help shape how the rules are applied, and what measures can be taken to make the programs more responsive to its intended purpose. There are always several paths to get the information: Title: Small Business Size Regulations, Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program Legal Description: 13 CFR Part 121 RIN 3245-AG46 Web Locations: Easiest to read and comment on line (new site): https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2012/05/15/2012-11586/small-business-size-regulations-small-business-innovation-research-sbir-program-and-small-business Also good and official: http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=SBA-2012-0008-0001 Old fashion hard copy Federal Register PDF www.zyn.com/sbir/insider/SBA-2012-0008-0001.pdf You must submit your comments on or before July 16, 2012 The SBA provides good guidance on the rule and how to comment. Please note that in an unrelated recent notice of proposed rulemaking for "Reform of Federal Policies Relating to Grants and Cooperative Agreements" more than 349 universities and non-profits offered comments, greatly influencing that policy. It is important that the small business community show up and comment on these important SBIR/STTR rules otherwise the conversation may be dominated by large special interests. The SBA wants to hear from you! We will be following this SBIR Insider up with some comments and explanations from SBIR experts in the field, with the hopes of clarifying some of the issues for you. I hope to have it for you next week. Federal employees please note: Your comments may be very important in these issues, but it must be as an individual, not a government employee. If you feel uncomfortable posting directly to SBA, feel free to send me your comments and we’ll include them without attribution. Your SBIR Insider does not want, nor should try to shape your comments on SBA’s call for public comment. However, we want to keep you informed so you will be more willing to provide your thoughts to SBA. We will have more information on overall SBIR news in our next issue. Note to our DoD readers: Wednesday May 16, general debate will take place in the House on H.R. 4310, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013. The House Report includes Section 1617 "Restoration of 1% Funding for Administrative Expenses of Commercialization Readiness Program (CRP) of Department of Defense. The SBIR reauthorization bill inadvertently didn’t include the 1% funding for the CRP (formerly known as the CPP) and this section corrects that error. This is a non-controversial section and is expected to survive. The big question is when/if H.R. 4310 gets passed in the House. Many expect it to pass, but in this congress, you never know. I’m sorry this Insider is mainly a 1 topic issue, but I wanted you to be able to get up to speed. There are many other items to report on, and I promise you an issue next week. Sincerely, Rick Rick Shindell SBIR Gateway Zyn Systems 40 Alderwood Dr. Sequim, WA 98382 360-681-4123 rick@zyn.com www.zyn.com/sbir Go to Online SBIR Insider Please respond to this email if you want to be removed from this distribution. This and back Issues of the SBIR Insider are available at www.zyn.com/sbir/insider Copyright © 2012 Zyn Systems. All rights reserved."

I’m really excited about my brand-new book, Lead with LUV, that I wrote with Colleen Barrett, President Emeritus of Southwest Airlines. The reason I’m excited about it is that if I were asked to leave a legacy of my thinking today, this would be it. The world is in desperate need of this message of love and people first. If you know anything about Southwest Airlines, you know they’re all about love. (They sometimes spell it L-U-V because LUV is their symbol on the New York Stock Exchange.) They love their people and they love their customers. They love their work and take it seriously—but they don’t take themselves seriously. For example, a colleague of mine was flying on Southwest recently when the attendant got on the public address system and said: "You know, this is the last flight of the day and we’re really tired. To be honest with you, we don’t have the energy to pass out the peanuts, so we’re going to put them on the floor in the front the plane and when we take off and gain altitude, they’ll slide down the aisle.  If you want some nuts, just grab them." And that’s what happened! The whole airplane was in hysterics—laughing, having fun, grabbing peanuts, passing them to their neighbors—just having a blast! That’s leading with LUV. How different is that than your typical experience on most airlines, where everyone seems so uptight? Leading with LUV is about treating your customers right. Southwest really gets this. For example, when you call most airlines to change a reservation, you usually get a recording that says they really value your business, but all of their operators are busy right now; they’ll get to you as soon as possible. Then the music starts.  You could be waiting on hold for fifteen or twenty minutes or more. But when you call Southwest Airlines, you usually get an operator, and if you don’t, you get a recording that says, "Your business is really important to us.  We’re sorry all of our operators are busy right now, but at the beep, please leave your name and phone number and we’ll get back to you in ten minutes." I did this recently, and you know what happened in ten minutes?  My phone rang and somebody said, "Is this Ken Blanchard?" "Yes, it is," I said. "This is Bob from Southwest Airlines," he said. "How can I help you?" Now that’s what I call raving fan service! And that’s how you lead with LUV. No wonder Southwest is the only airline that has consistently turned a profit while the others have struggled. These heart-warming stories don’t happen by accident. When an organization has happy people, happy customers, and happy shareholders, it’s because the leadership has created a culture that supports leading with LUV.  