BuiltEnvironment

Counting my blessings

I found out today that my good friend, Jo West, had passed away in Dallas. Jo had been fighting cancer for about a year or so. I saw her in mid-April and she looked and sounded pretty good, she just ran out of steam in the middle of the afternoon.

I spoke with Terry (the friend who called to let me know), a little about Jo herself and the grace with which she waged her battle, and a little about how Terry himself was getting by, especially since he was one of the people making the phone calls to let other friends know.

When I hung up the phone, I thought for a while about the blessing Jo had been in my life. She was a wonderful woman with a heart big enough to encompass all of the "strays" who somehow found their way to her table. She genuinely cared about her friends -- cared a lot. And she had lots of friends to care about.

For me, she was a true friend -- she was there when I needed her, providing unconditional love, and support and encouragement for everything I tried. Sometimes, she made me feel like a success even before I did something, when we were still just talking about it. When she fell in love with my music, she offered to produce my next (4th) CD, but a cross-country move happened instead.

After a while, I started thinking about some of my other blessings -- a brother whom I love, and his family, whom I also love; cousins in Texas, California and New York, with whom I am very close; friends in Dallas and Austin who are as close to me as some of my blood family; and two careers of 30+ years each, both of which give me great satisfaction, and each of which makes me luckier than much of the adult population slaving away at jobs they hate.

I look at the friends I went to school with -- many of them, for one reason or another, wound up in jobs they hate. How amazing is it that I found not one, but two things to do with my life that I wouldn't trade for anything.

What a joy to discover that my life's work is something I love. And how astounding to find that I have stumbled across two different life's works, both of which I love, and which can be done concurrently.

I am blessed. Now I just have to make sure I stay busy!

The hardest part of self-employment

Ever since The Siben Consult, LLC opened its doors in January 2004, people have asked me, "What's the hardest thing about being self-employed?"

Some asked because they were contemplating going out on their own; others asked because they were curious. I've told everyone who asked the same thing:

                                                                                Self-discipline!

A/E/C industry marketers are used to having their lives dictated by deadlines. Everything revolves around when the next proposal is due. But what do you do when you don't have an assignment with a deadline?

I have one client assignment that has more than 25 components and no deadline. I can use the pieces as "fill" when I'm between time-sensitive assignments. I also have a typical amount of paper filing, cleaning of electronic files and emails from recent projects, expenses to track, expense reports to write up and file, bookkeeping to do, etc.

None of these chores are terribly onerous. Individually, they don't take long (other than the ongoing client assignment), once I get started.

The hardest part of what I do in The Siben Consult is getting started on these items.

I know from experience that it's always easier to start a new time-sensitive project when my desk is relatively clean. It's certainly easier to work two concurrent projects if I start with a clean desk. But doing the administrative chores and getting the desk clean...

The hardest part of what I do is getting started.

So I shower and dress -- sometimes I even shave. I have to do that in order to have the "work mindset" when I sit down at the computer. I can't overcome the mental inertia until I deal with the physical inertia. And I can't approach the work seriously in my pajamas!

The right person for the job

A marketer recently asked, "My firm wants a new website; should I design it myself"?

In the A/E industry, we're all about experts. When you need something done, you get an expert, and you get the right one. You don't call a GIS specialist to design a bridge just because you think he is a quick study with new software packages. You don't call a biologist because you know she understands the interactions of complex natural systems.

The same goes for websites. You may know what looks good on-screen, but that doesn't mean you know how to write code. And while you did design your personal website seven years ago, that doesn't mean you can learn today's website design software packages quickly and completely enough to develop a site that stands out from the thousands of other A/E firm websites. Even if you have the time.

If you're thinking of designing it yourself to save some money, please think again! The money you save will be quickly surpassed by missed revenues when potential clients go elsewhere because your site is not as strong a "positioner" as the other A/E websites out there.

Finally, if you design the website yourself, you will probably have to maintain it yourself. Regardless of your other time commitments, many of which will have been made for you by people who didn't speak to you first, or even look at your calendar. Do you really have time for that?

