November, 2007

Save money….keep things on schedule

We always here phrases or slogan such as “the world on time”, “on time arrival and departure”,
“On time delivery”,,, etc. Time is the most valuable commodity in the business world, and for that matter; time is the most valuable commodity for every successful individual. If time can be bought, it will be the most expensive item in the market.

Time Management for managers:

As a manager in a small firm, nothing more frustrating to me than missing a deadline. We are in the service industry and one of the advantages we are trying to maintain over our competitors is our on time service. When I joined my current firm, I noticed how much money the firm was losing due to missing deadlines.
We are in the IT industry and our major profit generators are our repair service and our onsite service. I noticed from the start that with proper “on time service” management, the firm could turn a good profit.

In order to establish a better “on time service”. I knew I had to take the following steps:

1- Make a detailed list of all pending work orders and find out why there were delays.
2- Assign work orders to technicians that corresponded to their skill level.
3- Assess each technician skill level and inform the technician what deliverables are expected during a certain time frame.
4- Call back customers whose orders were delayed and inform them about new delivery dates and stick to the new dates.
5- Make it very clear to the manager on charge that delays will not be tolerated, only under unforeseeable circumstances.
6- Assign a part time trainee to go over work orders log each morning and inform site manager of any delays.
7- Create a culture with in the firm where each employee understands the value of on time performance.

The above simple steps resulted in:

1- 80% on time performance, up from only 30%
2- Turn around time was reduced from days to only hours in most cases
3- Profit increased by three folds
4- 150% increase in profit with only 50% increase in cost
5- Customer satisfaction is on the rise
6- Staff confidence level and job satisfaction are improving

As a manager, I felt a sense of satisfaction and relief knowing that my first few days as new manager resulted in a sizeable improvement in performance.

Customer service…it is all about attitude

In my opinion, customer service is a passion that not everyone has. Customer service is not only about delivering a service or product, but customer service must be an experience that should last with the client for a long time to come. We all have our share of a good and bad customer service experience; I have flown with some airlines where I wished the flight would last longer because of the atmosphere that flight crew created during the fight. On the other hand, on my last flight I couldn’t wait for the airplane to land, my seat was really uncomfortable, the food served was not adequate for such a long flight, and the flight attendant was annoyed because the passenger next to me didn’t understand English. As a client for the airlines, my last flight will come into mind the next time I fly and most probably I won’t fly with the same airlines.

As a manager, I keep this small example in my mind as I deal with customers on a daily basis. A customer has many options, and when a particular customer chooses to deal with you, he is actually choosing you over your competitors, so are you going to win him or lose him?

As a manger, I keep a close eye on customer service wherever I go. I keep my eyes open when I sit to eat in a restaurant, when I fly in an airplane, when I send a package, when I walk into a shopping mall, when I drive my car in the street,,,etc.

A restaurant chain I visited impressed me with their responsiveness, they had a customer complaints and suggestion box, if you drop their survey card in the box with a complaint, and you would get a call from their customer service department within hours. This restaurant chain is one of the most successful chains in Saudi Arabia; they are even competing with giants such as Macdonald in the Saudi Market. This restaurant chain is new in the food business and their food does not have that great taste, but as a customer I was fascinated by the quality of service. Each time I visit the place, I try to make notes of their service philosophy, I try to understand their competitive advantage and each time I find it in their great customer service.

Customer service is not a product you can deliver, but it is a culture that you nourish and build with your customers. In today’s economic climate, customer service has become such an important factor that even countries and not only corporations are eager to leave their visitors with the best experience possible.

As a manager, I am really concerned with customer service improvements at my firm; I know from experience that not every staff member will have the attitude to excel at customer service. You can train your staff to deliver good customer service, but you can not instill the service attitude in them. In your staff, you will need to find those few individuals who would go the extra mile to serve, Sit and build your customer service policy with them.

Managing During Disasters

You may have the best staff in world, you may have the best technology money can buy, you may have an unlimited budget, but when a disaster strikes, you better be prepared.

I learned a hard lesson yesterday, our phone system and the internet went down, and we were not reachable. Imagine being in the customer service business and your customers can’t reach you, what effect does an issue like this have on your customers and your business reputation.

Being in Saudi Arabia, I wasn’t at all prepared do deal with such a disaster. We called the phone company but more than 24 hours passed and we were still without phones. I thought something like this would be rare in today’s technologically advanced world, but I know now that I have to deal with facts and never assume anything.

We don’t have a disaster recovery plan, so what do we do to get back to our normal operation?

