Shipulski On Design

Archive for the ‘Clarity’ Category

For the past two decades, I’ve actively developed engineering leaders.  A good friend asked me how I do it, so I took some time to write it down.  Here is the curriculum in the form of How Tos:

How to build trust.  This is the first thing.  Always.  Done right, the trust-based informal networks are stronger than the formal organization chart. Done right, the informal networks can protect the company from bad decisions.  Done right, the right information flows among the right engineers at the right time so the right work happens in the right way.

How to decide what to do next. This is a broad one.  We start with a series of questions: What are we doing now?  What’s the problem? How do you know? What should we do more of?  What should we do less of?  What resources are available? When must we be done?

How to map the current state.  We don’t define the idealized future state or the North Star, we start with what’s happening now.  We make one-page maps of the territory.  We use drawings, flow charts, boxes/arrows, and the fewest words. And we take no action before there’s agreement on how things are.  The value of GPS isn’t to define your destination, it’s to establish your location.  That’s why we map the current state.

How to build momentum. It’s easy to jump onto a moving steam train, but a stationary one is difficult to get moving.  We define the active projects and ask – How might we hitch our wagon to a fast-moving train?

How to start something new. We start small and make a thought-provoking demo.  The prototype forces us to think through all the elements, makes things real, and helps others understand the concept. If that doesn’t work, we start smaller.

How to define problems so we can solve them easily. We define problems with blocks and arrows, and limit ourselves to one page.  The problem is defined as a region of contact between two things, and we identify it with the color red.  That helps us know where the problem is and when it occurs. If there are two problems on a page, we break it up into two pages with one problem.  Then we decide to solve the problem before, during, or after it occurs.

How to design products that work better and cost less. We create Pareto charts of the cost of the existing product (cost by subassembly and cost by part) and set a cost reduction goal.  We create Pareto charts of the part count of the existing product (part count by subassembly and part count by individual part number) and define a goal for part count reduction.  We define test protocols that capture the functionality customers care about. We test the existing product and set performance improvement goals for the new one.  We test the new product using the same protocols and show the data in a simple A-B format. We present all this data at formal design reviews.

How to define technology projects. We define how the customer does their work.  We then define the evolutionary history of our products and services, and project that history forward.  For lines of goodness with trajectories that predict improvement, we run projects to improve them.  For lines of goodness with stalled trajectories, we run projects to establish new technologies and jump to the next S-curve.  We assess our offerings for completeness and create technologies to fill the gap.

How to file the right patents.  We ask these questions: How quickly will the customer notice the new functionality or benefit? Once recognized, will they care? Will the patent protect high-volume / high-margin consumables? There are more questions, but these are the ones we start with.  And the patent team is an integral part of the technology reviews and product development process.

How to do the learning.   We start with the leader’s existing goals and deliverables and identify the necessary How Tos to get their work done. There are no special projects or extra work.

If you’re interested in learning more about the curriculum or how to enroll, send me an email mike@shipulski.com.

Image credit — Paul VanDerWerf

To be more effective at a meeting, take the time to dissect the meeting agenda and details.

Who called the meeting?  If the CEO calls the meeting, you know your role. And you know your role if a team member calls the meeting.  Knowledge of the organizer helps you understand your role in the meeting.

Who is invited to the meeting?  If you are the only one invited, it’s a one-on-one meeting.  You know there will be dialogue and back-and-forth discussion.  If there are fifty people invited, you know it will be a listening meeting. And if all the company leaders are invited, maybe you should dress up a bit.

What is the sequence of the invitees? Who is first on the invite list?

Who is not invited to the meeting?  This says a lot, but takes a little thought to figure out what it says.

How long is the meeting? A fifteen-minute daily standup meeting is informal but usually requires a detailed update on yesterday’s progress.  An all-day meeting means you’ve got to pace yourself and bring your coffee.

Is lunch served?  The better the lunch, the more important the meeting.  And it’s the same for snacks.

Is the meeting in-person or remote?  In-person meetings are more important and more impactful.

