Rockin’ to the Encore

Mary was a “mover” in her engineering department.  Though she had only been with the company for 2 years, she was currently in her third position and was working on her fourth product responsibility.  Mary thought that the best way to move up the ladder was to get a little bit of experience in everything – that way she could someday be the one that everybody turned to when things got exciting.  As part of moving to her second position, she was promoted to Senior Engineer.  She’s now hoping that her next promotion is right around the corner as she is looking at job postings in other groups.

Stephanie was more of a “stay put” kind of person in her engineering department.  Granted her first assignment wasn’t too exciting (as is the case in most entry level jobs), but she hung with it and in her second year, she found some interesting cost savings on a product that hadn’t changed for decades.  Although she was supposed to just “baby sit” this mature product – she presented her idea to her boss and it was actually implemented.  This cost savings earned the attention of her upper management and she too was promoted to Senior Engineer.

Flash forward several months to two everyday scenarios:
Scenario 1: A new team is being formed to work on designing the brand new WidgetMaster 9000.  (Doesn’t it bother you when I don’t get more specific?)  As the engineering managers look around; who do they choose to be on their team?  Mary-The-Mover?  Stay-Put-Stephanie?
Scenario 2: A million-dollar-a-day warranty problem hits in another department and additional engineers need to be deployed to help solve the problem.  Who do they choose to be on their team?  Mary-the-mover?  Stay-put-Stephanie?

Now some situations may be different, but the majority of the time, I’d put my money on Stay-Put-Stephanie.  She’s demonstrated the ability to “go deep” and depth is very a rare commodity in many of today’s engineering environments.  While Mary became a generalist; Stephanie became a specialist.  When you go to your doctor and he can’t figure things out where does he send you?  To the specialist.

Many companies have a two-path approach: managerial or technical – personally I think there should be some middle ground between them.  However as you think about your engineering career trajectory – where do you want to land?  That should ultimately guide your movement – or lack of movement within an organization or between organizations. 

I talk to lots of companies that struggle with retaining bright, young engineers.  That can be attributed to the companies themselves and their ability (or inability) to encourage, challenge, motivate and reward.  However, it can also be attributed to the “short sightedness” of many engineers.  The concept of “depth” is not necessarily valued as much as it should be.  So let me give you a few reasons to hang in there and “go deep”:

1.  Increased knowledge.  Spending time in an area means more time to learn about that particular technology.  Use that time!  Learn about what goes into making your product.  Learn about the areas that your product touches.  Learn about the history of your product.  Learn what others (or competitors) are doing with their versions of your product.  Learn what the biggest problems are with your product. Spend some time thinking about “what would the world be like without your product”.  Try designing your product if nothing ever existed.  Think about your product’s function and find 5 other things that have the same function but are totally unrelated (for example from nature or other industries).

2.  Increased reputation.  Staying in a department and “going deep” gives you more opportunity to deepen your “brand” as an engineer.  Not only do you have the chance to get smarter (see #1), you also have more opportunities to show off your abilities.  Reputation can be thought of as “that thing which you are known for” and reputation can be reinforced with repeated successes. 

3.  Layoff Prevention.  Let’s face it.  Economies change and sometime people lose their jobs. By becoming the resident expert in a specific area, you are perceived as more valuable.  In many cases it is preferred to keep the specialist as opposed to the generalist.  Generalists can be hired when needed; specialists take time and effort to develop.  Furthermore, the loss of the specialist’s knowledge can be much harder for the company to deal with.

4.  Peter-Principle Prevention.  I have a good friend who is a high-ranking executive in a Fortune 500 company.  He and I were talking about the topic of “when should someone make a career move?” and he offered some great advice.  (No wonder he’s where he is today!)  In his mind, you should move only when you feel that you’ve learned all you can and have mastered your current position.  In business school there is talk of the “Peter Principle”.  This is the principle that states: “people are promoted to their level of incompetency”.  In other words, people will always be promoted until they wind up in a job that they can no longer handle.  Then they are stuck there (often miserably) for the remainder of their career.  By staying put and going deep before a promotion, you guarantee that you hit the next promotion level with an added degree of knowledge – thereby holding Mr. Peter and his Principle at bay.

Keep on rockin.

Jamming with a Legend

If you want to get good at something… hang out with someone that is already good at it.

Recently, a friend of mine that plays guitar was talking about wanting to hang out with some great guitar players – just to see how they do what they do.  A few days later another friend was talking about improving at tennis by playing against better players.  This got me thinking about the importance of learning from or just plain hanging out with the “gurus” or “legends” that may be sitting in the very next cubicle.

