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Managing PartnerPhenomena Communications

Dr. Ali Anani - Managing Partner

Dr. Ali Anani : As General Manager, Dr. Ali Anani heads and supervises a team of talented young professionals, and manages the overall brand strategy - ensuring the cohesiveness and creative parts of each campaign for all Agency clients.

Dr. Ali Anani holds a PhD from the UK (1972). He has a wide experience in many fields. His accomplishments include the writing of more than eighty publications in international journals, the writer of three printed books in Arabic and one E-book in English. He has written widely for the media and presented a TV program and many radio programs.

Dr. Anani main credit is his creativity thinking where he scored among the top %5 creative people worldwide. Dr. Anani is an invited lecturer for more than fi�y international conferences and an author of many business slogans. Moreover, he has travelled to more than fi�y countries as an invited speaker and consultant and has consulted for many international agencies including UNIDO, Atomic Energy Agency, UNDP, ESCWA, private businesses and governmental agencies.

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Dr. Ali Anani - Managing Partner

Dr. Ali Anani : As General Manager, Dr. Ali Anani heads and supervises a team of talented young professionals, and manages the overall brand strategy - ensuring the cohesiveness and creative parts of each campaign for all Agency clients.

Dr. Ali Anani holds a PhD from the UK (1972). He has a wide experience in many fields. His accomplishments include the writing of more than eighty publications in international journals, the writer of three printed books in Arabic and one E-book in English. He has written widely for the media and presented a TV program and many radio programs.

Dr. Anani main credit is his creativity thinking where he scored among the top %5 creative people worldwide. Dr. Anani is an invited lecturer for more than fi�y international conferences and an author of many business slogans. Moreover, he has travelled to more than fi�y countries as an invited speaker and consultant and has consulted for many international agencies including UNIDO, Atomic Energy Agency, UNDP, ESCWA, private businesses and governmental agencies.

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A Metaphor for Freezing Employees, or Whatever

End of Year «Self-Accounting»

Moments of Humanity

Why Some People Show Glass-Like Behavior to Miseries?

Questions Are Your Lenses

Love and Positive Positivity

For Every Trend There Is an Opposite Trend

The Many Faces of Change

Business Strategies Vary, but not towards people

How Not to Fail?

Simple; yet Great Concepts

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A Metaphor for Freezing Employees, or WhateverI was talking recently to a director manager who was unhappy about the attitude of one of his employees. The manager said «I want to fire him, but regulations require that I give him three warnings before I may fire him. What to do»? Suddenly, the manager said «I have an idea….I shall freeze him. What is your opinion, he asked me»? Wait, I said to the manager. «If you have one idea, I have more than one. Let me think about them».

Companies tend to freeze budgets, expenditure, employees, and certain activities such as recruitment. Are companies taking the right decisions in undertaking these freezes? Or, are they doing it the wrong way? Is there a metaphor to help us doing the right thing right? This posts offers answers to these questions.

Freeze employees as a way of punishing employees is a harsh one and could fire back. The word freeze sent me on different thinking paths and raised many questions in my mind. I found myself thinking of Rod King, Ph.D. -4Q Diamond Model. Who to freeze? Why to freeze? How to freeze? What to do with what you freeze? And the discovery journey started. The -4Q Diamond Model proved to be an excellent tool along the way.

Who to Freeze? Like not all fruits and foods in general are suitable for freezing, so are employees. If you disapprove freezing of employees say that sometimes this can be to the benefit of some. Not all freezing of employees is necessarily an evil. You must know the suitability of a fruit before freezing before freezing. Likewise, we need to know who of the employees is fit for «freezing». One critical question on answering who to freeze in general

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is what you want to use the frozen product post to freezing. For example, cabbage, radish, parsley and other vegetables are not suitable for freezing to be used as raw salads. These vegetables oxidize quickly and give bad aroma and color and form limps. So, are some employees if you freeze them they turn worse than before freezing?

One other criteria of answering who to freeze is to determine the water content of the candidate product for freezing. Water becomes ice which has more volume than water upon freezing. You need to «water them down» before freezing them. Some employees may be need similar treatment; otherwise their self-watered ego might crack the surrounding if frozen prematurely.

