Making Ideas Happen (book)

I just finished reading the book "Making Ideas Happen" by Scott Belsky. I describe it as a "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" for creative people. MIH is broken into 3 sections:

1. Organization and Execution - avoid getting bored, persevere, and prioritize.
2. Forces of Community - tell people what you're going to do, and find collaborators.
3. Leadership Capability - share your ideas, be flexible on how work is done.

The big lessons:

1. When making notes, working on tasks, organize your thoughts into: action steps, reference, and back burner. You'll probably never use reference, you need a system for coming back to back burners, but the key is to always think about how to move forward. I've been doing this for the last few days. Usually these type of books don't stick, but the action step principle has changed my passivity in meetings and priorities.
2. Recognize the tendency of the project plateau. It's easy to come up with ideas, difficult to do them - don't get distracted with new ideas.

3. Create a Support Circle - set up a group, 10-15 people, who share common goals/ interests to support each other in meeting your goal.
4. 3 types of people: 1. Dreamers - come up with ideas quickly, suck at execution. 2. Doers - focus on execution. 3. Incrementalists - can iterate between doing and dreaming. The key lesson though is that many dreamers consciously 'hire' doers as partners.
5. Hire initiators (people that will voluntarily pick up and run with a project). I saw a survey for Google's recruiting that asked, "have you ever turned a profit at your own non-tech business" "won a world record" "started a non profit" - clearly they're looking for this too.
6. Cynics vs skeptics - cynics are unmovable.
7. In a project, identify the "sacred" aspects and comprise on everything else.

Good quotes:

• Justice prevails over time in any good organization, but justice does not prevail at any given point in time.
• Make yourself become who you are - Friedrich Nietzsche
• All I want to be is someone who creates truly meaningful things.
  

Testing seesmic for blackberry.

Status updates gone wild. Sorry I had ping.fm syncing issues with tumblr, myspace, friendfeed.

Just as I was giving rogers props...

If I Worked at Yelp

I've actively been using Yelp (I even attended an event) and Foursquare for the last several months (much to the dismay of my Facebook friends who have to see my Foursquare check-ins in Facebook). Actually using these services, you realize that they're fundamentally different products, independently addressing a piece of a larger opportunity. I keep asking myself why Yelp hasn't really aggressively responded to Foursquare.

This quote from Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman says it all, "Yelp has the chance to become one of the great Internet brands...That for me is the chance of a lifetime." They allegedly recently turned down a $700mm offer from MSFT and a $550mm offer from GOOG. AND they recently took $50mm in funding.

With that $50mm burning a hole in my pocket, I would focus on 5 things to make good on Jeremey's goal:

1. Leverage user segmentation

When I was in Quebec City on holidays, I tried using Yelp to get some recommendations. The problem is that one person's 5 stars could potentially be my 3 stars. The example I give is that I unapologetically like local dives. I want to give a venue 5 stars, but I don't want my Mom to misconstrue that as a recommendation for her.

The solve: Sense Networks. These guys do some interesting work -- they segment users into "tribes" based on the locations they frequent. For example, there could be two "tribes": 'fancy mama's' and '30-y-o wanna be hipsters'. So, when I do a search for restaurants in Quebec city, I would be effectively asking "for all the '30 yo wanna be hipsters' what are the top venues?"

2. Focus on micro-engagement

I know Yelp just launched the idea of checking in (the Foursquare idea) on their iphone app, but there's really 2 sides to this: checking in and getting recommendations. I want to ask, in an Urbanspoon-kind-of-way, for a restaurant nearby. I don't want to read any reviews, I just want it to be near me, and leverage the technology I mentioned in point #1.

3. Neutralize other networks

If you've used SocialScope on BlackBerry, or Ping.fm , you get it. Post an update once, and it finds it's way to all your "social accounts". I want to be able to check-in once, and it shows up in Gowalla, Foursquare, Loopt, and Yelp. An aggregator app like this, authored by Yelp, puts Yelp in control. Otherwise, some 3rd party (or a competitor) will do this and guide their users to a competitive site.

4. Double-down on mobile

I heard anecdotally that the number 1 status update source on Twitter is still SMS. Also, the cost of writing a good iPhone, Android, and BlackBerry app is much less than the $50mm in funding Yelp took. Seriously, aggressively develop these apps, leverage the platform-strengths of each, and make sure they have at least feature parity. People will engage much more.

5. Let me make reservations
I'm sure the Yelp Eliters don't like this idea, but from a 'user needs' perspective, think about the process of 'finding a place to eat'. I go to Yelp, search for a recommendation, then I need to call to make a reservation (and Yelp doesn't get paid). I don't want to talk to someone, I just want to click "make reservation", select day/time, add it to my calendar, invite my friends, and be done. A partnership with OpenTable would solve this problem, and if it turns out to be lucrative, at least Yelp would own the end user.