Several years ago, (too many years to count) as I was just a few weeks out of college, I had a chance to work with “Tom”.  He was one of those “gurus” that helped shape my career trajectory in ways that were unimaginable at the time. 

At that time, Tom had been with the company almost as long as I had been alive and had worked his way into a technical advisor kind of role – dealing only with special (that is “crisis”) kinds of projects.  He was one of those slow, methodical and meticulous kinds of guys that would spend hours studying a problem and testing theories.  You’ve probably seen or at least heard stories about this kind of guy… the guy where a “cluttered” office means that he happened to have one extra piece of paper on his desk next to his notepad and computer keyboard and monitor.  (I, on the other hand, tend to migrate towards a natural habitat of not being able to even see my desktop surface.)
As a young engineer, I was able to work with Tom on special projects and I was able to take in some valuable lessons.  Here are just a few:

1. Every pixel counts.
We were working on a huge multi-million dollar problem and were dealing with the analysis and presentation of 1000’s of data sets.  Tom emphasized the importance of presenting data in a clean, concise and understandable way.  If you don’t pay attention to the way you present your results, what will cause your audience to trust your results?  He was the first person that encouraged me to work toward “elegance” in solutions and their presentation.  Later I discovered the work of Edward Tufte (of whom I'm now a big fan) and this totally reinforced those previously learned lessons. 

2. Build your brand
When you are in front of an audience – either “live” in a room or “remotely” via documents or email that you’ve created; you have a chance to build a reputation.  As you think about your audience (and, yes – that means you should be thinking about your audience) what do you want your work to say about who you are and what you bring to the table?

3. Take your time
I’m assuming I’m among friends here, so I can admit this… I’m a very “type A” kind of person.  Generally I work at two speeds: fast and faster.  When I shut down, I generally shut completely down and go totally “offline” only to re-engage at some later time right back at full speed.  In the classic Tortoise and Hare fable I’m definitely the hare.  This kind of duty cycle is tough on machinery and is pretty tough on people as well.  My time with various engineering gurus throughout my career has revealed on common trait in them: they are not afraid to roll up their sleeves and dig deep into a problem... and stay "in deep" for a long time if needed.  They are not generally inclined to go with the first, impulsive answer; they take their time to find the “right” answer.
 
Now for some of you, those three lessons may not be earth shattering.  Nonetheless, those lessons were exactly what I needed at that specific time in my career.  However, beyond those specifics, I think there is an even bigger general lesson to be learned:

You need to spend time with mentor or a guru.

No matter where you are in your career, there is always someone that can make you better.  World class athletes need coaches in order to perfect their physical abilities.  World class engineers also need coaches or “mentors” in order to perfect their effectiveness.  Sometimes you can get lucky like I did and be able to spend some serious time with a mentor.  Other times you may need to seek out a small window of opportunity with a “guru”.  Here are some ideas for making it happen:

1. Identify a person that you can learn something from. 
This is probably the most important step.  Some gurus can help you with something as general as “dealing with management” while other gurus might be able to help you with “partial differential equations”.  These may not necessarily person, nor will you necessarily need input from the same guru at the same time.

2. Let them know where you are coming from.
Telling a person that you want to learn from them can be a huge compliment for them.  It lets them know that they are valued and it may help open the door for their sharing this ability with you.  This is a great way of “building a bridge” to them in cases where you may not know each other very well to start with.

3. Establish a small (make that a “very small”) commitment and…
4. be the one to keep that commitment.
I love the story about how Christine Comaford met with Steve Jobs for just a few minutes in order to ask him a few key questions.  She sent (even FedEx'd) letter after letter indicating the desire to spend just 5 minutes with Jobs.  In the end Jobs finally conceded and they met.  After the predetermined 5 minutes, she stood up and thanked Jobs for his time.  Jobs told her to sit back down and they continued to talk for another 45 minutes.  This is a great lesson in showing respect for a guru and can even help establish a solid relationship whereby further interactions can take place.  My advice – try a lunch with a guru.  When the time ends, thank the person and pick up the check.

5. Find someone that you can mentor and build up.
The best way to really learn something is to teach it.  This is true in the mentoring dynamics.  As you grow as a rockstar engineer, find someone that you can build into and help them grow as well.  This helps you better understand the sage/student relationship and ultimately can make you a better student.  Furthermore, mentoring a young engineer is the absolute best way I know to stay “mentally young”.

