Posts Tagged ‘Understanding Physics’

The Difficulty of Goal Setting in Domains of High Uncertainty

When you work in domains of high uncertainty, creating goals for the next year is exceptionally difficult.

When you try to do something that hasn’t been done before, things may blow up instantly, things may work out after two years of hard work, or things may never work.  So, how do you create the goal for that work? Do you give yourself one month to complete the work? And things haven’t worked out at the end of the month, do you stop the work or do you keep going?  If it blows up instantly, but you think you know why, do you keep going? Do you extend the due date for the goal?  At the start of the work, should the timeline have been set to one year instead of one month?  And who decides that?  And how do they decide?

When you have to create your goals for something that hasn’t been done before and the objectives of the work are defined by another team, yet that team hasn’t done the prework and cannot provide those objectives, what do you do? Do you create a goal for the other team to define the objectives? And what if you have no control over that team’s priorities and you don’t know when (or if) they’ll provide the needed information?  What does a goal look like when you don’t know the objectives of the work nor do you know when (or if) you’ll get that information.  Can you even create a goal for the work when you don’t know what that work is?  And how do you estimate a completion date or the resource requirements (both the flavor and quantity) when you don’t know the objectives?  What does that goal look like?

When you have to create your goals for a team of ten specialized people who each have unique skills, but you don’t know the objectives of the work, when that work can start, or when that work will finish, how do you cascade the team’s goals to each team members?  What do their goals look like?  Is the first goal to figure out the goal?  How many goals does it take to fill up their year when you don’t know what the work is or how long it will take?

When working in domains of high uncertainty, the goals go like this: define the system as it is, define something you want to improve, try to improve it, and then do the next right thing.  Unfortunately, that doesn’t fit well with the traditional process of setting yearly goals.

And your two questions should be: How do you decide what to improve? and How do you choose the next right thing?

Image credit — Rab Lawrence

Are you making progress?

Just before it’s possible, it’s impossible.

An instant before you know how to do it, you don’t.

After searching for the answer for a year, you may find it in the next instant.

If you stop searching, that’s the only way to guarantee you won’t find it.

When people say it won’t work, their opinion is valid only if nothing has changed since the last time, including the people and their approach.

If you know it won’t work, change the approach, the specification, or the scope.

If you think it won’t work, that’s another way of saying “it might work “.

If you think it might work, that’s another way of saying “it might not work”.

When there’s a difference of opinion, that’s objective evidence the work is new.

If everyone sees it the same way, you’re not trying hard enough.

When you can’t predict the project’s completion date, that’s objective evidence that the work is new.

If you know when the project will be done, the novelty has been wrestled out of the project or there was none at the start.

When you don’t start with the most challenging element of the project, you cause your company to spend a lot of money on a potentially nonviable project.

Until the novel elements of a project are demonstrated, there is no real progress.

Jumping Backwards – Cape Verde, Sal Rei” by Espen Faugstad is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Radical Cost Reduction and Reinvented Supply Chains

As geopolitical pressures rise, some countries that supply the parts that make up your products may become nonviable.  What if there was a way to reinvent the supply chain and move it to more stable regions?  And what if there was a way to guard against the use of child labor in the parts that make up your product? And what if there was a way to shorten your supply chain so it could respond faster? And what if there was a way to eliminate environmentally irresponsible materials from your supply chain?

Our supply chains source parts from countries that are less than stable because the cost of the parts made in those countries is low.  And child labor can creep into our supply chains because the cost of the parts made with child labor is low.  And our supply chains are long because the countries that make parts with the lowest costs are far away.  And our supply chains use environmentally irresponsible materials because those materials reduce the cost of the parts.

The thing with the supply chains is that the parts themselves govern the manufacturing processes and materials that can be used, they dictate the factories that can be used and they define the cost.  Moving the same old parts to other regions of the world will do little more than increase the price of the parts.  If we want to radically reduce cost and reinvent the supply chain, we’ve got to reinvent the parts.

There are methods that can achieve radical cost reduction and reinvent the supply chain, but they are little known.  The heart of one such method is a functional model that fully describes all functional elements of the system and how they interact.  After the model is complete, there is a straightforward, understandable, agreed-upon definition of how the product functions which the team uses to focus the go-forward design work.  And to help them further, the method provides guidelines and suggestions to prioritize the work.

I think radical cost reduction and more robust supply chains are essential to a company’s future.  And I am confident in the ability of the methods to deliver solid results.  But what I don’t know is: Is the need for radical cost reduction strong enough to cause companies to adopt these methods?

Zen” by g0upil is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

The first step is to understand the system as it is.

