Category: Coatching and Mentoring

Chapter 2: The Productivity Paradox – Embracing Constraints

August 15, 2023July 17, 2023by Jason NashLeave a comment

Contrary to popular belief, productivity isn’t merely a function of available resources. In fact, smaller, creatively adept teams often outperform larger counterparts, an aspect that many leaders overlook, giving rise to a productivity paradox.

The “10x developer” paradigm underscores the immense value of welcoming neurodiverse talent into organizations. Such standout developers can drive productivity levels up to ten times higher than their average peers. However, a common pitfall is managing software development projects with a manufacturing mindset, treating teams as assembly lines and seeking cost efficiency over skill diversity. This approach can be detrimental, especially in the context of new product development, which inherently requires an iterative cycle of experimentation and feedback. For start-ups, the primary objective is validated learning, not immediate scaling. Productivity ebbs and flows across different stages of a business lifecycle, and rushing to scale before establishing product-market fit can lead to inefficiencies. Therefore, it’s critical to balance resource allocation with strategic objectives to maximize productivity and value.

Eliyahu M. Goldratt’s Theory of Constraints (TOC) proposes that a system’s productivity is limited by its weakest component. By enhancing this constraint, overall performance can improve. The five-step TOC process includes:

Identify the Constraint
Decide How to Exploit It
Subordinate Other Processes
Elevate the Constraint
Repeat as Needed

For instance, a software team I worked with recognized testing as their constraint. By investing in automation and dedicating resources to optimize testing, they doubled their productivity. To implement the TOC, leaders must ensure that pivotal specialists aren’t overburdened. By optimizing their constraint with streamlined workflows and suitable tools, productivity increases. However, poorly supported delegation risks failure as does the failure to change leadership style.

Several methodologies can aid in managing constraints, such as Lean, Six Sigma, Agile, and Design Thinking:

Lean focuses on eliminating waste and maximizing value, improving productivity, efficiency, and quality.
Six Sigma, a data-driven approach, uses statistical analysis to eliminate defects and reduce variability, thereby increasing productivity and customer satisfaction.
Agile promotes flexibility, adaptability, and continuous improvement, allowing organizations to respond swiftly to changes and improve their processes.
Design & System Thinking a human-centred approach to problem-solving, views constraints as opportunities for creativity and innovation, leading to more effective solutions.

Despite the proven effectiveness of these methodologies, many leaders falter in their implementation. The crux of the problem often lies in focusing too heavily on process changes while neglecting the complementary shifts in thinking and leadership required to realize these new work methodologies fully. Changing how people work without modifying their mindset and the leadership style guiding them will fall short of achieving the desired results. Furthermore, a notable oversight in many businesses is the underutilization of these methodologies in addressing sustainability challenges. This gap represents a missed opportunity, as these methods can significantly contribute to achieving sustainability goals.

Constraints can act as catalysts for creative problem-solving, overcoming limitations without the need for additional staff. For instance, Patagonia has turned sustainability constraints into opportunities for product innovation. Similarly, budget restrictions can lead to process streamlining. Importantly, leaders must provide room for experimentation.

As climate change exacerbates supply chain disruptions, infrastructure damage, resource scarcity, and workforce availability fluctuations, collaboration between public and private sectors becomes crucial to enhance competitiveness sustainably.

The paradox is that having surplus resources doesn’t guarantee heightened productivity. Instead, potential lies in optimizing constraints. Organizations must effectively leverage their resources, just like managing road usage.

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to enhancing productivity. A diversified approach coupled with an unwavering commitment to continuous improvement is critical. By leveraging the power of focused education and coaching, the seemingly insurmountable productivity paradox can be navigated successfully, preventing the hazards of uncontrolled output. Essentially, achieving sustainability requires transforming perceived limitations into launchpads for innovation. As the majority of businesses today aspire towards more sustainable business models, a deeper comprehension of the Theory of Constraints (TOC) and its strategic implementation can play a pivotal role. It can help address the complex challenge of integrating sustainability into business practices, all while maintaining financial prudence.

Chapter 1: Understanding the 10x Productivity Revolution

August 8, 2023September 7, 2023by Jason NashLeave a comment

The 10x productivity revolution isn’t about a tenfold workload increase. Instead, it’s about amplifying efficiency, effectiveness, and impact ten times over by reframing focus from mere output to quality outcomes. It’s about doing more with less and understanding that constraints aren’t barriers but opportunities for focused innovation.

