Plan B Mindset

It is what it is. How many times have we each heard that said with the intent of convincing us to just accept the facts, reality or status quo of a situation? However, I love an addition to this line made by Pat Summitt, the legendary coach of the University of Tennessee women’s basketball program. She recently announced that she had been diagnosed with early stage Alzheimer’s but that she would continue coaching, with help from her assistant coaches. While people were wondering how she and her team would react, I listened to an interview with one of her friends. She asserted that the team would use the circumstance as a way to come together because of what Coach Summitt often said: It is what it is, but it becomes what you make of it. Isn’t that a great phrase? I have been struck by this phrase during the past few weeks – I can’t get it out of my mind. It takes a passive, almost helpless state – there is nothing I can do, because it is what it is – and turns it in to ...

Today’s marketplace is more competitive than ever. Increasingly the time for your competition to adapt to your new innovations is growing shorter and shorter. Yet some companies are finding ways to continue to stand out and draw in consumers. It is worth asking why? I believe the companies that have a truly defendable competitive advantage are those that understand where they create value. One of the key principles of Plan B Philosophy is to understand where you create value for your customer and be relentless in pursuing that proposition, even as tactics in delivering that value must continually change in the market. Yet there are key features and functionality that our competitors are offering every day. They, too, adapt to changing information and find new ways to create value. Let’s be honest, the guys on the other side are usually pretty smart as well. To stay ahead, we must continually adapt in providing more value to our customers. As we all face new features, new competit...

Like many pursuits in life, when I get into something, I like to really understand it. For awhile now (more than 15 years), I have been “into” wine. Lisa and I had a chance to spend some time together in Sonoma this past week, I had a chance to reflect on customer service, particularly through the eyes of a wine taster. For those of you who have not had a chance to visit the wine country, we are fans of the Sonoma side. A bit more laid back, a bit less like Disneyland (Napa). While Napa has some great wines, it’s just not our speed. The Sonoma side still has some agriculture feel left to it and particularly when you find a smaller winery where the family is involved. While we were there, I experienced some things that are transferrable to any business – whether you’re in the paint business or financial services. A personal touch matters. We visited about 15 wineries this past week. Some are the sort that you walk in the door and they ask, “So are you here for tasting today?” (No, ac...

For those of you that know me personally, you know that a significant portion of my spring and summer are spent on the baseball diamond coaching youth baseball for my sons, Ben (10) and Alex (8). I believe that sports moments are often great analogies for business. There is a true scoreboard in sports, which we don’t often have in business. Leadership, performance, teamwork and inspiration are all a part of winning the game. But during the past two weeks I was given the gift of two great lessons coaching baseball that I thought I would share. I have a philosophy on youth sports that sometimes does not make Type A parents of my players happy. When I start a season, I try to remind the parents that of all of the kids in Little League, at all ages and levels, it is likely only one or two will play college baseball and, statistically, none will make it to the major leagues. I would love to be wrong and would happily eat that crow, but the numbers are what they are. Therefore, we need t...

As a part of the strategic focus of our companies, we are continuing to evolve from an organization that has traditionally focused exclusively on business-to-business marketing to becoming more of a consumer marketing company. That is, while we serve consumers through our business clients (mostly financial institutions), we need to design our products, services and customer experience around the end consumer need. In the competitive financial services marketplace, there is no other choice – if you are not meeting the current and future needs of consumers, you are toast in the long-term.   Through a connection of the marketing director at TMG, we were able to have Tina Murray, a regional marketing director from Chick-Fil-A, spend the majority of the day with us this past Wednesday. Chick-Fil-A is a unique company, in that they have created a brand that has true raving fans, as well as their focus on an internal corporate culture of quality food and outstanding service.   Whil...

There has been quite a bit of buzz in the media and social networking sites about the potential for the world ending this coming Saturday. I am curious what time, because I have a really busy day! If it going to end at breakfast, there are a whole lot of things I won’t do on Friday. That being said, the world ending brings up connotations of the afterlife – heaven and hell. This reminded me of one of my least favorite sayings, “The Devil’s Advocate.” Usually this advocate is brought out in the middle of a conversation regarding a new initiative or a product/service that someone wants to launch. A person will say authoritatively, “Well, let me be the devil’s advocate here.” What they really mean to say is, “If you don’t mind, I am going to take the license to totally trash everything you just said and let you know how stupid you really are.” Of course we are all too polite to actually say that, so we wrap ourselves in this role of being an objective questioner and looking at the d...

“Enlightened trial and error succeeds over the planning of the lone genius.” This quote comes from a Nightline broadcast more than 10 years ago on the design firm IDEO ( Link to Video ). I have seen the video many times which documents their process of designing something truly different and unique. But when I saw the video again a few weeks ago, this quote struck me more significantly than it has in the past. Many times we spend countless hours crafting our message, building our plans and designing our strategies. Much like an annual report, which is said to be a document that is read more before it is published than after, our business plans and strategy documents are revised and refined to “perfection.” Yet when we go to the market, our tactics are often worthless. As Dwight D. Eisenhower said, "In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable." Our competitors, the market, our customers and even the government are all...