A good friend of mine asked me to write about a dumb thing that happens in his office frequently. Let me paint a picture:
Imagine: Conference call involving 2 colleagues on the same floor.
Each speaking to the same client (same conference call) but each has a difference role.
Both are sitting within 30 feet of each other yelling into their speakerphones at their individual desks.
Folks around them get quite annoyed. Why do this when the company provides numerous conference rooms with Polycom speaker phones?
I really feel that between email and phones that we’ve lost the point of collaboration. If I saw this happening in my (imaginary) company I’d either get folks to collaborate face to face when possible. Otherwise I’d sell the building or kill the lease on the place and let everyone work virtual office since that’s what’s happening anyhow but with all the overhead of a facility.
What are your thoughts on this? Does this happen to you? Does your Netcom GN headset with 2 earphones shield you from the noise?
-CSG
This is hot news and will really be interesting to see how the divide between Microsoft CRM and Salesforce will play out.
If you are trying to book appointments with partners and prospects and you end up in voicemail hell I have a few things that have worked well for me:
1. Never call on mondays unless its a specific call to followup on something already in progress.
2. Make your call list the night before with name, phone number and the gist of your call - must be done the night before.
3. Call on Friday especially. Folks have put in a productive week and friday is the day people catch up on reports and planning at their desks. My ratio of answered calls has gotten me to the point where all my appointment setting calls are done only on friday.
4. Have a specific goal for each call. (Eg. Schedule a meeting, demo via webex etc. )
5. Don’t call during lunch, take a lunch and use the opportunity to recharge before hitting the phones again.
Best of luck to you and happy hunting!
I love Dilbert.
In the next few weeks I’d like to write up the ultimate sales force automation / CRM integration wish list and see what others think of it.
Almost without fail I’ve worked for companies that have had separate business units selling the same products in full compete capacity. These teams rarely reported to the same execs and this generally played into a long term demise of revenue growth. Some of the items I’ve witnessed 1st hand:
1. Keeping notes in the CRM/SFA system incomplete and without names and phones numbers of important contacts.
2. Beating out another team within the company by offering better discounts than they.
3. Fear of cross-selling with another team based on the idea that the other team may steal an account - this results in leads that are sent outside of the company all together usually in return for leads or favors.
4. Decreased morale throughout the sales organization.
5. Poor usage of resources within the company when newly founded teams require more support than the incumbent sales force.
6. Higher overhead and expense. Multiple teams need multiple managers, directors and VP’s.
7. Higher turnover in all the teams based on deals lost internally.
I guess I write this in an effort to understand why companies employ such silly strategies. I have heard 1st hand accounts of car sales people “misplacing” keys to popular cars on the lot so that they can show/demo the car to their clients and earn the sale. This sounds to be very similar and I guess it will be one of those things that I never will understand.
The Dilbert Principal is an excellent book written by Scott Adams, I highly recommend it anyone who is facing re-orgs, corporate downsizing or just general angst in the workplace to check it out.
Ok no more tweaking - I’ve got it. If it wasn’t so cliche I’d yell out Eureka. Before I get into the simple GTD system that I’ve employed, I’d like to chronicle my journey through using a pc at work and a mac at home to using the mac in both places.
Note to non-GTD folks, this will seem really weird to you but I hope you will gather some usable knowledge from this write up.
I read Getting things Done by David Allen about a year and half ago after a good friend recommended it to me. I was immediately hooked, as work was overwhelming and I wasn’t keeping up at work or home and was tired of just complaining about it. Waking up earlier and earlier to try and keep up was running me down and at the time my team was down by a couple of people and I was making up the difference while we hired folks.
GTD experience #1
I was using a Windows XP laptop for work and I had a 12″ Powerbook G4 for home. For GTD I installed Netcentric’s GTD app for Outlook after downloading the whitepaper on how to setup Outlook for maximum productivity.
For those in a Microsoft/Outlook/Corporate world this was excellent. I loved it, only a couple of problems:
1. Outlook is bloated. Connecting to an Exchange server using sub-broadband speeds in obnoxious.
2. This was very conducive to doing work tasks but personal, family and someday tasks didn’t really have a place. (i.e.: fire up Outlook to put some tasks in on a weekend and then Wow - let me just see what this email from my colleague is!)
Otherwise the application was great, played well with Outlook and really followed the methodology closely. (of course being all windows, the BB sync’d fine)
GTD experience #2
With my personal tasks being neglected and not moving forward in my family, spiritual and community service areas I decided that the GTD frame work must reside outside of email especially Outlook.
