How do you evaluate talent

I had an opportunity recently to attend a session host by Compugen Inc., a leading IT Service provider in Canada. put on by Jamie Scarborough, Founding Partner, Sales Talent Agency. The guest speaker was Jamie Scarborough, Founding Partner, Sales Talent Agency. In the session, we all agreed that people are and will always be the real and most important asset for any organization that seeks sustainable growth.

Jamie shared how his company evaluates talent which can be categorized from two perspectives: Talent and Experience. He summarized the concept of three letters – DNA when evaluating people from a talent perspective. 

1. Drive – Goal-oriented and resilient.
2. Nature – emotional intelligence. How well candidates can fit into the existing environment.
3. Acumen – business acumen. i.e. whether a sales candidate can make a profitable sale. Rather than sell a product directly. Candidates can sell a valued solution to customers from which they will earn a higher gross margin. This is the so-called “solution selling”. 

From an experience perspective, Jamie utilized the acronym “PRO” to select the right people.

1. Performance history – whether the candidates had a proven track record in the past.
2. Relevancy – Whether the candidates have similar work experience.
3. Opportunity – opportunity management.

As for opportunity management, Jamie gave a 3-year talent benchmark that an employee should stay with a company for at least three consecutive years. In the first year, an employee needs to adapt to the new environment, learn the corporate culture and build positive relationships with colleagues. In the second year, they become familiar with the company processes and start to make a profit. In general, people make reasonably good profits in the third year. If an employee leaves a company within 3 years, the company is at a loss, given the training and resources that allocated to the employee.

On the other hand, how a company can attract talented people? In my opinion, a company should create an open environment and offer the following:

• Executive support.
• Allow mistakes – trial and experiment to identify the optimal methods for a chosen project.
• Buy-in/positive reinforcement from key stakeholders.

Can Xiaomi smartphone business model last?

Xiaomi is now the world’s third largest smartphone producer, followed by Lenovo and LG according to IDC. Samsung remains in first place, followed by Apple Inc. Xiaomi passed Apple and Samsung to become the best-selling smartphone provider in China in the second quarter of 2014, according to Canalys , a research firm. Xiaomi sold 61.1 million phones representing approximately $12 billion in revenue in 2014.

As the CEO of Xiaomi, Lei Jun summarized its successful model in  the following three main areas:

1. Hardware assembly: all components are of superior quality. For example, the chip is produced by highly regarded Qualcomm. The screen is from Sharp and the smartphones are assembled through Foxconn, the same assembler that builds for Apple smartphones. The quality of Mi phone is equivalent to that of Apple or Samsung smartphones.

2. Customers/Fans deep involvement: for example, when Xiaomi developed its operating system, it listened to the requirements from its fans and took the feedback seriously, including same  in the actual development process. 

3. The price is cheaper. Xiaomi smartphones are sold online in order to reduce distribution costs. The gross profit is very low. The selling price is close to its cost generating a modest margin. Xiaomi makes money through volume sold.  

The combination of the three areas is the so-called Xiaomi smartphone business model. Is this business model sustainable? Let’s compare it with Apple’s business model. For any product, it should follow the 6+1 industrial chains including the following six areas plus manufacturing:

1. Product design 
2. Raw material purchase 
3. Inventory and shipping 
4. Order management 
5. Wholesale    
6. Retail sale

The profit from manufacturing is very low, as we all know. The real profit lies in the 6 areas. Apple takes control of all 6 areas, but outsources manufacturing to Foxconn. In contrast, Xiaomi does not control product design. It is the origin of all kinds of problems. If you have used a Mi phone, you know it constantly has the problems such as crashing, overheating, camera giving off a red image and a periodic echo. The phone operates slower and slower over time and therefore you have to buy a new one every year. 

According to a market research, people who really like Mi phone only accounts for 23% of the users. But those who like Samsung or Apple smartphones account for 80%+. The main reason is because of bad user experience emanating from poor product design. 

Smartphone success is not as simple as assembling components. In my opinion, in order to succeed in the manufacturing field, a company must control all 6 of the industrial chains. Lack of any component will cause problems in the long run.

If you are interested in Xiaomi smartphone business model, you can click here to view what Hugo Barra, Vice President of Xiaomi Global said about it.

Tai Chi - a gentle way to keep healthy

Tai Chi Quan is one of the most famous martial arts in China. It was founded by a Wu Dang  master Zhang San Feng in 12^th century. Tai Chi Quan is widely practised by people of all age groups across China and has been for many centuries. In fact, 24-form  or 42-form Tai Chi Quan (simplified forms) class is offered at most Chinese universities nowadays. 