So, how do you do that? First, you have to create a vision—something to love, something with a higher purpose than just making money. Southwest’s vision was that all people—not just the elite—would be able to afford to fly. Second, you have to create the rules of the road—the values that will guide people as they work toward that higher purpose. For example, Southwest has three values: A Warrior Spirit A Servant’s Heart A Fun-LUVing Attitude Third, once you have the vision in place and the values established, the leaders have to get out of the way so they can cheer people on to achieve the vision. This means turning the traditional pyramidal hierarchy upside-down, so that the leaders support their people, rather than vice versa. What does this look like in the real world? How do you, as a leader, lead with LUV? First, by acknowledging people. When she was president of Southwest, Colleen Barrett sent out thousands of hand-written notes to her people every year, celebrating their successes, sympathizing with their losses, and thanking them for being extraordinary. Second, by backing people up. Southwest founder Herb Kelleher once got a letter from a grumpy customer complaining about how much it bothered him that the flight attendants goofed off during the safety announcement. Because a Fun-LUVing Attitude is a Southwest value and this was a customer who tended to complain a lot, Herb didn’t apologize or offer him a coupon. Instead he wrote back, "We’ll miss you." He stood by the values and the people of Southwest. The third way to lead with LUV is to make your people your business partners. For example, pilots at Southwest have personally paid for hotel rooms for customers who, because of bad weather, had to spend the night in an unfamiliar city. The pilots could see that the people needed help. Because the pilots knew they were Southwest’s business partners, they didn’t call and ask, "Is it okay? Will I get reimbursed?" They led with LUV and created grateful, satisfied customers. Leading with LUV is not soft management—it’s smart management. When you put positive relationships ahead of profits, you end up with an abundance of both. Someone once said to my wife, "Margie, you’ve lived with Ken for almost fifty years. What do you think leadership is?" Margie nailed it when she said, "Leadership IS love, it’s not about love.  It’s loving your mission, it’s loving your people, it’s loving your customers, and it’s loving yourself enough to let other people be magnificent." I couldn’t say it any better. So if you’re looking for satisfying, long-term success, remember: Leading with LUV is not about somebody else in some other organization. Leading with love is about you. So treat your colleagues and your customers like family, and Lead with LUV. Here are a few other great things we’re doing around the book: We opened a new webpage for people to learn more about how our company uses the Lead with LUV principles at www.leadwithluv.com. You can even watch Southwest’s fantastic corporate video! Do you know someone who leads with LUV? There are two ways you can let the world know about it: Go to our Lead with LUV page on HowWeLead and post your story in the comments section. Do you know of a great video like Southwest’s? You can even embed a YouTube video if you like! Catch someone doing things right via Twitter. Use the hashtag #leadwithluv and post a quick Tweet about a friend or coworker who exhibits these great qualities. Watch a video introduction by Colleen and myself, read the first chapter of the book, and learn more about leading with LUV at our book page. Have a great day!

Earlier this month, Discovery Machine participated in its first international conference.  ITEC is Europe’s leading exhibition and conference for the military training, simulation and education sectors. ITEC was held in London a couple weeks ago. Discovery Machine had a stand at ITEC for providing demonstrations of our latest artificial technology products.  We provided numerous demonstrations and had set up dozens of client meetings. Overall the show was a great success for Discovery Machine.  We met over a 100 international and US organizations that were interested in our technology. We showcased our current product offerings.  Highlighted among them was the VBS2 Behavior Modeling Console, the latest version of the Maritime Console, and a variety of other AI based knowledge capture solutions. Dr. Todd Griffith presented to an audience at the Innovation Showcase and at the Bohemia Interactive VBS2 Users Group, on how Discovery Machine works and the benefits of our AI approach. Potential users of our VBS2 Behavior Modeling Console were very interested in our latest VBS2 demonstration.  The demonstration showed a scenario to train players in how to defeat an IED bomber in VBS2. Our approach was viewed as a truly "real to the life" situation.  We did not just start with a planted IED which needed to be found. We created a village where all the Non-Player characters (NPC) were intelligent entities with a realistic pattern of life, a social network, and intelligent dialogue capabilities. The IED bomber NPC left his home, went to a place to pick up an IED, looked for a place to plant it, and then found a spot to set it off.  Any village NPC, in VBS2, that saw the bomber had its knowledge updated with the suspicious activity. So when the player entered the game and started to dialogue with the villagers. Some knew about the suspicious activity and some did not.  