Lessons Learned is a process for reusing knowledge
gained through experience.  The point being that
when you encounter conditions that closely match
something you may have done before, you may benefit
from understanding what it was that you did that
made that activity a success or a failure. Simply
put, a lesson learned is a validated working
experience that, when applied, can positively
impact your future business development, or marketing
efforts.

The ultimate goal of the lessons learned process
is to turn perceived deficiencies, and recognized
best practices, into opportunities to improve your
results in the future.  Analyzing your business
building and marketing efforts to determine why
they succeeded, and why they failed can save you
time and money, and may even be the difference
in your overall success or failure.

A subject for lessons learned could be any activity
related to creating and marketing your business.

Things such as:
- Product creation
- Planning
- Business process creation
- Website or blog development
- Traffic generation strategies
- Outsourcing techniques, and so on

It is a very simple process consisting of an
“Originating Action”, which is what was done the
first time. The “Result”, which indicates whether
the experience was positive or negative, and, in
turn helps to determine whether to recommend
repeating or avoiding the same experience.

Additionally - What was the lesson’s “Contribution”
to your business? This is the crucial step that
describes what you did originally, and what,
exactly, was responsible for the result of the
original experience.  This is the element that
should be repeated, when the experience has a
positive result, and it should be avoided when
the result is negative.

“Applicable Task”: You must identify the task(s)
to which the lesson is applicable.

“Conditions For Reuse”: Now that you understand
what happened – where can you best use that
knowledge to make something work even better
the next time – or avoid doing at all?

“Idea”: This is the recommended future action.
Make a habit of digging out the lessons from
all of your key activities, and you will begin
to see your business success really accelerate.

As Always, To Your Strategic Sucess,

Jim McCarthy
The Strategy Professional

That said, the one sure-fire way to learn is through repetition. As you take in the same information over and over again, you can begin to make sense of the data. Once you begin to truly understand the message, then you can begin to think of interesting ways to apply the new information to your own life, or to your own business.

If you are trying to make a living as an Internet Marketer, you know there are TONS of information for sale. That is not the problem. The problem is separating the really important stuff from the not-so-important. As a businessperson, you know the one critical limitation to success is time. There are only so many hours in the day. You cannot afford to waste them wading through piles of data looking for the true “golden nuggets”.

The most successful Internet Marketers, such as Mike Filsaime, Rich Schefren, Jeff Walker, Liz Tomey, and Frank Kern know this. A vital part of their overall business strategy (you DO have one, right?) to save time, and cut through the clutter, is their ‘Virtual Network’. You can bet that they have each other (and more) on speed dial; so if they have an idea, or a problem, or a question, they can pretty much get it answered right away.

Most of the rest of us do not have that luxury. So how can we get access to their network? Well, you could buy most of their products (if you are rich), or you could go to all of their seminars (if you are even richer), and stand in line to get a few precious moments of their wisdom.

OR, you could start your own Virtual Network. You can have access to the wisdom of the ‘masters’ day and night – anytime you want – without paying a fortune. Find ways to collect the knowledge of the very best and most successful marketers, and you will be well on the way to success and long-lasting profits.

What is not very well known (and probably not known in the Internet Marketing community at all), is that knowledge really has two facets; Explicit and Tacit.

“Explicit Knowledge” is the ‘what’ – the SEO knowledge; the Product Launch knowledge; the Traffic Building knowledge, etc. “Tacit Knowledge” is the ‘how’ – how a particular decision was made; the personal history and thinking behind a certain approach; the network the experts may use, and so on. You need to get the ‘gurus’ to share not only their expertise, but even how they think.

In my off-line work as a Certified Professional Management Consultant, one of the areas that I am a ’world-class’ expert in is Knowledge Transfer. No one else on the ‘Net’ knows how to do interviews that will get at both the Explicit and Tacit knowledge.

Check out www.prometheusinterviews.com for a my newest product, the Prometheus Virtual Network, for a great set of one-of-a-kind interviews conducted by me, and start your own “Virtual Network”!

