ROI is the performance measure used to evaluate the efficiency of an investment. I want to say up front, we will always need and must do live exercises. But the current economic environment means there is going to be less of them.  When we do live exercises, we need to make the most of them.  That is why immersive simulations are so important. They save money. They let you practice. They let you make those simple ABC mistakes, that beginners make, in an environment that does not hurt anyone. Immersive simulations also allow for a complete capture of all the sensory data that is so critical to an affective after action review. So the return is more than just the comparison to the cost of a live exercise.  It is really a multiple because immersive environments let you practice so any live exercise time is optimized. What are some examples of the costs of a live exercise (metrics taken from various websites)? An F-15 fighter’s use in a live exercise requires one and half pilots and 10 maintenance people. The US dollar per flight hour can range from $17,000 to $30,000. The cost to operate an M-1 Tank in Europe is $338,000 per year. An M-1 tank gets 0.6 miles per gallon. The cost of running an aircraft carrier for a year is around $160 million dollars. A Nimitz Class has 3000 people on board, 90 planes, and is 20 stories high. The Rim of the Pacific exercise this month, which was held near Hawaii, was the largest of its kind.  The exercise brought together 42 ships, six submarines, 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel from 22 nations. Role player exercises have multiple cost elements: Time of the trainee, Travel, Set up, Management, Sets/Props, Meals, Housing,  and Role player costs can be $500 to $700 per day The range of cost for an immersive simulation seat can start at a couple thousand dollars.  It can be used every day be different individuals. If you want to know the ROI? Just tell me your costs. I will tell you the ROI.

This morning I stumbled upon a blog post which I feel gives a good synopsis of the true meaning of the term "Best Practice" (full post: http://www.truefruit.com/when-best-practice-is-best). In this blog, the author challenges the popular meaning of "best practice" and replaces it with her own alternative definition, "the superior method of getting a task done." Short and to the point. The next hurdle each company must transcend is the purpose of storage and access of best practices. Now, some people, like the author cited above, will tell you the best place to store information is in an easily accessible location like a wiki, Google docs, databases, and file folders. Whereby all these are great locations, what does it matter if no one in an organization knows how to find them? What if the collection of best practices grows so expansive that it becomes a best practice to find a best practice? In my experience if people cannot find something, they assume it does not exist and create a new version at a "more logical" location further exacerbating the problem. I want you to ask yourself the following few questions: Where do I look to find my company operating procedures document? How long does it take me to find it? How many locations could I access it? Odds are, you will answer the questions with answers like these: Google docs, the shared drive at work, and my personal computer (Not to mention the working copy your company is currently "tweaking"). 15-20 minutes. Two or more. The point here is NOT that I think centrally storing files is a bad thing, because I agree with that wholeheartedly. The point is, without a means of sifting through the information at your disposal, it does no one any good. There must be a better way. What if there was a system akin to Apple’s "SIRI" and Google’s "Google Now" products for mobile devices, that could intelligently sift through information and produce intelligent insights. The human intelligence is the key here. What do people do when they use a best practice? They synthesize multiple documents to follow a process and produce an outcome. A system which assists in this can be extremely powerful. To go one step further, imagine a system that could: Point out when you are deviating from the generally accepted corporate best practices, thus ensuring that current employees actually follow the best practices and that new employees are coached in how to execute them from day one. Provide suggestions for improving your results along the way based on the information you enter into the system. Produce physical results in the form of documents, updated database entries, websites, etc. Learn from interaction with users and adapt over time to reflect changes to the corporate best practice. Wouldn’t this be a system worth investing in at a corporate level?  I think so.  What kinds of things has your corporation done to leverage best practices?  What would help enhance your use of best practices?  

Confidence Unleashed! http://ht.ly/41eVy

I recently read two compelling blogs. One blog discussed how software tools for data analytics does not necessarily make everyone an instant expert in data analytics.  http://www.kmworld.com/Articles/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=83489&PageNum=1 The second blog described the authors vision for the next 5 years in knowledge management.  One of the needed capabilities is " meaningful visibility into what knowledge users truly need and use".   http://blog.kana.com/service-experience-management/knowledge-management-the-next-five-years/ Although these two blogs have seemingly different topics, they have a similar underlying theme.  The theme is methodology. Every discipline has a set of methodologies.  Look here for a good definition of methodology.  http://www.thefreedictionary.com/methodology A methodology is the principles that determine how tools of the discipline are deployed and interpreted.  Expertise is developed through years of executing a methodology and refining the methodology to get the best results. A novice plopped in front of an expert’s tools is still a novice. During training, an expert will stand over a novice’s shoulder, guide the novice through the methodology and help to determine when to apply the right tool or knowledge at the right time. The next challenge for data analytics, knowledge management and collaboration tools is to capture and deploy expert methodologies. How will you capture and deploy expert methodologies?

8/23/2012 2 PM EST Hosted by the SBA Discovery Machine, Inc. and many other companies participated in this extremely timely and valuable web conference. The slide deck from this two hour event will be available in a few days, after modifications based on feedback obtained at the web conference. A few things were made very clear: The changes are here to stay as they are now the law There remains a huge amount of controversy over VC and non-US companies now competing for SBIR/STTR funds New directives will be phased in agency by agency Comments are REALLY encouraged during "comment periods" We can only hope that more good than bad comes with these major changes. The SBA web site (www.sba.gov) is a great resource for all small businesses. Following are the most visited topics on http://www.sba.gov: Small Business Size Regulations Borrowing Money Follow These 10 Steps to Starting a Business Business Plan Executive Summary 8(a) Business Development Find A Local SBA Office SBA Loan Application Checklist Women’s Business Centers

