Formula for success

"Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It's quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure."
Thomas J Watson, Founder of IBM

Murder your darlings

With the passage of time all of us accumulate a lot of office/household goods which are practically junk. And it is hard to get rid of this junk without conscious effort. I advocate (and rigorously practice) simplicity but sometimes I find it hard to get rid of something which looks and feels wonderful but is practically useless.

This blog post discusses this in a nice way:

My theory is that the things that you own that you’re not using or don’t need aren’t just a waste of money and space: they’re draining you of your energy.  Every time you walk past that cookbook that you never opened, or that model airplane kit that you meant to assemble, or the oscilloscope that you haven’t turned on in a year, a little neural pattern fires that says “Someday I should..” or “I always meant to…” or “God, I really ought to take care of that.”
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There’s a saying among writers about the process of copy-editing: murder your darlings.  You may have crafted a beautiful phrase or metaphor in this paragraph, but if it’s not serving the whole piece, it’s got to come out.  You have to murder your darlings.

Six hats map

Six thinking hats framework by Dr. Edward de Bono helps you stay focused and productive during meetings and discussions. Hats framework allows you to detach your ego from your discussions and focus on results.

Hats are used symbolically and there is no need to actually wear a particular hat. You just state that you are going to wear a particular hat. Hats are used to simulate the role playing. Six hats framework is extremely easy to learn and can be taught in 5-10 minutes to anybody including children. (who love role playing)

To use the hats during a meeting or discussion, you explain the six hats metaphor to everybody. During the discussion, everybody explicitly states the hat he or she is wearing and makes a statement according to his or her hat's color. Hats can be changed as many times as you like.

For example if you want to make an emotional statement, you will put on your red hat and put forward your statement. Similarly to say anything negative, you will tell the participants that you are now going to make black hat statement.

Blue hat is normally used by someone who is conducting the discussion (the controller) and allows him or her to keep everyone stay focused on the subject of the discussions. If the discussion drifts to off-topics, he can wear his blue hat and ask everyone to stay on the topic.

Some people are always positive, some find satisfaction in findings faults. Some others are creative. Six hats framework forces you to recognize your favorite hat and expects you to use all the hats in a balanced way. For example if you are too much critical (black hat) or emotional (red hat), it is expected from you that you use the yellow hat (positive) and white hat (facts) too.

To use the hats effectively you need to use the correct hat for each statement. For example you cannot say something emotional and make it look like a white hat statement. White hat is reserved for pure facts and you are expected to be asked for a reference which can prove that your statement is a pure fact.

Here is a mind map of six thinking hats which you can print and distribute before meetings/discussions or use as your computer desktop background for easy reference.

Low cost and innovative businesses

It is always possible to look at your existing business practices and simplify and/or innovate these. Unfortunately most people do not do it unless there is a competitive pressure or some regulatory demand. Innovation and simplification require both lateral thinking and courage.

Intercity bus service in our country was terrible before Korean company Daewoo started its service and set the standards of quality service and punctuality. It still seems the only buss service which has a regularly updated website. I tried but could not find the website of the biggest local intercity bus service, New Khan.

PIA started offering e-tickets only after Air Blue launched its service in Pakistan with e-tickets.

The picture below (click to enlarge) shows how low cost airlines (In Europe and US) are able to lower their fares compared to expensive airlines. Some of the strategies (from the picture) include:

1. Higher seat density with single class cabin.
2. Fast turnarounds (up to 25 minutes) - higher utilization of the plan.
3. Direct flights - point to point; no transfers, short routes.
4. Smaller airports - cheaper and simple ground facilities.
5. Tickets sold directly mostly by internet (easyjeb - 95%)
6. No frills - no additional costs
7. Standardized fleet (only one aircraft type) - cheaper maintenance, training
8. High variable proportion of salary (up to 26%) - better HR utilization. Ryanair is serving 9679 passengers per employee
   
9. compared to 715 passengers by employee by Air France.

If you are having trouble making your business profitable in these difficult times, reconsider your strategies.