I had to act fast and my staff made huge efforts to keep things in running order.

This incident made me come up with some quick resolutions and put the “disaster recovery plan” on top of my “things to do” list.

We were able to manage by:

1- Making an extensive use of cell phones: although you can never use cell phones to run a business, not yet at least, we had to resort to our cell phones to stay in touch with our customers. We contacted out main clients and informed them about the situation. I asked the site manager to start to call all customers who have pending issues, to inform them about our status and assure them that we are on top of things.
2- One of our managers has a relative who holds a high position with the phone company so we asked him to get his contact involved and try to expedite a fix for our phone system.
3- I made sure all the staff was on location each day with a cell phone.
4- We hired our own electrician to check the phone lines, as we were waiting for the phone company technician to arrive.
5- I was on hand for any extra help.

Although this disaster was not hard to over come, it really alerted me to have a good communication system in place under a bigger disaster recovery plan. I already have a plan to make a solid “disaster recovery plan”, but I never felt the urgency to include a plan on how to keep work flowing while our phone system and internet were out.

We discussed an alternate phone system or internet connection, we can use mobile internet as a back up for our wired LAN. We need to keep good call back numbers for all our clients in case we have to initiate the contact. We will also consider including a mobile phone number in our company contact numbers in the instance of our land line malfunctioning. Also, we designated another location for our technicians if everything else fails.

This was a fast resolution for an unexpected problem; a fully detailed disaster recovery plan is a must for any organization. Many people may think “oh I am sure they have a good back up plan”, but you will be surprised by how many, large and small organizations, who don’t have a solid disaster recovery or back up plan in place.

Managing in an ever changing technical world

In my daily work, I am faced with the same question everyday, what next? Interaction with my staff, our clients, and reading the news, lead me to ask more questions. What new technology that I have to watch for? What skills my staff will need to develop over the next few months in order for them to remain technically competitive? How long the demand for our current skill set will will last?

As a manager, I must always be prepared for the next big technical trend and shift in demand. From my daily observation, I can see which skills will be in demand for few years to come and which skills will be in low demand.

Networking skills will be in high demand for few years to come, demands will include:

1-Network engineers of various skill levels from home networking to large corporate networks
2- Network equipments of various size and functionality from small routers which support few computers to fiber optic cables that span the globe.

Data back up will be in high demand too. I have seen the disasters that were caused by date lose; I have seen it at small firms as well as big corporations. The demand will be more noticeable with small businesses. Since much of the world is going digital, the traditional archiving using paper folders and steel cabinets is giving way to the more convenient digital archiving. Many small business need to be educated on the advantages of having their data backed up digitally, since sooner or later most of their business transactions will be done online 100%

I believe most small business owners will good potential clients for data backup technology if:

1-They were presented with easy to use and understand back up solutions
2-The solution is within their budget, which is possible since the price for backup equipment is dropping rapidly

VOIP is growing rapidly and eventually all phone communication will be done using Voice over IP technology. VOIP will lower the cost of long distance calls to almost nothing. Worrying about your long distance phone bill will be a thing of the past.

In my daily work, I have noticed the momentum the above three technologies is gaining, of course there are many other technical advances that are being achieved in other areas which also worth observing.

As I notice technologies that are gaining momentum, I see the demand is dropping or will soon drop for other technologies or equipments.

The prices of desktops dropped scientifically over the past two to three years. Today you could find a used brand name P4 computer in very good working condition with less than $100. These drops in prices will very soon lead to a drop in demands for desktop PC technicians. It will be cheaper for a customer to buy a new Desktop PC than to repair the not functioning one.

I haven’t used any official statistics in this article; I only reported my daily observations and my feeling about the future in my field.

Staff conflict resolutions: part2

Conflict in the work place must be dealt with immediately; otherwise the consequences would be difficult to overcome. Bear in mind that dealing with conflict is not an easy task. A balance between all parties involved must be maintained by you as a manager.
Begin with these following steps and you can add more to the list as needed for your particular setup:

You must identify the conflict: this is a critical step; you can not resolve a conflict if you do not know the root cause of the conflict. You must develop a deep understanding of the cause of the conflict and have separate meetings with all involved.

You must determine whether it is a personality issue or a work issue: some conflicts arise from issues that have nothing to do with the work environment such as (cultural conflicts, gender conflicts, and religious conflicts).

You must remain open minded and impartial: when you listen to each party, remember to be open minded and listen to facts and not emotions. Conflicts usually charge people emotionally which may lead some employees to distort the facts, is its imperative to remain focused on the issue and separate facts from opinions.