You have bad employees that you consider like rotten eggs? Well, you need to remove the crest of eggs before freezing them. You may freeze eggs for one year. May be you want to freeze an ‹egg-like» employee for a year, but remember you have to «use» them as soon as you thaw them. Thawed eggs must be eaten right away.

Why to Freeze? Having decided on who to freeze (it could be employees, budgets, recruitment or whatever) it is time to answer the question: why to freeze? If an employee is getting too ripe to handle at the moment may be h/s is a good candidate for freezing. Only fully ripe bananas are suitable to freeze instead of throwing them away. Bananas that aren›t fully ripened aren›t suitable for freezing as freezing shall not make them sweeter. If one of your employees has reached the maximum «sweetness degree» possible, h/s may not soon be fit for the work. Instead of getting rid of them freeze them because you may need them later for specific tasks. Think always of the future consequences of what you may do today. You have a legitimate answer to the why question of freezing «over-ripened employees».

How to Freeze? Having answered who and why questions we then move to the how question. Not all freezing is done the same way. Back to bananas there are three ways of freezing bananas, and if you click this you shall be able to watch videos on how to do that. Without getting into the technology, suffice here is to say know how to do what you do.

What to Do with the Frozen Items? Understanding the value of this question is of paramount importance. It is like freezing milk. This will be lumpy when you thaw it, so freezing it is not the best idea if you want to drink it straight. If you›re planning to use the milk in cooking, however, thawed milk can work. What are you going to do with the frozen employee, budget or whatever is a valuable question to consider.

You consider freezing your relationship with:

Then I hope this post is for you.

To dear Dr. Rod King, Ph.D.- I thank you for introducing me to your inspiring -4Q Diamond Model. If I fail to put it to good use, you may consider «freezing» me.

your spouse your friends your activities for LinkedIn your interest in reading

your visits to the gem your expenditure, or whatever crosses your mind

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End of Year «Self-Accounting»The year 2015 is nearing its end. I normally do why I term «Self-Accounting» to review what I accomplished, identify limiting factors for more success (or, less failures and how to learn from them). As I am writing this post for LinkedIn, the idea of what assessing my presence here came up. I decided to share my thoughts with the readers as some of my experiences might be relevant to other readers.

Looking back in the rear window I find that one of my reversed decisions was to quit writing for LinkedIn because of an observed a falling trend of readers of my posts. I learnt a big lesson from that decision: not to assume without solid proofs. Never a post attracted so many comments like this one. I have never learnt so many lessons as I learnt from this post. A second big lesson is learning what I can do or do not; what to expect and not what to expect. As a writer I need to select seed ideas of value and of relevance to the readers› community and plant it (publish it) in the right time. What happens afterwards is beyond my control and better also to put beyond my interest. You never know when a seed shall germinate. I expressed some of these ideas in a presentation that in fact I addressed to myself.

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Life isn›t only painful lessons; it is also delightful rewards. It is when we magnify the pain and belittle the rewards that we become pessimistic. Worse, if we surrender to pain and forget that turning pain to delight has a great value. It is from the big pains of failing that most enjoyable successes emerged. I had my share of pains on LinkedIn. Misunderstood comments are examples of what I mean. I experienced this very recently. One of my posts was shared on The Group «Power through Collaboration» under the title «Leadership Wine» and shared by the respectful lady Vijaya Sawant,PMP, OCP. One comment caused a fury because it sounded as if it claimed that II stole the post from another article that was published later them mine! How could somebody steal from unpublished work? It turned out that the commenter was referring to herself using the word stealing instead of quoting. Writing is a way of communication and if done wrong or in a foggy way can be dangerous. What lesson I learnt is to verify before acting. In the minutes of anger we may destroy relations, which may become later difficult to re-build. Beware of exfoliating small issues into difficult ones.

Life isn›t also painful lessons; it is also delightful rewards. It is when we magnify the pain and belittle the rewards that we become pessimistic.