It was about this time that Apple released the Macbook Pro with it’s Intel chip. Parallels was becoming a true virtualization platform and folks were claiming that Windows XP performance on their macs was beyond usable. Coming from the Virtual PC 6/7 world I was beyond but made the plunge by purchasing a Macbook Pro Core Duo 2 and a copy of parallels. I used Outlook with the Netscentrics GTD app for Outlook running on Windows XP running on Parallels and was using Kinkless with Omnioutliner Pro courtesy Ethan Schoonover and OmniGroup respectively.
Overall Experience:
I am in sales, my work and personal life blend frequently. Having two GTD applications does not work. Contexts mean nothing between 2 different operating systems and 2 different programs.
I dropped the Netcentrics plug-in for Outlook and began to put everything into Kinkless. Even spanning 2 operating systems this was a little better but having a single button to click to bring an email into a task as I had with the Netcentrics application I started hating the jump between operating systems. Again, being in sales is a very full time gig, tough to leave things at the office.
GTD experience 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4 and so on
I thought there was something more universal that so I basically ended up installing almost every GTD application that I found on Merlin Mann’s wiki page. There are some cool things out there. I really liked Tracks and Thinking Rock.
GTD experience #3
While traveling overseas and still working for my US based company I got frustrated with Outlook with it’s partial header downloads while I was on a 256k DSL line (which is high end for the country I was in) and then begin to wonder what I really use Parallels/Windows XP for. Here’s what I figured out:
1. Outlook
2. Visio
So my 3rd incarnation of GTD on Mac I end up dropping XP all together. I fire up Entourage 2004 and get it working with my corporate exchange server. I drop another $95 on Apani’s VPN client so I can use our Nortel Contivity based VPN (which I wish was was Cisco since the client is free) which lets me into the intranet. This is excellent because all my work is based on one operating system. Additionally, there are some cool scripts for Entourage that allow me to push emails into instant tasks in the various GTD programs I am trying out at the time. I am still fumbling with Kinkless and other GTD applications and for a brief stint I get frustrated and go back to a paper based system. Also during this period I try the to-do application on my Blackberry as well as Remember the Milk which I love since I can access it from my Blackberry and my computer. I even installed the Quicksilver script and twitter so I can quickly add tasks to it. But I still wanted something local that allowed me to work even while offline. I even start using Firefox so I can use Google gears to do Remember the Milk offline.
The setup of RTM just doesn’t do it for me and some mis-labeled tags cause me to miss some actions.
GTD experience #4
I completely fall in love with iGTD. I love pushing Entourage task by hitting F6 and using the same F6 to push things from my personal email ( I use mail app for personal email accounts). I love the ability to highlight things in safari and then have them appear as tasks in iGTD. I love the ability to link files and notes as well. This is it, I’ve found the answer and even send a small donation over to the author. Additionally the frequent updates he releases is like a never ending surprise of cool new features and fixes to the small little glitches that will sometimes cause small annoyances.
I have no complaints about iGTD at all, what thwarted my attention was a powerful mixture of refinement and nostalgia.
GTD experience #5
I get the email from Ken Case from Omnigroup telling me that I could now download the alpha of Omnifocus. Omnifocus at the time wasn’t as slick and feature filled as iGTD but it was the best of Kinkless, the best of Omnioutliner and had lots of potential - I couldn’t resist. Daily and almost bi-daily updates were provided for alpha testers and features would magically appear and disappear. I started using Omnifocus as my primary application but really felt that it had a ways to go.
GTD experience #6
Pen and paper, I’ve struggled with trying to combine personal and work like onto one machine with the ability to blot out work on the weekends and late evenings. I am not very happy but I seem to be able to focus on the biggest items of the day and get them done. I use the GTD principals when it comes to dealing with email and contexts but I always feel like there’s a task I’ve forgotten.
GTD experience # 7 and final
Somewhere in all these iterations I read Getting things Done for the 3rd time. It takes that many readings of almost anything for me to get a concept clearly. I decided to stick with Omnifocus which is extremely stable and had plenty of features for me to use. I now instantly pull email from Mail (personal) and Entourage 2008 (work) into to-do items. I sync Omnioutliner with the iSync services on my mac which are then picked up by the Blackberry when I sync.
