My April "Chicago Business Journal" Column: How old-school Chicago snack makers like Mondelez and Mars innovate

My Chicago Business Journal column for April is out:

http://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/news/2017/04/18/how-old-school-chicago-snack-makers-like-mondelez.html

Buckminster Fuller Quote on Thinking

“If you want to teach people a new way of thinking, don’t bother trying to teach them. Instead, give them a tool, the use of which will lead to new ways of thinking.”

- Buckminster Fuller

Simple Messaging and Communications Quotes from Cam Barber

Don’t deliver your information by the barrel, serve it by the glass." - Barber, Cam


"When it comes to communication, people want quality, not quantity." - Cam Barber

And Their Fridge Was Running Wi-fi...

Last Friday, I waa at friends house, and I tried to make a phone call, but I couldn't, and then I found that my phone was connected to their REFRIDGERATOR's wi-fi!

As the expert in strategic simplicity, I work with companies to make sure that complexity isn't interfering with the core success of their business.

A fridge that runs wifi, but prevents you from making a simple phone call–that's not strategically simple!

My March column in the Chicago Business Journal has been published

Will software eat the world? Innovators at Chicago's Economist summit say 'yes'

http://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/news/2017/03/16/will-software-eat-the-world-innovators-say-yes.html

New Product Creation Cycle: Simplicity to Complexity to Simplicity

When new products are first created, they tend to be simple, and just implement basic functionality.

Then, as the product proves itself in the market, new features are added, and the processes around the product (sales, support, management) grow to handle the new volume of customers.

The product is moving from simple to complex.  But, this complexity is fine, because it is adding value.

However, at a certain stage, sooner or later, we let our guard down and we cross over to a third stage: over complexity.  Now, much of the newly added complexity is not good, because it is adding minimal or (worse) negative value.

At this point, we need to simplify and clean up.

Lesson:  We can't go straight from simple / low-function to simple / high-function.  We need to go through the intermediate state of complexity as we innovate and create.  The trick is to minimize it and, above all, not to linger in needless complexity.

Four Micro Strategies For Productivity and Success

1. People say "Life is Short". Wrong! Life is long. Achievement happens in sudden bursts, so there is plenty of time to succeed and be happy.


2. Quality always beats quantity. It's better to enjoyably write one great paragraph than slog through writing a mediocre article.


3. The cure for procrastination is to "micro" something. Ex: write a micro-article, or do a micro-task.


4. Don't make a To-do list. Make a don't-do list.