All organizations could benefit from such a shift, but some like the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) could benefit much more. From the outside, it appears to be a bureaucratic mess; with complexities and numerous competing priorities, the system seems inefficient. I often think the NHS has a product management problem, not a management problem. However, it most likely has both. If the NHS focused on customer experience (CX), customer journey mapped its services/products focused initially on its citizens’ most crucial healthcare needs, the NHS could provide superior patient outcomes and service, and reduce system inefficiencies. It should be a world-class organization with its customer data that could drive AI and its monopoly on the market. In the world of software as a service, and service as software the NHS fails to demonstrate the power of joined-up, thinking, leveraging its data assets for AI and connecting its patience with joined-up experiences that enhance their lives by supporting prevention and treatment. Instead, it’s a collection of disparate pieces, all using different systems and technologies, separate leadership, and teams, driving separate agendas. The admin and cost of such a disconnected way of working must be astronomical. One of the deliberate decisions that good product managers make is to build, buy or partner decisions. This approach could shift towards a collaborative, outcome-focused system from the current fragmented, business model. Moreover, it could foster a culture that values innovation, problem-solving, and individual empowerment. So what are organizations like the NHS to do?

The 10x Mission

As proponents of the 10x revolution, our mission is to embrace novel leadership methods, innovative thinking, and efficient work practices. Our goal is to eradicate unproductive ‘busy work’ and consistently deliver value that is customer-centric, sustainable, and mindful of constraints. To fulfil this mission, we must champion diverse cultures, modern leadership styles, and outcome-based measurements that align with our organisation’s objectives. We need to foster an agile mindset, focusing on customers and value and ensuring our processes and tools are fit for purpose.

The following 10x productivity principles:

Focus on Customer Value: Prioritise your customers’ needs and desires in every undertaking.
Outcomes Over Output: Success is measured by your impact on your customers and organisation, not merely the volume of work produced.
Constrained Innovation: View limitations and constraints as opportunities for creativity and innovation.
Unleash Productivity: Eliminate “busy work” and unnecessary tasks that distract from your goals.
Continuous Learning: Always strive to improve and grow, remaining curious and open to new ideas.

While prioritising outcomes over outputs isn’t new, it’s paramount in our AI-dominated era. It means adopting a holistic approach to productivity measurement, factoring in aspects such as employee engagement, customer satisfaction, and sustainability.

Goal-setting is often a challenging task for many businesses. Microsoft’s Rhythm of Business (ROB) process, involving monthly check-ins and progress tracking against objectives, stands out as an effective approach. Another proven method is the use of Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), a tool for setting and achieving specific, measurable, and time-bound goals, as advocated by John Doerr, the famous venture capitalist.

Redefining Knowledge Work

Knowledge work will fundamentally change as we shift focus from ‘busy work’ to problem-solving, leveraging our unique human capabilities and emotional intelligence. This change involves identifying and eradicating ‘busy work,’ tasks that add minimal or no value. I propose classifying knowledge work into Reactionary Work, Planning Work, Procedural Work, and Problem-Solving Work.

Reactionary Work: This includes tasks such as responding to emails and other communication, which can consume significant time without adding substantial value.
Planning Work: Strategic planning is essential, but the constant need to rework plans can result in a wasteful cycle. To break this cycle, we must focus on executing and measuring the impact of our plans.
Procedural Work: These tasks deal with ways of working. When done right, procedural work can help organisations create new, unique ways of operating, codifying their core competencies.
Problem-Solving Work: The most valuable for organisations and the most fulfilling for workers, problem-solving work is engaging and motivating. It allows us to find new and creative ways to solve problems.

Embracing the 10x productivity revolution requires us to ask: Should you hire that next person? It’s essential to consider how much time your team spends on problem-solving work that adds value to your organisation. Before making your next hire, think about how you can harness constraints to drive performance and achieve the 10x shift.

Stay tuned for the next chapter, where I will explore the productivity paradox and how embracing constraints can help you drive better performance.

The Human Condition: Why we kill productivity

March 7, 2023March 7, 2023by Jason NashLeave a comment

Understanding the complexities of the human condition is crucial in pursuing the 10x productivity revolution. The human condition has been explored by many philosophers, artists, and writers throughout history, including existentialist philosophers like Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Martin Heidegger. It involves a deep understanding of the nature of humanity and the purpose of existence. Having a deeper understanding of the human condition can help individuals navigate their own emotional experiences and develop resilience in the face of life’s difficulties, providing a more profound sense of connection to others, a greater appreciation for the challenges and rewards of life, and a clearer sense of purpose and meaning in one’s own life.