Note on Blackberry sync with Macs. No offense to the Pocketmac folks but it seemed that using this app would swap my work and personal email and phone numbers for many contacts. I would email someone at work and then get upset when they didn’t reply within a couple of days. It turns out that I had emailed them on their personal email account which the don’t check with the frequency of a work email. I went with the missing sync for Blackberry which was pricey at $39 but has been flawless in performance to date.
So here’s my final, current and hopefully last setup:
Mac OS X Jaquar, Blackberry 8700, Omnifocus and the Missing Sync. Works great and now I have to use this great setup to actually get something done! I wish you the best in your quest to figure this out but overall there are a few things to keep in mind:
-Simple is better
-Try to separate personal and work life to some extent.
-Have your tasks with you when you are out and about.
-All these things are useless if you don’t review your goals, tasks frequently
-Don’t tinker once it works. I and many others tinkered because these newer programs weren’t developed yet
-Don’t get caught up with the tool and focus on the freedom of getting these items knocked out.
Best of luck to you!
It was ~1995, I was selling Automotive chemicals into Car Dealerships, Car washes and Auto Body Shops. Shipping and management of distant territories were impossible from our MD based headquarters so we chose to find key distributors in all the major cities east of the Mississippi.
I had an IBM Aptiva, P166 computer running Act! 2.0. Back then I had the ability to do the following items:
1. Scroll through my account lists very quickly while viewing notes that would populate at the bottom of the screen in perfect realtime.
2. Quickly chose an account, click “correspondence” and instantly generate a distributor pricing which I would print to our HP LaserJet III printer (while printing an envelope) and dropping into snail mail or directly faxing from the computer. (my modem port was connected to our fax line which allowed me to do many cool things with a good ole’ analog line)
3. Sync my entire Act database with my Palm Pilot Professional (with it’s whopping 1 MB of RAM!). I could be on the road with my palm pilot and have detailed contact info and notes on each of my accounts.
4. Trying to build a really tight distributor network required sifting through many unqualified companies; to do this I’d make between 10 and 50 calls a day. In Act, I would have my prospect list for the entire country loaded into a list tagged prospects and proceed to have Act dial each one of them. When a human voice would answer I would pick up my phone and the call would be right there. I could pop open a notes field on my computer and document the conversation which would be date stamped (maybe time stamped too, I can’t remember).
5. Everything was fast and local. Even when I needed to add additional users to the system it was still fast, sure none of us were working remotely or dong this work from home but with our 10 Mbps ethernet based network at the office we were in love. (We had 2 SMC Hubs connected together which linked all the computers together.
My life now, using Saleforce Enterprise, a Mac Laptop (2.16 GHz, 3 GB of RAM) and an Blackberry 8700.
1. Salesforce has a cool mode called “console” which uses Ajax to smoothly scroll through my contacts, definitely not as fast as local but getting there. The data at the bottom of the screen is cluttered with info that my management team needs, not me. (not salesforce’s fault really, I know these things are customizable)
2. Corresponding with existing customers takes a few extra steps. To build and develop templates seems to be tricky and I haven’t used it yet. Faxing directly from the computer is definitely not an option ( at least not from the server ).
3. Using a mac there’s one program out there that allows synching of contact info and dates. It’s very nice and up and coming but doesn’t allow for segregation of my address book data and grouping. Literally all my contacts in my addressbook are sent to salesforce as accounts which includes my parents, my accountant, my wife and my religious institution - not of which would be targets for the services I sell today. This app has great potential. For taking the data on the road with me I can try to browse with a web browser on my Blackberry but it hasn’t been very usable. For a small monthly fee I can have full access using the BB.
4. Cannot dial with salesforce. Sure we could look at VOIP enabling our server but this is a high cost for just a simple efficient perk.
5. I’ll have to hand it to Salesforce, the console mode takes huge steps towards making the user experience seem local and like a fat client. Based on your internet bandwidth and the configuration of salesforce this can be at times disappointing however.
My point here is not to rant but to point out that we are definitely coming to grips with web based applications. Back in the day I ran Act alone since I was the only person responsible for sales whereas now I work for a company that has dozens of reps inside and outside. I travel to our corporate HQ once a month at most. Being a loose follower of GTD and being generally an efficiency nut makes me look at the tools I use daily and try to shave off precious seconds off each thing I do.
For the small business, with all users connected on a fast LAN I think I’d still pull for a locally installed sales force automation tool. I am sure this will change and salesforce and sugarcrm get their applications polished. What are you using in your sales life? Is it even automated at all? I relied on a tickler file system for sometime and had reasonable success with it.