Have you ever tried to put together, from ‘scratch’, an unassembled barbecue? It has literally thousands of parts. Each of these parts has a function; some of the functions are obvious (e.g., the grilling grates, the propane tanks and hoses, the grill cover, etc.), and some are not at all obvious (such as the hundreds of small screws, braces, nuts and bolts). As you spread them out all over the garage floor, while it is not at all clear how they go together, you know that when you figure it out, you will have a working barbecue grill. All you need is a picture of the final product, and a plan that shows you what each part does, and how it fits together with the other parts to create a working whole. For your barbecue grill, that plan is your assembly instructions.

Now think about your business. It, too, has literally thousands of ‘parts’. You have all of the various functions, all of the processes, all of the skillsets. Then there are all of your personnel and the various levels and specialties connected to them. Next, you have all of your products and services, all of your policies and procedures, all of your physical and intellectual assets, and so on. And, that is just your business. Now you have to think strategically about everything external to your company—all of your customers, your competitors, your regulatory agencies, competitive products and services, etc., etc.

By the way, if you are an individual entrepreneur doing business on the Internet, you face the same issues. You still have to account for all the various activities connected with making your business successful. Activities such as your blog; your website(s); your newsletters; your products; your JVs and Affiliates; your outsourcing partners; your market analysis, and so on.

Just like that barbecue grill, in order for it all to come together and function as you intend, you require a ‘future picture’ and a plan. For businesses, that is your strategy. Businesses without strategy are doomed to failure, or, at best, they will never realize their full potential. To engage the whole business in creating and executing winning plans, you need a common framework for strategic thinking.

Let me introduce you to Prometheus. Now Prometheus was an interesting guy! He was the wisest of the Titans in Greek mythology. The old Greek gods assigned two brothers the responsibility of putting life on earth—Epimetheus, whose name means “hindsight”, and Prometheus, whose name means “forethought”. Epimetheus went first and populated the earth with all the animals. Then it fell to Prometheus to create humankind.

In order to prevail against the bigger, stronger and faster animals, Prometheus gave to humankind the ability to think ahead. He also stole fire from the gods. Today, forethought and fire (passion) fuel high-performing business. Those companies and leaders who think strategically and execute passionately have the ultimate competitive advantage—the power to spark their own success, illuminate the future, and ignite the energy of all of their stakeholders.

The Prometheus Strategic Planning System is a methodology for envisioning and creating your future, and igniting the passion and energy in your business to make it happen. Once Prometheus is accepted and incorporated by the business, everyone can move forward together. Most importantly, people will no longer be thinking like bricklayers. Bricklayers are specialists, but are usually not thinking about the larger strategic issues, such as how a community should be organized, or what the purpose of the buildings should be. They are primarily concerned about the details of construction: How many bricks will we need? How high should this wall be?

The Prometheus System helps people “think like an architect rather than a bricklayer.” It engages as many people as possible in the process of answering four strategic questions:

1. What future do we want to create?

2. What system change is necessary for that future to become reality?

3. Which leverage points in the system will move it in the desired direction?

4. How will we know when we’re finished, and what is the exit plan?

When these questions are answered for the overall business, the result is an overarching Grand Strategy. The process then becomes fractal—the same kinds of questions are answered at ever lower levels until every unit of the business has its own sub-strategy. This fractal approach builds a deep level of understanding, commitment, and alignment. If your are in business by yourself, you should be including in your discussions about your strategy; your JVs, your Affiliates, or any outsourcing partners you may have.

Over time, using the Prometheus System leads to a new strategic mind-set in a business. The day-to-day dialogue is no longer confined to tactical details, but begins to encompass larger, longer-term issues. Groups within the business find new ways to connect with one another. Just like the screws, nuts and bolts of a barbecue, people who, on the surface, appear to have little in common, begin to work together like teams of architects planning a new community.

