Category Archives: Process

Getting to Forest Height

I’ve just gotten back from a lovely vacation, spending some time relaxing and away from the pressures and day-to-day of work. While the vacation glow persists for another day or two, it got me to thinking about the tremendous value of just stepping back for a bit.

It is a truism that we often miss the forest for the trees; that is, we get so enmeshed in the detail of things that we can miss large-scale trends or broader context. That’s not to say the details aren’t important — in fact, in terms of execution, they’re incredibly important — but in isolation, they can be crippling.

Getting even just a few days away from the current project can be helpful to come back to it with fresh eyes and a fresh perspective. New approaches are more obvious, as are (more importantly) new questions: Why are we doing it this way? Are we really on track to meet the intended needs? Does this all still make sense?

The tech world mythologizes the start-up work environment where everybody works 20 hours a day and sleeps in their cubicle (or works around the clock from their bedroom). There are times when that may be necessary or desirable. But I’d submit they are pretty few, and if they’re not interspersed with time for recharging and replenishing both cognitively and emotionally, you may end up confusing motion with progress.

When Things Go Wrong

When a new relationship is starting out, things are perfect. Your prospective suitor is shiny and new, and you spend time getting to know what each other likes and dislikes, how they like to do things. Whether that exploration is over long meals, coffee dates, movies, whatever — that exploration is part of the joys of dating.

After a while, though, sometimes the relationship hits a rough patch. And the getting-to-know-you part of the relationship plays a huge role in whether or not it survives the rough patch. Did you learn the ways that you each like to communicate? Did you work on solving problems that were small before something bigger came along? Do you have a depth of history together that can help you weather the storms?

These are all similarly felt in a strong business relationship as well, of course — although there are fewer movies and dates.

When we start talking with, and working with, a new client, we spend time understanding how they work, what is important to them, and how they communicate. We talk about how to keep the lines open, to address small things before they get big. And if small issues do come up, we try to get them resolved as quickly as possible.

But sometimes, bigger issues do appear. It is only through these preliminary steps of understanding, though, that we build a strong foundational relationship that carries us through these conflicts.

When we talk with other agencies and contracting firms, we find that they focus a lot on the many good things they can do (and that’s important). But they’re often more reticent to discuss what they do when there’s a bump or hiccup. If you (or they) are in it for the long haul, though, it’s worth asking the follow-up question.

It’s just a little bit of insurance — you don’t ever want to need it, but when you do, it’s good information to have.

The Importance of the Side Project

Every job has its ups and downs, not just the job of elevator operator. (Sorry, old and bad joke.) There are parts of the work that are engaging and interesting, finding answers to problems and implementing those solutions. And then there are the other parts — the prerequisites, the occasional begrudging task.

That’s where the side project comes in. Around our offices, we make sure that everyone has a side project to keep them sharp and engaged, even when the primary project might be a little stultifying. This gives our team members a chance to step away, shift gears, and focus on a different matter for a while.

It’s useful not just to provide a palate cleanser for drudgery. Sometimes, we can get so enmeshed in the norms and expectations of a specific project that our vision begins to narrow. Keeping another project on the side enables us to shift that perspective and keep our sights broad.

For some of our team, it’s a passion project — helping reach out to an underserved community through Internet broadcasting, for instance. For others, it’s a project that might end up being commercial one day, like a new and improved nonprofit management system. Still others combine the two, exploring a recreational opportunity app, for instance. (For one of us, it’s writing for this blog!)

Regardless of the specific project, it’s something we prize greatly, and I think it helps us stay sharp and balanced. Because even with the most fun of projects, there’s always a chance to get sucked in a bit too far!

Creative Destruction

With advances in technology, there are several ways to measure the pace and/or severity of change. Often, we refer to it in terms of speed (see, for example, Moore’s Law). Sometimes, we refer to it in terms of how it abruptly changes old practices (the idea of disruptive technologies, for instance).

At Square Lines, we make a practice of studying long-term technology evolution in addition to short-term jumps and leaps. One aspect of technology integration that often involves sustainability over time isn’t its pace or its disruption, but rather its erosion of current practices. A practice we (and others) call creative destruction.

When a system or process practices creative destruction, it is continually eroding away the oldest and freshly developing the newest. You might think of it as a bridge where one end is slowly crumbling as the other end is being built (in that analogy, it would be a bridge without gravity, but you get the idea).

I was reminded of the value of creative destruction this morning as I learned that InformationWeek, a venerable magazine for IT professionals that has been around since 1979, was stopping its print publication and going online-only.

For many years, they published (wait for it) weekly, with thick books rich with information, editorial, and advertising. Then, beginning about 15 years ago, the creative destruction began. The InformationWeek website started getting richer (and carrying more ads). Beginning about five or six years ago, the print issues began getting slimmer — and, remarkable for a publication with “Week” in its name, began appearing less frequently.

Behind the scenes, according to the editor of the publication, ad revenue balances began to shift. What was 95%/5% in favor of print in 2000 switched to the reverse in 2013. Given the cost/benefit and ROI of their print circulation, it only made sense.

But because they had been practicing creative destruction for over a decade, it wasn’t an abandonment and retrenchment. It wasn’t a collapse. It was (and will be, I think) an advance, a migration. As the parts of the bridge that were on the print side of the gorge eroded, they were building new bricks toward the digital side.

That having been said, time will tell as to whether enough “bridge parts” have been laid. The online-only tech space is far more crowded than the print/digital hybrid, and the direct mail distribution of a regular periodical surely helped penetration of the audience (even the digital one). But they are definitely better equipped for the transition than had they not been working the problem for well over a decade.

And that’s the beauty of creative destruction.