"I’m sorry, Dave, I’m afraid I can’t do that" is a line which immortalized the classic computer villain HAL in the Movie 2001 a Space Odyssey.  Similar scenes have been painted across Hollywood in films ranging from The Terminator to I, Robot.  The common theme: artificial intelligence (AI) in machines, if unmatched, will take over the world.  Although these examples provide fun sources of entertainment, I question the validity of the evil AI paradigm they convey.  In fact, recent efforts have been finding very practical and beneficial uses of AI.  AI is no longer exclusively a notion for science fiction.  Gone are the days of malevolent artificial intelligence.  The world has finally caught up to the movies and figured out just how useful AI really can be. I recently have seen an abundance of articles on the emergence of artificial intelligence and how it will revolutionize the way people access and use information.  Quite frankly, this has come to no surprise to me, but it is encouraging that others have started to notice.  Two articles I read recently mention how AI is being used beneficially today and how it can be enhanced in the near future.  What’s interesting is AI research from two different spectrums are converging in the corporate world to propose new AI solutions for common problems.  Both military and academia have been obsessed with the possibilities of AI for years as a means of training troops virtually.  From intelligent collaboration of data to incorporation of intelligence into virtual assistants, the world has been taken by storm. One way businesses are benefiting is by applying proven military training technology to their own needs.  The article "Military Training Technology Making Leap to Civilian Use", published in the National Defense Magazine, discusses just this.  The article discuss how by transitioning military training simulations to the commercial market, businesses are seeing great benefits. Paramount among the benefit corporations see in transitioning military technology to meet their needs are: Cost savings due to relatively low price points on simulated training solutions. Time savings made possible by eliminating the need to bring all trainees to one location for training. Convenience of allowing students to train at their own pace and location. Increased learning rates made possible by enhanced engagement levels while training in virtual simulations. Academia has also had great impressions on the AI world.  Artificial intelligence research efforts led by some of the best academic research institutions have led to the realization of powerful AI systems.  Many of these efforts tend to be more data-centric and are designed to facilitate ease of access to information.  The article, "Tech’s New Wave, Driven by Data", published in The New York Times, highlights some of the many ways academic AI concepts are being applied for business today. Among the applications highlighted are: The Watson computer system developed by I.B.M. and a team of scientists at partner institutions. Driverless cars like those deployed by the Google corporation. Targeted advertisements and ability to project future optimal advertising approaches using AI. The applications of artificial intelligence continue to surprise me.  I am sure we are headed for an age of technological breakthroughs.  Artificial intelligence is now embraced by consumers and the focus has shifted from "how do we use AI" to "how do we provide the most valid information to AI users".  Discovery Machine is proud to be a part of the AI movement and is constantly striving to bring our customers the latest and greatest AI technologies.  Like the articles mentioned above, Discovery Machine believes that AI developed for the military should be accessible to the commercial world; just as data should be synthesized intelligently and put at the fingertips of all.

As part of a new series, I’m introducing today’s leadership concept via a segment extracted from my latest book, Lead with LUV, coauthored by former Southwest Airlines president Colleen Barrett.   The Customer is King I’ve said for many years that profit is the applause you get for taking care of your customers and creating a motivating environment for your people. No organization has lived and breathed that lesson better than Southwest Airlines.  Read on for a great example of how Southwest creates Raving Fan customers by taking care of them like nobody else does. Ken: These days, nobody has to convince anybody that the customer reigns. People are realizing that their organizations will go nowhere without the loyalty and commitment of their customers. Companies are motivated to change when they discover the new rule: Today, if you don’t take great care of your customers, somebody else will. Colleen: That’s for sure! So great customer service has to be top of mind for all of your people. We emphasize that all the time. I love the way you and Sheldon Bowles challenged us all to create Raving Fans®, not simply satisfied customers. Ken: We think enthusiastic Raving Fan customers make your business into a great business. Today you can’t be content to simply satisfy customers. Raving Fan customers are customers who are so excited about the way you treat them that they want to brag about you—they become part of your sales force. Let me give you a simple yet powerful example of this, from an experience I had personally with Southwest Airlines. What usually happens when you call most airlines to either make or change a reservation?  You get a recording that says, "All of our agents are busy right now, but your business is very important to us, so please stay on the line and we will be with you as soon as possible." Then the music starts. You could be on hold for who knows how long, sitting and waiting to talk to a human being. Recently, I called Southwest to change a reservation. Normally at Southwest, a human being picks up the phone. This time, a recording said, "I’m sorry, our Customer Service Agents are all busy right now; but at the beep, please leave your name and telephone number and we will call you back within ten minutes." So that’s what I did. What do you think happened a few minutes later? My cell phone rang, and this pleasant voice said, "Is this Ken Blanchard?" I said, "Yes." "Ken, this is Bob from Southwest Airlines. How may I help you?" Colleen, I’ve never had that experience with any other airline. How did you make that happen? Colleen: That’s a feature that’s available to all airlines. It’s called virtual queuing. It helps us handle our heaviest calling times without lowering our Customer Service standard. Ken: Why would Southwest use such a feature, and no other airline seems to be doing it? Colleen: I don’t know. But we’re always looking for service capabilities that far exceed those of the competition, and that even exceed customer expectations. Being called back by an airline? It was beyond most customers’ belief. Yet we routinely try to do the unexpected, and can then enjoy the growth and good reputation generated by customers like you, Ken, who have spontaneously joined our sales force by bragging about us.   If you think it’s too much trouble to go the extra mile for your customers, think again. It’s just common sense: Treat your customers unexpectedly well and they’ll be so delighted they will come back again and again, tell their friends, and your organization will reap the benefits.  Do you have any great customer service stories that have become legendary around your organization? If not, you might want to stop and think about it.