If pre-read material is sent out two days before the meeting, the organizer is on their game.  If the pre-read material is sent out three minutes before the meeting, it’s a different story.

If there’s no agenda, it means the organizer isn’t all that organized.  Skip these meetings if you can.  But if you can’t, bring your laptop and be ready to present your best stuff.  If no one asks you to talk, keep quiet and listen.  If you’re asked to present, present something if you can.  And if you can’t, say you’re not ready because the topic was not included in the agenda.

The best agendas define the topics, the leader of each topic, and the time blocks.

All these details paint a picture of the upcoming meeting and help you know what to expect.  When you know what to expect will enable you to hear the things that aren’t said and the discussions that don’t happen.

When the group avoids talking about the charged topic or the uncomfortable situation, you’ll recognize it.  And because you know who called the meeting, the attendees, and the meeting context, you’ll help the group discuss what needs to be discussed.  You’ll know when to ask a seemingly innocent question to help the group migrate to the right discussion.  And you’ll know when it’s okay to put your hand up and tell the group they’re avoiding an important topic that should be discussed.

Anyone can follow the agenda, but it takes preparation, insight, awareness, and courage to help the group address the important but uncomfortable things not on the agenda.

Image credit — Joachim Dobler

Clarity.  People will know why they dislike (or like) your position, have good ideas on improving it, and appreciate your clarity.  Well, at least they’ll recognize you’re communicating differently.

Brevity.  Make it short.

Visual.  When you draw a picture of the situation, people will understand the main system elements and how they interact.  Use arrows to describe how the system changes over time.  Even better, create a series of snapshots in a time series so you can decide to solve the problem before, during, or after. Words constrict. Use images to create space for divergent perspectives.

Distilled.  When you converge on the most important theme, the discussion is focused on the most important thing.  And when it strays it’s easy to recognize and put it back to importance. To distill, limit yourself to one page and limit the number of words to twelve.  This is unnatural and requires confidence through practice.

Know what you want to communicate.  Use fewer and simpler words.  Decide what to leave out. Use images and cartoons. Make it clean.

Less is more.

Image credit —  Charlie Wales

When planning a project, we usually start with a traditional left-to-right schedule. On the left is the project’s start date, where tasks are added sequentially rightward toward completion. When all the tasks are added and the precedence relationships shift tasks rightward, the completion date becomes known. No one likes the completion date, but it is what it is until we’re asked to pull it in.

I propose a different approach – a reverse schedule.  Instead of left to right, the reverse schedule moves right to left.  It starts with the completion date on the right and stacks tasks backward in time toward today. The start date emerges when all the tasks are added and precedence relationships work their magic.  Where the traditional schedule tells us when the project will finish, the reverse schedule tells us when we should start.  And, usually, the reverse schedule says we should have started several months ago and the project is already late.

There are some subtle benefits of the reverse schedule.  It’s difficult to game the schedule and reduce task duration to achieve a desired start date because the tasks are stacked backward in time. (Don’t believe me?  Give it a try and you’ll see.)  And because the task duration is respectful of the actual work content, the reverse schedule is more realistic.  And when there’s too much work in a reverse schedule, the tasks push their way into the past and no one can suggest we should go back in time and start the project three months ago.  And since the end date is fixed, we are forced to acknowledge there’s not enough time to do all the work.  The beauty of the reverse schedule is it can tell us the project is late BEFORE we start the project.

Here’s a rule: You want to know you’re late before it’s too late.

The real power of the reverse schedule is that it creates a sense of urgency around starting the project.  In the project planning phase, a delay of a week here and there is no big deal. But, when the start date slips a day, the completion date slips a day.  The reverse schedule clarifies the day-for-day slip and helps the resources move the project sooner so the project can start sooner.  And those of us who run projects for a living know this is a big deal.  What would you pay for an extra two weeks at the end of a project that’s two weeks behind schedule?  Well, if you started two weeks sooner, you wouldn’t need the extra time.

