Our business relies primarily on word-of-mouth marketing via networking. When you’re seeking strategic partners instead of selling, it’s easy to answer the ubiquitous question “What do you do?” We’re a business technology company. We help staff spend less time shuffling data. We write custom software for Innovators. Pick a ‘Phrase du Jour.’

But when one of those connections leads to a referral to a company who may benefit from our services, I’m often asked “How should I introduce you?” It’s a hard question to answer, because I seek out companies who have problems we can solve. And who wants to be told they have problems?

My best answer so far is this: Our clients typically recover 10% or more of staff time that was wasted on juggling spreadsheets, chasing paperwork, or fighting with software that doesn’t really fit their business. I’d like my contact to suggest that Agile Reasoning may be able to do the same for them.

That’s very specific to us though, so let’s hear some more examples. How do you gently tell a business connection that their web site stinks, their marketing isn’t doing the job, their HR policies leave them exposed to a lawsuit, or make any other outsourcing recommendation where the ‘prospect’ may take offense?

Although I call myself a software architect, it seems I spent most of my time talking to other business people. I guess that could be because I gave myself the sales role in my company, but I digress.

About a month ago I connected two business contacts of mine. One had complained frequently about the lack of contact management software (CRM light) in her company, and the other (you guessed it) owns an entry level contact management web service. I felt good about making that introduction.

This morning I asked my software challenged friend how it was going with the new service. Not so good apparently, as she abandoned it after a brief trial. Her problems revolved around the initial import of her contacts, which surprised me because I’ve heard good thing about this service from others.

Here’s the bigger surprise. Her ‘import’ consisted of the contacts her predecessor created in Outlook. She personally never bothered to add to that list, and tracks newer contacts on paper. She isn’t alone in her situation, but I can’t wrap my head around wishing for a CRM system when you’ve rejected Outlook as a stepping stone. I’m not a fan, but it’s better than nothing.

This is one of the little things that makes my job ‘interesting’. If you can’t embrace a small change, a larger one is that much harder to digest. And the person defending the status quo doesn’t perceive the reward for their temporary discomfort.

As for ‘How many software architects does it take to change a company?’ Well, first the company has to want to change.

Sometimes dealing with a large corporation is dehumanizing. Other times it’s just stupid. This is an example of how bad processes waste everyone’s time.

My wife and I sold a house a little over two months ago. We paid the final bill from the power company through our bank’s epay system like every other time. So we’re good, right?

The following month we received a notice claiming the balance was unpaid. Something’s gone wrong, but it should be easy enough to resolve by phone right? Not so much. On calling customer service we was forced to leave voice mail. That seems a bit odd, but still no real cause for concern.

Until this month. We didn’t realize they never called us back until we received a notice from a collection agency. We called Duke, and again we were forced to leave a voice mail instead of talking to a person. The next call was to the bank, to see if they could shed any light. In reviewing the details of the ‘missing’ payment, here’s what we realized.

Duke Energy changed out account number on the final bill. CHANGED OUR ACCOUNT NUMBER! Of course the payment wasn’t applied correctly.

I haven’t had a chance yet to ask why a new account number was issued, but I suspect if I get an answer it will be some variation of “We’ve always done it that way.” As far as the unanswered voice mails? To paraphrase Ernestine the Operator, “We’re the power company, we don’t have to care.”

Your business processes are only good enough for today. As soon as you stop improving them, someone will eat your lunch.

Speed Kills?

We’re conditioned from an early age to believe that Speed Kills. Depending on your age, the phrases ‘Unsafe at Any Speed’ or ‘55 Saves Lives’ may be deeply ingrained. While that may be smart thinking on the highway, here’s how slowing down affects your business:

• Slow processes = more staff, less capacity, or both
• Slow processes = having to call your customer back
• Slow processes = losing business to better-managed competition

It’s time to learn a new Mantra.

Speed Wins!

What do you measure in your business? Now how much of that is based on a unit of time? You can analyze those metrics to the point of paralysis. Or take action and pursue this simple goal. Make every part of your business faster.

• Faster processes = more revenue from the same staff
• Faster processes = more responsive to your customers
• Faster processes = beating the competition

How many ways can make your business better, faster, and cheaper to operate? Better software may be part of the solution, but only if it enables you to optimize your processes. Embedding a crappy process in an automated system only makes the software part of the problem.

Keep It Simple Silly

Don’t overthink this. Whether the first thing you need is software, equipment, training or something else, the plan is still the same:

1. Find the bottleneck.
2. Make it faster until something else is the bottleneck.
3. Repeat.

What are you waiting for?