Please, Let There Be Another Explanation

One of the things I was most excited about with an Obama presidency was that it finally seemed as if we had a real leader in the hot seat.  Someone who might actually be able to run an effective government instead of a bureaucracy paralyzed by partisanship.  I still have this hope.

But I also hope what we’re seeing around the stimulus bill is not what we’re in for the next four years.  What I’m seeing is a complete absence of leadership around the problem.  Seems to me, taking lessons from the corporate world, that Obama should have done two things that would have gotten the program passed in a bipartisan way much more quickly:

1. Build true consensus ahead of time and make the congressional leaders do the sales job in a bipartisan way.  It’s great that Obama went up to the Republican caucus to talk to them and get their point of view, but shouldn’t he have gathered the top 2-3 leaders of each party and each house of congress in his office (or in theirs) to whiteboard this whole thing out ahead of time, so that those people could be bought in and then go on to convince others?  Few successful major corporate initiatives are launched without a careful eye to how all major stakeholders will react so that the majority will be on board.

2. Link the plan to the election in an obvious way.  Obama can credibly claim that the election was a decisive call for change.  He can also credibly claim a small number of priority items that clearly emerged as points of change — reducing/eliminating our dependence on foreign oil, vastly expanded access to health care, reducing taxes on the middle class, and fixing the problem of the revolving door between lobbyists and government as the relevant ones here (there are others around foreign policy and the wars, of course).  Why isn’t the stimulus package pumping money in the economy to the specific ends that were articulated during the campaign, at least for 60-80% of the money, anyway? Seems to me like that’s the best way not just to sell the program to Congress and the American people, but to actually have it stand for something other than 535 people’s pet local projects.  Again, in corporate America, once everyone has agreed on a strategy and goals, it’s much easier to define a path forward around how to execute the details.

I hope something else is going on here — perhaps Obama just wants to make Congress look like a bunch of idiots, so they self destruct and ultimately yield more power to the White House — but my fear is that our new leader needs some lessons in leadership.

The Highest Form of Flattery

Competitors copy us all the time.  Sometimes it’s big things like product features or strategy.  Sometimes it’s little things like marketing collateral or a logo or product name.  Those are always a little annoying, but really, there’s nothing one can do about it.  As we say at Return Path, it’s the price we pay for being a market leader.  And to be honest, I’m sure we do the same on occasion, whether inadvertently or on purpose.

But we spotted one today that’s so incredibly egregious and just plain silly, I don’t even know where to start.  A competitor — name will be hidden to protect the guilty — just ripped off our boiler plate language at the top of all of our job descriptions.  I know this because I personally wrote the copy for ours, and I did it before this competitor even existed.  At least I think they did…let’s compare:

Here is ours:

If you’re obsessed with creating a world class organization and looking for a great company to call home, we want you! Return Path is a growing, thriving company full of smart, motivated people. Our 140+ employees are a tightly-knit, super-focused and incredibly dedicated team. We work hard, and we’re passionate about making email work better for both our clients and their customers.

And theirs:

If you are a smart, dedicated top performer, we want you! Company X is a growing, thriving company full of smart, motivated people. Our employees are a tightly-knit, super-focused and incredibly dedicated team. We work hard, and we’re passionate about safeguarding the credibility, rendering, and effectiveness of our clients’ digital communications.

You be the judge!

New Media’s Influence on the Traditional

Last week, DMNews unveiled its new look and feel and format (of the print publication) at the DMA’s annual convention in Chicago.  Hats off to Publisher Julia Hood and Editor-in-Chief Elly Trickett for diving in and coming up with some great improvements to the publication so quickly after taking the reigns.