The following graph is simple but effective at illustrating an important point when it comes to learning: there is an optimal zone for motivation based on learning ability and difficulty of the material. Let’s think about this graph as it relates to learning through gaming and simulation training exercises. If an exercise is too easy, advanced students may lose interest out of boredom. On the other hand, if a training exercise is too difficult, beginner students may lose interest out of frustration. ­­The trick to keeping students engaged is to increase the difficulty of the training exercise as the ability to learn increases. At Discovery Machine, we are applying theory to practice by developing behavior models with the ability to simulate both high and low proficiency crews for more varied military training. One key way we are working to achieve this is by varying how our simulated crews attend to environmental elements (shipping vessels, enemy subs, etc.), or perform situation awareness. Our behaviors are designed to include a model of situation awareness. In a military training setting, the situation awareness of a crew is critical to its decision-making ability and ultimately how well it performs a given mission. We are also developing behavior models that simulate high and low skill levels of specific military crew actions such as searching for and following enemy vessels. The ability to train with crews operating at different proficiency levels will add a new dimension to our simulated missions and help keep trainees more engaged throughout the learning process.

If you went around your office and asked each person, "Are you doing a good job?" what would be the answer?  Would most people respond by saying either "I don’t know" or "I think so"?  And if their answer was, "Yes, I think so," and your follow-up question was, "How do you know?" would you hear lines such as, "I haven’t been chewed out by my boss lately" or "No news is good news"? Such answers reveal that most people receive little feedback on their performance until they make a mistake. This is a sad state of affairs. People need feedback on their performance to feel motivated to move toward their goals.  Managers know what they want their people to do but many times don’t bother to tell them because they assume people know. This leads to the most commonly used management style in business, often referred to as seagull management. When someone makes a mistake, seagull managers fly in, make a lot of noise, dump on everyone, and fly out. Since this is the predominant style of management in organizations, it is no wonder that motivating people is a major organizational problem today! Can you imagine training for the Olympics with no one telling you how fast you ran or how high you jumped?  The idea seems ludicrous, yet many people operate in a vacuum in organizations, not knowing how well they are doing on their jobs. This can lead to what we call decommitment—a change in an employee’s motivation or confidence—which can be one of the biggest challenges managers face. To avoid this situation as a manager, stop and think about how you would answer the following questions:  Are your department and organizational goals clear?  Do you talk to your people about performance expectations?  Does every person know what a good job looks like? Is anything getting in the way of performance?  Are you giving each person regular feedback on his or her performance and behavior? I often repeat the words of my former colleague Rick Tate, who said, "Feedback is the breakfast of champions."  Letting your people know where they stand and how they are doing can help nurture genuine relationships and create job satisfaction all around.

The 10/1/2012 SBIR Insider has done a great job of trying to clarify where this evolving process is and may be heading. Below I’ve quoted the introduction to the newsletter. Each agency is at a different point in the adoption of these new directives so we all need to stay focused on our customers and how they are trying to work within this, more complex, process. Discovery Machine, Inc. continues to build partnerships with other small and not so small businesses. We are all learning, as we go….. "Welcome to fiscal year 2013! Of course in SBIR FY-13 is not handled in a uniform manner, so it’s not easy to tell where a particular agency is at any given time. It is also not easy to know when each agency will implement particular provisions of the new SBIR law and policy directives. The battle for SBIR reauthorization may have been won, but it is very questionable as to what you have actually won. There is not an "individual" "Darth Vader" at work, but small businesses are once again a victim of circumstance due to a combination of congressional disrespect (from a few but powerful forces), irresponsible knee-jerk reactions to the misdeeds of a few small businesses (let’s call them what they are, "crooks"), subordination of small business interests to the "K" street lobbyists (let’s call them what they are, the bosses of many of our most powerful congressional leaders). Consequently SBIR has congealed into a blob of complexity that few understand, let alone agree upon, and it’s affecting everyone including SBA, the agencies, small businesses, universities, primes, and the support networks. In this issue: The SBIR Policy Directive and its Role Growth & Complexities of the Policy Directives Make      Commenting Problematic Your Commenting on the Policy Directive Fraud, Waste and Abuse - The Biggest Fraud! What Constitutes Fraud Waste and Abuse? Eligibility, Commercialization and Technical Assistance National SBIR Conference - Portland OR / Nov 13 - 15,      2012 Closing Thoughts"

Today, I’m going to give a short, one-question quiz.  Here’s the question:  How do you rate as a leader? I don’t ask this question flippantly.  It is a question I’ve asked countless people at the leadership seminars we conduct. As leaders, most people rank themselves as being very close to a minor deity or at least Mr. or Ms. Human Relations.  Seldom do leaders give themselves low marks. Strangely enough, when the tables are turned and people are asked to rank their boss’s leadership style, we often find many supervisors graded as being adequate, merely OK, or at worst, office autocrats who depend heavily on the often-referenced "seagull management" technique as their sole line of attack—they leave their people alone until something goes wrong, and then they fly in, make a lot of noise, dump all over everyone, and fly out. More often than not, we find that leaders lull themselves into thinking they are top-flight leaders because they think they use a supportive or coaching style, which someone told them are "good" leadership styles.  Not too surprisingly, this isn’t the way they are seen by those in their department, office or store. To get a true and accurate answer about the question above, it is necessary for you as a supervisor to honestly determine how your employees perceive your leadership style. These are the folks who know you best.  They have first-hand experience with your leadership style and operate on their own perceptions about it.  They are the best judges of your managerial effectiveness. However, getting an employee or subordinate to give his or her honest feedback on your leadership style is difficult.  People fear being the messenger who will get shot for bearing bad news.  Hence, they are naturally reluctant to be totally candid. Employees are sharp observers.  In the past, they may have gone to their leader and made an honest suggestion such as, "Ken, I think our Thursday afternoon meetings are a waste of time."  If the supervisor answers with an outburst by saying, "What do you mean a waste of time?  Are you kidding? Those meetings are important," it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that one thing the leader doesn’t want to hear is the truth. It is important to remember that when people you supervise tell you what they honestly think about your style of leadership, they’re really giving you a gift.  When someone gives you a gift, what is the first thing you should say?  "Thank you," of course!  Then it’s a very good idea to follow up by saying, "Is there anything else you think I should know?"  When a person learns that you won’t become defensive or hostile when he or she gives you an honest evaluation about your style, you’ll find that you’ll be given many nuggets of truth which are extremely valuable.  My advice would be to encourage people to give (feedback) at the office, and to give often! Just remember, what you think about your own leadership style really doesn’t matter.  In addition, there is no one correct style, nor is there a "good" or a "bad" style.  Rather, style is judged by those immediately influenced by it.  It’s your people’s response to your style that matters.  If you are getting the right response consistently—high productivity and morale—then you’re doing just fine.  If not, then perhaps it’s your style that needs changing, not your employees.