Too many people become engineers because they are brilliant, independent-minded, can tackle tough problems and can create amazing products and solutions.  Unfortunately, this independence (the same attribute that can launch a great engineering career) can also completely squelch such a career when an engineer doesn’t choose to spend some time “rocking with the legends”.

Rock on.

Party Like a Rockstar

This week the 2011 Punkin Chunkin World Championships are being televised.    No, those aren’t spelling errors – that’s the actual name of a rather strange competition.  In this competition, a bunch of completely crazy, bizarrely creative, and yet amazingly smart guys and girls get together to see how far they can launch a pumpkin.  Sorry, did I say pumpkin?   For this event, they’re called “punkins.”

As I watched this, one thing struck me… these guys are having an absolute blast!  Even when a pumpkin shatters during the launch (they call it "making pie”), they still keep smiles on their faces and just get to work making things ready for the next round.  As most reality shows go, there is a lot of great behind-the-scenes footage showing the teams actually designing and building their machines.  They are laser-focused on one goal: make a pumpkin fly as far as it possibly can.  However, you also get to see that there is a ton of laughing, smiling, joking and more high-fives than you can count.  Team interviews are filled with comments like “this is what I live for,” “I put 110% into this,” “once I chunked a punkin, I knew I wanted to chunk punkins for rest of my life.” 

Teams have crazy names like: “Bad to the Bone,” “United Flingdom,” “Pumpkin Slayer,” “Sir Chunks a-Lot.”  Chunkin legend “Fat Jimmy” even has his own dance. 

This brings a rockstar engineer question to mind:

When was the last time you had this kind of fun while working on an engineering team? 

Or, let me put this in terms of numbers (since you are engineers after all)…

How many high fives are given in your team meetings?

I'll just cut to the chase here: I think fun brings energy and energy fuels every aspect of the engineering process. 

Now some of the Harvard MBAs out there will say (most likely while looking down their up-turned noses) “this is an example of a social dynamic best described as synergy.”  My response to that is: “Yeah, yeah, yeah.  Blah, blah, blah.”  I almost hate to use that s-word as it is way overused in business and I don’t want this blog to be classified as “just another guy talking about the same old buzzword.”  Did you realize that in the linked web page they used the S-word four times in the opening paragraph alone?  So let’s not even use the S-word.  Let’s just talk about bringing energy and focus to a team meeting or a team environment. 

Here are some tips:

1. Have a crystal clear goal sentence. 
Yes, I said sentence… singular.  Organizations are crippled when they have too many objectives.  The same is true for your team.

Examples:

    Make a pumpkin fly as far as it can. 
    Fit a square carbon dioxide filter into a round hole (see Apollo 13) 

2. Realize that there is value in each person in the room. 
Several years ago I was in a group of “specialists.”  Each of us had our own not-too-related-specialty and yet the cross-discipline collaboration was amazing.  There were no significant egos at play and the sharing of ideas was tremendous.  I was working in dimensional measurement, yet I learned a mathematical trick from a fluid dynamics specialist that I still incorporate in many of my projects today. 

When I visit companies, I often find that the “lowest” person on the corporate ladder is the one who is the closest to the solution of the problem.  This person actually has his or her hands on the machine or measuring instrument and therefore often has knowledge that others don’t take the time to tap into.

3. Ask dumb questions. 
As a consultant, I’m typically, the “outside guy” in a meeting.  This gives me the opportunity to ask the dumb questions.  In fact this gives me a huge advantage in a meeting and my “dumb questions” often get people talking in a way that they wouldn’t have otherwise.  A few years ago I was teaching a class in a very high tech Silicon Valley research center.  Just about every person I met in the room had a Ph.D. (or more) in some far-out aspect of physics, quantum mechanics or physical chemistry.  Everybody, but one guy, that is. 

As I was teaching, this one, non-doctor guy would stop me and ask an occasional question.  When he did, an amazing dynamic happened in the room... just about all of these "doctors" seemed to exhale a sigh of relief as if saying “yeah, I wanted to ask that, but I was afraid to.”  After the session I found out that this one “non-doctor” was their vice president.  He was the rockstar in the room because he wasn’t afraid to ask questions.

4. Throw some dumb solutions out there. 
The most creative of teams have something like an “umbrella of grace” kind of policy.  I originally heard of this concept from Bill Hybels at what is now called Global Leadership Summit and it is a very powerful tool.  This “umbrella of grace” policy means that there are no dumb ideas and grace is extended to anyone who puts forth an idea.  In some departments the “no dumb ideas” thing is often just a cliché.  However, great teams really embrace this concept. Sure there may be some joking along the way, but the bottom line is that all ideas are respected as even the weirdest one may lead to something great.  In fact, you can take advantage of this concept by using this approach the next time you put forth an an idea in a group setting:  “OK I need an umbrella of grace here... what if we try _____?” 

