Unfortunately I certainly was.
Though I have improved, I’m certain I still have much that can still be further improved – hence in some ways I still resemble Chad more than Mike. I now have more practical tips to help me continue improving.
Let me explain…
As I have noted elsewhere, our customers mostly like us, and what we do – the results we received from the survey we recently conducted were largely what we expected, in this sense.
When I find a bit more “spare” time, I’ll summarise some of the feedback here.
It’s a nice thing, but one we can’t take for granted.
From my perspective, we’ve already disappointed some of them on too many occasions. I really want major improvement in the months ahead.
If we are really going to make “Customers First” our prime reason for being, we need to have an explicit measure of the extent to which we really do live by this motto. When we have this measure, we will drive the company by this measure.
The development of this measure will be one of the core responsibilities that our new GM for Finding, Attracting and Delighting Customers will need to adopt, when we have recruited them.
Hence it was with interest that I stumbled upon this presentation titled “Ideas for Building Better Software Businesses” from Dharmesh Shah (of HubSpot) at the Business of Software conference in 2009:
Note that Dharmesh (as an additional service to his customers and fans) has prepared this page from his “OnStartups” blog to list some of the key points in the video.
I like this approach of “going the extra step” to make the message more understandable.
The following notes are specifically about his suggestions for the Customer Happiness Index (CHI):
Note that there is plenty of other good stuff in this video (you have to get to minute 47 before he mentions CHI), which I might have a chance to talk about at some other time.
Technically speaking, our recruitment process has not even begun yet.
However, back in January I did mention that we hoped to have our GM M&S in place before the end of the year.
As a result of the interest generated when we kicked off the process of recruiting Derrick as our GM for DDD WCW, a number of people contacted me about this second position. Some of these have kept in touch with me to keep tabs on our progress with a view to being considered when the process begins.
In case there are other interested people out there, here are some details of our status.
I was pointed to this post on the Esther Derby blog by some discussion on one of the many groups I’ve joined on LinkedIn.
With Shirlaws reminding me that one of the enduring roles of the CEO being to coach (and not play), I am keen to learn as much as I can about this increasingly important part of my role in the company.
In my 20 years of professional experience, I’ve gained a fair exposure to a wide range of aspects of the competitive electricity market – and have some clear ideas about the needs of our broad range of clients, and how we can delight them with the software we develop.
The role of “coach”, however, is not something in which I have gained extensive experience. Hence I’m keen to (and need to) learn as much as I can.
Nothing else to say now – just want to keep a record of this post for future reference.
When you see a job advertised with a title like
General Manager for Discerning, Developing and Delivering
What the Customer Wants
it is hard not to be curious. In particular, I’d never had a job title that needed an acronym before - “GM 3D WCW” has a sort of geeky attractiveness about it, so I had to come and have a look.
Frequent readers to this blog will have noted an organogram included in a post made back in January that identified the organisation structure and responsibilities that existed at the start of the year.
Since that time, our business has been evolving fairly rapidly – with a fair number of changes already completed (and a number still to go) in order to ensure that we really can deliver on our primary core value of “Customers First!”.
When I have a bit more time, I will post in more detail about some of the other developments that have been completed, or are still in progress – in this post I just wanted to ensure you were aware that last Monday (22nd March) we were delighted to have someone start with us as our new General Manager for Discerning, Developing and Delivering the Software our Customers Want.
The title is a bit of a mouthful, so he will shorten it in most cases – but he will certainly be specifically focused on delighting our growing customer base with the software we develop.
I will let him introduce himself in his own time, so stay tuned for more …
As you may be aware, we’re in the process of recruiting a General Manager for Discerning, Developing and Delivering the Software our Customers Want (Need).
Up until this weekend, we have been receiving proposals from a small number of candidates shortlisted from the large number of applications we received in the first 2 weeks after the position was opened on 24th January.
Given the importance of this position (for us, and for the candidates) this has entailed investing many hours of time in getting to know each other, and to ensure the candidates could gain a clear view of our company (where it is now, and where it is headed). We want them to come in with their eyes fully opened – both to the opportunities and the challenges!
This week I will be reviewing these proposals to determine which one is the best fit for where our bus is headed.
Have seen this posted about before, but never taken the time to look – it was an Anthill article “The best three-minute video about leadership you will ever see” that prompted me to hit play.
A bit weird and wacky, but relevant to us – even in an industry that could be thought of as boring:
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Not sure about “the best” tagline – but this video is very instructional, and entertaining at the same time.
On January 24th 2010, we commenced (in earnest) the recruitment of our new General Manager for Discerning, Developing and Delivering What the Customer Wants (Needs) – more traditionally known as our GM Products. We posted this advert on our blog then.
This led to Derrick Hill starting with us in this role on Monday 22nd March 2010.
The process was was intensive (lasting 8 weeks, not including considerable preparation time) but has resulted in a good fit to our needs.
As part of this process, we shortlisted a number of candidates, and provided them with a detailed briefing note to explain more about our starting point, and where we wanted them to help take the business. As part of this briefing note, we also included the following core areas of responsibility. read more »