If there’s a recurring problem, take the time to make sure the system hasn’t changed since last time and make sure the context and environment are still the same.  If everything is the same, and there are no people involved in the system, it’s a problem that resides in the clear domain.  Here’s a link from Dave Snowden who talks about the various domains.  In this video, Dave calls this domain the “simple” domain.  Solve it like you did last time.

If there’s a new problem, take the time to understand the elements of the system that surround the problem.  Define the elements and define how they interact, and define how they set the context and constraints for the problem.  And then, define the problem itself.  Define when it happens, what happens just before, and what happens after.  If there are no people involved, if the solution is not immediately evident, if it’s a purely mechanical, electromechanical, chemical, thermal, software, or hardware, it’s a problem in the complicated domain (see Dave’s video above) and you’ll be able to solve it with the right experts and enough time.

If you want to know the next evolution of the system, how it will develop and evolve, the situation is more speculative and there’s no singular answer. Still, the first step is the same – take the time to understand the elements of the system and how they interact.  Then, look back in time and learn the previous embodiments of the system and define its trajectory – how it evolved into its current state.  If there has been consistent improvement along a singular line of goodness, it’s likely the system will want to continue to evolve in that direction.  If the improvement has flattened, it’s likely the system will try to evolve along a different line of evolution.

I won’t go into the specifics of lines of evolution of technological systems, as it’s a big topic.  But if you want to know more, here’s a nice description of evolution along the line of adaptability by my teacher, Victor Fey – The best products know how to adapt.

If there are people involved with the system, it’s a complex system (see Dave’s video).  (There are complex systems that don’t involve people, but I find this a good way to talk about complex systems.) The first step is to define the system as it is, but because the interactions among the elements are not predictable, your only hope is to probe, sense, and respond by doing more of what works and less of what doesn’t.  Thanks to Dave Snowden for that language.

The first step is always to understand the system as it is.

Space – Antennae Galaxies” by Trodel is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Free Resources

Since resources are expensive, it can be helpful to see the environment around your product as a source of inexpensive resources that can be modified to perform useful functions.  Here are some examples.

Gravity is a force you can use to do your bidding. Since gravity is always oriented toward the center of the earth, if you change the orientation of an object, you change the direction gravity exerts itself relative to the object. If you flip the object upside down, gravity will push instead of pull.

And it’s the same for buoyancy but in reverse.  If you submerge an object of interest in water and add air (bubbles) from below, the bubbles will rise and push in areas where the bubbles collect.  If you flip over the object, the bubbles will collect in different areas and push in the opposite direction relative to the object.

And if you have water and bubbles, you have a delivery system.  Add a special substance to the air which will collect at the interface between the water and air and the bubbles will deliver it northward.

If you have motion, you also have wind resistance or drag force (but not in deep space).  To create more force, increase speed or increase the area that interacts with the moving air. To change the direction of the force relative to the object, change the orientation of the object relative to the direction of motion.

If you have water, you can also have ice.  If you need a solid substance look to the water.  Flow water over the surface of interest and pull out heat (cool) where you want the ice to form. With this method, you can create a protective coating that can regrow as it gets worn off.

If you have water, you can make ice to create force.  Drill a blind hole in a piece of a brittle material (granite), fill the hole with water, and freeze the water by cooling the granite (or leave it outside in the winter).  When the water freezes it will expand, push on the granite and break it.

These are some contrived examples, but I hope they help you see a whole new set of free resources you can use to make your magic.

Thank you, VF.

Image credit – audi_insperation

Three Things for the New Year

Next year will be different, but we don’t know how it will be different. All we know is that it will be different.

Some things will be the same and some will be different.  The trouble is that we won’t know which is which until we do.  We can speculate on how it will be different, but the Universe doesn’t care about our speculation.  Sure, it can be helpful to think about how things may go, but as long as we hold on to the may-ness of our speculations.  And we don’t know when we’ll know. We’ll know when we know, but no sooner. Even when the Operating Plan declares the hardest of hard dates, the Universe sets the learning schedule on its own terms, and it doesn’t care about our arbitrary timelines.

What to do?

Step 1. Try three new things. Choose things that are interesting and try them.  Try to try them in parallel as they may interact and inform each other. Before you start, define what success looks like and what you’ll do if they’re successful and if they’re not.  Defining the follow-on actions will help you keep the scope small.  For things that work out, you’ll struggle to allocate resources for the next stages, so start small.  And if things don’t work out, you’ll want to say that the projects consumed little resources and learned a lot.  Keep things small.  And if that doesn’t work, keep them smaller.

Step 2. Rinse and repeat.

I wish you a happy and safe New Year.  And thanks for reading.