The player was provided visual cues like shop keepers abandoning stands when they saw the IED planted. A woman stopping a child because her social network had let her know that section of the village had suspicious IED activity.  If the player talked to enough villagers and asked the appropriate questions, then they could find out about the IED and hunt down the bomber.  If not, then they could be the IEDs victim. This demonstration highlighted the power of Discovery Machine’s VBS2 Behavior Modeling Console and the utility of the VBS2 solution from Bohemia Interactive. While the IED topic is unfortunately timely, the best training to eliminate IED threats could be the use of the latest AI technology to make the training true to how the real world works. After ITEC, we hope more military VBS2 users adopt our behavior modeling capabilities to build the most effective "true to life" training scenarios possible. The other Discovery Machine demonstration provided at ITEC was of our Maritime Behavior Modeling Console for the Joint Semi-Automated Forces (JSAF) simulator.  Before the conference, Discovery Machine had received permission from the US Navy to use an unclassified copy of JSAF to demonstrate this capability at ITEC.  The Maritime console received great reviews from viewers who saw its complex entity behavior models seamlessly executing behaviors, responding to player voice commands, re-tasking themselves in response to voice commands, and tasking additional craft to assist in their primary mission.  It was truly a "train as you fight" demonstration. So ITEC so far has been a great entry into the international military market for Discovery Machine.  If you did not get to see our demonstrations, please visit our website at http://www.discoverymachine.com/demos to see online demonstrations of what we highlighted at ITEC this year.  Thanks.

"I wish I was an expert," is a statement which many people make. Unfortunately, expertise is not a notion which spontaneously appears in our consciousness. It is not a state of awareness which we cook up in a dream or are inherently born with. Becoming an expert is a process and is undertaken by the dedicated few who take the time to master their industry or craft. Merriam-Webster describes the word expert as "having, involving, or displaying special skill or knowledge derived from training or experience." but they fail to mention just how much information and experience an individual must amass before they reach the level of expert. This definition provides a concise statement describing exactly what people think of when they think of an expert, but it fails to associate actual values to how long it takes to become an expert. Malcom Gladwell strives to describe just how long it takes to become an expert in his book Outliers. In this book, Gladwell utilizes the 10,000 hour rule.  The concept of this rule is that in order to be a noted expert in your given field, you must invest at least 10,000 hours of practice and study in your area of interest. With this in mind, is it any surprise that people who have worked in the same field their entire lives are the best at what they do? This is why it boggles my mind that large corporations allow their best experts to walk out the door to enter into retirement without even attempting to harness the experiential knowledge of that individual. They simply hire a replacement and start over again from the beginning. Can you fathom the loss of intellectual property for that company? To put it into perspective, let’s do that math. If we assume an average work week of 40 hours and 52 weeks in a year, it would take the average person just under 5 years to become an "expert". However, this number assumes a person will constantly work in one area of expertise for each of those hours and takes no vacation: a fact which is seldom true. So let’s say a new hire spends half of their time on developing experiences, it would take them 10 years just to get to the expert level! At that point, the new hire finally is at the same level as the person who retired… 10 years after the new hire started. Let’s call this the "stairway approach": you will still get there with work and dedication. It does not need to be this way. Artificial intelligence and knowledge capture technologies have come a long way and are now capable of capturing expertise and deploying it in a realistic manner. Discovery Machine has a methodology and technology which does just that. By working directly with experts, Discovery Machine can capture the knowledge of an expert and deploy it in action in weeks. Compare that with the 10 years described above. People who use the complete systems can learn from the successes and failure of their predecessors instead of reinventing the wheel. They can accelerate their climb to the top and learn from others as they go using an approach akin to riding an escalator. Would you rather learn from experiences of others or capture it and accelerate the education of the next recruit? So you choose: climb the stairs or take the escalator? You arrive at the same goal but one way is faster.

Here are 10 ways to identify a best practice. It is documented in a standard operating procedure. Experts like to tell stories about it. You have case studies. It is critical to your business. It is specific to your business. You wish you had better training on the topic. If somebody leaves the company, it will be lost. New hires to the organization do not know how to do it. They change, evolve and adapt with your organization. Some people execute the best practice better than others. How do you identify a best practice for your organization?