What I find particularly interesting about the new format is that its design and even content structure seem to borrow heavily from the world of online media,  such as:

• A top-of-page “navigation bar” that tells you at a glance what articles are on the page (email, circulation, multichannel, legislation, lists, etc.) so you can flip pages and figure out quickly where to stop based on your interests
• MUCH shorter news briefs
• More “fixed” topic sections that are (I think) meant to be recurring in every issue…”Gloves off,” “Duly noted,” “Nailed it”
• “Key points” call-outs of an article etc. instead of all the long form of the prior generation of the publication
• A section called “data bank” that is almost like an analytics widget

I had been ignoring the print edition for several months, assuming I’d catch any critical articles to me via the web site, keyword feeds, and the email newsletter.  But this new format will definitely have me back to at least flipping through the print edition looking for relevant articles.

Eight is NOT Enough!

Today is the eighth anniversary of the founding of Return Path. No offense to Dick Van Patten or Grant Goodeve, but Eight is NOT Enough.  We are just hitting our stride here! 

Congratulations to our incredibly hard working and dedicated employees, and thanks to our clients, partners, and investors for all their support these past 8 years.  Eight may have been Great…but Nine will be Fine!

Holiday Cards c. 2007

Every year, I get a daily flood of business holiday cards on my desk in the second half of December. Some are nice and have notes from people with whom we do business – clients, vendors, partners, and the like. Some are kind of random, and it takes me a while to even figure out who they are from. Occasionally some even come in with no mark identifying from whence they came other than an illegible signature.

And every year, I receive one or two email cards instead of print & post cards, some apologetic about the medium. Until this year.

I think I’ve received about 10-15 cards by email this month. None with an apology. All with the same quality of art/creative as printed cards. It’s great! A good use of the email channel…much less cost…easier overhead for distribution…and of course better for the environment.

I wonder what made 2007 the tipping year for this.

Bad Side Effect of Tropical Heat Waves?

I love David Kirkpatrick’s weekly column called Fast Forward.  In his most recent edition, he talks about the connection between technology and world peace, which is insightful.  But it also led me to click on a link in the first paragraph to Wikipedia and its great map and listing of ongoing global conflicts here. 

I’m not sure if anyone has ever done any research on this — I’m guessing the answer is yes — but what jumps off the page for me is that all of the ongoing global conflicts today are clustered around the equator.  I do know that crime in urban areas swells in the summer when it’s hot out and tempers flare. 

Not to be too glib, but is it possible that we just need a giant air conditioner around the middle of the planet (an environmentally kind one, of course)?

The Gift of Feedback

My colleague Anita Absey always says that “feedback is a gift.”  I’ve written in the past about our extensive 360 review process at Return Path, and also about how I handle my review and bring the Board in on it.  But this past week, I finished delivering all of our senior staff 360 reviews, and I received the write-up and analysis of my own review.  And once again, I have to say, the process is incredibly valuable. 

For the first time in a long time this year, I got a resounding “much improved” on all of my prior year’s development items from my team and from the Board.  This was great to hear.  As usual, this year’s development items are similarly thoughtful and build on the prior ones, in the context of where the business is going.  Since one of my prior year’s items was “be as transparent as possible,” I thought I’d share my development plan for the coming 12-18 months here on my blog.  If you’re reading this and you report to me, you’ll get a longer form debrief at our next offsite.

1. Continue making the organization more of a Hedgehog, lending more focus to our mission and removing distractions wherever possible.

2. Move the organization’s leadership team from “pacesetting” to “authoritative” management styles by focusing more on :

    a. standards of excellence around employee behavior and performance: develop a more clear performance management system, raise the bar on accountability around leadership and management issues, shift management training from tools to values-based coaching

    b. clear communication loops: balance open door policy with manager empowerment by getting the executive in charge to fix issues (instead of fixing them myself) and/or facilitating stronger manager-employee communication

    c. constant translation of vision into execution: foster clearer context and deeper employee engagement by not just communicating vision, but communicating HOW the vision becomes reality at every opportunity

3. Sharpen elbows further around leadership team: identify key attributes of success, weed out underperformers, re-scope other roles, and clarify “partner for success” opportunities as part of core responsibilities. Make each individual’s development needs public in the senior team (I guess this is the first step towards that!)