The tools and techniques contained within the Prometheus System, if followed carefully, will substantially improve your probability of success in business and government—no matter the size of your company—whether you are an individual, a sole proprietor, a manager, or the chairman of a global enterprise.

Good luck, and good strategy!

Jim

Is Strategic Planning Recession Proof?

Strategic Planning is a road map to lead an organization or a single entrepreneur from where they are now, to where they would like to be in the future.

Fair enough – but is it recession proof? The answer is emphatically yes! Strategic Planning is the one business tool, which if done right, can make your business essentially immune to business cycles. The key part of that sentence is “if done right”.

Strategic Planning is, at its core, a method for predicting the future. Strategy is the game plan to create your future – to win – even in the face of resource constraints, or intense competition. Strategy:

Maximizes reward, and minimizes risk

Leverages resources

Provides context, meaning, value, direction, and alignment for tactical actions

Leads to long-term success

Think about it: In almost every industry today, there are two kinds of organizations. First, there are those like Microsoft, Google, and Dell that change the game; they shape the ‘rules’ to their advantage. Second, are all the other organizations in those industries that are left to follow in their footsteps. When the competitive rules change, and they will change, the followers must do all they can to adapt, just to stay in business. They are, in a sense, on the defensive, and that is not a particularly advantageous place to be.

The ‘game-changers’ have a significant advantage because, since they left the starting gate before their competition, they get first crack at market share, and mind share. Simply put, when you make the rules, it is easy to win the game.

A major benefit of strategic planning is to help your business see the big picture, especially from a marketing point of view. By creating good strategic plans, you will be better able to understand the need for timely changes in your marketing approach and product mix. Strategic planning requires setting clear goals and objectives, and meeting those goals and objectives during specified time frames.

Why? – as I said earlier, strategy is about predicting the future, making assumptions about what is going to be, and making commitments based on those assumptions. If the future you predict is wrong, all of your right actions will still doom you to failure.

There are ways to ensure you don’t guess so wrong that you jeopardize your business:

1) Thoroughly understand your market and your business environment, and determine whether any potential “Market Disrupters” are on the horizon.

2) Create a strategy that has the effect of changing the market in your favor.

3) Create Strategic Flexibility in your business and marketing plans.

Strategic Flexibility is the key. You want to be in a position where, even if some of your assumptions are wrong (and they will be); your business is still viable.

One way to create flexibility is to think like a chess champion. You need to master the concept of “Down Board Thinking”. World class chess players do not simply think about their own moves, they look ‘down board’ and consider their opponents (competitions) possible responses to their moves, and plan a number of alternative moves ahead. This kind if thinking is particularly relevant both in creating your strategy, and in managing and monitoring the implementation of your strategy.

Another way is to have enough actions (tactics) going on at roughly the same time (in parallel) so that even if some of them don’t turn out as well as you expected, you will still prosper because you have enough right actions happening.

The real aim of Strategy then, is to have a set of actions in place consistent with your view(s) of your desired future. Once you have those actions in place, with systems, processes, metrics, and exit plans (because all strategies end), you can begin to manage strategic uncertainty, overcome business cycles, and prepare your business to be the one that prospers, even in times of recession.

If you want to take advantage of the full power of an unstoppable strategy, please go to www.prometheusstrategy.com, where you can access the Prometheus Strategic Planning System, which was created by the U.S. Government and is the most powerful, sophisticated, yet easy-to-use Strategic Planning in use today.

Jim

“Things alter for the worse spontaneously, if they be not altered for the better designedly”.

That quote from Thomas Bacon was uttered back around the year 1600, but it is as good advice today as it was back then. In fact, given the rate of change today, I would argue that it is even more relevant!

You know that things will change. You know your market will always be in flux, with new companies entering it, new products and services appearing, new customers, new regulations, new technology, companies going out of business, and on, and on, and on. Change will happen.

So, it begs the question – why plan if there is going to be so much change?

Indeed, in his book The Strategy Paradox, Michael Raynor notes that managers must make choices with far-reaching consequences today, but must base those choices on assumptions about a future they cannot predict. If the future does not turn out as expected, these strategies can fail horribly.