This approach provides for two, powerful dynamics.  First, it makes it clear that you are being vulnerable and this idea may not be totally thought out.  Second, it gives the audience a less threatening presentation of your idea in the form of a question.  This question encourages discussion rather than a “sales pitch” which encourages criticism.  Presenting ideas in their earliest, most unrefined form (rather than waiting for all of the data to come in), allows others in the room to jump in and adopt them as their own.  For a person to put energy into a solution, they need to feel some ownership.  Having more people on board with your ideas, makes for more energy and for a better solution.  And let’s face it: full rock bands can typically make a lot more sound than a solo artist.

5. Now for the big one:  Laugh. 
Yes, laugh.  When you are dealing with the deepest aspects of science like physics and chemistry, laugh.  When your pumpkin "pies" instead of flying 4000 feet, laugh. When you are dealing with the biggest warranty problem that your company has ever faced, laugh.  Laugh your head off.  Laugh until someone wets their pants.  OK, maybe just up to the point where someone is about to wet their pants.
I want to make a very important note here: you don’t have to be “off-color” to be funny.  In fact rude or profane humor can do far more damage than you might ever know.  Your audience may give courtesy laughter, but underneath they are probably distancing themselves from you.

Laughter brings energy.  The TV show M.A.S.H. was a comedy set in a mobile military hospital in South Korea during the Korean war.  For these doctors and nurses, even in the scariest, bloodiest, most gruesome moments – humor is what kept them going.  Some scientists have suggested that laughter actually gets more oxygen to your brain.  

Hold it!  Don’t start Googling for the joke of the day or start digging through your favorite old Dilbert comics.  Humor that is real and energizing doesn’t necessarily come from the Internet; it comes from getting comfortable with those around you.  Humor that is real and energizing comes spontaneously and is best when it comes from a person that is willing to let his guard down.  Here are some quick ideas for making it happen:  Self deprecation (picking on yourself rather than others) is always safe – in fact I encourage it.  Real rockstar engineers don’t need to tell people how good they are – they can take shots at themselves and in doing so they build bridges with others.  Another powerful tool is one that a friend of mine refers to as “teasing up”.  In other words, when teasing others tease them about how super-great they are rather than cutting them down with sarcastic humor.  Sarcastic and insulting humor is the easiest and one of the lowest forms of humor.  Rockstar engineers don't need to stoop to that level.  "Teasing up" is also relatively easy, but do be careful about crossing the line into sarcasm. 

Saying, “Hey Bill, you’re the closest we’ve got to an Einstein here.  What do you think about _____?” is a way of teasing up.  On the other hand saying, “Nice one, Einstein” could be a very sarcastic way of cutting someone down.  One last note: Be sure there is at least a tiny nugget of truth when teasing up and you will become a great energy catalyst in your meetings.


Bringing it all together…

I have friends who are musicians in various bands and they sometimes talk about when it just “works.”  “We had great time last night at practice.  We wanted to stick around all night and just jam.”  Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case.  Hopefully, some of these tips will help to make those “engineering jam sessions” happen more often.  But when you are stuck in a room and things aren’t clicking, try to shake things up.  If you still don’t get there, take a break or call it off (if possible). 
One of the most common outcomes of a meeting without energy is the dreaded M-word… mediocrity.  And mediocrity is not the stuff of rockstar legends.

So get the team together, have a few laughs, crank up the amps to “11,” go launch a pumpkin and get your team rockin.

Maybe they will even name a dance after you!

Getting the band back together...

Tomorrow will be a life changing day for 6 people.

But let me rewind a bit...

A few weeks ago I was reading Wired Magazine and came across an article about the Mars500 project. (“Are We There Yet” November 2011)

This was a fascinating article and I was surprised that I (being the geek that I am) had not heard about this before!

Basically the Mars500 project is an experiment where 6 guys were locked away in a simulated spaceship for a pretend trip to Mars. The total travel time... 520 days! That’s right, 520 days cooped up in an “experimental isolation facility”.

Their “journey” began in June of 2010. Tomorrow (at 11:00 am Central European Time) they open the hatches and the 6 guys (3 engineers, a surgeon, a physiologist and a astronaut research instructor) return to the real world. The Wired article speculated that they will return “changed in ways that they will forever protect as secret, and also in ways that they may never quite fathom themselves.” 