Rogers Redeeming Themselves

Well I have to say, I'm impressed with Rogers. Months of complaining (I've written about it in tedious detail here), calls, and defection; they've (partially) redeemed themselves with a (newly) implemented social media program -- they're listening. @RogersRob replied (well actually he was on vacation, @RogersMary took care of me). I followed her, she direct messaged me, took my contact info.


Literally days later, I received a voicemail from 'Steven L' from "the office of the president" at Rogers. We played some phone tag, but we spoke yesterday, and I have to say again that I'm impressed.


Steven listened to my story, conceded that it wasn't particularly well-handled (either the sales or support process) and offered up 50% of the early cancellation fee (~$250). He also made sure to mention that he was willing to provide the rebate even if I don't come back to Rogers.

I offered to volunteer for a customer advisory board related to early cancellation feeds and Steven said he'd look into it. He conceded that there's a chance that the ECF wasn't properly communicated originally. I told him that that could have been solved by putting a letter in my first bill clearly (simply) stating the policy, the cost, and a phone number to call w/ any questions (or to address my buyers remorse).

A couple of weeks later, the check showed up, but they haven't taken me up on my advisory board participation.

Goodbye Rogers! - Is a class-action appropriate?

Updated - 20091231

I can't believe these Rogers guys -- they can't keep their hand out of my pocket. I was trying to let it go, but it's really a comedy of errors that has played out over 4 months: 

• Sept 2009 - See the post below. Basically, they slap me with a $360 early cancellation fee on my cell plan. 
  
• Oct 2009 - They reversed my VIP savings and charged me back. I cancelled all of my other services with Rogers.
• Nov 2009 - They slapped me with another set of early cancellation fees (despite their assurance there wouldn't be) for my TV and Internet (God Bless TekSavvy). 
• Dec 2009 - This is the best part. I get a card from Rogers saying "Something's Been Missing You" and "We've missed you and want you back" - the envelope was addressed to "RESIDENT". Yes, that's right, they miss yours truly, Resident. Incredible. The best part, they offered a "free" digital cable box, valued at $550. Wouldn't it have been cheaper to retain me by showing a bit of empathy and flexibility with their ECF policy? 

Rumor has it that Rogers has engaged in some kind of social media presence. Search Twitter for #rogersfail, and you'll see @rogersrob diligently blocking and tackling (I'd imagine, not an easy job). I'm going to drop Rob a note, or maybe Mr. Phil Hartling, the VP that misses "resident" so much. 

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Not that it will make a difference, but the story needs to be told -- if only for my personal sanity. I'll make it short here, I promise:

• Becky and I move back to Canada last year, she brings a BlackBerry (she had her own hardware, this is important) and I sign her up for no-contract service.
• Becky starts school at Ryerson - and they up sell her, over the phone, to a "student plan". Cool - good deal.
• Turns out we don't need Becky's line anymore, so we go to cancel it. Rogers dutifully cancelled the service.

Here's where it goes pear-shaped I get a bill in the mail, and I'm actually excited. Will be nice to not have that re-occurring expense. Turns out there was an early cancellation fee of $400 on the student plan.

This is BS for so many reasons:

1. We didn't even need their stupid student plan.
2. We didn't even get a "phone" out of the deal. If they had subsidized the phone, this is fair, but for an under-used wireless line, $400 is a little heavy handed.
3. I've been a subscriber of rogers services as long as I've been buying phone-internet-cable.
4. They screwed me last time I moved from Waterloo->Seattle with an early termination fee.
5. We don't remember, but at no time were we told that there was an early-cancellation clause.

Anyway, I digress - so:

• I call rogers last week and say "come on guys, this is crazy. I've been a rogers subscriber for years. I still have internet and cable with you. Cut me a break." The woman on the phone was arrogant and antagonistic and didn't budge.
• I tweet my discontent and several people write back saying "check out teksavvy". I call them up, and they're rad - nicest people on the phone (the one guy said sarcastically about their $0.25/GB overage charge, "yeah, we rape our customers" (!awesome), great price, no contracts, they're in Chatham. Great except I needed to confirm that my building supports their service.
• Confirmed today.
• I called Rogers to cancel, one last chance to be a good corporate steward. Nope. I told him to cancel the remainder of my services, didn't ask for anything, didn't really mention the wireless issue until he asked, "yes, I'm a little frustrated with the wireless guys." His retort, "what?! you expect that you're going to threaten to cancel over a $400 ecf from a contract that YOU signed?" Fair enough, but still.

Technically, that is legally-technically, it's probably my fault -- I should have inquired about early-cancelation-fees, though I don't remember signing a contract. The spirit of the situation here makes me think we need more consumer protection around this sort of thing:

1. It's illegal in California
2. It's regulated elsewhere

Here are the clinchers:

1. When I left Seattle for Toronto, TMobile hit me with an early cancellation fee. I called an explained - THEY WAIVED IT!
2. I recently got an annual fee for a TD visa card that we don't use anymore. I called and cancelled the card after-the-fact, and TD (a bank for christ's-sake!) waived the fee and closed the card.

When the banks are the good guys in a story, you know we have problems with wireless providers in Canada.