To write is to express opinions. People might agree with the writer and might disagree. I have encountered both. It is nice if people would agree; it could be much nicer if you learn from disagreements. I had an idea about toxic people in which few readers disagreed. They were of the opinion that the environment is only toxic; people are not. The work culture could be the main promoter of toxicity. Why blame employees who got intoxicated by such an environment? Is it any different room somebody living in a humid place filled with fungi and then this person turning damp? Or, if putting healthy apples in a toxic atmosphere and then the apples get rotten? Is it the employee or the work environment? I softened my views on this issue.

Differences should lead to better understanding if put those differences in a healthy discussion environment. If not; differentness may become toxic.

There is the delight of having been part of the Group «People-Before-Profit». I have been an active part of this group because of my firm believe that people come first. Invest in people like you invest in your kids and that shall be the best investment. People are the source of ideas, growth, and profits. As an author it is readers who I write for. I don›t write to make profit. But if people believe in me and trust me enough then they may buy my new book and I make profit. Profit before people is like putting the cart before the horse. Simply, it doesn›t work.

My treasure of connecting with hundreds of thinkers has been a prime source of energy for me. I say thank you and happy new year to all my friends here- too many to name.

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Moments of HumanityI am sure that you experienced such moments in which you read something and you feel your body shaking and your passions flowing. This happened to me an hour ago while reading this» The poor boy that refused to take food saying that he is used to hunger and instead asked the donor to feed another boy who could not tolerate hunger». I extracted it from a post by Kartic Vaidyanathan. This feeling was soon to be doubled while reading another post by Lisa Gallagher in which she wrote «Unfortunately, after people lose someone they love most people go on with their lives and forget that the person they care for deeply is still in so much pain».

Two scenes showed two different human behaviors to miseries. When a common disaster attacks a society this disaster becomes the glue that binds people together. People show solidarity and the disaster brings them to the edge of their creativity and generosity. It is apparently different when one person runs through difficult times. People show passion, but just for a while and soon the passion wades.

Social disasters have their momentum. The greater the scale of the disaster is, the greater the momentum of response. The effect of TV reports and social media interactions cause havoc and people rush to help. It is not the same for individual disasters as they gather much less momentum. It rests on individuals to accept personal losses with a spirit. It is the

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realization that we one day a partner shall leave or pass away. Separation is the ultimate destiny. We aren›t immortal on this earth. Being ready in advance to accept facts of life is the pre-requisite for handling difficult personal crisis.

The holidays are drawing nearer and may be this is a well-timed post. It is during these times that we should care. The sudden swings from high plans for traveling with a partner on a Xmas holiday turn to great pain should the partner pass away. But it happens occasionally. There is no denial of this fact. It is being ready for crises that empowers us and give us more resilience.

We plan for parties, birthdays, celebrations and happy times. We don›t do the same for bad times. This makes us feel that all our days are rosy and filled with joy. The higher the expectations are, the tougher is experiencing a crisis or a tragic death of a beloved one.Do we need to «condition» our thinking to better suit hard times when they arrive? I say, yes.

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Why Some People Show Glass-Like Behavior to Miseries?To start with I challenged myself to write this post. I am trying to answer if we have a choice in changing our response to miseries, or if it is like our fingerprints leaving us with no choice..

Social networks are changing the landscape of businesses and our lives. We used to discuss value chains for offline businesses; now extended to include online businesses. We used to see mostly linear growth of social connections. Now we experience exponential growth of social networks and interruptions by social networks. The famous Twitter Curve testifies to wham I am saying. Global teams are becoming more like crossed-linked chains. We are entering an area of chain building and quite rapidly. A tweet might easily grow into chains of tweets.

The growing trend of chains formation shall create certain challenges. Building chains shall bring along many new phenomena. They are like chains of polymers as they exhibit different properties at different conditions such as varying temperature.

The one property that attracted my eye is the similarity between the behaviors of polymeric chains and exponential growth. They tend to have similar shapes. Polymeric chains may turn upon cooling to certain temperatures into brittle glassy. The general shape is like below, where the intersection of the extrapolated linear part and the exponential part is the temperature where polymers become glass-like. Will, the Twitter Curve, show a similar

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glass point if tweets reach an exponential rate followed by a chilling spell?

