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Rework. Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson. 2010 ISBN 9780307463746. These are the two  chaps of 37 signals who started  Basecamp and a host of other tools.  They were also early advocates of Ruby on Rails.  A breathless book that runs through the gamut of pragmatic business advice. You will find your self agreeing with them much more than disagreeing. Their comments on software design ( It should be simple, practical, easy to use but often is not) resonated today as I was running through Microsoft Office 2010. sigh, I can see why Open Office is attractive – Microsoft changed the paradigm yet again, breaking all of Don Norman’s rules.  37Signals say marketing is not a department which is bang on since it is something every one in your company is doing 24/7. For example:

• Every time you answer the phone its marketing
• Every time you send an email its marketing
• Every time someone uses your product, its marketing
• Every word you write on your website is marketing
• If you build software, every error message is marketing
• If you are in the restaurant business. the after-dinner mint is marketing
• If you are in the retail business, the checkout counter is marketing
• If you are in the service business, your invoice is marketing

Marketing is the sum total of everything you do.

Buy it read it and pass it on to someone you like. Its short but right on. Website www.37signals.com/rework

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The Design of Design. Essays from a computer scientist. Frederick P. Brooks. 2010. ISBN 9780201362985. The author of the Mythical Man-Month, the Father  of the IBM 360 hardware and software, Brooks is a giant.  He has put together a series of essays  that give any designer serious insights into the process.  Regardless of what you work in, architecture for homes or cathedrals,. OS for RIM, Linux modules,  web pages or wooden picnic tables, there is something for everyone on these essays.  From the book , “The author tracks the evolution of the design process, treats collaborative and distributed design, and illuminates what makes a truly great designer. He examines the nuts and bolts of design processes, including budget constraints of many kinds, aesthetics, design empiricism, and tools, and grounds this discussion in his own real-world examples—case studies ranging from home construction to IBM’s Operating System/360. Throughout, Brooks reveals keys to success that every designer, design project manager, and design researcher should know.

He points out that you study history to find out what works and how in order to learn from others.  His chapter Constraints are Friends is worth the price of the book.  He is veru harsh on himself for the errors that occured on his watch.  He also advocates that good design requires much more  planning and research than people are giving it.  If a company is always in a hurry to get to market, then it is not committed to good design. If you consider yourself a designer – you have read this book.  If you love computers you will cherish this book.

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Thoughts on hiring a sales person, what companies forget about.

Reg Nordman

We have had numerous discussions about how companies seem to hire the wrong sales people.  This comes up so often that I feel the need to comment, since it is done so regularly.

Usually the situation comes up because a company exec believes they need to add new sales DNA into their company. They may have been doing all or most of the selling up to now, and feel that they need to go onto other things. These are all good things. But the symptom that it is about to go wrong is the implied or expressed belief that once they add a sales person, the problem is resolved. In our experience the problem is about to be exacerbated.

Rocket Builder has heard many common myths about sales people, here are just five

1. All salespeople are the same.
2. All selling is the same.
3. Any salesperson can fit in any company.
4. Being sales driven means I can do things the same as always.
5. Getting out there and selling is the only sales training needed.

Beliefs like this usually lead to this profit killing sequence:

1. Placing a general ad for sales people – “lets just put it out there”
2. Changing the candidate requirements mid stream – “no one met what I wanted”
3. Accepting candidates at random – “they worked for a really big company and did well”
4. Making the wrong hire – “Seems the best of those I talked to, I have a feeling about…”
5. Wasting six months of effort, wages and profits before firing the new hire – $$$$
6. Return to step one.

To help you make your “better” choice for adding sales people to your mix you need a process.  You certainly have a product development and bug fixing process.  Why not a sales hiring process for something this key?A  logical process like the one Geoffrey Hansen, Rocket Builder has. He says:

1. Select your market
2. Select your requirements for that market
3. Deliberately target candidates who meet the requirements.

Sounds like it would be a good coding practise. Of course,  in using this process effectively there is much well thought out detail involved, which is where Rocket Builders helps companies. It is in the execution and details that you find the secret sauce.  If you do this right, then you, Mr/Ms. C- Level,  can:

• add new sales DNA to your company,
• go on to doing those 101 other things you want to do, and
• know that your money machine is working away.

In this business,  prevention is so much cheaper than rework. It just might save your company.  Comments?

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The Design of Everyday Things. Donald A. Norman. 1988. ISBN 9780465067107. This is the classic text on design. All players in the tech industry need to read this.  An early quote,”  Each time a new technology comes along, new designers make the same horrible mistakes as their predecessors. Technologists are not noted for learning from the errors of the past. They look forward, not behind, so they repeat the same problems over and over again.”

Norman spent a lot of time in Apple’s early days as VP Advance Products Group, and the rest is history.  A fascinating easy to read writer, he fills the book with concrete examples of horrid mis design, drawn from all around us.  And he is right, present wireless devices are horrid.  While reading this you will become sensitized as to how bad design permeates our life.  From the huge (Chernobyl and Challenger) to the almost trivial (bathroom taps), you will start to see what he sees. Computer programs of course come in for a lot of abuse. (My favorite is the brutal treatment we receive from telco and Revenue Canada voice mail systems.  Enjoy. (He has other  books , Emotional Design, The Design of Future Things and Living With Complexity)  By the way his website http://www.nngroup.com/ is a bit of a surprise.   a sample of his writing https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://jnd.org/dn.mss/LWCChapter1.pdf

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Superfreakonomics. Global cooling, patriotic prostitutes, and why suicide bombers should buy life insurance. Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner.  2010. ISBN 9781554686087.  This reads like a novel with twists, turns and surprises on every page.  A very easy to read fact filled and entertaining book.  If you have read Freakonomics you know what you are in for. If not you will find this a treat.  I really enjoyed the discussions form Intelligent Ventures in Seattle.  If you have heard about geoengineering, you will find out more about much simpler responses to global warming than we have head from others. And yes you will hear detractors. But such is the lot of people who debunk sacred cows – especially ones that have so much funding and lobbying attached.

