Laura's Winning Ideas

Click here for Exclusive interview with Seth Godin on Leading VS Managing from GiANT Impact on Vimeo.

Leaders IMHO do not need to own the company. It is a choice you can make to lead from within, rather than manage from executive guidance. If you are building a team where none existed before, a Leader will build a team that accomplishes more than they could imagine.

A Manager will accomplish some synergy, and celebrate a 5% improvement over the sum of the parts. A proposal team with a Leader will accomplish much more, 35 or 40 percent improvement.

The suggestion to fire your “D” customers is one I’ve used with success for several clients. It’s a scary idea that makes Leaders take a deep breath, and then jump in and do it. Managers would rather cut their prices.

One of my mentors, Warren Yerks, taught me that you have two choices when your market becomes cut-throat: Cut expenses so you can cut prices, and you’ll make your firm a commodity, always competing on price. The other choice is to be gutsy, fire your “D” customers and sharpen up your offerings to your best customers, innovating so you sell them things they haven’t yet imagined they need.

I’ll be speaking and moderating a workshop for SMPS in Pewaukee, Wisconsin on March 17. If you are in the area, you are welcome to join us!
I’ll be telling stories and describing how we lifted firms from tough times. And the crowd at SMPS is always fun and full of good ideas they are willing to share. Registration is here: http://smpswisconsin.org/halfday.html

My compatriot, Fritz Grutzner of Brandgarten will be hosting the morning session, working on Branding. This is important because your reputation arrives well before the proposal, and some attention here will prevent you having the kind of problems proposal managers at Enron and Microsoft suffer(ed): Enron Vs. Microsoft by Laura Ricci

Gotta love the idea of engineering change by adding fun to the equation. What about your process could be changed positively by adding fun?

Lottery for resume updates? Video dance of Joy for on-time submissions?

Covers are on my mind this week. I just watched the movie “September Issue” about Vogue magazine and Anna Wintour the editor. The cover determines the news stand sales of magazines and is taken very seriously. Serious money rides on a good cover.

I also just finished reviewing a stack of proposals. One loser I could predict from the cover alone.

The cover can hurt you badly. On this cover, a smear of logos was at the top of the cover, more than a half dozen, some big firms, some unfamiliar firms. The client was mentioned in the fine print. The illustration was meaningless.

The story this cover told me is ugly: Our team is VERY important, more important than your agency and your project. We are all dedicated to maintaining our corporate identity, so we are less likely to be easily managed. In fact, a smaller firm is Prime, and some really big firms are sub, so it will be very interesting for the customer to deal with who is in charge. If they can figure it out!

Don’t do this.

Here’s how I like to work up covers, in order of preference:

• What is your Theme? Illustrate it. (some folks aren’t using themes yet, and if so, try the next approach.)
• What brilliant ideas are you proposing to the client? Can they be illustrated?
• What is your client most proud of? Can it be illustrated?

The cover should be all about the client and how your team brings something special to their project. If you don’t bring anything special, you’ll be just an also ran, so why bother writing a proposal doomed to lose?