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Changing behavior from a glass-like polymers to rubbery materials depend on many factors. The backbone structure has a great influence on this behavior. The more rigid, the backbone is, the more likely the material to exhibit glassy behavior and not change a rubbery one upon heating. Is this what we are witnessing in many organizations that have solid structures that shatter like glass when hammered? They are very immobile and when exposed to hammering risks they are too heavy to move. These organizations need to «lubricate» their structure so as to allow more mobility and greater resiliencies to impacting risky changes in the business environment.

Social networks have a tendency to form long-tail distributions. These long tails have two main regions: the long tail and the short head. Two regions are interacting. The long tail region dictates the strength of the network whereas the short head houses the hub of closely connected bodies. Heavy connections mean action region or zone. Will the two regions show a glass like behavior that turns into a rubbery one or the very strong connections would prevail such that the whole network would act like a glassy one? Would members with influence act on their own leaving the «lubricating» mobile members away? Should this happen the network would shatter like a glass board beaten by a hammer?

Human bodies contain so many polymers. For example, it is estimated that the human body to have 100,000 different proteins. Proteins are polymers. The question that hovers over my mind with such variety of polymers in the human body is their distributions similar in all of us? Or, are they different that they may exhibit different performances? Is the rigidity of some people related to the polymeric components of their bodies that in some show more rubbery characters and glassy characters in others? Human have different capacities to cope with miseries. Miseries are the hammers that beat our bodies. Some people shutter into pieces and others absorbs them like a rubber absorbs shocks. How then can we improve the resilience of human to shocks the way we improve the performance of materials to absorb shocks?

I just wonder if the rigidity of humans has to do with the type and distribution of polymers in their bodies! Or, do humans show performance curves that go from glassy characters into rubbery ones, but these curves are like fingerprints distinctive to each individual?

What do you think?

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Questions Are Your LensesIt is amazing how authors change their paths of writing. I wasn›t considering writing a new post till after New Year. However; two posts by dears Rod King, Ph.D.and Sara Jacobovici got me thinking. Their effect became like a wind blowing my mind and here I find myself writing.

Rod King, Ph.D wrote a great presentation on SlideShare that merits every reader›s attention. The presentation titled «SUPERSMART LEARNING TOOLS for Lean Startups: Volume 1 - Six Question (Q) Templates shows great uses of the questions Who, Why, How, What, When and Where. The idea of arranging those questions as a hexagonal prism or crystal popped up as I shall expand later. Almost during same time I read the post by Sara titled «The most exciting attractions are between two opposites that never meet». This is a profound post that is extremely illuminating. From the post I quote the following «This sparked a connection for me with the theme of opposites which appear in the posts of Ali Anani.

In a way, opposites are the “binocular rivalry” that occurs emotionally and psychologically. We tend to resolve the challenge of being overwhelmed by trying to hold two opposites, through a similar process of suppression. We experience one as the dominant opposite and it becomes the perspective through which we will “see” the issue at hand». Binoculars are simply two telescopes side by side, one for each eye. But there›s a catch. When light rays from a distant object pass through a convex lens, they cross over.

The way light bends when it goes from air to a different material (such as water or glass) is called refraction. Are questions the binocular, or are they the lenses of a binocular? I find

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myself thinking and loudly.

The way light bends when it goes from air to a different material (such as water or glass) is called refraction. We tend to diverge on different paths and then converge on the most promising one. Questions are therefore like convex lens because they do the same with light as convex lenses to converge scattered light. Concave lenses act oppositely to convex lenses. We need both types of questions. We need concave-like questions to send our thinking in different directions and then convex-like questions to converge our thinking and focus it in one direction. The beauty is also related to how we arrange the lenses in front of each other or by having them side by side so as to get different views. We can also start by the six questions mentioned above by having arranging them as hexagonal.

Questions can refract the light of ideas crossing our minds and lead us to many exciting findings. For example, they may show us the sundog of refracting the light coming from delightful emotions.

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So are questions that may be arranged like an opal crystal. As opal shows us different light from different angles, it is the question that we may ask how to refract this phenomenon that expands our thinking horizons.

