Agreed Mark, I think that we're all not that far apart here.... When one has experience and has developed sound judgement better calls on what the few things are that actually move the needle more often than when one is inexperienced.
Consider now what happens when a person is - early career (still inexperienced) - doing Customer Development for a completely new product / service (not clear what the key performance drivers are), or - trying to solve a problem arising from the deployment of the latest technology (experience may not translate to new domain/tech) In these case one may not necessarily have enough experience to make good calls and is therefore potentially more prone to getting bogged down or making a bad call. A lot of the Lean Startup stuff is designed to inject break points into development work so that effort is focused on real customer needs and not on polishing to perfection. FYI Please don't interpret the point of the intro below as saying that solving information overload alone is THE silver bullet to enabling great personal / company performance! The second part of what's being looked at below is the social aspect. If you're on the wrong track and go have a conversation with someone whos' in the know... you'll hopefully get told this and then re-adjust your focus to be on that which matters. Experienced folk in the form of Good Managers / Execs / Leaders help provide this function. The survey call out below is about trying to understand at the root level how people find out about important things and then how do they communicate potential insights based on these with others when they think that something needs to be done. It may well be that people are fine the way they are and that only inexperienced people suffer from information overload and the personal / performance issues that follow. However: From the results I'm seeing so far it would appear that this is not the case: many people in senior roles continue to struggle with information load / focus / getting things done despite their experience. It will be interesting to see how prevalent the phenomenon really is as more people take the survey. cheers, Roger On 29/10/2011, at 4:01 AM, Mark Smallcombe wrote: > I agree with Patrick. The #1 challenge is finding the few things that > actually move the needle and then completely focusing the company to > address those issues (ignoring other things that feel important but in > reality aren't important). Focus reduces information overload, reduces > burn rate, reduces distraction and creates excellence in the few > things that matter. As Steve Jobs said, "Focus is about saying no". > > Mark > > On Oct 27, 11:21 pm, Patrick Collins <pcolli...@gmail.com> wrote: >> Roger, >> I was with you for a bit there until you put forward your theory that a lack >> of startup performance was due to too much information and the ability to >> process it. If I was to dig one step further on that problem, one might land >> at another possible underlying reason for information overload: experience. >> It takes experience to know what information to listen to and what is noise. >> >> Personally, I would rank information overload, way down on my list of >> reasons that I underperform as an entrepreneur. I do agree with Mick that >> focus is one of the biggest challenges. Focussing and also being focussed on >> something worthwhile. >> >> But I am genuinely interested, since you've met a lot of people, why you >> think information overload this is so high up the list on the causes for >> under performance? >> >> Patrick. >> >> On 26 October 2011 19:58, Roger Kermode <roger.kerm...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >>> Dear Silicon-Beachers, >> >>> Firstly let me reintroduce myself... I'm Roger Kermode and amongst other >>> things I'm one of the founders of Pushstart, I also ran the MEGA >>> Entrepreneur Course in Sydney earlier this year. >> >>> Since returning to Australia in 1999 after stints at the MIT Media Lab, >>> SGI, and Motorola in the US I've been involved with a wide variety of >>> organisations that span mulit-national network equipment manufacturers, >>> internet standards, government, uni-commercialisation, media, telco, mobile, >>> startups, and foreign market entry. I've been deliberately very broad in the >>> things I've done so I could better understand how technology businesses (in >>> particular startups) work and find out out who the awesome helpful people >>> are here in Australia. Aside from the obvious personal benefits of being >>> broad and connected, my motivation to do this stems from a fundamental >>> desire to a) become better at helping people execute and b) become more >>> efficient at connecting with others who could help them further beyond what >>> I could do for them since this improves the Aussie ecosystem as a whole. >> >>> This year I've spoken with over 200 startups, early-to-mid stage companies, >>> and early-stage investors across Australia and I would observe that while >>> things are rapidly improving (in fact they've never been better) there's >>> still a number of common issues that people consistently struggle with that >>> prevent them from executing and getting the traction they need to succeed. >> >>> The first is a lack of focus (as is well called out by Mick "Mr Focus" >>> Liubinskas from Pollenizer) and the second is that most companies are >>> under-capitalised to attempt the things they are doing. There's been lots of >>> other posts here about the value of focus / lean startup / customer >>> development and also the challenges of getting funding here in Australia, >>> and to be honest I think these things are to some extent symptoms and not >>> root causes of why companies are finding it harder to perform. If we can >>> help people help themselves to address some of the root causes they will >>> automatically focus better and become more efficient at securing the "yes" >>> they need from a customer, investor, their peers, or their boss. >> >>> I think we need to stop complaining about lack of support from Government / >>> Investors and get closer to what is the root cause of why people struggle to >>> focus and hence find it difficult to successfully pitch their ideas to get >>> funded or even better win sales. Fix the root cause and we'll get better >>> formed, more focused offerings that can create real value faster and hence >>> get funded or supported earlier. Do this....and the problem goes away. >> >>> I will go out on a limb here... in a nutshell, I think that the causes of >>> underperformance might stem from a combination of the following >> >>> - there being too much information to keep up with (both outside and >>> inside an organisation) >>> - people not knowing how to or having the right tools to efficiently >>> generate insights from the deluge of data that's now available >>> - people not have the tools to efficiently share and test their ideas >>> to build social support to make things happen when they do have an >>> insight. >> >>> This of course is just conjecture / a thesis that needs to be tested more >>> formally by talking to people to properly understand where their pains are >>> before then potentially moving towards the creation of a solution.... >> >>> So as part of testing this thesis, I'd like to invite you to take a short >>> survey on "Information Overload and Productivity" that I've put together on >>> google docs: >> >>> https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dFA3OFpiZTgzMEdi... >> >>> It's relatively short and should take no more than 5 mins to complete, I >>> would be most grateful if you take a moment to fill this out and if so >>> inclined to pass it on to your colleagues. >> >>> I'm interested in getting responses from people in a wide variety of >>> organisations from concept stage startups through to be big corporates since >>> I think there will be some causes that are common to all companies and some >>> that are specific to an organisation's size or industry. >> >>> cheers and thanks in advance to those of you who fill out the survey, >> >>> Roger >> >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach >>> Australia mailing list. Visthttp://siliconbeachaustralia.orgfor more >> >>> Forum rules >>> 1) No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself. >>> 2) No jobs postings. You can usehttp://siliconbeachaustralia.org/jobs >> >>> To post to this group, send email to >>> silicon-beach-australia@googlegroups.com >>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>> silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com >>> For more options, visit this group at >>> http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach > Australia mailing list. Vist http://siliconbeachaustralia.org for more > > Forum rules > 1) No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself. > 2) No jobs postings. You can use http://siliconbeachaustralia.org/jobs > > > To post to this group, send email to > silicon-beach-australia@googlegroups.com > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach Australia mailing list. Vist http://siliconbeachaustralia.org for more Forum rules 1) No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself. 2) No jobs postings. You can use http://siliconbeachaustralia.org/jobs To post to this group, send email to silicon-beach-australia@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en
