34 GEARS March 2008

MAKING IT WORK

by Dennis Madden

The Details Make

The Difference

What’sWorking!

Figure 1

Figure 2

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GEARS March 2008 35

In the last issue we discussed vari-ous projects types as they relate to those your customer sees and

doesn’t see and those that are repetitive and non-repetitive. Projects are always weighted based on their overall impact to the results you’re looking for but generally speaking you would address repetitive projects that your customers see, first. A telephone procedure would fall in this category; you answer the phone with the same greeting and it’s the first impression you make on your customer so this is an important one.

But now, every project group you have contains two of these components and they alone don’t determine which project to focus on. Remember, one of the greatest reasons we fail at our proj-ects is that we try to work on too many at once, and consequently, we fail at all of them, or at minimum do a poor job at them.

So now let’s look at the interac-tion between all our projects. That is, what impact the components of each project has on the whole. Figure 1 illustrates a business with four key areas: Advertising, Sales, Rebuilding and Delivery. Notice the score of 160 at the top of the illustration. Also notice that each of the four key areas has a score of 40, and that each lower box contains a smaller number; 20, 10, and 5. This illustration shows the formula y = f(x) in action. Recall from earlier discussions that this formula represents a process we’re all bound by whether we know it or not; that is, our outcome is based on our processes and what we put into those processes (if you want to revisit this concept, you can go back to the July 2007 issue of Gears).

All the boxes at the bottom, the ones with 5 in them are the X’s of the process. Notice that as the boxes flow upward they contain the sum of the lower boxes. What this means is that all of the upper boxes are dependant on the bottom boxes; y = f(x). The 5’s in the lower boxes are arbitrary for this discussion and simply represent a per-formance factor. You might think of it as the results of a survey where 5 is the highest score and 0 is the lowest. Now let’s put this to work!

Figure 2 shows this same illustra-tion, but notice that the overall score at the top is 157 rather than 160. What

changed? If you look closely at sales, one of the boxes has a 2 in it rather than a 5. This box could represent any area of your sales process: closing the RDI, your price presentation or the

way you speak to the customers during the sales process. For now, don’t be concerned with what area fell short, just recognize that one of them did, result-ing in a lower score and the impact of

The problem is that some of

these details seam so insig-

nificant that we ignore them

“What’s it matter if my coun-

ter top is a bit greasy?”

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36 GEARS March 2008

that failure flowed all the way to the top; affecting the overall outcome, or performance.

Your business is built in a simi-lar fashion in that you have several departments, and then within those departments you have main functions, followed by minor or sub-functions and then followed by the details. It’s these details that affect everything in the business and they are the only things you have direct control over. The results derived from the details (the X’s) flow through your process and show themselves to you as the results (the y). You may have more than four key areas and dozens of details but it’s the details that make the difference. The prob-lem is that some of these details seam so insignificant that we ignore them “What’s it matter if my counter top is a bit greasy?” But combine all of those deficiencies and you have a full blown mess on your hands.

Figure 3 shows what happens when you allow the details to slip away from you. The final score is 98; not very good. This pitiful outcome is the result of all those details we neglected: inef-fective advertising caused by a 1950’s-style yellow page ad, a direct-mail campaign without a clear message, or a radio spot that plays at 1:00am. How

about a sales process with an ineffective or even offensive telephone answering procedure? Remember, Rodger Bland pointed out in the January issue of Gears that his study revealed that about 78% of the centers called answered the phone with an ineffective message; some didn’t answer the phone at all.

What about your rebuilding pro-cess? No torque wrench, a dirty parts washer, poor training, or even some-thing as simple as not lubing the rear seal so your drive shaft runs dry dur-ing the initial road test, resulting in a premature failure. How about your delivery? What impact does a greasy steering wheel have on your repeat cus-tomer potential?

As you can see, the overall per-formance of your business is based on the details; the little things. So what’s this mean for your project selection? Sure, start with those projects that are repetitive and those your customer can see, but keep in mind that there are dozens, or even hundreds of details contained in those projects. Can you make a policy to check that steering wheel? Sure, that’s simple. Can you develop a friendly, professional script for answering the telephone? That’s pretty easy too. One by one you can make progress toward increasing that

top number in the chart; the score for your business. It’s the details that make the difference!

Figure 3

In the next issue of

GEARS, we’ll go a

little deeper in just

how to implement

this project process

into your business.

We’ll look at how to

get buy in from your

employees (which

isn’t always easy).

Your business is a

series of projects

and your success

with these projects

determines in large

part, the success of

your business… and,

Making It Work!

The Details Make The Difference

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