The project doesn’t start when the project schedule says it starts.  The project starts when the resources start working on the project in a full-time way.  The reverse schedule can create the sense of urgency needed to get the critical resources moved to the project so they can start the work on time.

Image credit — Steve Higgins

Tariffs.  Economic uncertainty.  Geopolitical turmoil.  There’s no time for elegance.  It’s time for the art of the possible.

Give your sales team a reason to talk to customers.  Create something that your salespeople can talk about with customers.  A mildly modified product offering, a new bundling of existing products, a brochure for an upcoming new product, a price reduction, a program to keep prices as they are even though tariffs are hitting you.  Give them a chance to talk about something new so the customers can buy something (old or new).

Think Least Launchable Unit (LLU). Instead of a platform launch that can take years to develop and commercialize, go the other way.  What’s the minimum novelty you can launch? What will take the least work to launch the smallest chunk of new value?  Whatever that is, launch it now.

Take a Frankensteinian approach. Frankenstein’s monster was a mix and match of what the good doctor had scattered about his lab.  The head was too big, but it was the head he had.  And he stitched onto the neck most crudely with the tools he had at his disposal.  The head was too big, but no one could argue that the monster didn’t have a head.  And, yes, the stitching was ugly, but the head remained firmly attached to the neck.  Not many were fans of the monster, but everyone knew he was novel.  And he was certainly something a sales team could talk about with customers.  How can you combine the head from product A with the body of product B?  How can you quickly stitch them together and sell your new monster?

Less-With-Far-Less. You’ve already exhausted the more-with-more design space.  And there’s no time for the technical work to add more.  It’s time for less.  Pull out some functionality and lots of cost.  Make your machines do less and reduce the price.  Simplify your offering and make things easier for your customers.  Removing, eliminating, and simplifying usually comes with little technical risk.  Turning things down is far easier than turning them up.  You’ll be pleasantly surprised how excited your customers will be when you offer them slightly less functionality for far less money.

These are trying times, but they’re not to be wasted. The pressure we’re all under can open us up to do new work in new ways.  Push the envelope. Propose new offerings that are inelegant but take advantage of the new sense of urgency forced.

Be bold and be fast.

Image credit — Geoff Henson

If it’s taken from you, you’ll have a problem if you think it was yours.

When it’s taken from you, it doesn’t matter if it was never yours.

No one can take anything from you unless you think it is yours.

There can be no loss if it was never yours to have.

You can be manipulated if they know you have a problem letting go.

Said differently, if you can let go you can’t be manipulated.

Whether you want to admit it or not, it all goes away.

But if you see your favorite mug as already broken, there’s no problem when it breaks.

If you recognize your thirties will end, you won’t feel slighted when you start your fourth decade.

And it’s the same when you start your your fifth.

When you know things will end, their ending comes easier.

When you’re aware it will end, you can do it your way.

When you’re aware it’s finite, it’s easier to do what you think is right.

When you’re it all goes away, you can better appreciate what you have.

When you’re aware everything has a half-life, you’re less likely to live your life as a half-person.

Wouldn’t you like to do things your way?

Wouldn’t you like to do what you think is right?

Wouldn’t you like to live as a whole person?

Wouldn’t you like to appreciate what you have?

Would’t you like to bring your whole self to the party?

If so, why not embrace the impermanence?

Image credit — 正面顔〜〜〜(- .. -)

No one has ever been promoted by failing fast.  They may have been promoted because they learned something important from an experiment that delivered unexpected results, but that’s fundamentally different than failure.  That’s learning.

Failure, as a word, has the strongest negative connotations.  Close your eyes and imagine a failure.  Can you imagine a scenario where someone gets praised or promoted for that failure?  I think not.  It’s bad when you fail to qualify for a race.  It’s bad when you fail to get that new job.  It’s bad when driving down the highway the transmission fails fast.  If you squint, sometimes you can see a twinkle of goodness in failure, but it’s still more than 99% bad.

When it’s bad for people’s careers, they don’t do it. Failure is like that.  If you want to motivate people or instill a new behavior, I suggest you choose a word other than failure.