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The Imposter. How a Juvenile Criminal Succeeded in Business and Life. Kip Kreiling. 2009. ISBN 97065320557.   A personal diary, a business opportunity, a life guide , this book could be some of each of these and more. A very personal book that I could not put down and thus read in one sitting. I am sure we all know people who struggle in life and this book is written at such an open human level it could reach many of them. There are echoes of the Heath book , Switched, in that Kip references some of the same research on making change.  I learned , again,  that we make our own way , that everyone can change, but there are ways to make it stick.  His section on reality slicing and how it allowed him to recognize the existence of logic behind many different points of view is very well thought out. Very readible and you will enjoy his eight principles of transformation.

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Rocket Builders Names Top 25 Technology Companies to
the 2010 ‘Ready to Rocket 25’ List
Annual list highlights technology trends and those private BC companies
positioned for high growth potential in 2010
VANCOUVER, BC – January 26, 2010 –
Rocket Builders today released its eighth annual ‘Ready to Rocket 25’ list
naming 25 privately held BC companies that are best positioned
to capitalize on the 2010 technology sector trends that will lead them to
faster growth than their peers.
The annual ‘Ready to Rocket 25’ list provides accurate predictions of
companies that will likely experience significant revenue growth, venture
capital investment or acquisition by a major player in the coming year. The
‘Ready to Rocket 25’ list is the only predictive list of its kind in North
America.
The Ready to Rocket list is viewed by investors from around the world.
According to Kevin Cable, an Executive Vice President with Seattle-based
Cascadia Capital, “When a BC company hits my radar I check to see if they
are on the Ready to Rocket list. It helps me understand if they are a
company I should get to know.”
There are 19 companies on the 2010 list that repeat as “Ready to Rocket”
recipients. The 6 new companies to appear on the “Ready to Rocket” list
are:
• MetroLeap Media
• Axia Software Corporation
• Clevest Solutions Inc
• Advanced Ecommerce Research Systems (AERS)
• Conasys Consumer Assurance Systems Inc
• Pulse Energy, Inc
Each year, Rocket Builders does many man months of investigation into
market trends and companies to refine its selection criteria. For 2010, much
attention was spent on identifying industry sectors where the economy will
recover more quickly while also identifying solutions where customer
demand is more urgent.
“In the past we have observed how trends like Software-as-a-Service or
new wireless technologies like the BlackBerry had driven growth of B.C.
companies.” said Geoffrey Hansen, Managing Partner at Rocket Builders.
“For the coming year, we are predicting a big impact for Smart Grid
technology. We’ve already observed increased Venture Capital interest,
including a recent large financing of B.C.’s Tantalus Systems.”
MetroLeap, Axia, Clevest and AERS are past recipients of “Emerging
Rocket” recognition, a list that identifies pre-growth companies with high
likelihood of acquiring investment and customers to position themselves
for future selection as “Ready to Rocket” companies.
Today, Rocket Builders is also publishing its 2010 lists of “Emerging
Rockets” and highlights companies across 4 areas of technology:
• BioTech & HealthTech
• CleanTech
• Information Technology and Communications (ICT)
• Internet, Wireless and New Media
According to Dave Thomas, Senior Partner at Rocket Builders, “B.C. has
strong clusters of emerging technology companies that are attractive to
investors. At this year’s Canadian Financing Forum in Vancouver later this
week, attendees have indicated increased interest in early stage investing
in B.C. companies.”
Ready to Rocket 2010 List

• Advanced Ecommerce Research Systems www.researchadvanced.com
• Antarctica Digital Marketing Ltd. www.antarcticadigital.com
• Aquatic Informatics Inc. www.aquaticinformatics.com
• Avigilon Corporation www.avigilon.com
• Axia Software Corporation www.axiasolutions.com
• Bycast Inc. www.bycast.com
• Carbonetworks Corporation www.carbonetworks.com
• Clevest Solutions Inc www.clevest.com
• Colligo Networks Inc. www.colligo.com
• Conasys Consumer Assurance Systems Inc www.conasysinc.com
• Contigo Systems Inc. www.contigo.com
• Digital Payment Technologies www.digitalpaytech.com
• Fit Brains (Vivity Labs Inc) www.fitbrains.com
• GenoLogics Life Science Software Inc. www.genologics.com
• Guard RFID Solutions www.guardrfid.com
• In Motion Technology Inc.www.inmotiontechnology.com
• Inetco Systems Ltd.www.inetco.com
• MetroLeap Media www.metroleap.com
• Pulse Energy, Inc www.pulseenergy.com
• RX Networks Inc. www.rxnetworks.com
• Sempa Power Systems Ltd. www.sempapower.com
• Tantalus Systems Corporation www.tantalus.com
• TenDigits Software Inc. www.tendigits.com
• Teradici Corporation www.teradici.com
• Vivonet Inc www.vivonet.com

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