I was looking at the Discovery Channel website this week. Who doesn’t like the Discovery Channel? There are many good shows, but I am not really a fan of Texas Car Wars. I saw this interesting article by Bambi Turner on "Tens Ways Artificial Intelligence Will Affect Our Lives". The first way was for "Taming the Weather". It talks about how scientists will be able to predict the weather better by using artificial intelligence to shift through complex data to spot patterns the human eye misses. This seemed timely with the terrible Hurricane Sandy that the East Coast experienced this week. Some of the other ways mentioned are interesting. I do not agree that Transhumanism represents the ultimate application of artificial intelligence to human life. Take a look at the list and tell me what you think? http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/curiosity/topics/ways-artificial-intelligence-will-affect-our-lives.htm

Before you give a reprimand—think!  In many cases an employee needs to be redirected rather than reprimanded. In today’s workplace with constant changes in technology, people are continuously learning new skills. With all that learning, mistakes are bound to occur. For this reason, generally speaking, the need for redirection is much more prevalent today than the need for reprimands. Use the following "decision tree" to help you determine whether an employee’s misstep in behavior or performance should lead to a reprimand or a redirection. When someone does something wrong, first ask yourself, "Should this person have known better?"   ·       If the answer is "No," then the person is obviously unfamiliar with his or her assigned responsibility or task and still in a learning stage, and needs redirection. Never reprimand a learner—whether it’s a new hire learning the ropes, an experienced employee working on a new task, or your daughter learning to tie her shoelaces.  It will only cause confusion or outright discouragement.  In this instance, your role as a leader is to help, or redirect, the person who is having a problem. The five steps of an effective redirection are: 1.    Give the redirection as soon as possible after the problem happens. Prompt feedback is very important. 2.    Explain specifically what went wrong and how it could affect others. 3.    Take on a bit of the responsibility by saying something such as, "I must not have made it clear enough…" This reduces the pressure on the employee who is simply in need of supportive redirection. 4.    Reiterate the importance of the task. 5.    Reassure the person you still have confidence in him to help him move toward success on the task. The purpose of redirection is to set up, as soon as possible, an opportunity for a praising to occur.   ·       If the answer is "Yes," and you believe the person should have known better, then you must ask yourself, "Did this person make the mistake deliberately or because of a lack of confidence?" Remember—only reprimand deliberate behavior or unusual regressive performance of a normally strong performer. If the problem revolves around a lack of confidence, try to determine the reason.  It could be that a new situation exists that is unsettling to a seasoned worker. For example, perhaps Brad, an experienced cashier, makes many errors on the new cash register.  The reason is most likely a lack of confidence due to a change from the familiar.  Brad doesn’t need a reprimand; rather, he needs training and practice on the new register, coupled with support from an understanding boss.  Reprimands have no place in this example. If you have good reason to believe the person purposely did something wrong, or if the person’s typical good performance is continuously and obviously declining, a reprimand may be appropriate. If you deliver the reprimand with "caring candor," a phrase coined by Garry Ridge, President and CEO of WD-40 Company, it can be a powerful motivator for a high performer whose recent goal achievement is not up to normal high standards.  Remember these four steps when you must reprimand an individual: 1.    As with a redirection, deliver the reprimand in a timely manner—as soon as the unusual poor performance or behavior is detected. A reprimand should never be saved for an annual performance review. 2.    Be specific about what was done incorrectly and the impact it could have on you or others; i.e., "You didn’t turn in your weekly report on time. When I don’t get reports from all our team members, I can’t do a complete analysis for my Monday leadership meeting." 3.    Share your exact feelings about the situation—frustration, disappointment, surprise, etc. 4.    Finish by reaffirming the person’s past performance and letting her know the reprimand is not about her as a person, but about her behavior or actions. "This upsets me because it’s so unlike you. You’re one of my best people and you usually get your reports in on time." This last step is very important because you want the person to walk away thinking about what she did wrong, not about how poorly you treated her.   Above all, remember to catch your people doing something right and praise them at every opportunity. You will be making deposits in the bank of goodwill, so that if you occasionally need to make a withdrawal via a redirection or reprimand, the sting will be short-lived and the employee will be that much more motivated toward high achievement.