Learning, as a word, has highly positive connotations.  Children go to school to learn, and that’s good.  People go to college to learn, and that’s good.  When people learn new things they can do new things, and that’s good.  Learning is the foundation for growth and development, and that’s good.

Learning can look like failure to the untrained eye.  The prototype blew up – FAILURE.  We thought the prototype would survive the test, but it didn’t.  We ran a good test, learned the weakest element, and we’re improving it now – LEARNING.  In both cases, the prototype is a complete wreck, but in the FAILURE scenario, the team is afraid to talk about it, and in the LEARNING scenario they brag.  In the LEARNING scenario, each team member stands two inches taller.

Learning yes; failure no.

The transition from failure to learning starts with a question: What did you learn?  It’s a magic question that helps the team see the progress instead of the shattered remains.  It helps them see that their hard work has made them smarter.  After several what-did-you-learns, the team will start to see what they learned.  Without your prompts, they’ll know what they learned.  Then, they’ll design their work around their desired learning.  Then they’ll define formal learning objectives (LOs). Then they’ll figure out how to improve their learning rate.  And then they’re off to the races.

You don’t break things for the sake of breaking them.  You break things so you can learn.

Learning yes; failure no.  Because language matters.

Image credit — mining camper

Happy – when you can bring your whole self to everything you do.

Lonely – when you’re with people all day but can’t be truthful with them.

Sad – when you see what could be but never will.

Angry – when someone is less than truthful.

Happy – when people you care about are treated well.

Lonely – when you’re misunderstood.

Sad – when you realize a person’s lack of truthfulness will make them lonely.

Angry – when you take things personally that aren’t personal.

Happy – when an old friend visits.

Lonely – when there’s no trust.

Sad – when you see someone break trust and you know that will bring them loneliness.

Angry – when you know someone should know better.

Happy – when someone asks you for help.

Lonely – when you know you can help but they don’t ask.

Sad – when someone is set up for failure and there’s no way to help them.

Angry – when that someone is a good friend.

Happy – when you have your health.

Happy – when you have fun with friends.

Happy – when you spend time outside.

Happy – when you walk your dogs.

Happy – when your kids and your partner love you.

Whether you’re happy, lonely, sad, or angry, this too shall pass.

Image credit – Tambako the Jaguar.

If you got what you wanted, what would you do?

Would you be happy or would you want something else?

Wanting doesn’t have a half-life.  Regardless of how much we have, wanting is always right there with us lurking in the background.

Getting what you want has a half-life. After you get what you want, your happiness decays until what you just got becomes what you always had.  I think they call that hedonistic adaptation.

When you have what you always had, you have two options.  You can want more or you can want what you have.  Which will you choose?

When you get what you want, you become afraid to lose what you got.  There’s no free lunch with getting what you want.

When you want more, I can manipulate you. I wouldn’t do that, but I could.

When you want more your mind lives in the future where it tries to get what you want.  And lives in the past where it mourns what you did not get or lost.

It’s easier to live in the present moment when you want what you have. There’s no need to craft a plan to get more and no need to lament what you didn’t have.

You can tell when a person wants what they have.  They are kind because there’s no need to be otherwise.  They are calm because things are good.  And they are themselves because they don’t need anything from anyone.

Wanting what you have is straightforward.  Whatever you have, you decide that’s what you want. It’s much different than having what you want.  Once you have what you want hedonistic adaptation makes you want more, and then it’s time to jump back on the hamster wheel.

Wanting what you have is freeing.  Why not choose to be free and choose to want what you have?

Image credit — Steven Guzzardi

You know the space is new when you don’t have the right words to describe the phenomenon.

When there are two opposite sequences of events and you think both are right, you know the space is new.

You know you’re thinking about new things when the harder you try to figure it out the less you know.

You know the space is outside your experience but within your knowledge when you know what to do but you don’t know why.

When you can see the concept in your head but can’t drag it to the whiteboard, you’re swimming in new soup.