But is refraction caused by questions a simple issue? No, as the most important optical property of ice, which causes spectral variation in the reflectance of snow in visible and near-infrared wavelengths, is that the absorption coefficient (i.e. the imaginary part of the refractive index) varies by seven orders of magnitude at wavelengths from 2.5-0.4 micrometers. Normally, the index of refraction is expressed as a complex number, n+ik. There are real and imaginary parts of the refractive index for ice and water. The beauty here is that complexity has an imaginary part as complex systems do. We need to ask questions that deal with the complexity of what we investigate. Equally important is asking questions allowing our imagination to have a key role so as these questions may truly act as refractors. Imaginary numbers need imaginary questions. How correct Einstein was when he emphasized the value of imagination!

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Love and Positive PositivityThe last thing on my mind was to write a post during holiday seasons. A message from dear Jean L. Serio, CPC moved me with its spirit, passionate and kindness. I find myself so energized that I couldn›t resist writing this post. It is the effect of I call «positive Positivity».

I discussed negative negativity two year ago in my presentation titled «The Iceberg of Opposites»

In Slide 7 I showed how negative thinking coupled with negative feelings may lead to stressing the body and very rapidly. The combination of two negative feelings such as feeling of guilt and despair may accelerate rapidly this process.

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A year later I read a post was published which highlighted negative negativity and its impact on our lives such as marriages. The post based itself on the work of Dr. John Gottman in which he developed a sophisticated method of analyzing a typical conversation between spouses and looking for certain cues and trends that reveal the underlying emotional dynamics and habits of thinking. Gottman’s method allows him to listen to an hour of conversation and predict, with %95 accuracy, whether the couple will still be married in 15 years. As much as negative negativity is harmful; still it has one advantage in that it is accompanied by developing patterns of habits that enabled Dr. Gottman to identify. Gottman discovered that for a marriage to endure there must be at least a five-to-one ratio of positive to negative emotion in the couple’s interactions. He also discovered that the presence of certain key emotional indicators, and mainly contempt is a sure sign that a marriage is in trouble and unlikely to survive. Of interest is Dr. Gottman›s finding that «where the amount of negative emotion in the couple›s interactions crosses the magic threshold and hardens into something that carries them inexorably towards increasing conflict and eventual divorce. This is consistent with the my prediction as outlined in the presentation mentioned above. Chögyam Trungpa , who first coined the term «Negative Negativity», explained it as « our tendency to spin out our negative thoughts and feed them so that they snowball into neurotic patterns that take control of our lives in subtle or gross ways». My friend Dr. Edward Lewellen will surely have a contribution to make here.

My search for the term «positive Positivity» did not show any mention of it. It should happen whenever we allow positive feeling to interact, instead of negative feelings that lead to negative negativity. It is amazing that I failed to find such a term used in spite the established value of positive thinking and its rewards. We are living in a world what hatred is mounting, enmity is on the rise and the negative negativity is fostering its impact on our lives. Negative negativity is not only responsible for breaking marriages; it is also breaking societies, cooperation and global understanding. The only way to offset it is by filling our lives with love to others and mix love with care, honesty and all good feelings and actions. The mounting of global hatred makes the declaration of the People-Before-Profits Group and its forthcoming conference next May a truly global opportunity to promote love among people.

These hopes are not mirages as they are fostered by scientific research. I quote one reference of relevance here. «In fact, the biggest benefit that positive emotions provide is an enhanced ability to build skills and develop resources for use later in life. Fredrickson refers to this as the «broaden and build» theory because positive emotions broaden your sense of possibilities and open your mind, which in turn allows you to build new skills and resources that can provide value in other areas of your life.

Loving people is the way to move forward in life.

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For Every Trend There Is an Opposite TrendI am writing what I believe is a daring post. I am trying to link different concepts from different disciplines and see what inquisitive results we get.

My starting point is there is an opposite trend for each trend in an attempt to keep the balance. This is in accordance with Newton›s Law that there is a reaction for every action; in this case it is there is an opposite trend for each trend. I discussed this issue in a featured SlideShare presentation on «Trends Spill-Over Effect». I strongly recommend that you go through the presentation to read the rest of this post with hopefully more keenness.