Mike

“three” by Travelways.com is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Some Problems With Problems

If you don’t know what the problem is, that’s your first problem.

A problem can’t be a problem unless there’s a solution.  If there’s no possible solution, don’t try to solve it, because it’s not a problem.

If there’s no problem, you have a big problem.

If you’re trying to solve a problem, but the solution is outside your sphere of influence, you’re taking on someone else’s problem.

If someone tries to give you a gift but you don’t accept it, it’s still theirs. It’s like that with problems.

If you want someone to do the right thing, create a problem for them that, when solved, the right thing gets done.

Problems are good motivators and bad caretakers.

A problem is between two things, e.g., a hammer and your thumb.  Your job is to figure out the right two things.

When someone tries to give you their problem, keep your hands in your pockets.

A problem can be solved before it happens, while it happens, or after it happened.  Each time domain has different solutions, different costs, and different consequences.  Your job is to choose the most appropriate time domain.

If you have three problems, solve one at a time until you’re done.

Solving someone else’s problem is a worst practice.

If you solve the wrong problem, you consume all the resources needed to solve the right problem without any of the benefits of solving it.

Ready, fire, aim is no way to solve problems.

When it comes to problems, defining IS solving.

If you learn one element of problem-solving, learn to see when someone is trying to give you their problem.

“My first solved Rubik’s cube” by Nina Stawski is licensed under CC BY 2.0

How to Know if Your Idea is Novel

When your idea is novel, no one will steal it. No NDA required.

If your idea is truly novel, no one will value it. And that’s how you’ll know it’s novel.

When your idea is novel, no one will adopt it. This isn’t much of a stretch as, due to not-invented-here (NIH), no one will adopt anyone else’s idea – novel or not.

When your idea is novel, it will be misunderstood, even by you.

When your idea is novel, it will evolve into something else and then something else. And then it might be ready for Prime Time.

Novel ideas are like orchids – they need love beyond the worth of their blossom.

If your idea hasn’t failed three times, it’s not worth a damn.

The gestation period for novel ideas is long; if it comes together quickly, it’s not novel.

The best way to understand your novel idea is to make a prototype. And then another one.

Your first novel idea won’t work, but it will inform the next iteration. And that one won’t work either, and the cycle continues. But that’s how it goes with novel ideas.

If everyone likes your novel idea, it isn’t novel.

If no one likes your novel idea, you may be on to something.

If you’re not misunderstood, you’re doing it wrong.

If your dog likes your idea, you can’t say much because he loves you unconditionally and will always tell you what you want to hear.

If you think your novel idea will create a whole new product line in two years, your timeline is off by a factor of three, or five.

If your most successful business unit tries to squash your novel idea it’s because it threatens them. Stomp on the accelerator.

When you are known to give air cover to novel ideas, the best people want to work for you.

 

“it seemed like a good idea at the time” by woodleywonderworks is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Without a problem there can be no progress.

Without a problem, there can be no progress.

And only after there’s too much no progress is a problem is created.

And once the problem is created, there can be progress.

 

When you know there’s a problem just over the horizon, you have a problem.

Your problem is that no one else sees the future problem, so they don’t have a problem.

And because they have no problem, there can be no progress.

Progress starts only after the calendar catches up to the problem.

 

When someone doesn’t think they have a problem, they have two problems.

Their first problem is the one they don’t see, and their second is that they don’t see it.

But before they can solve the first problem, they must solve the second.

And that’s usually a problem.

 

When someone hands you their problem, that’s a problem.

But if you don’t accept it, it’s still their problem.

And that’s a problem, for them.

 

When you try to solve every problem, that’s a problem.

Some problems aren’t worth solving.

And some don’t need to be solved yet.

And some solve themselves.

And some were never really problems at all.

 

When you don’t understand your problem, you have two problems.

Your first is the problem you have and your second is that you don’t know what your problem by name.

And you’ve got to solve the second before the first, which can be a problem.

 

With a big problem comes big attention. And that’s a problem.

With big attention comes a strong desire to demonstrate rapid progress. And that’s a problem.

And because progress comes slowly, fervent activity starts immediately. And that’s a problem.

And because there’s no time to waste, there’s no time to define the right problems to solve.

 

And there’s no bigger problem than solving the wrong problems.

Wrong Questions to Ask When Doing Technology Development

I know you’re trying to do something that has never been done before, but when will you be done? I don’t know.  We’ll run the next experiment then decide what to do next.  If it works, we’ll do more of that.  And if it doesn’t, we’ll do less of that. That’s all we know right now.

I know you’re trying to create something that is new to our industry, but how many will we sell? I don’t know. Initial interviews with customers made it clear that this is an important customer problem. So, we’re trying to figure out if the technology can provide a viable solution.  That’s all we know right now.