When you come back from a walk with a solution to a problem you haven’t yet met, you’re circling new space.

And it’s the same when know what should be but it isn’t – circling new space.

When your old tricks are irrelevant, you’re digging in a new sandbox.

When you come up with a new trick but the audience doesn’t care – new space.

When you know how an experiment will turn out and it turns out you ran an irrational experiment – new space.

When everyone disagrees, the disagreement is a surrogate for the new space.

It’s vital to recognize when you’re swimming in a new space.  There is design freedom, new solutions to new problems, growth potential, learning, and excitement.  There’s acknowledgment that the old ways won’t cut it.  There’s permission to try.

And it’s vital to recognize when you’re squatting in an old space because there’s an acknowledgment that the old ways haven’t cut it.  And there’s permission to wander toward a new space.

Image credit — Tambaco The Jaguar

For right frustration to emerge, you need an accurate understanding of how things are, a desire for them to be different, and a recognition you can’t remedy the situation.

The emergence of your desire for things to be different starts with knowing how things are.  And to see things as they are, you’ve got to be in the right condition – well-rested, unstressed, and sitting in the present moment. When you’re tired, stressed, or sitting in the past or future you can’t pay attention.  And when you don’t pay attention, you miss details or context and see something that isn’t.  Or, if you’re tired or stressed you can have clear eyes and a muddy interpretation. Either way, you’re off to a bad start because your desire for things to be different is wrongly informed. Sure, your misunderstanding can lead to a desire for things to be different, but your desire is founded on the wrong understanding.  If you want your frustration to be right frustration, seeing things as they are is the foundational step.  But it’s not yet a desire for things to be different.

Your desire for things to be different is a subtraction of sorts – when how things are minus how you want them to be equals something other than zero. (See Eq. 1)  Your brain-body uses that delta to create a desire for things to be different.  If how things are is equal to how you want them to be, the difference is zero (no delta) and there is no forcing function for your desire.  In that way, if you always want things to be as they are, there can be no desire for difference and frustration cannot emerge.  But frustration can emerge if you know how you want things to be and you recognize they’re not that way.

Eq. 1   Forcing Function for Desire (FFD) = (how things are) – (how you want them to be)

There is a more complete variant of the above equation where FFD is non-zero (there’s a difference between how things are and how you want them) yet frustration cannot emerge.  It’s called the “I don’t care enough” variant. (See Eq. 2) With this variant, you recognize how things are, you know how you want them to be, but you don’t care enough to be frustrated.

Eq. 2  FFD = [(how things are) – (how you want them to be)] * (Care Factor)

When you don’t care, your Care Factor (CF) = 0.  And when the non-zero delta is multiplied by a CF of zero, FFD is zero.  This means there is no forcing function for desire and frustration cannot emerge.  But this is not a good place to be.  Sure, frustration cannot emerge, but when you don’t care there is no forcing function for change.  Yes, you see things aren’t as you want, but you go along for the ride and don’t do anything about it.  I think that’s sad.  And I think that’s bad for business.  I’d rather have frustration.

Eq. 2 can be used by Human Resources as an Occom’s Razor of sorts.  If someone is frustrated, their CF is non-zero and they care.

Now the third factor required for frustration to emerge – a recognition you can’t do anything about the mismatch between how things are and how you want them. If you don’t recognize you can’t do anything to equalize how things are and how you want them, there can be no frustration.  Think – ignorance is bliss.  If you think you can do something to make how things are the same as how you want them, there is no frustration.  Because it’s important to you (CF is non-zero), you will devote energy to bringing the two sides together and there will be no frustration.  But when there’s a mismatch between how things are and how you want them, you care about making that mismatch go away, and you recognize you can’t do anything to eliminate the mismatch, frustration emerges.

What does all this say about people who display frustration? Do you want people that know how to see things as they are?  Do you want people who can imagine how things can be different?  Do you want people who understand the difference between what they can change and what they cannot? Do you want people who care enough to be frustrated?

Image credit — Atilla Kefeli