This got me thinking... these 6 guys were removed from society for more than a year. They had only electronic communications with the "real world" and even they had to deal with a "simulated delay” – the delay being based on the lag associated with where they were in their "simulated journey”.

Let’s pull this into the rockstar engineer context...

These guys have already gone more than a year with no “live” interaction with people. One of the biggest lessons I learned when hitting my first “real job” out of engineering school was this: people are the most important part of the effectiveness equation. The quicker you learn this, the more effective you will be.

In college you can “hole up” in some remote location and pull an all nighter to tackle some task. You can be somewhat self-sufficient. In the real world you are, more often than not, dependent on others in order to be able to deliver. Even if you can create something you are going to be dependent on others to either supply, package, test and/or buy it.  

As a typical engineer you may be better with math and science than you are with people. But to make the best use of your math and science you need to learn to play well with others. The best way to make that happen is to begin to understand the “value” of those around you.

I still remember walking into my first role as a laboratory advisor and the first time I met the technicians. All of them had been with the company longer than I had even been alive. I wasn’t too intimidated, however, since I had just completed my Master’s degree in the exact area of measurement that they were working with.

As I met the guys, I started asking them questions about sampling strategies, Nyquist wavelengths and transmission characteristic curves – all the analytical stuff that I learned about in graduate school. It’s probably no surprise that they couldn’t answer any of my questions.  It's probably no surprise also that they thought I was a complete jerk.  However, I went on to find about 1.0E6 things that I could learn from them . (That’s a million by the way.)

I went on to rebuild a relationship with those guys and thoroughly enjoyed working with them each day.   Each morning I looked forward to keying the combination to the door and they seemed to look forward to my arrival.  It turned out one of them was a phenomenal baker and his particular interest was in creating the greatest chocolate chip cookie ever.  I was more than happy to be his cookie tester... but that's a story for another time

Nonetheless, here a few learnings from that experience:

1.  I learned how things get done.

I learned that they “knew the system” and I didn't. These guys knew the right people and the most efficient way to make things happen. They introduced me to some of their "friends" and it was amazing how effecient things could be.

2.  I learned that my book knowledge meant very little in terms of what really matters.

I knew measurement systems signal processing. However, that meant very little when the main questions are related to “can we ship these parts?” or “why isn’t this part working the way it should?” Fortunately for me, these guys could look at the situation and know exactly what is going on. They would usually start their response with “several years ago we had this same problem...” and they went on to specifically identify the problem and propose best solution.

3.  I learned that a “position” or a “title” mean very little in terms of a person’s “value” .

My current job takes me from dirty manufacturing floors working with those that are the lowest on the salary scales all the way to executive offices of multi-million dollar businesses working with presidents and CEOs. I can honestly say that something can be learned from both places as well as from all those who are somewhere in between.

The Mars 500 guys have been "away" for a long, long time. Hopefully, a great deal can be learned from this experiment as I'm afraid that the team has paid a great price.  These 6 guys were cut off from human interaction for more than a year. Some engineers take this approach in their work lives and do all that they can to get away from people. I admit, there are times when we need to get away to focus. But I’m also the first to say, real effectiveness comes through working with people.

Welcome back guys!

Your Opening Act – The Handshake

"You never get a second chance to make a first impression” (often attributed to Will Rogers... but nobody can be sure where it came from)  

Last week my two football worlds collided.     

Having grown up in Michigan I was genetically engineered to have a soft place in my heart for the Detroit Lions.  However, when moving to Indiana several years ago, I became a fan of the Indianapolis Colts.  This year, things got pretty messed up when the Colts started losing and the Lions started winning – but that’s another story.

Back to the collision...

When I started getting interested in the Colts, their quarterback was Jim Harbaugh – who now coaches the San Francisco 49ers.  This past Sunday he coached the 49ers to a victory over the... (drumroll please) Detroit Lions – who were undefeated going into the game. After the game Harbaugh was pretty pumped up with the win and things got out of hand in the most unlikely of places: the coach’s handshake. 

This got me thinking about the concept of a “handshake”: a seemingly trivial action that typically lasts no more than a second or two.  However, in that second or two an enormous amount of information is conveyed about who you are as a person.

So let’s talk about some ways to rock the handshake.