Why Tai Chi Quan is decidedly popular in China and in many overseas countries? I had an opportunity to learn Wu Dang style Tai Chi Quan, which includes 108 forms and over 700 movements, ten years ago. Based on Chinese traditional medical science, the thesis is that a disease is caused by inner energy flow blocks. Therefore, according to the master Taoist, all the movements of Tai Chi were designed to help human being’s enhance their inner energy system to flow smoothly and for people to breathe deeply. 

The essence of Tai Chi is to help people return to their natural state. As we all know, when a baby is in the mother’s tummy, he/she relies on the navel to absorb nutrition. But after a baby is born, the navel function is obviously lost. Tai Chi helps people to rebuild the connection between nature and the human body through focusing on this pivotal part. 

When you do any Tai Chi movement, bear in mind the concept of Yin Yang and a cycle. The Yin Yang picture is based on a navel’s cross section. Every movement has to be as smooth as a consistent cycle. Pick your comfortable position. Don’t think too much, just follow the flow of your body and you will feel refreshed after the practice. It normally takes 36 minutes to complete the entire set of 108 forms. However, it varies dependent on each person’s own pace. There is no strict restriction regarding the speed. The optimal times to practice are between 7am to 9am or 7pm to 9pm. It is recommended that you start the movement facing south as our body is a magnetic subject. This direction is aligned with the magnetic direction of the earth.

To see real benefits of Tai Chi are only fully realized through persistence. Your body will let you know how good it is after 3 months if you practise it every day.

There are side benefits of doing Tai Chi. Take myself as an example, I became more focused and calm after practising Tai Chi for 10 consecutive years. It also teaches me that a person must be humble and unassuming. This leads to no resentment, just like a cycle. 

Don’t let the wrong correlation of cause and effect impact your decision-making

Causes and effects are the most often discussed topic from a personal, an organization or a government perspective.  However, often times in haste, or lesser quality analysis or other subtleties, we can get inadvertently make the wrong correlation between cause and effect.

Here are some examples: 

According to an analysis, banks found out that well-operated companies seem to borrow much more money than the less profitable companies. However, it is because a company’s financial condition is good that a bank is willing to lend money in the first place.

There is a hilarious real story that in 1990, a US laboratory reached the conclusion that spiders depend on their legs to listen. They had an experiment that they made some noises close to a spider’s legs and the spider ran away immediately. But after they cut its legs, the spider did not move.  The confusion was that without legs, their hearing was compromised. Even a child would realize that a spider cannot move without legs. 

In 1992, an American plasma physics laboratory conducted a research project about nuclear fusion. In order to convince the US government to continue to fund this project, the professor did some research and reached the conclusion that a nation uses a great amount of energy has a positive correlation with the longevity of a country. But we all know that there are many other factors that influence longevity. For example, a nation is a developed country and has better medical facilities and people can afford a healthy lifestyle, technology presents the opportunity for higher and longer economic advantage, .etc. 

The impact of false cause and effect correlation is substantial.  There are mainly two reasons why people allow this kind of bias to happen.

1. We tend to believe in previous knowledge and/or our past experience. However, in a rapidly changing era, what proved to be true in the past may not work under current circumstances. We need to be more open and allow for different possibilities.

2. We trust authority. During the French colonization, Vietnam had an infestation of rats. The French government decided to pay $$/rat to people who could kill rats. But the result was astounding that the number of rats increased because people raised rats and killed them to qualify to make money instead of catching them in the wild, which was the obvious target.

In an internet world, it’s much easier to make a false correlation between cause and effect. For example, some dishonest analysts promote that the price of a particular stock will increase the next day to 5,000 people and send another email saying that the price will decrease to another 5,000 people.  They continue to do the same for other stocks.

In the end, there will be a small group of people who would see the results are always correct. These people will trust that the organization can accurately predict the stock movement and may give these dishonest analysts, who are engaged in illegal activity, their hard earned money. Once the criminals receive the money, they will disappear. 

Turning over a new leaf - an interesting team building activity to deal with change

When I worked with the Ministry of Government Services, I had the opportunity to attend a team building event. This event was designed to answer Ontario government employees’ perception that little or no change was taking place in the Ministry. The team building game is called “Turning over a new leaf”!  The concept was to demonstrate to team members that change is happening although you may not recognize it as such.

Here is how it plays: 8-10 people stood on a plastic cloth. The cloth can be of any material as long as it is large enough to provide each person with just enough space to stand up but it shouldn't be too big to make this game too easy to complete.  One person starts to turn the cloth upside down from one angle and ask another person next to him/her to step on the opposite side of the cloth. Gradually, each person moves to stand on the opposite side of the cloth until the cloth is completely turned over and everyone is standing on the opposite site of the cloth.