In addition to the benefits of understanding the human condition, it is essential to recognise and address cognitive biases that can negatively impact productivity. Biases such as confirmation bias, where we seek out information that confirms our preexisting beliefs, or the sunk cost fallacy, where we continue investing time and resources in a project that is not delivering results, can lead to irrational decisions and unproductive behaviours. These biases are common among all individuals, including knowledge workers, and can be particularly damaging to productivity in the workplace.

Another factor that can negatively impact productivity is the ubiquity of technology, including smartphones and social media. Our natural tendency is to be easily distracted and seek immediate gratification, and these technologies can exacerbate those tendencies. Parents need to consider screen time for children and young adults, with one in four (23%) demonstrating addict behaviours, ranging from 10-30% across the different studies. By being mindful of where we spend our time and identifying any negative productivity aspects, we can work to overcome these distractions.

The pursuit of the 10x productivity revolution requires a deep understanding of the human condition, an awareness of cognitive biases, and a mindful approach to the use of technology. By recognising and addressing these factors, we can improve our decision-making and increase our productivity, both as individuals and as organisations.

#humancondition #cognitivebiases #technology #productivityrevolution #10xHero #dalle

Embracing Experimentation, Validated Learning, and “Pirate metrics” to drive 10x Productivity

February 28, 2023February 21, 2023by Jason NashLeave a comment

As a product manager and Chief Product Officer, I’ve learned that the key to productivity is not more resources, but rather a smaller, more talented team with specialist knowledge in software development frameworks. Embracing experimentation, validated learning, and “Pirate metrics” can also lead to greater productivity.

To become a 10x productivity hero, it’s important to understand what makes teams productive at different stages of the product and business lifecycle and to minimise waste by recognizing the benefits of smaller teams. Follow the “2 pizza box rule” on team size as a good rule of thumb.

Coordination and communication become crucial in larger teams, especially when not co-located. And remember that becoming a 10x programmer is not about doing an order of magnitude more work, but by making better decisions an order of magnitude more often.

Join the 10x productivity revolution by following my blog for more insights on increasing productivity and becoming a productivity hero in your organisation. My book will be out in early march.

#ProductivityRevolution #10xhero #specialistknowledge #validatedlearning #coordination #communication #2pizzaboxrule #productivitytips #dalle

Why Curious Cognition?

December 18, 2018September 6, 2019by Jason Nash8 Comments

Why have we called the company Curious Cognition? Well, you need to read on to find out….and I’m hoping that the fact I posted a question will hook your interest and keep your attention. It’s a tried and trusted storytelling technique, and it leads into what I want to tell you about – what I’ve been doing and why I decided to leave Travelport. It begins back in January 2017 when I became fascinated by the power of authentic storytelling.

From selling to storytelling

I had just been promoted as part of a restructure into a newly created role of a chief storyteller at Travelport. I quickly set about enhancing my predominantly product management and marketing skill set with all I could find about storytelling. I interviewed a large number of senior stakeholders across the business to understand what everyone thought the current company story was. Unsurprisingly – this is common to many large companies – everyone had a different view of what they believed (we’ll come back to this in a while) the company story was.

Following the interviews, I spent time with Gordon Wilson Travelport’s CEO to capture his thoughts before we worked with the brand team to start to build out a company narrative. This drew on some of my newly discovered skills such as the seven-point story arc, the concept of the audience being the hero and the presenter being the mentor, all of which is designed to increase the empathy and authenticity of the story.

The Power of the Platform

Within a few weeks, we had built out a topline company narrative which became known internally as the “The power of the platform”. This story started to be shared with customers at our events and in one-on-ones during strategic reviews with key customers. After a few weeks of feedback and a few tweaks, it really started to resonate with customers. You know when a story is working because your audience leans into the room – you can physically see them lean forward and become much more intense and interested in what’s being said. When the story is crafted with the things the customer cares about, it starts to matter to them; it’s about them not you. Good delivery also clearly matters and helps the messages land.

Pitch perfect

Next up I worked on building out a curriculum so that I could train more people across the business on what was rapidly starting to feel like a superpower. I read a number of excellent books – you can find many on my goodreads.com list – and I watched and made detailed notes from the Ted Talks on storytelling. It’s amazing just how much free high-quality content you can find online….