4. Make the organization more nimble, inspiring a bias for action through shifts in priorities and cross-functional swat teams where required

So there you go.  If you work at Return Path, please feel free to hold my feet to the fire in the coming months on these points!

I Can’t Tell If I Like This Or Not

I am blogging at 35,000 feet, using American Airlines’ new GoGo in-flight Wi-Fi service. I am definitely having mixed feelings about it. On one hand, it’s nice to download the 47 emails I just wrote before two-hours after landing (sorry, team!). It’s also nice to be able to clean out my Inbox so it’s not overflowing when I get to our California office.

On the other hand, it has the potential to destroy one of the last few places in my life that’s completely free of connectivity. That kind of makes me sad.

I think I’m going to turn it off once I do a single pass at the Inbox. I guess I can turn it back on for the same $12.95 fee if I need it again. This service is a great convenience but a bit of a luxury. At least the guy next to me isn’t using Skype!

Why The Rules Have to Be Flexible

We have clients ask us all the time – how much email should I be sending out to my subscribers? One a week? One a month? And usually, we give the same advice – it depends on what you are sending, and on what expectation you set with your subscribers when they sign up.

This week is a great example that proves the rule “it depends.” I get the Wall Street Journal’s email alerts of major headlines. I think I’ve subscribed in two different categories, maybe three – I can’t remember, since I signed up about 10 years ago. In a typical week, across all the categories, I might get 5 or 10 emails from the Journal. So far this week, I’ve received 42 — and my guess is that we’ll close out the week around 50.

With all the global financial markets in turmoil, of course the Journal should be sending out news more frequently. It doesn’t even occur to me that it’s “too much email” or spam. In fact, I would have thought something was weird if I didn’t get a lot of them this week. Context makes it right.

Managing in a Downturn

I spoke at a NextNY event last night along with several others, including fellow entrepreneur David Kidder from Clickable and angel investor Roger Enhrenberg about this fine topic (Roger wrote a great post on it here) and thought I’d share a few of the key points made by all of us for anyone trying to figure out what to do tactically now that Sequoia has told us to be afraid, very afraid.

Hope is Not a Strategy:  Your business is not immune. It will do what everyone else’s will. Struggle to hit its numbers. Struggle to collect bills. Lose customers. There is no reason to hope you’ll be different.

Get Into the Jet Stream:  Develop your core revenue streams — and make sure they’re really your revenue, not just skimming tertiary revenue out of the ecosystem.  Investors will look to see how sustainable your model is with more scrutiny than ever.

It’s a Long Road to Recovery:  I don’t care what people say. There is no true “v-shaped” bounceback from a true downturn. Plan for a long (4-8 quarter) time to return to normalcy.

Budget Early and Often:  Things change rapidly in this kind of environment. Make sure you reforecast, especially cash flows and cash, monthly when you close the books.

Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow:  If you have a real business, you need to be it for the long haul. Keep pursuing opportunities. Keep investing in the future. Don’t pare back your vision and ambitions. Just make more conservative investments, insist on shorter payback windows, and adjust expectations about timeframes.

Leadership Counts:  Your people are nervous. They’re concerned about their own bank accounts. Their jobs. Be even more present, more transparent, and more communicative. And set the right tone on expenses with your own decisions. The troops need to know that you care about them — and that the big boss has a steady hand on the wheel.

Next One is the Big One, a.k.a. Nine is Fine

Today, Return Path turns nine years old. 

What an exciting year we’ve had, too.  As I mentioned a couple months back, we completely reorganized the company this year, marking a major transition and a new stage in the life of the business.  We acquired our largest competitor, Habeas, consolidating our space and further establishing ourselves as the leader in email deliverability and whitelisting.  We marched right past our 1,000th client milestone and now are well on our way to our 1,500th.

Thanks again to our fantastic team and our great group of investors and Board members for another fun and exciting year.  Nine is fine…and now the march to The Big 1-0 begins.