It is quite difficult to accurately predict what the future will hold, and the further out you try to predict, the less accurate you will be. Think about the weather forecast. How often have you relied on the local weather forecast to plan some important activity, and then gotten rained out.

Strategic Planning is, no matter how you “dress it up”, a guessing game. By being very rigorous in your planning, you can stack the odds that your guesses will be right, or at least right enough. And, even more critically, the process that you go through to create your plans will yield tremendous information and insights into your markets, your competitors, and your own company.

These insights are perhaps the best reason that going through the process of creating a strategic plan is well worth the effort. As an example, suppose you were going to get in a road race with your neighbor. The race was going to take you from San Diego, California to San Francisco, California, a distance of about 500 miles. Suppose further that there is a $1,000,000.00 prize for the one who gets there first.

Race day arrives and your neighbor is off and running. He is gone out of site before you have gone a mile. Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention that he is driving a Porsche, and you are driving a minivan. Things don’t look too good eh?

Well, 500 miles later, you are sitting there, having dinner at Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco when he comes flying down the road, just getting into town. It would probably be nice if you bought him a nice glass of wine with your million dollar prize.

How in the world, you are saying, did I beat the Porsche? The answer is really quite simple, you planned your trip. You took the time to go to AAA or Google Driving Directions to map out your route. You found out in advance where the detours where, and where traffic was likely to be backed up (if you have driven anywhere in California, there are plenty of those spots!).

You know what else you did, you had one of those fancy new Global Positioning Satellite devices in your car so that it was near impossible to get lost. Oh, by the way, your GPS was the really neat kind that gave you real-time updates on traffic conditions and construction delays – in other words, you had a great strategy and intelligent flexibility.

As I mentioned earlier, one of the greatest benefits of doing strategic planning is the incredible amount of information you gather in the process. That information will allow you to be very sensitive to changes in your market, and to react to them in a way that ensures your continued profitability. That information will enable you to cope with the fickle demands of customers and the free-ranging attacks of the competition.

Prepare to take advantage of a world interconnected in ways not yet understood; of huge quantities of money searching for profitable ideas; of a world where people are increasingly ready to pay to save time, and a world where change occurs with marvelous regularity. Prepare with great plans, and greater knowledge.

The only difference between you and the big guys is scale and scope.  They operate on a larger playing field and have a lot more resources at their disposal.  You have to be smarter and quicker (which is actually easier since you are smaller).

Any marketing attempt that is approached without a plan will yield very poor results, and the same is true for small business or internet marketing.  A good traditional marketing plan, however, normally brings about positive results, and this is also true of internet marketing.

Small business owners very often fall prey to the marketing idea (tactic) of the week because they have no overall strategy.  If you need to change anything about the way you view marketing - that would be it.

By strategy, I mean your marketing reason for being, and I don’t mean just to exchange money for time, or some simple product or service.  Far too many people think “selling lots of stuff to lots of people” is a strategy.  WRONG!  What do you want your market to know about you, what do you want them to believe, what do want them to feel, experience, think, when they consider what you are about - that’s what comes from strategy, and that’s what gets you on the fast lane to success.

Create a roadmap (a strategy) for your marketing of your business and then put every tactic into making that strategy real.

Some Examples:

• Dominate a narrow market niche
• Give legendary customer service
• Create long-term relationships
• Package your services like no one else and create a category
• Become famous for doing one thing

These are examples of strategic business approaches that can inform every single tactical decision you make.  I guarantee you that if do this; find your strategy, marketing your business will become a whole lot easier.  The main goal of any business is to generate qualified traffic and make sales, period.  To generate traffic and sales, you need to create awareness, or “buzz”.  In order to do this successfully, you need a plan, you need strategy.

As always, I welcome your comments and conversation.

This morning, I picked a random number and the winner I came up with was Comment #5. And THAT comment belongs to Tim Hodges!