Bottom line? Get the right expert for the job. Just as you call a structural engineer to design a bridge, call a website designer to design your new website.

Sharing knowledge

I've heard it said that you learn (or re-learn) something best when you have to teach it to others. So I try to teach as often as the opportunity arises. In fact, my desire to share knowledge is such that my answers are often way more detailed than the questioner ever wanted!

So far this year, I've had three opportunities to conduct professional workshops, requiring quite a bit of travel.

In late February, I went to Anchorage, Alaska, where I conducted two half-day workshops at the Alaska Surveying and Mapping Conference. In the morning, I did my "Who's Afraid of Marketing?" for the 17th time. I love doing this workshop. It's designed for senior technical folks -- project manager and higher -- who fear marketing as an "unknown" because they don't know they do it every day. In the afternoon, I did my new "RFQs/RFPs -- Writing and Responding" for the first time. This session focuses on the required components of a solicitation and the various ways to respond to them. It also touches on the ethical dilemma of whether or not to write an RFQ or RFP for which only the writer's firm can make a fully responsive submittal.

In mid-April I had two speaking engagements -- one in California and the other in Florida. At Lake Tahoe, I spoke to CELSOC, the Consulting Engineers and Land Surveyors of California, presenting a shorter version of "Who's Afraid of Marketing?". A week later I was at the ZweigWhite 2008 Marketing Now Summit in Coral Gables, where I presented a new workshop on how an A/E firm's marketing staff might be impacted by the firm's implementation of an "integrated services" method of service delivery.

One of these opportunities paid a fee plus travel, lodging and miscellaneous expenses; one paid for travel and lodging; and one gave me only a free conference registration. It didn't matter. The combined opportunities to teach and to learn are always worth it for me.

These are great opportunities to talk about a wide range of "how to's" related to marketing A/E, planning, surveying, environmental and construction phase services. They showcase me and my firm and bring me additional opportunities to teach, write and consult. But the best part is the exchange -- the "question and answer" section at the end of each workshop, where I get to defend my ideas, which helps me make sure they are still relevant, or that I've struck the right chord in developing a new presentation.

I learn more in these "teaching" sessions than in anything else I do. If  you and your firm would like to give me an opportunity to learn by teaching, call me at 559.901.9596 or contact me at [email protected]. I'll be happy to chat with you about how I can deliver the kind(s) of workshops you want to provide for your staff.

Tom Peters and Me

For a few years now, I have been sharing this mantra with clients and workshops: the quality of the work experience can be a bigger differentiator than the quality of the work product.

Some people get it. But a lot of them don't seem to understand what I'm saying.

So imagine the rush of pleasure I got the other day when I read the same thought in chapter 3 of "design," by Tom Peters. "design" is part of a 4-book group called the Essentials Series. I've already read "leadership" and "talent," and found them both enjoyable reads full of valuable insignts. But neither gave me the warm fuzzies that I got from chapter 3 of "design."

Essentially, it comes down to this:

Think of any service your firm performs, and let's assume you do high-quality work. The quality of your work differentiates you from other firms that don't produce the same high-quality product.

Now, it is pretty much a "given" that there will be at least one other firm in your market that provides the same service at a similar level of quality as your firm -- perhaps at the same price or better -- perhaps on the same schedule or faster. What differentiates your firm from that other firm?

What makes your firm the obvious selection in a market where two or three firms can provide the same work product at the same quality for the same price in the same timeframe? The difference lies in the quality of the work experience. Are you more fun to work with than another firm? Do you give your clients a stronger sense of "all bases are covered, you can sleep nights while we're on the job!"?

That's a very powerful differentiator!

It's always nice to find an idea that I've been "pushing" in the work of someone I respect. Professional validation is a wonderful thing. But finding such an idea in a Tom Peters book was a very special bonus for me. I'm hoping it will be a powerful motivator for me as well.