While turning over the cloth, some team members won’t be able to see what’s happening but they have to hold tightly on to other team members and trust that their peers are actually working on turning over the cloth and make sure everybody is standing on the opposite side one by one. If any team member steps off the cloth, the team is eliminated from the competition.

Here is a demonstration video.

Almost every organization is experiencing some sort of changes generated either by internally initiated actions or external influences. It is crucial to build team confidence through explicit innovative change management and also in less directive cycles that slowly we are making changes but we need patience. Leadership, buy-in, trust and fully support are required to make the change happen and ensure competitive superiority!

Why organizations need to react effectively and expeditiously in response to the challenge of new technology- A brief history of weaponry and its impact on military system

Why organizations need to react effectively and expeditiously in response to the challenge of new technology

-          A brief history of weaponry and its impact on military system

It is not uncommon for individuals in an organization to resist change. The resistance is primarily based on the facts that either people are not yet up to speed on the new system and work expectation or they feel threatened in that they will lose the status or role that they feel comfortable with.  It takes time for any company to adapt to new technology; however, If it does not change the mindset and adjust its systems, it will soon find itself far behind competition in short order.

Let’s take a look at the history of weaponry and its impact on a military system. The cold weapon divided into two general types.  The cold weapon such as knifes and spears were designed to fight within a short distance, whereas the javelin and bow were designed for long distance combat.  The choice of weapon often was based on the warrior’s physical strength as not all men could lift a heavy javelin and/or hit a target. The military system during cold weapon period really depended on the number of soldiers, the strong will of the troop and commander’s ability to lead the army. The movie BraveheartFreedom by Mel Gibson demonstrates this premise.

Firearms ultimately replaced the cold weapon. The arquebus was the first gun fired from the shoulder thanks to lockmaker. It was invented in Spain in the mid-15th century. Its effective range was less than 650 feet (200 m), however much greater than that of a bow and arrow. The arquebus was superseded by the larger musket in the mid-16^th century.  If you watched the movie “The Patriot”, you will recall that the army looked very different with colourful uniforms and marching in organized rows.  This military system at this point was based on musket structure as the bullets are added from the front down to the barrel. It was difficult to aim at the target with any accuracy, but the impact of an organized army marching together in rows and the opponent organized in the same fashion permitted improved accuracy and impact.  The army with stricter discipline often was the victor. This also allows more people with less physical strength to be able to be effective soldiers.

In 1866, the mauser came to market.  The bullet could be loaded from the back end of the gun. This allows gun barrel to be seamless and without smoke when fired.  This structure allowed the army to scatter and hide behind barriers and thus becoming more flexible and a more difficult target. During the British/American, Britain maintained the old military system but America used the new method. The British army became easy targets and lost the battle.

When the machine gun was developed, the military system changed dramatically. In the Battle of Somme, German troop set up machine guns every 100 metres for 40 kilometres.  This battle created record of killing 60,000 English soldiers within a day.  

Slow reaction to new technology can lead an organization or an individual to watching the competition from behind as they pass you by!

Love advice applies to Marketing in the business world

As I was surfing the internet the other day I accidentally came across a singles dating video presentation. Curiosity got the best of me and I decided to look in. The rather humorous theme was “How to make a guy (male) fall in love with you (female). But in spite of the trivial nature of the show, one point caught my attention. The thesis was “Rather than (females) chase a guy directly, the talk show offered some advice on how to get his attention and in a subtle fashion devise a strategy makes him chase you instead. On further thought, it struck me that this suggestion, albeit somewhat playful in the love arena, it very well has application in marketing in the business world.

The support for the approach and guidance to the ladies was:

What is your strength- there are many ladies out there who may have a better physical appearance, education and career .etc. However, every man has his own taste in women. And your job is to find out your unique attributes. Likewise, what is your company's competitive advantage that differentiates you from the competition?

Success lies in the details – some people may think polishing one’s nails is futile especially in the winter time. But success lies in the details. People opened Apple products and found out that the inside was a powerful presentation and art like! No matter which era we are in, product/service quality still matter.

Build a connection- one tip from the talk show is that try to build a connection with the guy. For example, you can ask the guy to share some interesting articles he has recently read or pursuits that he is actively engaged with you. If done with integrity and sincere fashion the connection may well be successful. How can you build a connection with your customers?

Make it interesting – they postulate in order to keep the guy’s attention you need to always to do something different and try not to let him know what you will do next. This can also apply to sustaining and advancing your customer base. Always think out of the box and offer superior unexpected features/services .etc.