No one is asking for that obscure technology. Why are you wasting time working on that?  Well, the voice of the technology and the S-curve analyses suggest the technology wants to move in this direction, so we’re investing this solution space.  It might work and it might not.  That’s all we know right now.

Why aren’t you using best practices? If it hasn’t been done before, there can be no best practice.  We prefer to use good practice or emergent practice.

There doesn’t seem like there’s been much progress.  Why aren’t you running more experiments? We don’t know which experiments to run, so we’re taking some time to think about what to do next.

Will it work?  I don’t know.

That new technology may obsolete our most profitable product line.  Shouldn’t you stop work on that? No. If we don’t obsolete our best work, someone else will. Wouldn’t it be better if we did the obsoleting?

How many more people do you need to accelerate the technology development work? None.  Small teams are better.

Sure, it’s a cool technology, but how much will it cost?  We haven’t earned the right to think about the cost.  We’re still trying to make it work.

So, what’s your solution? We don’t know yet.  We’re still trying to formulate the customer problem.

You said you’d be done two months ago.  Why aren’t you done yet? I never said we’d be done two months ago. You asked me for a completion date and I could not tell you when we’d be done.  You didn’t like that answer so I suggested that you choose your favorite date and put that into your spreadsheet. We were never going to hit that date, and we didn’t.

We’ve got a tight timeline.  Why are you going home at 5:00? We’ve been working on this technology for the last two years.  This is a marathon.  We’re mentally exhausted.  See you tomorrow.

If you don’t work harder, we’ll get someone else to do the technology development work.  What do you think about that? You are confusing activity with progress.  We are doing the right analyses and the right thinking and we’re working hard.  But if you’d rather have someone else lead this work, so would I.

We need a patented solution.  Will your solution be patentable? I don’t know because we don’t yet have a solution. And when we do have a solution, we still won’t know because it takes a year or three for the Patent Office to make that decision.

So, you’re telling me this might not work?  Yes. That’s what I’m telling you.

So, you don’t know when you’ll be done with the technology work, you don’t know how much the technology will cost, you don’t know if it will be patentable, or who will buy it? That’s about right.

Image credit — Virtual EyeSee

The Power of Prototypes

A prototype moves us from “That’s not possible.” to “Hey, watch this!”

A prototype moves us from “We don’t do it that way.” to “Well, we do now.”

A prototype moves us from “That’s impossible.” to “As it turns out, it was only almost impossible.”

A prototype turns naysayers into enemies and profits.

A prototype moves us from an argument to a new product development project.

A prototype turns analysis-paralysis into progress.

A prototype turns a skeptical VP into a vicious advocate.

A prototype turns a pet project into top-line growth.

A prototype turns disbelievers into originators of the idea.

A prototype can turn a Digital Strategy into customer value.

A prototype can turn an uncomfortable Board of Directors meeting into a pizza party.

A prototype can save a CEO’s ass.

A prototype can be too early, but mostly they’re too late.

If the wheels fall off your first prototype, you’re doing it right.

If your prototype doesn’t dismantle the Status-Quo, you built the wrong prototype.

A good prototype violates your business model.

A prototype doesn’t care if you see it for what it is because it knows everyone else will.

A prototype turns “I don’t believe you.” into “You don’t have to.”

When you’re told “Don’t make that prototype.” you’re onto something.

A prototype eats not-invented-here for breakfast.

A prototype can overpower the staunchest critic, even the VP flavor.

A prototype moves us from “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” to “Oh, yes I do.”

If the wheels fall off your second prototype, keep going.

A prototype is objective evidence you’re trying to make a difference.

You can argue with a prototype, but you’ll lose.

If there’s a mismatch between the theory and the prototype, believe the prototype.

A prototype doesn’t have to do everything, but it must do one important thing for the first time.

A prototype must be real, but it doesn’t have to be really real.

If your prototype obsoletes your best product, congratulations.

A prototype turns political posturing into reluctant compliance and profits.

A prototype turns “What the hell are you talking about?” into “This.”

A good prototype bestows privilege on the prototyper.

A prototype can beat a CEO in an arm-wrestling match.

A prototype doesn’t care if you like it. It only cares about creating customer value.

If there’s an argument between a well-stated theory and a well-functioning prototype, it’s pretty clear which camp will refine their theory to line up with what they just saw with their own eyes.

A prototype knows it has every right to tell the critics to “Kiss my ass.” but it knows it doesn’t have to.

You can argue with a prototype, but shouldn’t.

A prototype changes thinking without asking for consent.

Image credit — Pedro Ribeiro Simões

Mike Shipulski Mike Shipulski
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