When the members of your team walk out the door, does their expertise come back? Here are six steps to follow to create knowledge assets that stay with your organization. 1.  Focus on strategic knowledge assets.  It is impossible to capture all expertise.  Even if all expertise is captured, it is hard to say it will be useful.  Think about the strategic initiatives of your organization over the next year.  Which of them is dependent on expertise?  Which people have the expertise?  Who is the customer of the expertise?  Where does the expertise need to be used to achieve the objective? 2.  Get to the stories.  Give the targeted experts or practitioners the opportunity to brainstorm stories falling under the umbrella of the targeted strategic initiative.  Stories are a great way to convey tacit knowledge - the knowledge that is developed through experiences.  Telling a good story is a great way identify important situations for knowledge transfer. 3.  Create a framework for knowledge assets based on stories.  Find the synergies, divergent points and commonalities in the stories.  What is the pattern?  Where are the gaps?  Often seeing a summary or map of the stories helps the experts remember additional details. 4.  Make the knowledge assets operate.  A framework for knowledge assets isn’t enough.  The knowledge assets must operate, solve a problem, assist a novice, give an answer, advise of a problem.  Think action not storage. 5.  Deploy a knowledge asset in the enterprise situation where it will be used.  If the knowledge is needed beside a machine inside a manufacturing floor, then that is where the knowledge asset should go.  If the knowledge is needed on a mobile device at a customer site, then that is where the knowledge asset should go. 6.  Improve the knowledge assets over time and experiences.  There will always be more stories.  If your knowledge asset cannot adapt as employees solve problems, then your strategic initiative will fail. My later blogs will go into detail on each step. For a FREE copy of a whitepaper which discusses these points in greater detail, register on our website.

The concept of power in the workforce has a negative connotation.  It brings to mind such associations as coercion, manipulation, and even corruption.  This does not have to be the case. Power has many positive aspects, and everyone can learn to explore and harness different sources of the individual power they have in the workplace.  By developing their own sources of power, employees will be less dependent on others for the leadership they need and thus be better able to take initiative and make a greater contribution in their jobs. In our program called Situational Self Leadership, we take a different perspective on power.  We suggest that "The sole advantage of power is the ability to do more good." Thus, if you want to do more good for yourself and more good for the people around you, it is important to learn how to tap into your own points of power. Points of Power.  There are at least five power sources you can develop in any job, all of which relate to each other in varying degrees: Position power, task power, personal power, relationship power, and knowledge power. Position power is inherent in the authority of the position you have.  You have position power when your business card has a title printed on it that indicates you have the power to manage people or command resources. My dad, an officer in the Navy, used to say, "The best leaders are those who have position power and never have to use it." Task power is power that stems from being good at a particular task at work and being able to help others with a process or procedure they may need to do. Personal power comes from your personal character attributes such as strength of character, passion, inspiration, or a personal vision of the future.  Personal power is further enhanced by the strength of your interpersonal skills, such as your ability to communicate well and be persuasive with others. Relationship power comes from association with others through friendship, personal understanding of a colleague, cultivation of a relationship, nepotism, or reciprocity (trading favors). Knowledge power is about having expertise in an area. This is often through knowing a special skill or group of skills in your job, but is also evidenced by having certain degrees or certifications indicating special training.  Knowledge power can often be transferred from job to job or from company to company-it is a general type of power. Charting Your Points of Power An enlightening activity is to list a number of workplace situations or conditions where you feel you have the power to influence outcomes or people.  Next to each item, categorize the type of power you have in that circumstance. Now draw a five-pointed star with ten hash marks from the center to the tip of each point.  From the center of the star, mark off the corresponding number of responses you listed in your assessment of each type of power.  The farthest hash mark you indicate on each arm of the star becomes the new tip of that arm.  Connect these new points.  The resulting graphic should be some semblance of a star, with certain points having more emphasis and others having less. This will show you at a glance your primary points of power. If you want to be a real star in the workplace, try to develop a strategy to balance the points of power where you work. Some examples: ·       You have high knowledge power due to expertise in analysis and are often asked to analyze situations and report your findings in meetings.  However, you are weak in personal power and a poor communicator.  Your strategy might be to take a presentation skills course or to ask someone to critique a presentation before you give it to the group. ·       You have high task power and need to present an idea to the head of your department, but are somewhat weak in relationship power.  Your strategy could be to ask a coworker who has the ear of the department head to give you feedback on how he or she thinks the department head will react to your idea. ·       You have task power and are working on a very visible project, but you lack position power, which might make it difficult to get support.  Your strategy could be to use your task power to solicit a sponsor or champion who will help promote your project and your credibility. ·       You have personal power, but are weak in relationship power. Your strategy might be to use your social skills to network.  Ask others for instructions, attend meetings of professional organizations, or schedule lunches to help build relationships. Take advantage of the points of power where you are strong.  Use your power in a positive way to do more good for yourself and those around you.  If people throughout your organization are enabled to develop their sources of power, it could create a more even playing field for everyone. Power doesn’t have to be concentrated in the hands of a few.