Give the parties a chance to resolve it between themselves: having all parties involved resolve the conflicts themselves will lead to a greater understanding between them which will help in avoiding future conflicts.

If the above steps don’t work, then go through them again to ensure verification of the issue and then come to a compromise. As a manager, you must make a compromise that would be fair to all parties involved. You may not be able to please everyone, your resolve must be fair, impartial and based on full understanding of the conflict and in line with your firm’s policies and procedures.

It is makes good managerial sense to have a grievance policy in place that allows staff and team members to have a platform for resolution.

Staff conflict resolutions: part1

One of the signs of a successful business is staff dynamics. Staff interaction could turn into a serious issue reflecting on the performance of the firm if the issue is not tackled in the early stages.
Almost every major corporation has specialists dedicated to manage staff conflict and ensure smooth interaction between employees at various levels. The size of your firm or the number of staff you manage, has no bearing, the potential for staff conflict is ever present.

As a successful manager, you must always bear in mind that there will be a source of conflict with any interaction between a group of people, human nature dictates this. You will be better prepared knowing what the signs and sources of potential conflict are.

Seniority conflict: in aviation there is a course taught by many airlines called” cockpit resource management”, this course was designed to keep the communications in the airplane cockpit smooth and eliminate any prejudice in the interaction between the pilot and the co-pilot. This course was developed because of the many fatal air craft accidents that were the result of seniority conflict between the senior airlines captain and the less experienced co-pilot. Many accidents would have been avoided had the captain listened to the continued warnings by his co-pilot.

Background conflict: in today’s global economy, it is common to find your staff made up of people with many cultural and religious backgrounds; this is an area open for potential conflict.

Gender conflict: there is general biased against women in managerial positions and many companies have tendencies not to hire women for IT positions.

Group conflict: various departments within the organization may compete for the same resources or one department may not communicate well with another department, which may have a serious impact on the work flow. Many universities today offer a degree program in “management information systems”, part of the program is to teach students how to facilitate communications between departments within the organization.

These are some major conflicts that I have experienced throughout my career; you may have experienced other types of conflict. As a manager you will need to maintain your calm and your objectivity as you deal with conflicts.

The next part of this article will go over some steps on how to deal with conflict within the work place.

How to release yourself from a contract

My daily tasks as manager of a small IT firm involves contract negotiations. I have to renegotiate contracts that were signed before I joined the firm, or were signed few days after I joined the firm. One of my major goals as general manager is to cut costs; my current staff need major training in cost cutting methods. A few days after I joined the firm, a major contact was signed to develop new software. The software was built to help technicians and the site manager to keep track of daily maintenance activities. I agreed to facilitate the project based on recommendations by the site manager. The site manager recommended a software developer to manage the project, which I later discovered lacked the skills to develop the software with the needed functionality.

Now it’s my job to cut the funding for the project and explain to the developer that his product is not meeting our expectations. How do I release our firm out of this contract without jeopardizing our reputation in the market as a company that keeps its promises to its clients and to its contractors?

I had to do a little homework and use my technical and programming skills to evaluate the software, which lacked the very basics. I also had to search in the local market, the local market in Saudi Arabia, for software with similar functionality so I could compare it with our software. This is called benchmarking research. It also gives weight to your argument.

I decided to stop the project when I discovered that the developer was asking a premium price for his work, which I believe was not done professionally to begin with.

I had a technical discussions with the developer over his work and I asked him some technical questions regarding his work which he failed to answer.

I asked him:

1- Do you have the requirements gathering document?
2- Are you familiar with black box testing?
3- Are you familiar with white box testing?
4- Are you familiar with user acceptance testing?

The developer was asking premium price for his work which I refused to pay, since his work was more of an immature programmer than a professional developer.

The lesson from the above article is: as a manager, it’s your duty to ensure that your firm is getting the best product for money paid. Don’t put up with sloppy work; learn how to negotiate your way out of a bad contract.

To negotiate yourself out of a contract, use the following tips:

1- Make sure that the other party has actually violated the terms of the contract
2- Do your homework, and become very familiar with all the technical aspects of the products - benchmark research
3- Be ready to prove to the other party why their work is not acceptable - be precise and give examples
4 -Make it clear to the other party that your time and resources were wasted
5- Keep it clear that the decision was made based on a professional review and not on a personal preferences

Managing costs - learn to save

As a competent manager, one of the areas where you can prove your ability is in cost reduction.
There is nothing more frustrating than unnecessary expenditures that get out of control. One thing that every business strives for is cash. There seems to be a constant demand for cash regardless of how large or small your business is.

