This Prestigious Award That No One Knows About
Have you ever heard of the Gold Award?
The Gold Award is the highest achievement within the Girl Scouts of the USA, and it’s only earned by Senior and Ambassador Girl Scouts.
Only 5.4% of eligible Girl Scouts successfully earn the Gold Award.
It’s not easy.
But who knows that?
If you had a “Jesse” with a “Gold Award” on their resume and then you also had another “Jesse” but they had “Eagle Scout” on their resume . . . who would you hire if you had to choose?It’s simple.
This problem is two-fold.
Its . . .1) a branding/marketing problem and2) a straight up sexism problem.
There are things you can control right now and there are things you can’t.
The marketing part of the problem is solvable relatively quickly.The other one will take multiple generations to eradicate.
2 Minute Action
Here’s a framework I learned from a mentor last year and I use it all the time:CAPACorrective Action (what will I do right now to make this better?)Preventative Acrion (how will I stop this from happening again?)For the Girl Scouts it’s straightforward.Take 2 minutes to look at a problem with CAPA today.It should NOT take more than 2 minutes to run through this exercise.If it takes more than 2 minutes you may need a consultant or expert.
This App You’re Using Is No Better Than CDROM
Have you seen this one in every hotel?
Control this TV with your phone
The benefit of the app can’t be that it replaces the remote. The remote works just fine. Why do we need to replace it?
If we’re going to build an app, it should be doing more than the remote. It should beat the remote.
The magic of an app can’t be that the same capabilities of the remote are now on a shiny screen!
We already went through that!
That was CDROM in the 90s!
How is that better?
A lot of resources go into technology products and if we’re developing with a lean mindset, this product really needs to justify why it exists.
That product really needs to justify why it took so many developer hours and venture capital.
There are a few times it’s okay to invest in something to achieve “feature parity.”
Feature parity just means that the new thing has the same capabilities or features as the old version.
This can be okay but only under certain conditions, like when it enables you to build more or better future features at less cost or more stability or by using less computer processing hours.
That’s an investment. That’s justified.
Having a lean mindset means that tasks, features, and innovations are all fighting for their lives to stay on your task list.
2 Minute Action
You have a list of things to do?
Great.
Spend 2 minutes right now, going top to bottom.
Everything must fight for its life to stay on the list.
Good questions to ask:
What might happen if I put this off?
What might happen if I never finish this?
The Strange Thing Hotels Do To Keep Customers
For the past two years, I’ve traveled for about 100-150 days per year.
This means I’ve stayed in a lot of hotels.
There’s this one thing that I’ve noticed about nearly all hotels:
It’s the indoor pool.
Here’s what’s weird about it:
Almost no one uses it.
It’s smelly, loud, and there’s always a risk of someone else getting into that tiny hot tub with you, too.
So why does this still exist?
It’s a serious cost for hotels to install and maintain.
Yet, basically, all hotels continue to offer this as a feature.
The feature isn’t the pool. It’s the feeling you get when you know you could use the pool. It feels like a luxury to have access to a pool with fresh towels.
How is an indoor pool related to anything?
Whether you’re building software, teaching students, taking care of patients, or growing an audience, you are developing and revising your “features.”
As you look at user behavior, you have to decide what features to keep, which ones to remove, and which ones to build from scratch.
I’m not saying the indoor pool is a great idea.
What I’m saying is that you have to find out what’s really valuable about what you’re doing and make sure you’re focused on that.
It’s up to you to decide whether the ends justify the means.
Just think what would happen if the hotel removed the pool. Pools are so ubiquitous that customers could look at this and feel that they’re being ripped off of a standard feature!
By having the pool, you’re now on par with the guest’s expectations for what features a hotel should have. You’re not adding anything. You’re just keeping up.
This is just the unique context that will help inform decisions.
And honestly, that’s the easy part.
The hard part is identifying that it’s not the pool that’s valuable, it’s the feeling of having access to a luxury that’s valuable.
2 Minute Action
What’s something you do that is valuable?
It can be as small as the holiday card you send to clients or the tissue box you put in the grieving room for the families of patients.
Now ask: how do you know what’s valuable about that?
Don’t make this hard. You only have 2 minutes.
Just ask the user. Write an email asking for feedback. Monitor website clicks to see behavior.
Your action can be small and still have a big impact.