Stephen Shu, PhD

The post has been reproduced from my blog at 21Publish.

As I’ve started to put myself in the shoes of customers and prospective
customers of 21Publish, I not only try to absorb the technology
environment people are
facing but also try to consider the culture and organizational
processes
that they follow and/or want to implement. To be frank, sometimes it can be overwhelming to talk with people of all walks of life from fishing to K-12 education to
Southeast Asian Health initiatives, but I find the discussions
fascinating and humbling too.

One aspect that I have been trying to keep in the back of my mind
during these discussions is this. For those that have read Malcolm Gladwell’s
book, "The
Tipping Point", you may recall loose references to optimum community
sizes of 150. Now as you may recall, 21Publish launched a free
pricing
plan configuration that covers 100 users. Is that the right number? Who
knows? But I will say that registrations have ramped up fast since we
introduced this. I hope that we are adding value.

I have found it interesting to revisit some of the theories behind the
Dunbar Number. Christopher Allen has an incredible (but older) post about the
Dunbar Number. Here’s a select snip from Christopher’s post (but you should really read the whole thing if you can):

I also like the matrix of mean group size vs. neocortex ratio done by
the Boston Consulting Group. Little did I know that they had monkey
frameworks to complement the infamous farm animal-growth share matrix
of the stars, cash cow, dog, and problem child or (?) …

On June 1, I started a new endeavor as COO of 21Publish, a leading cooperative publishing and hosted multi-user blogging service. Being clear so as to not divulge any confidential information, I thought it would be useful to share some general thoughts on getting grounded in any general management role.

Early on stuff:

• The first few days are like drinking from the firehose – Learning more about the subtleties of operations overwhelms one in the first few days. In general management roles, one covers lots of ground including sales, systems, pricing, unknowns, competitors, psuedo-competitors, different uses of terminology, what’s working, what’s not, conversion rates, buzz in the blogosphere, PR outlets, international resources, etc. After the deep dive, step back and figure out the high leverage points.
• Figure out how to position oneself in the company – People’s roles shift about when new people get introduced. Have to be diligent to make sure that tacit knowledge gathered by people in the organization is harnessed.
• Get talking to customers, prospects, and employees – Figure out how the product really gets sold and the decision-making process people use to buy. See what roadblocks and concerns people have. As an example at 21Publish, perhaps people aren’t getting a clear understanding of how to integrate existing individual blogs into a community. Or perhaps people have a hard time understanding how the 21Publish system enforces greater aspects of community interaction (say with non-profit memberships, university alumni groups, classrooms, or church communities) as compared to blogging platforms targeted at individuals (like TypePad). Or maybe people don’t understand the concept of a hosted service/no software/no hassle model. In any case, get way down in the trenches to see what is happening in customer service, lead generation, etc. Figure out how to resolve these issues for marketing and sales operations.
• You should have no delusions about the company having a right to fire you if you do not perform – Perhaps I’m a little harder on myself than most people, but having been a traditional management consultant, I’ve always believed that if I do not perform as a manager within a firm, the company has every right to put me out on the street. In the case of 21Publish, I have sales, marketing, and operating goals. For me to meet these expectations, I need to deliver and add value to customers prospects first (which may in turn, "turn strangers into friends and then strangers into customers", in the wise words of Seth Godin). The company one works for needs to get indicators from customers and the market that one is doing a good job. Otherwise, why are you a senior manager there?
• Eat your own dogfood – A classic example is development of one of the operating systems at one of the Big Corporations. The development team had to develop the new operating system using applications on the prior version of the operating system. This structural arrangement clearly got bugs out of the system faster and put company employees in the shoes of the customer. In the case of 21Publish, I need to become a user of the product in blog community settings. As such, I will be starting some new blogs to give me an appreciation for 21Publish’s unique offering at different levels. 21Publish has sometimes been referred to as "the TypePad of group blogging and multi-user blogging services (i.e., turnkey blogging communities)". Although I’m stumbling over the words a bit still, I’ve got to learn how customers (like Amnesty International, 20six, Mercury, Whittier Elementary School ) and customer prospects define the product in their own minds. This will help me to refine what 21Publish means to me, and this will in turn help 21Publish to better adapt it’s message.

In closing, general managers need to create tension to perform and to get grounded in reality very quickly. I always ask myself, where can I add value and make my mark?

Steve Shu

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I forget how I ran into this excellent essay by Scott Berkun on "Why Smart People Defend Bad Ideas" (probably through del.icio.us), but I like it on many levels because it touches on things like business, logic, organizational behavior, and personalities.

I think two of Scott’s sentences capture an angle that I wanted to post about. Scott writes in two places:

• "… How can smart people take up positions that defy any
  reasonable logic? …" and
• "… I’m
  not proud to admit that I have a degree in Logic and Computation from Carnegie Mellon
  University …"

Although I’m not for defending stupid ideas unto death, I have to say that there’s a lot of value in my book in being trained to defend stupid ideas unto death. More precisely, I think there’s tremendous value in the business world in being able to take either side of an argument and to defend that position whether you like it or not. In the business world, it’s a courageous/West Point type of training that I’ve always associated with Harvard MBAs (based on those that I used to work with in the field at management consulting firm PRTM).

I’m not prescribing being irrational or two-faced in either business or personal settings. What I am prescribing is to open one’s mind, to be able to develop courage, and to develop a leadership style. By being able to defend and argue two sides of a coin, your creativity stretches and you learn to reveal weak spots in your own reasoning. That latter part may be the most important thing to me as it leads to a path of self-improvement.

I am somewhat envious of Scott’s background in logic and computation. After taking what I consider to be one of the more unusual GMAT tests on critical reasoning many years ago, I developed a deep appreciation for honing skills in weakening and strengthening arguments. Many people visit my blog seeking information out about the value of an MBA. Studying for GMAT, and in particular the critical reasoning section of the test, is unlike studying for any GRE or SAT exam I know of. You can learn a valuable life lesson before your MBA by studying for that section of the GMAT. Stupid is(n’t) as stupid does (always).