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One of the major shifts is the trend to move from normal distribution to long-tail distribution. A probability distribution is said to have a long tail, if a larger share of population rests within its tail than would under a normal distribution. Don›t we observe a similar skew in the directional selection mode of adaptation, as suggested by Darwin? There are four major modes of adaptations. These are:

Directional selection:Traits at one end of a spectrum of traits are selected for, whereas traits at the other end of the spectrum are selected against. Over generations, the selected traits become common and the other traits become rarer and rarer until they’re eventually phased out. Stabilizing selection:This type eliminates extreme or unusual traits. The best adapted individuals are those with the most common traits, which maintain the frequency of common traits in the population. Over time, nature selects against extreme variations of the trait. Disruptive selection:The environment favors extreme or unusual traits and selects against the common traits. Over time the traits at opposite ends of the trait spectrum dominate Sexual selection:Females increase the fitness of their offspring by choosing males with superior fitness; females are therefore concerned with quality. Males contribute most to a species’ fitness by maximizing the quantity of offspring they produce

As there are four modes of adaptations, there are four modes of social cycles. These four modes are shown in the figure below:

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If interested, I discussed these four cycles in my presentation below:

http://www.slideshare.net/hudali15/law-of-comments-cycle.

The question is: are the four social cycles in synchronism with the four modes of adaptations?

The long-tail distribution is a directional one in which niche products and services are the real profit generators. It is the creative ideas and the innovations based on them that derive the major profits. This implies that we are in the Intellectual Cycle. There are smart business people around who can «smell» the fragrance of upcoming opportunities. They create a new business environment in which the «fittest» products are those that the acquisitors see fit. It is the Rule of Wealth in operation. Is this cycle equivalent to the Sexual Selection adaptation mode as we enter the age of «marrying ideas to investors»? I believe so.

The real meaning to disruption then is NOT to disrupt the market with new technologies as much as it is social disruption resulting from the advancement of technology and accumulation of wealth by a few percentage of population. Disruption occurs because of laborer) upheaval in search for more equality of profit distribution, better wages and work conditions. This is equivalent to the Disruption Selection of the Adaptation Mode. Disruptions resulting from the Arab Spring started in Tunisia by the killing of a poor salesperson.

«The real meaning to disruption then is NOT to disrupt the market with new technologies as much as it is social disruption resulting from the advancement of technology and accumulation of wealth by a few percentage of population»

Disruption Adaption lasts for short time spans as the Rule of Force social cycle begins to restore order. This cycle is equivalent to the Stabilizing Selection of adaptation.

Businesses entering new territories with new products have to adapt. Do these adaptations follow the four social cycles and are these cycles in effect reflecting the four modes of adaptations as well? I tend to say yes.

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The Many Faces of ChangeDiscoveries, theories, models, paradigms, habits, facts, opinions and beliefs change over time. Change itself has different faces and some of our habits, for example, become obsolete or may adapt to the new environments. Not all changes have the same rate as some changes may be sluggish or very fast and in between moderate rapidity of change. I wonder if these ranges of changes may be accommodated in a normal distribution, for example!

Examples serve to clarify points of view. Aristotle led people to believe for thousands of years that four elements make all matters on earth. These are: water, fire, earth and air. It was only when Priestly discovered Oxygen that this theory fell apart. This is what I call «conclusive change» because it made previous theories totally obsolete.

There are changes that build on previous findings without eliminating them completely. We encounter this type of change quite frequently in studying human-related issues. I find that social theories are like moving sand- always unstable and subject to further changes. Is it right to call them «sandy changes»? To elaborate by example, let›s take teams and their developmental stages. Psychologist Bruce Tuckman first came up with the memorable phrase «forming, storming, norming, and performing» in 1965. Later in 1977, he added a fifth stage which he called adjourning (mourning). This is ‹building on» type of change because the original theory remained the same. However; the arrangement of these phases of change are subject to continuous changes «conformational changes». For example, to include the type of social interactions in each stage the following representation of team developmental stages was suggested:

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Reference- http://www.slideshare.net/perspectum/-5stages-of-group-development-norms-tuckman3/16474067-

Like the four wheels of a car in balance, the idea of arranging the four basic stages of team development so that they may keep the balance of the team (equivalent to car) is possible. This is as shown below. Here, I returned to the original four stages of team forming. This arrangement may appeal to dear Dr. Edward Lewellen and dear Isabella Wesoly and may at least in part respond to their comments on the dynamics of change.