I’ve been working on some home improvement projects around the house now that the weather isn’t terribly hot. My latest project is building a walkway that runs parallel to my driveway and connects to an existing brick walkway that takes you to my front door. This will prevent folks that step out from a car on the driveway from stepping into the mud which accumulates on the side of the driveway since grass wont grow there due to the foot and car traffic when we overrun the driveway.
Eitherway, I was outside working on digging out the grass and trying to get about 7-8″ down below the level of the driveway through tough clay. Left outside without my cell phone and with only 2 shovels (large and small) I found that it was very easy to just keep working until I got to the end of the driveway. I didn’t have any phone calls, no instant messages, emails didn’t creep over the drive way and land inside my trench. It was actually quite hard to do anything but dig unless I was just taking a break. The longer I worked at the same task the more efficient I became. Even minor corrections to the angle in which I dug the shovel into the ground seemed to make small differences that added up over the course of the few hours I worked.
It reminds me of the introduction to Getting things Done by David Allen where we writes about the knowledge worker whose limits of responsibility are no longer defined in contrast to the factory worker who finishes a manufactured product. Easy to know when the job is complete; product assembled = job done. Whereas as a knowledge worker you may have finished a project but noticed that new people in your department struggle to learn the ropes at your company so since there’s no department responsible for training in your company you take it upon yourself to develop a training program that consists of maybe an intranet site, a manual and possibly a PowerPoint slide show that is used during the orientation of the new employee. Of course in the long run this makes your job easier since you’ll spend less time hand holding and answering questions but this wasn’t necessarily in the job description.
I guess my thought here was that with the removal of distractions of emails, phones and instant messages it’s easier to stay on task and finish a job. The longer one stays on a particular task the more efficient that person becomes at completing it. Interruptions not only prolong the duration of a task but add 1 to 20 minutes of “warm up” time required to return to the efficient level one had achieved. What’s our recourse? Does one take drastic actions physically to limit inputs in ones life? Possibly the consolidation of all communication into one device which at certain times of the day is turned off? Were we better off using MS DOS with applications that run one at a time? One has to wonder about this. For an enjoyable read on consolidating communications I’ve been kicking around the idea of going to GrandCentral based on an article by Productivity Guru Merlin Mann.
For the sales person this is very critical. We are only earning our keep when we are speaking to clients and following up on specific needs for each client. Building excellent partner networks and keeping in touch with our industry contacts is what allows us to achieve some momentum in sales. Spending loads of time on internal process and billing issues directly affect our bottom line and are definitely poor excuses to give to management as to why we are underperforming.
Not having a concise daily plan ensures that you will slavishly accomplish all the items that other people ask you to do in a day that aren’t necessarily high priority on your to-do list. Ideally this plan is formulated the evening before your work day. Here’s an overview of the typical day without a plan:
Get up early and get into the office
Check email and a bunch of little items litter your head and inbox
You can’t help but to respond to some and do some of the items given you to via email
You will answer the phone more willingly and actually “feel good” that you are accomplishing something.
Folks will drop by your cube or office and need to discuss things with you, you will allow this to occur and again will feel that you are “working”
You will respond to emails, do the items that come across and again feel like you are “working”.
Mean while, you will remember that you are in sales and you get compensated only for bringing in revenue. Your daily objectives such as:
Getting into a new partner for referred opportunities
Following up with a client that you sent pricing to last week
Get special legal terms in a contract approved by your legal folks for a prospect
Calling the company around the corner that was acquired who will require the product you sell to make the integration smoother with their new parent company.
Reviewing your pipeline to ensure nothing is slipping through the cracks
Getting face to face meetings with potential clients
Solving an issue for an existing client that has been great to you
This phenomena is the same one that allows sales people to call busy decisions makers on a Friday or the last day before a holiday and actually get results. The folks answering the telephone are looking to “work” and thus taking your call becomes “chatting with a vendor that can help us with (insert project here)”. It’s great when it plays into our favor but absolutely stinks when we are victim of it.
To help plan out my days I utilize an application (currently in beta, not yet for sale) called Omnioutliner. You can see it in action here. Sorry this is another Mac only application. For windows users who use Outlook try the Getting things Done plug-in for Outlook.
I know I’ve mentioned these applications before but if you don’t have a system in place I’d suggest good old fashion pen and paper setup which is the most reliable and portable system that used.