Often the missing puzzle piece for achieving strategic objectives is knowledge transfer.  Someone has knowledge and it has to be transferred to more people  in order to improve the organization.  When people develop new expertise - they get excited and  motivated!  Members of a team like to be empowered to contribute to accomplishing strategic objectives. In my previous blog I described Six Steps to Boomerang Expertise. In this blog I will describe in a little more detail the first step - focusing on strategic knowledge assets. Think about the strategic initiatives of your organization over the next year.  Which of them is dependent on expertise? Which people have the expertise? Who is the customer of the expertise? Where does the expertise need to be used to achieve the objective? There are systematic approaches to targeting expertise and deploying expertise.  At Discovery Machine our methodology starts with expert domain scoping.  It follows basic project management principles but helps stakeholders focus on capture to deployment of expertise so strategic objectives will be attained. Meet with stakeholders.  Stakeholders include decision makers, managers, experts, practitioners, end users, knowledge engineers and IT.  Determine who has authority and responsibility.  Develop buy in to the solution from all the right perspectives. Understand the need, goal, and objectives.  Essentially make sure you understand the problem.  Determine metrics for success (something that can actually be measured), potential roadblocks, assumptions, budget, and timeline.  Tip:  the timeline should be short! Determine requirements, use case and system diagram. Understand the requirement, not the solution.  Why is the knowledge needed?  What does it have to help the end user do?  What decisions?  A use case is a story about how the end user will leverage the knowledge assets during relevant business situations.  The system diagram is a visualization of the context in which the user will leverage the end product.  Even if the end product is a document, where will the document be?  How will the user get to it?  What network?  Is it printed?  If so, where will it be stored?  Understand where the knowledge asset will be deployed. At Discovery Machine we have a document template to guide us through these steps.  Over the years we have fine tuned what is needed in the document template to get a knowledge asset deployment project off the ground and finish successfully.  We have combined project management, system engineering, cognitive science and artificial intelligence into the template to make sure we scope the project to the domain as well as the strategic objectives. Do you have an approach for scoping expertise capture?  What problems and successes have you had defining the scope of a knowledge capture project?

Even though most of us know about the need to have balance in our lives, the journey from knowing it to actually doing it isn’t easy. Looking at our lives with the help of a model we can use and reuse can be a great way to keep stress at bay and help us achieve the work/life balance we need. The model I’m referring to was drawn from a study about peak periods of happiness in people’s lives, as well as various studies of the effect of stress upon health.  Researchers were looking for common elements that explained the phenomena of stress survival or optimal well being. They hoped that such identification could lead to prevention of strain caused by excess stress and a model for improving well being. Peak Periods of Happiness             In this study, people were asked to describe a three-week or longer "peak period of happiness" in their lives—a time when they felt that life was truly worth living.  Ask yourself:  When was the happiest period of time in my life?  When did I feel that life was the most fun, the most meaningful, the most alive?  Where was I?  What was I doing?  Who was I with?  A researcher named Herbert Shepard asked people these questions.  As he collected several hundred interviews, he began to notice that there were common elements in the lives of people as they remembered and described these wonderful periods of time. The Impact of Stress The other studies are about the impact of stress in a person’s life.  After studying people who had experienced a number of stressful events over the course of a 12-month period of time, researchers found that 80 percent of such highly stressed individuals developed a physical illness within the next 12 months.  The conclusion was that illnesses such as diabetes, ulcers, cancer, and heart disease quite often follow a very stressful period of time in a person’s life. The other side of this research is interesting as well. Researchers asked:  Why did the other 20 percent of those highly stressed individuals not get sick?  What is happening in their lives that is enabling them to remain stress-resistant, or "psychologically hardy"?  Interviews with these stress-resistant people revealed that they had some important common ingredients in their lives.  Such "stress survivors" survived 12 months of frequent and/or intense stress-inducing life events without becoming seriously ill during, or one year following, the onslaught of high stress. As luck would have it, not only were the researchers able to identify the elements related to both peak periods of happiness and stress survival, but the two sets of elements were also found to be fundamentally similar to one another.  When I studied this research , the similarity of the results of the two investigations confirmed the my feeling that a simple model for life balance and satisfaction would enable many of us to better manage the day-to-day options and demands of a busy life. The PACT Model For convenience, I’ll be referring to four elements—Perspective, Autonomy, Connectedness, and Tone—as the PACT model of life balance and satisfaction.  The remainder of this article will explain these four key concepts and suggest how to achieve a balance among these elements. P:  Perspective The first element that can create both happiness and stress resistance in your life is perspective.  Perspective can be defined as the "big picture" of life.  People with good perspective know their purpose and direction in life and value their past experiences while still having a keen sense of the present moment.  Perspective is that broad picture of where you’ve been and where you’re going that sets the context for this moment and for today. An example of perspective for me has always been Viktor Frankl.  Frankl was a World War II concentration camp survivor who wrote the book Man’s Search for Meaning.  When Frankl was first imprisoned, his captors burned the only copy of a prized manuscript he had written, right in front of him.  As a result, his main purpose in life became to live through that horrible experience and rewrite his manuscript.  It turned into an obsession.  While in this camp, he observed that, in this most degrading of all human situations, some people managed to keep going and survive, but others seemed to lose their will to continue—one day they would refuse to get out of bed in the morning and two weeks later they would be dead.  Frankl’s observation was that the people who were able to keep going month after month and year after year were the ones who had a purpose in their lives they could hang on to—a great love they wanted to return to, work they felt compelled to finish, a strong spiritual direction, or even a strong desire to get through each day and help others through the dreadful experience. For each of us, perspective can translate into goals we want to achieve, values we want our lives to reflect, or a sense of living each day as if it might be our last. It’s helpful to think about perspective at home and perspective at work. Some of us have a very good idea of our work goals—our professional direction in life—but our personal life needs some thinking about.  For others it’s just the opposite—we do well at home, but our career goals are uncertain.  For many people, the challenge is keeping a balance between work and home that is comfortable and at the same time allows them to obtain goals in both worlds. Any time there’s a big change in our lives, our perspective is liable to drop.  Certainly a person going through a divorce, a person who has just been fired, or someone who has to make a major change in his or her life for any reason may be going through a period of low perspective. Most people, however, ultimately find that this period of low perspective becomes an opportunity for growth in their lives, even if it doesn’t feel comfortable or familiar. Next week:  Part 2 - Autonomy, Connectedness, and Tone

