Improve, Replace or Retire it

Did you ever notice that many of today's problems, issues, and poor performers may have been great or at least decent solutions once upon a time, but today somehow, they just don’t seem to work so well? Previously great or good enough can turn into currently poor. Just as people need to refresh and retrain, products also need to be improved to remain relevant and have a chance at continuing to be great.

Perhaps coworkers or a supplier assures you that the product was once great, so why mess with something that’s not broken? Perhaps you used a leather article that wasn’t ideal or dealt with a tannery with late deliveries or quality problems. It was a small manageable problem in the past…so you kept going with it due to limited resources or you just ran out of time and chose to work on bigger issues.

So now it's back and it's a bit worse this time...perhaps much worse.  

Once great, now just OK... but not poor enough to be an easy drop. Some would say its easy money, it’s selling, but is it converting enough customers into sales, or are you losing sales because you continue to hold onto an old style that is no longer great by today's standards?

It could be a part of the product. Seemingly small issues that don't seem to be central to the product are easy to put aside as not worth the time investment to optimize. ...after all, why focus on issues that will give incremental gains, versus focusing on obviously bigger opportunities, right? Perhaps the product is too heavy, and you’ve not lightened it but the competition has caught up and now theirs is lighter and better than your product. Your customer will know once she tries on both.

All elements of a product are interconnected components in an assembly. When taken all together, it creates one product experience. The weakness of any one piece reduces the effectiveness of the whole system. True some parts are more instrumental than others (a last versus an aglet) but it pays to approach each component with the same rigor to eliminate weak links and to establish a consistency of design intent, performance, and quality in the finished product. This creates a great product and affirms what the brand is all about.

Other times, its simply time to retire the product and replace it with a much better product in every way, one that leaps over competitors causing them to scramble to catch up. Be assured that if you don’t proactively improve or replace those that have fallen behind, your competitors will replace it for you with their own improved products.

Put the money where it counts

When developing a product, we look at the COGS (Cost of Goods Sold) to discover if our costs are on track and why the product costs what it does.

Sure, it’s easy to look at the highest cost items on the list and declare that we have to get that cost down, but think again. Are you falling prey to the race to the bottom trap? Cost reducing to compete on price? Emotional buy-in from your manager? Take the cost out of the wrong components and are you now eliminating your key benefits over competing products?

Value does not mean low price. Value means the product offers something other products do not, or perhaps the product does something others do as well, but your product does it better.

It takes guts and marketing acumen to take the right road in order to reach the right customers, your target group that will appreciate the fact that you didn’t strip out the most important product features and benefits.

This is not to say that cost is not important, nothing could be further than the truth, but taking the position that the footbed in the shoe is too expensive, for example, so we have to get a cheaper less comfortable footbed, is counter-productive if the shoe brand is a comfort shoe brand competing on comfort in a market with similarly styled and priced shoes.

Of course, don’t overpay for the right footbed, and make sure that footbed really is the right one so you’re putting your money where it counts. Why not piece the upper, or use a less expensive breathable lining, or choose from any number of other opportunities to lower your cost instead?

If the item improves the product in a way that is meaningful to the brand and to the customer, then the item is an Asset. If not, it’s a cost that’s ready to be reduced. Be thoughtful about where the money is going and put it where it counts.

Thank you for your patience, please continue to hold, your call is NOT important to us

Key bank came with such glowing reviews. Cohorts in my MBA program raved about the awards for customer service. Unfortunately, my experience with this bank is far from glowing...

A merchant charged me more than one time too many, so I filed a dispute.

Hold times in excess of 15 minutes every time I call? Yes

Phone representatives who ask for your full social security number?… and before they confirm you are in the right department? Yes

Can I walk into a local branch to resolve the issue? No. They will call and wait on hold in their branch, the same as you are waiting on hold at your location.

Does the bank close the case without any contact to check the details? Yes

In a world competing for business, in an industry where service is the product, somehow this once former glorious bank has lost their way and now delivers a poor customer experience that will undoubtedly drive this customer and undoubtedly countless others elsewhere.

Co-Working Flexible offices still have a way to go

We all loved the idea and promise of the flexible open office, social co-working environment where people bring their dogs to work and you never know who you might bump into on the way to the espresso machine,…until work crawled to a stop.

Aren’t we supposed to love the interruptions, the forced interactions?

If we need to get out of our isolation chamber and discover what’s happening in the rest of the company, then perhaps occasional interruptions can be a good thing, but if thinking work is the order of the day, then each interruption means a huge setback in momentum and the schedule.

What if each interruption was vital? Vital for whom? We all need to engage others, especially when we’re stuck or when we need answers asap so we can proceed. The problem is that one person’s priority is another person’s useless interruption.

Notifications on our mobile devices are the equivalent of the open office with a steady stream of interruptions, most of them meaningless. Let them all in at your own peril.

For now, designated “Quiet” or “Do Not Disturb" times may be our best bet for getting real work done, and our best protection from unwanted interruptions, whether from our mobile device, a random office co-worker or your boss’ dog begging to be fed or walked outside. Turns out most co-worker interruption-problems were issues that could have solved without your involvement, with just a little effort on their part.

Even when your 5-person office occupants behave like stars, not interrupting you every 10 minutes, we can still hear conversations transmitted through the plenum, walls, and bouncing off of the other hard-surfaces of these modern interior environments. Bonus: the occasional hallway troll walks nervously shouting on their mobile phone, for all on the floor to hear.

Regain control of your attention and time and establish some rules about interruptions. Find a quiet place to work when all else fails. This will enable you to move forward with your work while helping others to dig deeper into their own abilities to solve problems and you will see the work suddenly leap forward with progress.

The quest for better

Every day, every project brings new challenges and new opportunities to learn and improve. Maybe this is why product development is so much fun…it’s never the same thing twice. Each brand, each factory, each season, each product brings a new set of aesthetic, technical and pricing challenges.

Let’s not forget the big picture stuff that’s equally fun and important– shaping the brand taste level and market position, price points, merchandising, planning assortments, and keeping the design and development effort on track, on budget and on schedule.

The goal is better and the quest is never-ending.

Better means creating a mix of product traits that will be more meaningful to customers compared to other products on the market. Better than they expect, more wow, more fashionable, more practical, better materials, better value, a better fit for their wants and needs, overall a better product that makes customers happy and keeps them coming back, generating better revenue and better profit growth.  

This is my world, so here is my blog. It’s a sounding board for my reflections on getting to that position of "better" relating to strategy, business, design, development, shoes, life and more…it's also a vehicle to share what I’ve learned from my victories and failures in the trenches and in the boardroom...an opportunity to explore common situations in uncommon ways and to shed light on those subtle things that made all the difference.

I hope you enjoy it and feel compelled to share and leave a comment.

-Rob