Enchanting Your Boss, Guy Kawasaki-Style

John Greathouse, a LinkedIn colleague in the Southern California Venture Capital Group recently posted an article he'd written on infoChatchke.com, "A Serial Entrepreneur's Take On Guy Kawasaki's 'Enchantment'".  I commented, and he suggested that I blog on this topic:

I personally apparently developed a number of the behaviors on Guy's list through the course of my career and have expressed them through time as: 

• Part of my job is to make folks up my chain of command look good and tell them so right at the get-go
• When they say jump I say, "How high?" (but also, "Will there still be ground there when I land?")
•  Become known for underpromising/overdelivering ("Star Trek" Scottie-style)
• E-mail regular/weekly short bullet progress reports of accomplishments, successes or wins for them to pepper their reports
• Form a relationship with them based on personal understanding and admiration
• Ask for mentoring and accept offers/invites/door opening efforts, both in-company and elsewhere
• Prevent shocks and surprises:  Give them heads-up about what the path requires near-term, and any minefields, and show you understand that part of your job is to protect their position as well (see first bullet above).

I'd also add two more:

Support:  Call for mutuality of agreement, especially if your responsibility involves a certain amount of risk, exposure or blazing new territory. Specifically ask for/create an expectation early on, as a verbal contract of sorts at the start of a job or project, if you agree to go forth waving your butt out on the flagpole, that if you get into a tight spot their face will be the first thing you see when you look down, right there to support you if needed. A solid relationship based on respect and trust in abilities should be able to handle this and find ready assent. It creates a foundation which has worked for me repeatedly. 

Your Personal Brand:  Be bold.  Be brash.  If you're out there operating cross-functionally, globally, company-wide, with customers and partners:  If folks compliment you, say/write something brief like, "Like our work?  Tell our management." (And give them a way to do so.  They will.)  This is all about your personal brand, making your successes known, encouraging testimonials which come from others.

You as team player strategically marketing You the Brand, as knowledgeable about/sensitive to what concerns others in your organization, as someone who's actively willing to take risks, stretch your own capabilities and deliver.

Voting: Social Contribution or Act for Reward?

As real-world shoppers vote with their feet, Web visitors vote with views, click-throughs and purchases.

Market research has never been more automated or in a position to glean valuable insights quickly and from so many, while products and services can be concept-tested before general release with minimum investment of funds, people power and time.

• Testing a new product can be as simple as posting it without a price and requesting that customers and regular visitors vote with their views, effectively, as a social contribution.  
• If not priced, they're voting on visual/aesthetic appeal and overall brand attractiveness.  
• Vote outcomes can surprise, delight and shock e-commerce vendors depending on whether they're consistent with regularly tracked pageviews or, once requested in an urgent or time-limited fashion, if they take a complete left turn in terms of results or based on which of their viewer personas participate. 
• Using analytics to track viewer source becomes beyond critical.
• Target market purchasers in one geography may beg out completely from just voting, for whatever reason, and viewers-as-product-gift-recipients in that geography who are not new product targets may also beg out.
• Whereas regular viewers in a region elsewhere on the planet, who don't necessarily buy -- perhaps due to shipping costs, exchange rates or other barriers -- may step forward unexpectedly and influence an entire vote's outcome. 

• Publicly reporting product test voting results as they come in, as with political elections, also serves to sway the bell curve and incites voter turnout as viewing guests jump on the bandwagon to give Voice to their opinions.
• In one 24-hour period, voters in one country or region may be joined by others in their country or region, just because they know others "like them" are participating.

• Creating time-limited urgency inspires viewers with the activist gene who'd be the 20% of "doers" at most anything anyway.
• Offering a "What's in it for you" reward "thank you" acknowledges that, on the Web, voting for products isn't a privilege, but a requested need -- with the ultimate outcome customer-focused as it enhances viewer purchase options.
• The reward should focus on increased participation and not price-based brand value degradation.

• Spreading product concept voting capability across social networks, each connected directly or tangentially to its topic, brings in the necessary variety of voices as a check-and-balance to assumptions about which audiences to target at launch.  
• One network's viewing voters may work in fields related to the product; another network's viewing voters may be critiquing, peer-level product designers -- each have their unique perspectives which can track together or diverge wildly.

It's a beautiful thing to find that a wide variety of viewing customers/guests vote consistently across social networks.  This is solid, verified market research corroboration verifying correctness of direction and attractiveness of any new product or service concept.