How Do You Get Inside the Heads of People You Know? There are two quick and easy steps to follow. Describe your problem. Let a mentor tell you a story about how he or she solved a similar problem. It’s easy to get inside the heads of mentors if you know how to get them to tell good stories.  Getting someone to tell a good story is, well, another story and one which we will focus on in a later blog. A mentor needs a well defined problem. A person has to be bold enough to ask for help. The problem statement must be well thought out and researched.  You have to at least try to solve the problem on your own first. In addition, the right story teller must be found. The mentor must personalize the story. The mentor must understand where you are coming from and be able to relate to you. Does the mentor know your background and level of expertise? Will the mentor be able tell the story with details at the right level - not too simple, not too hard - so that knowledge transfer occurs? A good story has several parts. What resources were required, What did you expect to happen, What happened, What went well, What could have gone better, and What were the results? Sometimes one story isn’t enough. Several  stories that occurred under different conditions are helpful to identify different ways to look at the problem. Did the same or similar problem happen more than once? Did you solve it different ways? Did you have different resources? Did you learn something different? Determine when it is time to codify stories. Is it difficult for the mentor to be innovative and creative because he or she is solving the same problem over and over? Has the organization developed a methodology that needs to be stated explicitly or risk losing the valuable expertise if mentors leave the organization? Has the knowledge become transactional and critical to organization profitability? The first step to codifying stories is to collect enough to address a strategic objective.  Model all of the stories at a sketch level.  Find the similarities and differences in the sketches.  Fill in details.  Specify special conditions.  Before going any further in the codification process you should have a clear understanding of how the expertise in the stories will be deployed in the organization. In my next blog I will go into more detail on how Discovery Machine codifies stories. See 6 Steps to Boomerang Expertise for our full approach.

In last week’s blog, I started telling you about an effective model you can use to achieve balance so you can enjoy your life more and resist stress.  The acronym for the PACT model stands for Perspective, Autonomy, Connectedness, and Tone. Adopting this model and putting it into practice on a daily basis is a fabulous way to keep your stress level in check and keep your work and life in balance—the ultimate goal being a happier and more peaceful day-to-day existence. Who wouldn’t want that? We started last week with P: Perspective.  Keeping good and bad experiences in perspective can contribute greatly to a feeling of well-being and help your stress level remain low. A: Autonomy The next element that contributes to peak periods of happiness and high stress resistance is autonomy.  Autonomy is a feeling of having control over your own life. People with a high sense of autonomy usually have a clear sense of their own identity, feel the freedom to make choices in their lives, have career or job options and sufficient skills, and see their daily activities as moving them toward their long- and short-range goals.  If we ask individuals a single question—Are you in control of your life?—and they answer "no," we know that those individuals are at a much higher risk for illness. The lack of power and control felt by those who are underprivileged, really struggling to make ends meet, in a situation where there is racial or sexual discrimination occurring, or simply stretched to their limits in terms of workload, is the very opposite of autonomy and control.  People who feel powerless are under the most stress and are often the most angry.  These people often have the most severe health problems of any group in our society. On the other hand, people who are good time managers, who feel that they are managing their daily lives well and have the skills to do it, are the ones who are likely to feel the most control and the most autonomy.  In their stories of peak periods of happiness, these people often referred to two or three weeks or a month when they were in a special place and they could decide what it was that they were going to do each day.  Others referred to a job they had or a project they were working on where they could choose the direction in which they were going and felt in control of the situation. Clearly, most people can’t go through life on a vacation or in complete control of everything—but certainly a young mother with two toddlers running around and no money for a babysitter has a different degree of autonomy than a young mother whose youngest child has just entered the first grade. The latter may have six open hours for deciding how to spend her time. Is she going to play tennis or sleep until 10:00 a.m., take a class to further a career goal, or start a part-time job? What is her choice for today? One of the most powerful ways to build control and choice in your life is through the development of key skills—skills like knowing how to manage others effectively, being a good parent, managing your time well, or helping people feel like they are doing their jobs well.  Again, people often have different degrees of autonomy at home and at work.  Some people do very well at the office—they set goals, hold committee meetings, participate in performance reviews, and they progress well.  At home, however, they never have time to exercise, break appointments with themselves and other family members for scheduled "quality time," or they might have half-finished projects around the house they have been putting off for years. C: Connectedness The third ingredient in stress resistance and high life satisfaction is connectedness.  Connectedness relates to the quality of relationships in peoples’ lives.  People who report high connectedness often feel they have positive relationships with friends, family, self, coworkers and supervisors.  Connectedness also relates to a feeling of contentment and resonance with one’s physical environment.  You can have a highly connected experience watching a beautiful sunset or walking into a home that you’ve decorated because it feels good to you. In fact, there are good reasons for people, when they first move into a home or a new community, to spend time decorating that new environment so that they feel more connected to it. You can have a highly connected experience having a cup of coffee with a friend or sitting in bed at night cuddled up to a loved one. My definition of low connectedness is when you do not feel you are an integral part of your environment.  For example, if you move to a new community and go away for the weekend, then return and find that nobody knows that you were gone and came back, it can be an indicator that you are not very connected to your neighborhood.  In fact, after a move most people feel totally disconnected and many people report a great deal of illness during the year following a major relocation. In their stories of peak periods of happiness, people often referred back to a time when they were first married and didn’t have much money and so did more things at home, such as played a lot of bridge because that was all they could afford to do. Often, however, their friendships were solid and meaningful.  Men often referred back to fraternity days in college or to a high school group of friends when connections were strong and non-competitive. All types of relationships you have affect your connectedness, but the most important relationships are those with your spouse and your boss. In fact, the number one predictor of health at the worksite is your relationship with your boss.  A bad relationship with a supervisor can make people sick.  A good relationship can enhance a feeling of overall well-being and productivity.  On the home front, are you spending quality time with your spouse?  Do you make special efforts to plan "memory-building" times together?  In general, have you spent the time that you need to nourish the most important relationships in your life? T: Tone The fourth element in the PACT model is tone. This important concept includes how you feel about yourself physically. This includes the way you look, your health and energy level, your sense of fitness, even the way you are dressed and the colors you are wearing.  People with high tone generally have high energy levels, maintain a proper weight, have sound nutrition and feel really good about their physical appearance.  In their stories of peak periods of happiness men very often thought back to high school or college when they were in the best shape they had ever been in—easily able to bench press 300 pounds or run several miles.  Women often talked about the time when they were 10 pounds lighter and could fit into all the clothes in their closet.  Generally both men and women talked about a time when they were active, looked good, had an abundance of energy, and paid attention to their physical health. Over the years I’ve found that when everything else seems to be floundering and I feel my balance is slipping away, often the quickest and easiest ingredient to impact is tone.  Tone is often easiest because it lends itself better to measurement and you can see concrete results more quickly. Balancing the Elements What has been helpful to me about this model is that the elements of perspective, autonomy, connectedness, and tone can be a dynamic balance for one another.  As an example, what do we do in our society when someone becomes ill or injured and is hospitalized?  By definition, their physical health (tone) is low now. So what do we do? Customarily we send this person a card.  What might the card say?  We care about you (connectedness).  This won’t last forever (perspective).  Soon you’ll be up and about (tone) doing what you want to do (autonomy). We may even send flowers to help him or her connect better to a sterile hospital room. Why I like the PACT is it helps.  It’s like a good diet.  It will work even better for you as you personalize it and make it yours.  I have used this model for many years now to keep my own life in balance and monitor the times when balance isn’t present.  If I notice I’m not looking forward to a given day or time, or I feel my energy is lagging, I try to step back and ask myself:  What’s feeling out of balance?  Am I so over-committed or over-stressed that I’m doing what everyone else wants me to do today without any time for myself?  Or am I upset about a relationship with someone close to me?  Or does my house feel untidy with lots of undone tasks and thus doesn’t provide a nourishing harbor from the stormy world?  Or have I lost track of what all my efforts are for?  Or am I confused about why I’m working 12 hours today and worked 12 hours yesterday and don’t have time to see the people I love? The PACT model has helped me, and it can help you, identify what’s wrong when you’re feeling out of balance and pay more attention to life when you are feeling great. When your life is in balance, stress naturally loses its grip and you are able to enjoy life on a higher level.