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I strongly recommend reading Slide 7 in the embed presentation below to further understand the dynamics of teams stages.To show more the dynamics of team formation and the complexity of their possible interference it would be possible also to put the four stages of team formation on a three-dimensional graph.

The presence of four blocks or four stages is quite common in business and social domains. For example, the four blocks of The Blue Ocean Strategy Raise versus Reduce and Eliminate versus Create may be arranged similarly.

The great thinker dear Edward Lewellen commented on my previous post on For Every Trend There Is an Opposite Trend by saying «So, I wonder, are the four Modes of Adaptation and the four Modes of Social Cycles an illusion of reality based on prior thinking? As you show in your SlideShare, there are many underlying (quantum) elements causing new definitions, even to the word Creativity. If that is the case, instead of stating that there are trends which balance each other, could it be that there are totally new trends arising from within the things we know, or don›t»? This is a profound comment and I am trying to offer some insights. But again dear friend change of insights is also possible.

I dedicate this post to my spiritual brotherly friend Dr. Edward Lewellen and dear Isabella Wesoly for they know how to engage my mind and keep it restless.

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Business Strategies Vary, but not towards peopleThey say nothing is permanent, but change. In business we have approaches of fixed prices versus variable prices. Or, to apply a fixed strategy versus a dynamic strategy that evolves with time. Or, to «fix» employees in one job versus rotating them so as the employees may gain different expertise even on the expense of falling productivity early on. The examples are too many, but the idea of using a fixed approach or a revolving one is worthy of consideration.

Businesses have competitions. Would a business follow one strategy that defines its direction? Or, better use a strategy that may evolve with time or change as the business arena dictates? There are few basic competition strategies for businesses, in emulation of plants. Businesses compete mainly for:

Customers, Raw materials, New Markets and Talents

The equivalent four competition sources for plants are: air, light, nutrients and water. Plants

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employ different strategies. These are:

Grouping Strategy- in which plants act collectively to scare off a herbivore. No single plant could do it on its own.Dispersing Strategy- by which plants use wind, fury animals and other means to spread their seeds to other territories. Avoidance Strategy- in which one plant eats some parts of competitive plants.Universal Adaptive Strategy- the plant uses not a fixed strategy, but an adaptive one to cover its needs for self-maintenance, growth and regeneration. It may tend to eclipse sunlight from other plants by growing higher to ensure fulfilling its adaptive strategy.

One great strategy for plants to achieve their adaptive strategy is through Mutualism. Mutualism is defined as an interaction between two species, plants, businesses or whatever to achieve mutual benefits. This is another facet of the Grouping Strategy in which small entities pool together to scare of a predator.

Great values are fixed and don›t divide. You can›t be %50 trustful; either you are or you aren›t. Same for business values either they are fully complied with or not. How then the efforts of new businesses would succeed in facing «eclipsing» from big giants or even getting eaten out? How would businesses with values putting people before profits survive in spite of the competition coming from all directions and from well-established business giants?

Logic says that big giants are more exposed to light, have their penetration roots, are better equipped with resources and got the «talents» to fight their battle?

Let me deviate here to give a real example that we are living. There are «sponsored» writers on LinkedIn that draw thousands of views and there are many authors that draw few hundred views or much less. How would small and «unsponsored» authors find their way? Those authors have one fixe value- to keep ethics and not lose their self-value in finding their way through. It is Grouping Strategy that works and I have seen many posts written to pool the efforts of «poor» writers so as to have mutualism between them and to scare off, if needed «readers-eaters».

That is the strategy for the group of small writers as much as it is the strategy for «People-Before-Profits» Group. It is the ethical grouping of small players whose combined efforts shall take them to the sunlight to shine light for others. Noble and humanly-based values shall survive.

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How Not to Fail?A friend of mine sent me a message asking me why I thrive on the concept of People-Before-Profit (PBP) as evidenced by my several posts on this topic. He then showed concern that I might be on «a sinking boat».

I have a strong belief that we only fail if we don›t have enough determination to succeed and that correct concepts shall finally emerge victorious. But success isn›t a random thing; it needs sustained dedication and effort. What does it take to achieve the objectives of putting people before profit and as a natural dividend profits shall follow?