With my newly-created curriculum, I started to work with different teams; up-skilling people on the basics and more advanced topics. All was going well, but I still did not feel that most people had the confidence to use it in their day-to-day engagements with customers. So as part of a sales academy programme, we rolled out training and we began something we called pitch perfect – giving the sales teams a safe environment where they could pitch ideas and get feedback on their upcoming customer meetings. I think it’s fair to say – and I will be interested to see if any of the Travelport team comment – that most people who attended not only understood why it worked, how to ‘do it’ and what they should do to be successful, but they also seemed genuinely energised by the process. Which brings me back to that point about ‘believing’. By turning them into believers in storytelling, it was turning them into believers in Travelport.

Seeing more and more success from the approach, I started to wonder what it was about authentic storytelling that made it work, and I began reading more around the subject. I had previously read Hooked (by Nir Eyal) about how product managers could create addictive products. It talks about triggers, actions and variable rewards – such as all those little dopamine hits we get making the red dots disappear from our phone icons, the badges we get through gamification and much more. I then referenced that book to find others, coming across several books on heuristics, behavioural economics/behavioural sciences and cognitive biases. You can think of heuristics as cognitive shortcuts or rules of thumb that simplify decisions. Because our brains use lots of energy and the body is always looking to conserve energy, they are the shortcuts we use to make decisions. Some lead to cognitive biases affecting rationality and most crucial decision making. It’s heuristics and the associated biases that account for why storytelling works so well.

Today…

Today, a few short weeks before the end of 2018, I’m excited to be working on the next chapter of my life, building out my own consultancy focused on supporting product management teams and their executives who want to optimise the performance of their products and portfolios. This falls squarely in my comfort zone of commercial product management, product P&L’s, pragmatic product management and, of course, lean start-up. Plus I’ve remained active in coaching and working closely with a number of the product managers and proposition team members during my time at Travelport. I’m focused right now on consulting engagements and finding one or two non-exec board roles. I’m convinced, however, that it’s going to be possible to create social and economic value from connecting the dots around cognitive biases and helping organisations and product managers build more effective messaging…and I have started to run some experiments, including lean start-up.

So, why Curious Cognition?

There are a few reasons. The first is the fact I have always had a very curious mind – I’m always reading something or listening to an audio book. A couple of years ago, I taught myself some iOS coding and built a few simple apps (following guides such as https://www.raywenderlich.com) as I thought it would be useful when discussing product requirements with developers – the fact it gets dark really early in the UK in the winter also helped! Second, I have always wanted to build my own product and I think I have some interesting ideas that I am working on right now. Nothing to share publicly at this stage but stay tuned to find out more on that front. The final reason is a little more personal; my own curious cognition is driven through the simple fact that I suffer from dyslexia – which is a blessing and a curse. Reading and writing English is a chore and even with spell checkers I still find it to be a real effort sometimes. I will often write things as I would say them, leading to verbose and unclear sentence structure.

On the bright side, modern technologies have good workarounds tools like www.grammarly.com, audio books and voice recognition. Other strengths include the fact that I build relationships with people quickly, have good verbal communication skills and an IQ of 139 the last time it was tested. I would describe myself as a horizontal thinker – I join things up other people don’t see, I am quite creative and I used to be a wiz at organic chemistry, in-fact anything requiring 3D visualisation or spatial awareness. The other thing dyslexia has given me is a strong work ethic and maybe a little overachiever’s syndrome and a fear of failure. When you’re the stupid kid in the class you have to work harder than everyone else and then, one day, you’re not the stupid kid anymore. But by then the damage is done, and the work ethic is set. It’s funny how the last few weeks have made me realise some of these defects in my character are very ingrained.

Inspiring leaders

So, after two years of successful storytelling, I am totally confident that storytelling is a better approach to conventional presenting. There is no shortage of evidence for the benefits and a number of inspiring leaders have been focusing on its virtues for some time. I believe in the power of authentic storytelling; narratives that come to life and stick in the hearts and minds of the recipients. And it’s the cognitive biases that are at the heart of that reason that it works. If you want to influence behaviour, consider creating a good story for your products, for your strategy, for your review, for yourself. Customers who have been won over by a good story are more likely to share it with others. And if you want people to remember you or your company, tell them a good, authentic story with all the details that give them a reason to care and reason to share it.

This is the first of my Curious Cognition blog articles – I would love your feedback. I know it’s a little longer then convention would recommend, but I have never been one to stick with convention.