MentalRise » Observations

Breaking the Holding Pattern – Moving Forward on Your Path

admin — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 02:05:52 +0000

Planning the future in spans of 6-12 months requires deciding with certainty what paths to follow.

The present is most valuable when its events are the results of past planning. Knowing not only where we are currently, but where we should be, sets an internal pace, and an objective measure of progress along our path.

Even in writing this, I stumble over words and concepts I know to be almost universally true. Why? Because their truth is uncomfortable, and as such, they are shown to be all the more timely and important for me.

Some of us, myself included, have tried to avoid planning for fear of missing some larger but hitherto unknown opportunity. We must realize however, that the negative effects of continued stagnant procrastination, a self-glorified, self-righteous, self-justified holding pattern we daren’t break, wastes away our precious time and focus.

While those action-oriented individuals spend their time continuously planning, executing, processing input from successes and failures, and repeating, those in the eternal holding pattern gain zero units of real world experience. This withdrawal from reality into an unproductive feedback loop is where many of us find ourselves today.

So now, what is the first action?

It seems that I must repeat the most boring, generic, cliche advice that all of us claim to know, but few actually rise to act upon – brainstorm and write out goals, now!

Work backwards from these to the present, and take immediate action.

10 Startup Steps for Hiring a Great Sales Team

admin — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 05:34:56 +0000

For some of us, the products we develop and market need to be sold directly to clients via direct sales and eventually, referral building.

At the beginning of our ventures, it is imperative to personally develop a strong, benefits-based sales method for our product. But what about afterwards? We aren’t supposed to sell each and every widget ourselves, right?

Enter the Sales Team.

But wait – there are a lot of amateurs, yahoos, and slackers out there! There is a real danger that the wrong pick could:

Damage your reputation
Waste your precious seed money
Get you in legal trouble
…Impregnate your daughter?

Anything is possible! With that in mind, pay close attention to The 10 Startup Steps for Hiring a Great Sales Team

Properly define the job.: Most managers try to determine whom they want to hire rather than hiring the best fit for the job. If you profile the person whom would do a superior job, the resulting profile might define some one totally different than originally planned, filling the position based on skills, behaviors and motivators inherent to the job.
Benchmark the position.: Job Benchmarking is a definitive tool designed to take the guesswork and bias out of the hiring process. It assesses the job based on the merits of the work required by the employee and not on their perceived abilities and personality. It also eliminates comparing the new employee to others already doing the job. Hiring as hired in the past will not target super stars needed to excel and grow your business.
Re-write your ad.: Most ads ask what the candidate has done in the past, and while it might be important, it doesn’t tell you what they can do or how well they will do the job. Specifically state the outcomes you want each candidate to display while employed. Most will not apply if they feel pre-screening will not meet your requirements.
Pre-screen the applicants.: To many, this means going over the resume to qualify backgrounds, experience or education. Instead, E-mail each applicant a set of questions to weed out ones who are clearly a poor choice for the job especially if they interface with internal or external customers, and are unable to represent the company in a professional manner.
Screen the applicants.: Most companies have set pro-cedures in place to screen out prospects that do not meet the basic requirements of the job. However, pre-screening via email and a set series of questions will help to further weed out unprofessional or less than desirable candidates.
Pre-interview meeting.: Many companies have multiple employees interview prospective candidates. What they fail to do is preplan the interview process to consistently obtain the same information from each of the candidates. When possible, interviewers should also be included in the benchmarking process to ensure buy in and accountability.
Interview the Candidate.: Most managers have not been trained on how to interview a perspective new employee. When possible, companies need to hire a coach to train managers on how to interview and determine a good fit for the organization. Most interviewers make the decision to hire based on a person’s past performance and within the first five minutes of an interview. Companies need to teach how to avoid these pitfalls by reducing the hiring bias and taking the guesswork out the hiring process.
Assess the Candidate.: Talent assessments tell how closely the candidate matches a job. Many feel this part of the process should come after the interview. A well-designed talent report will help determine not only if a candidate can do the job but also how well they might do it. It will often highlight deficiencies that might detract from the individuals’ overall performance as well. Why waste more time and money interviewing a candidate requiring compromise to hire?
Post-interview meeting.: Debrief each of the interviewers on their choice of candidate(s). Interviewers need to justify choices based on the sample questions each asked and on relevant feedback and agree as a group. If you did your benchmark correctly, and you have already run a talent report, there should be a stand out candidate.
Don’t hire to just to fill a slot.: Some just want the hiring process to stop because it is taking to long and fill the position with a “body”. Managers who are willing to settle for a so-so employee are probably just so-so managers. Either you did not throw a wide enough net to capture enough good prospects or your ad writing needs improvement. It costs just as much to find a good employee as it does to find an incompetent one.

(View Full Source Article Here)

What other tips have helped you while hiring Sales Representatives?

Obama CTO – Top Priority Idea

admin — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 02:03:13 +0000

When http://www.ObamaCTO.org posed the question “Barack Obama is going to appoint the nation’s first CTO. What are the top priorities?”, it struck me as a very good time to come up with something truly useful.

There are a lot of different tasks that need tackling by the new CTO (whoever he/she/it is), but as a Security Administrator for a hosting company, my perspective is a bit different. The explosion of the web has led, of course, to the explosion of hostile code, fraud, and network attacks, with the United States leading the pack.

My Idea?

Negotiate escalation procedures between ISPs/Providers

ISPs and owners of large networks (hosting companies, colo facilities, Military networks, large corporations) should have an established method of escalating incidents between each other.

Any company with a minimum network size of ____ IPs is required to register. Only registered members can escalate between each other, ensuring that each complaint/escalation is properly formed.

Anyone reporting an incident would provide proof (logs, urls, etc) as necessary.

Depending on the reputation of the reporting entity (i.e. military vs. small ISP), automated action can be taken against the offender(s)

Volunteer organizations, corporations, and other good netizens can join the fight against botnets, spammers, and virii-laden machines.

Companies would have a responsiveness score, showing the community how quickly and seriously they respond to threats.

What do you think? Send me a twitter @MarcelChastain , and vote at http://www.obamacto.org/.