Success bases itself on facts. One fact is that success is not necessarily achieved only by numbers. In soccer it is not unusual to see a team of 10 players beating a team of 11 players. A small group of dedicated people can outsmart an opposing large group with hugely more members. How can this happen?

First- the small group has a purpose and a noble one. I have shown in my previous post «Purpose and Performance» the value of purpose in achieving high performances.

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I was very happy to read a document on the value of purpose in scaling up successful startups. In the document titled «Force Multipliers» it says:

Purpose = Profit

The same document identifies the three requirements for a startup to scale up. These requirements are:

A strong community An authentic purpose A flexible and adaptive leadership style

The purpose of the PBBP Group is noble. The leadership is heavily adaptive and flexible to new ideas and strategies.

It is building the community that remains a cornerstone in scaling up PBP into a global force. Here, it is important to make as many units as possible and in different regions that shall make the PBP force of enough momentum to achieve its goals. In one of my presentation titled «Marketing and performance multiplier force» I explained that having say ten units rather than say five units means a difference in force equal to:

75 = 25 - 100 = 2^5 - 2^10

That is to say having ten units gives 75 times more force than having only five units. It is the strategy of establishing as many purposeful units that shall overcome the initial low membership of the group.

A spirited person with a strong engagement for what he/she is doing will also go a great way in passing the chasm of growing into a global power. It is the synergistic effect of combining purpose, establishment of network of small units around the globe that exchange information, knowledge, expertise with sheer engagement and commitment that make dreams come true so as not fail to reach their vision.

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Simple; yet Great Concepts

Alone you are weak; with dedicated people you are strong. A company might feel powerful, but it is as strong as its weakest point. Many companies that were giants one day are now gone. It is what I call the «Strength Blindness». Strength turns into weakness that becomes vulnerable for competitors. Kodal for example lost its footage when turned blind to the advancement of the electronic camera and soon was almost phased out. Some companies forget that customers aren›t only the main source of revenue; equally important they are the source of new product ideas. I still remember while attending a summer course at MIT in the eighties that research there showed that almost %75 of business ideas come from customers. Customers are people and not machines and neglecting people is a recipe for cracking of any businesses.

The reputation of companies is a crucial element in their success. I remember doing a survey few years ago in which I asked the surveyed to mention the name of the three banks that top their mind. Almost one bank was mentioned %85 of the times first and second. Upon doing further research it turned out that the bank never failed to pay back deposits even though the bank lost some branches because of wars. The reputation of the bank proved to be the treasure to attract more deposits. The bank walked the way to meet the needs of its customers and that is still keeping it as a leading bank in our region. Again, excellent reputation means peoples› trust and hence more business.

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One painful fact that failing companies do is to forget also that loyal customers recommend them and customers with bad experiences repel other customers from doing business with companies that harmed them. Bad experiences are like losses and people are scared more from loss than profit. Customers with bad experiences talk much louder than satisfied customers. It is provoking how some companies fail to realize these basic facts and only to find that their companies cracked because of lack of cash. No cash causes crash. Instead of satisfying their customers some of the falling companies tend to sell inferior products, give false promises, fail to deliver on time, and refuse to replace sold inferior products and a long list of wrong doings. The result is a down spiral of their reputation and eventual death.

I suggested a -3level approach to maintain customers by offering a unique metaphor to do that. I recommend strongly the read of the presentation below.

Again, customers are people. Strengthening the connection between businesses and their customers and entangling this relationship is the surest way for customers to continue doing business with their trusted business partners. It is the mutualism between and businesses the surest way for the longevity of any business. Plants and fungi do it and their roots networks entangle so much that it shall be very difficult for an outsider to find the key to unlock the mutually benefiting relationship between the two. Is there a better guarantee for a relationship to last? It is the creative businesses that find ways of strengthening the relationship with its customers that shall be successful. No strong relationship shall be based on robbing people, fooling them and losing their trust. See the presentation below on how to build mutualism with your customers.

The new formula for a business to succeed is to be great to people and create a relationship of mutualism with them. This is the best antibiotic from the hostility of the others and even a business hostility to itself.

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BalancingOpposite

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BalancingOpposite

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