I think the biggest problem with knowledge flow is design.  Design begins with abstract representations and progressively gets more detailed and structured.  Early stages of design involve stories, desires, and sketching with notional shapes.  Knowledge management and social media systems are pretty good at this part.  However, the next stage of design - where abstract notions are molded into a solid framework - is ignored.  I call this stage formalize.  Formalize is where flow is considered and enabled.  Flow is an important aspect of design - I can’t think of any designed artifact where flow isn’t a major factor in the success of the design.  Consider a house.  A house has entries, windows, and connections between rooms.  These are designed to enable flow of light, air, and people.  When you walk up to a house, it is clear how flow is enabled.  Now consider something more abstract - like software.  Flow is enabled through user interfaces as well as data through the program.  User interfaces and data will flow easily only if a good framework is constructed during the formalize phase of design. In the book A New Culture of Learning the authors discuss World of Warcraft (WoW) and how effortlessly knowledge flow occurs.  I think it is because there is a design for the flow.  Flow is designed around the game and the knowledge assets are clearly deployed in the game.  This happens a little more easily because WoW is not anywhere as complex as the real world.  The real world does not come with instructions, hard and fast rules and clear boundaries.  In the real world we must consciously design knowledge flow in the formalize phase.  Knowledge assets from social media, intranets, wiki’s, communities of practice, documents, manuals, notes and e-mail do not constitute a framework for flow - they are just storage.  A taxonomy and search is part of the solution but not a complete design.  Flow must come from the decision making and problem solving of practitioners. The framework evolves from divergent points and commonalities in requirements, stories, and sketches.  What is the pattern? Where are the gaps? Visualizing a framework helps the framework evolve to a more complete stage.  At Discovery Machine we have a methodology involving 6 major steps that reveals knowledge flow and how to support flow. There is resistance to designing knowledge flow because designs can be difficult to build and maintain.  How a knowledge flow will be deployed and maintained is critical to the design.  In later blogs I will discuss deploying and adapting knowledge assets to support knowledge flow.

Knowledge transfer does not equate to knowledge flow. On linkedin I am reading a discussion on renewable energy.  It is an amazing dialog.  Many people from all over the world are participating.  Links to data and research supporting different points of view are being shared.  Knowledge is going from being stored to transferred. What are we doing with transferred knowledge? What actions will take place?  What decisions will be made?  Knowledge transfer for the sake of knowledge transfer doesn’t necessarily help an organization accomplish its strategic goals. For knowledge flow to be powerful knowledge assets must be operational. By operational I mean: Solve a problem, Assist a novice, Give an answer, Give advice, or Bring a past experience to forefront. At Discovery Machine we have a methodology involving 6 major steps that reveals knowledge framework and how to support flow. One of the steps is making the knowledge assets operate.  We do not stop at creating a framework for knowledge, we create job aids that create a force for knowledge flow. We have found four critical features for any operationalized knowledge asset to enable flow. Situational awareness: Problem solving must occur in the context of the current problem. Communication:  Job aides must communicate with end users in a natural manner. Explanation:  A job aide should be able to explain how it solves a problem or why it is giving a piece of advice. Adaptation:  The job aid should adapt over time incorporating new experiences related to the knowledge framework. Powerful knowledge flow enables an organization to accomplish its strategic goals through decisions and actions.

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!