Toss the dead weight overboard

Todd Ordal //January 4, 2012//

Toss the dead weight overboard

Todd Ordal //January 4, 2012//

A client recently asked me to read a lengthy document. When I asked why, he said, “I’d just like to get your thoughts on it.” I’m not fond of “gotcha” activities, but I trust this guy. So I took it back to my office and sat down with a cup of coffee.

The beginning section read like a private placement memorandum – pitching a specific product. It was well-written, but I was confused about its purpose. The next section was apparently a sales pitch about how the product fit strategically with my client’s business model. It then rolled into an update on cool pending product enhancements and finished with staff descriptions that sounded like Academy Awards® nominations.

No financial projections, no results.

At my next meeting with this client, I told him I couldn’t for the life of me understand the document’s purpose but that it seemed to be a verbose justification for continued existence. I watched the steam come out of his ears for a moment and then asked, “So what gives?”

The client said that this document, written by someone on his staff for an existing product, ended up on his desk, though he hadn’t asked for it. Clearly someone took a great deal of time to write it (I found out later that two people wrote it). When he asked about its purpose, the VP in charge of that area said it was “just an update.” The product had little revenue and wasn’t profitable.

The client said there were many documents like this floating around his company; people trying to justify their existence, but adding no value. Further, as he looked at the company’s centralized meeting schedule, which someone had to manage, he realized he had many people who spent half their time in meetings that had no real purpose outside of “updates.”

The easy solution was to take out a red marker and start cutting head count. However, rash decisions often have unintended consequences. We talked further and he decided that he would start to engage more with people at all levels of the organization and ask two questions: What value do you bring to the organization? How could you design your job so that you brought significantly more value?

Some people add little value, but when given a chance, they might see how to change that. Regarding the “update” meetings, you might ask: What’s the purpose of these meetings? How could we accomplish this more effectively? If you weren’t in this meeting, what would you do that delights a customer, saves costs or brings in more revenue? It’s about the end, not the means. Think output, not input.

Bloat is not only bad for our waistlines but also for companies. Unnecessary white papers and valueless meetings grow like barnacles on a ship and must be scraped off every so often — or you’re dead in the water.
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