As a manager in a small firm, I felt challenged by the unnecessary expenditures that were not geared toward generating profit. I also felt excited by this challenge, since controlling cost required simple but firm steps by management in teaching staff how to reduce cost. I developed the following strategies for my staff to follow:

1-Go green: you would be surprised by how much money a firm would spend on items like (coffee cups, paper towels, copy papers, cleaning supplies, etc.). I cut the spending of coffee cups to zero; each employee was giving a reusable company cup to use. The same went for other office supplies, but not to eliminate supplies all together, but to reduce consumption. You can train your staff to use less air conditioning and use cooling fans; it’s not only saving you money, but also helping the environment.

2-Renegotiate with your suppliers: constantly ask your suppliers for better prices, you would be surprised at how many suppliers are ready to renegotiate price with you, Many firms forget to constantly check with their suppliers for better deals, some of the supplying contracts may have been signed years ago, but no one seems to check the contracts for updating and reminding suppliers of their competitors for your business.

3-Do it yourself: it should be part of the firm’s culture to encourage employees to reduce cost by asking them to do simple tasks such as (changing light bulbs, changing filters, fixing minor computer and network problems, cleaning their desks, etc.), it may sounds non work related to ask your employees to do such tasks, but if you want to survive, you need to cut costs.

4-Reward your employees for participating in cost reduction: give small bonuses from the money you saved by reducing cost to your employees, this will show them the effects of reducing costs - and produce a graph for your employees to see how you are progressing and set targets so they can see how close they are to receiving a bonus.

In an increasing competitive and environmentally aware world, reducing cost and reducing consumption, will add great value to your firm.

Are you a Micro or a Macro Manager?

What is your management style? Are you a macro or micro manager? Where is it appropriate to use micro management and where is it appropriate to use macro management?

I think your company setup and your staff education level will detect what type of management is more appropriate. In small companies, it’s obvious you will interact more with your staff even if there is no communication involved, versus a large corporation where your staff may be located in various offices in the building or even some of your staff may be working off-site.

Some of your employees will require little supervision in order for them to do their job, others may not work well on their own and they will require constant supervision and feedback from you.

So how do you decide which management style to use and when to use it?

I developed the following guidelines for myself to follow:

1- On your first days as a manager, set your objectives and make them clear to everyone involved
2- Make a good observation of your staff and make a good assessment of their knowledge and skills
3- Make a list of your staff and write next to each name the level of supervision they will need
4- You will find in your staff one or two leaders who will adapt your vision quickly and will work with you to build on your vision - utilize their skills to micro manage and monitor feedback to you - this will allow you to continue with your continuous improvement and action plans
5- Other staff members may be less willing or may not see your vision as clearly as you see it, here’s where you will need closer supervision and constant feedback
6- As a manger, you will need to find the balance between micro management and macro management

As a manager, I would walk away from a job that requires great level of micro management, as a manager, your time should be spent more on vision building and leading, than spending it on mentoring.

Customer service at global level

Do global firms provide better customer service at home than abroad? Currently I am on a work trip in Saudi Arabia. As with any free market economy, Saudi Arabia hosts many global firms in various industries.

During my stay here, I had to ship some work materials to the United States, so I went to this US based mail carrier to ship my package. I was expecting speedy and friendly service as I had come to expect from this carrier in the US, but I was disappointed with the level of service I received. Some of the issues that arose were:

1- Not everyone on staff was wearing the company uniform - so it was difficult to know who was who
2- The staff were really intimidating in the way they approached the customer
3- Complete lack of knowledge on shipping terms and regulations, they refused to take my package on the basis of “not fit for shipping.”

I tried to talk to the store manager, but he insisted that my package would be sent back to me since it’s not fit to ship to the US, I asked him where it stated that on their company website and he failed to answer.

I was able to ship the package a few days later, but after I did my own research on the company website, and taking the package to a different store of the same company where the store manager seemed more knowledgeable.

Someone may say, well this is an isolated incident and can not be generalized, I would agree with that, but I have seen the same issue with customer service with many global firms working in Saudi Arabia.

Why do we see different levels of customer service at different locations for the same company? Does the company value one market more than the other? As global managers, how can we make sure our clients world wide get the same level of customer service?

I face this dilemma almost on a daily basis, why is there a variation in customer service at different locations - surely the policies and procedures of the same company should be uniform?