SBIR Insider (Rick Shindell) Call For Action…" IMMINENT threat to SBIR - please take the time to read and ACT on this before even more SBIR funding is taken away from YOU!"  I have included this request, below, to simplify the learning process. For Discovery Machine, Inc. the new proposed submission criteria remains a significant concern. The notion of non-US companies and VC controlled "SBIR factories" destroying this valuable research environment is more than scary. We believe most small businesses are delighted to compete, but only on a level playing field. We are republishing this URGENT call to action from Rick Shindell, the SBIR Insider, about an IMMINENT threat to SBIR - please take the time to read and ACT on this before even more SBIR funding is taken away from YOU! URGENT call to action from the SBIR Insider:    Dear SBIR Insider, Another "Call to Action" you say? Well… [not sounding like Reagan] if you don’t mind watching your chances diminish for getting an SBIR/STTR award, or starting a new high tech business utilizing SBIR opportunities, then hit your delete button and relax. Folks, this is as hard for me to write as it is for you to read, so lets look at a few quick action items you may want to consider. Keep in mind that many of the brightest and most experienced SBIR minds are also deeply concerned with the SBA proposed rules. So are many of the premiere SBIR/STTR guidance and assistance folks such as Fred Patterson [The SBIR Coach], Gail & Jim Greenwood [Greenwood Consulting Group] and John Davis [SBIR Resource Center] who have all written about this situation. Now the stakes have been raised because Congressman Ed Markey (D-MA) and Congresswoman Niki Tsongas (D-MA) have written (but not yet distributed) a Dear Colleague letter to muster support in the House to press the SBA not to adopt several of the anti-small business provisions of their proposed SBIR size standard. The letter hasn’t been sent out yet, but please consider asking your representative to sign on to it today. The letter calls for the SBA to respect the congressional intent to keep SBIR as a domestic program for small business. Speaking of congressional intent, it should be understood that the SBIR law provides (as a pilot program) for small businesses that are majority owned by multiple VCs to participate in SBIR, at levels up to 25% of award dollars in NIH, DOE and NSF, and up to 15% in the other agencies. Although that should be respected, I see where some VC companies are wanting to take advantage of the loophole SBA has created which will allow VCs etc to qualify for unlimited access to the program. That must be stopped. Here are the action items I hope you will consider:  Action item #1 - Call your Representative’s DC office and ask them to please consider signing on to Congressman Ed Markey’s and Niki Tsongas’s Dear Colleague letter to keep SBIR a domestic small business program. This must be done on Thursday. You can call the Capitol switchboard (202-224-3121) and ask them for your representative’s office. If you’re not sure of your representative, go to http://congress.org/congressorg/directory/congdir.tt and enter your zip code. Action item #2 - The SBTC has created two letters, one to Congress (see http://www.nsba.biz/docs/sbtc_letter_to_congress_7-2-12.pdf ) and one to the President (see http://www.nsba.biz/docs/sbtc_letter_to_president_obama_7-2-12.pdf) If you agree with the letters, please consider adding your name to them. This has to be done by Friday. This is IMPORTANT! To be included, simply send an email to alec@sbtc.org with the following information: Your Name Company Name Company’s City, State You can also tell Alec if you only want to be on one of the letters (tell him which one) Feel free to copy me on it if you’d like (rick@zyn.com). Action Item #3 - Only 4 days left till the SBA comment period closes on July 16. As of now 3:30am pacific time, only 69 comments have been posted on regulations.gov. This is very poor and makes the small business SBIR community look disengaged. Go to https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2012/05/15/2012-11586/small-business-size-regulations-small-business-innovation-research-sbir-program-and-small-business and click on the green button on the right that says: "Submit a Formal Comment", then follow the instructions. You are not restricted to one comment, you can add as many as necessary. In fact, Jim Greenwood of the Greenwood Consulting Group has posted 6 comments (on different issues), and they are all very good. His comments are from the perspective of someone who trains SBIR companies as well as training the trainers. We have combined them in an easy to read page at www.zyn.com/sbir/insider/greenwood.htm I hope he doesn’t mind. You can view all the comments at http://www.regulations.gov/#!docketDetail;dct=PS;rpp=100;so=DESC;sb=docId;po=0;D=SBA-2012-0008 Here are some simple quick suggestions for comments. You can modify, or just cut and paste into the comment window. Your own comments are best. "Keeping with the intent of Congress, foreign ownership of SBIR companies should not be allowed. SBA should restore the requirement that to be considered a domestic business concern, more than 50% of the business must either directly or indirectly be owned by U.S. citizens, permanent resident aliens, or domestic (US OWNED) corporations, partnerships or limited liability companies (LLCs)." "The proposed changes to the affiliation rules are bad for small business and the SBIR program. SBA should continue to apply its current affiliation provisions to the SBIR/STTR programs." There are many more issues and you can learn about from the SBTC background paper at: http://www.nsba.biz/docs/sbtc_paper_on_sba-sbir_regs_06-29-2012.pdf FOR THE REST OF THE SBIR INSIDER’S EMAIL, VISIT http://zyn.com/sbir/insider  Paid for by InnovationPAC Not authorized by any candidate or candidates committee. 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