Archives: February 2013

The Heart of MBWA

Adi Gaskell points out that social media can be used to expand your reach if you plan to incorporate Tom’s MBWA, Managing by Wandering Around, practice into your management style. Social media are good for connection. Tom’s agreement on that score is obvious by his immersion in Twitter, tirelessly offering strategy tips and conversing with followers the world over. Yes, a social media presence is important and useful for leaders and managers to maintain open communication with their employees. We heartily agree, especially if they’re following Gaskell’s important reminder: “Candor is a given.”

Gaskell argues that MBWA, in its original state of actually walking around is limiting. We think his focus on the method’s lack of efficiency is misplaced. MBWA has, at its heart, the element of being there in person. Talking … face-to-face. One of Tom’s often-used quotes is from Texas Bix Bender: “A body can pretend to care, but they can’t pretend to be there.” We think there is an enormous difference in the quality of an interaction in person versus via social media. Looking someone in the eye, shaking their hand, laughing with them when in their physical presence creates a very different kind of bond than can be achieved over social media.

Consider Tom’s message in this audio clip from The Little BIG Things: travel 5,000 miles for a five-minute meeting (with credit to sports agent Mark McCormack). Finally, see Tom tell the origin story of MBWA in this video, which concludes with him urging you to get out of your office and get “close to where the work is really done.”

Keep up with your presence on Twitter, Facebook, and internal channels to maintain open communication. But leave your office, wander around, have an actual conversation in addition to the virtual one. If you want to practice MBWA, in its true spirit, you have to be there.

If It's Good Enough for Bob

My great friend Bob Stone, among other things former head of the (largely) stealth successes of VP Gore’s re-inventing government program, dug up a paper of mine which he plans to use in his current professorial job. Bob’s Success Secret #1 (in my opinion) is cultivating change by providing positive role models, rather than focusing on what’s broken (the negative stuff). Here’s my favorite Stoneism: “Some people look for things that went wrong and try to fix them. I look for things that went right, and try to build off them.”

Love it!

At any rate, we’re attaching here the paper of mine that Bob’s using. It focuses on the peril of a “systems first” approach to Big Change, arguing that systems are of the utmost importance, but mostly fail, or fail to reach their full potential by a country mile, because the organization’s “culture” does not support them. Hence a “culture first” approach is usually/invariably the better bet. The paper is argued via 11 case studies from every setting imaginable.

Enjoy!

Google Authorship, Google+ & Business

The buzz around Google Authorship is gaining serious momentum. Why should you pay attention?

Google Authorship gives credit where credit is due. For all those writers whose writing can be found in various places on the Web, it’s the long-overdue feature that links your identity to your writing in a standard way, regardless of the publication. The link is essentially your Google+ profile, and establishing yourself this way will add to your credibility:

Google’s Eric Schmidt has hinted that the search behemoth could give higher rankings to content when it’s linked to verified Google+ profiles -via Google Authorship.

That’s right, he said “higher rankings.” This affects businesses directly since Google+ features the ability to offer social feedback by giving +1 ratings. Google is strengthening its search results by adding a social component, not just relying on the bots to make the ranking decisions. Read Monica Romeri’s The Lowdown on Google+ for Business to get a better feel for how this impacts businesses.

Google is the uncontested monarch of search. It’s name is now listed in the dictionary as the equivalent of search. Adding Google Authorship to Google+ increases Google+’s relevancy for businesses, enhancing its attraction as a social network. Furthermore, Dave Lloren’s Fast Company article today goes into detail about several other tools Google is bringing to bear while quickly becoming a powerful hub of business solutions we’ll soon not be able to live without.