Congratulations Tim. Please contact me directly and I’ll get you setup with your winnings. My contact information is right over here in the top right corner.

Until today, Fortune 50 companies and the corporate world
were really the only ones cashing in on this same system.

But I’m pleased to say that the Prometheus Strategic
Planning System is NOW LIVE!

Here’s the webpage:
http://www.PrometheusStrategy.com

I have included $1762.28+ worth of reasons why you should be
one of the first 300 to look into Prometheus RIGHT NOW:

Prometheus is still a very new technology… it’s a
revolutionary new Strategy mapping system that can transform
a mediocre results business into a long term profit-hog.

So why is “strategy” such a hush-hush topic?

Good question!

How much planning did you put into your last vacation? …
Figuring out where you want to go. Looking into the
resorts and hotels. Being careful about which way your
hotel room faces. Budgeting costs for the vacation.
Spending time on what to pack. Arranging a ride to make
sure you get to the airport early enough.

Now what about your business?

How detailed is your strategy for your business?

There are marketers — and you KNOW their names because
these are your 7 and 8 figure earning “gurus” — who put
A LOT of careful attention into their long term business
strategies.

On the other hand, the masses talk of new fads, gimmicks,
automation software, pretty new techniques, traffic
generation and anything that is in their immediate view
rather than looking at the big picture.

They don’t see the forest from the trees.

Take a quick look at what others (possibly you included)
replied to my simple “market research” question.

I asked a 2 part question:

A) How much time have you devoted to even the basics of
planning and strategy work (this can include mind-mapping,
business plan development, marketing campaign strategy)…

B) Do you feel it is important to develop a “big picture”
strategy for an organization (including small and individual
businesses)? Why or why not?

Here are the replies I received:

http://www.prometheusstrategy.com/marketresearch/

The replies will serve as an important eye-opener.

But don’t linger on that blog too long right now as I
have a $1700+ bonus package for the first individuals
who reserve their copy of the Prometheus program.

The exclusive minority who get permitted to access this
information typically pay $7000 for the priviledge…
head over to the website and you’ll see that today I’m
providing access to the material for a LOT (a lot!) less:

http://www.PrometheusStrategy.com

I like to think of a good strategy as if you had a sophisticated GPS navigation system installed in your business.  Because you took the time to understand your market and your own business, you have “loaded it up” with all the information you need to get to your destination.

Michael had asked about the relationship of strategy to work of Henry Mintzberg and his colleagues.  Mintzberg provides 5 definitions of strategy, what he calls his “5 P’s” (Plan, Ploy, Pattern, Position, and Perspective).

Clearly, using Prometheus, strategy is indeed the development and implementation of a plan of action, we also use a combination of a ‘direct’, or ‘indirect’ attack (ploy) on our competitors as a means of securing a dominant position in a given market.  For example, the Japanese used an indirect method to move into the US automobile market via small cars when it was not fashionable.  They secured their position before the US automakers knew they were even a threat.

Prometheus also connects to Mintzberg’s “patterns” through what we called ‘Calculated’ and Axiomatic strategy, where the Calculated strategy is is your strategic plan, and the Axiomatic is what will happen if the plan is not well developed and embraced by all.

In terms of “Position”, this is what, in Prometheus is called the ‘System Desired Effect’, where you would make every effort to understand the”world” in which you operated (your market and your own business), and you would explicitly define what they needed to become to help your plans succeed.

Finally, Mintzberg’s “perspective” is analogous to connection between the strategy and the resources and world view of your business.  Prometheus strategies are created using what we call ‘Open Planning’, in which as much of the business as possible (sometimes even including competitors!), is involved in the creation of the plans.  In this way, strategy execution is well aligned with the capabilities and interests of the individuals in the company.

Perhaps the most important concept to grasp when creating a strategy for your business is that the journey is as important as the destination.  The process of creating a great strategy will enable you to understand your business and your market to such a degree that your chances of success are vastly greater.  Also, remember that a good strategy builds in flexibility so that you can respond to changes quickly and correctly.