1.   All hands are worthy of a shake
My first “corporate job” was during a time and in a department where you did the “corporate look” - you know the kind: white shirt, tie, sport coat and all that phony “dress up” stuff.  Once I was with my boss, Bill, in a manufacturing plant.  We were in our white shirts and ties, walking past one of the machines and Bill stopped to talk to one of the workers.  The guy looked like he just crawled out from under the machine.  He was filthy from grease, grime and who knows what else.  Nonetheless, Bill stuck out his hand and introduced himself.  The guy apologized for being dirty and resisted the handshake.  Bill persisted with “I never have a problem shaking a working man’s hand”.  They shook hands and I followed suit.  Guess what:  hands can be washed. 

I’m thankful for Bill’s influence – he taught me (by example) to build bridges with people.   That approach has led me to many successes as an engineer and a consultant.

2.   Be the “starter”
Be the one who extends the hand – no matter the audience.  This shows leadership and confidence.  Start anticipating a handshake before even walking in the room.  Get your hands out of your pockets.  Wipe them off if you’ve got sweaty palms... and stick it out there!  It only takes a second, but in that second, you’ve conveyed a big message.

3.   Be the “ender”
A handshake that goes too long is just plain creepy.  About 1-2 seconds is long enough in most settings.  Check out this one at about the 1:15 point: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ml8Q_qZxWLE.  In Germany it is customary to shake hand with everyone when entering a room.  These guys have it down to a science – a firm grab, one shake, and then move on to the next person.  A typical “American” hand shake is between 1-2 “pumps”.
 
OK, we’re engineers, we need the physics:

The “lock”
This is probably the most important part of the handshake.  If you don’t get all the way “in”, you will be in the position of having your fingers grabbed, much like a princess having her hand held to be kissed.  That is definitely not the position for a rockstar to be in.  Here’s a tip: you can avoid being the “princess” if you can get into the “thumb lock” position. 

Sometimes you have to go in fast if the other person is a “grabber”.  But if you obey rule #2 above, you’ll be ahead of the game.  Prior to the squeeze, get your thumb-to-forefinger webs into contact.  This tip can provide a huge help for women or people who are shaking a hand that’s much bigger than your own.  Remember, this is a “hand” shake, not a “finger” shake.

The “pressure”
A friend of mine is a professor and he actually teaches international students how to shake hands per the “American style” and most if it has to do with “pressure”.  I still vividly remember a job interview where a high ranking executive actually made my knuckles crack.  This guy wasn’t big, but he had a serious grip.  A firm grip is good builds bridges.  A knuckle cracker builds walls between people.  A wussy handshake (like a dead fish) is worse than no handshake at all. 

So how much is right?  That is a great question.  The best I can say is “firm”.  As a starting point, pick up a gallon of milk.  That requires a “firm” grip.   A handshake is a sort of “dance” – you have to work with you partner.  Firm will feel different in different contexts.  The good news is that you body has an amazing control system it can sense and react – but you have to be in tune.  

The “eyes” have it
The last element of the handshake actually has nothing to do with the hands at all.  It’s your eyes.  I’m basically a shy person when it comes to eye contact and I have to consciously work on my eyes when speaking with others.  One trick I’ve learned to try to notice the color of the person’s eyes while shaking their hand.  This gives my eyes a task to perform and helps me to focus on something. 

People know when you are paying attention to them and one of the best ways that they know this is from your eyes.  Another trick that helps connect is to somehow say their name during the handshake.  “It’s nice to meet you, Chad.”  “It’s good to see you again, Kathy?”  “Good morning, Joe.”

So get out there and practice...

Rockstars put in their time rehearsing and improving.  The best way to perfect your craft is to practice your craft.  So don’t be afraid, shake some hands.  You may even be able to shake up some new confidence or even a new image for yourself!  And if you ever find yourself on an NFL football field after beating the Detroit Lions, perhaps you’ll do better than Jim did.

Rock on.

For further reading check out:
http://www.sideroad.com/Business_Etiquette/handshake-etiquette.html

http://www.thedailymind.com/how-to/the-perfect-handshake-how-to-shake-hands-like-jfk-and-make-an-impression/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7HJ3RDYPVc (advice from an "expert")

A Tribute to a Rockstar Engineer Legend – Steve Jobs

“Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it's worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.” Steve Jobs - BusinessWeek interview, May 1998

Yesterday, Steve Jobs lost his battle with cancer and the engineering world has lost a living icon. 

As I look at the products, presentations and personality of Steve (pretending that we are on a first name basis), I see one theme shining through:   

SIMPLICITY

That single word holds a great deal of insight for rockstar engineers.  Let’s look at just few areas... and I’ll try to keep it simple.

1.       Keep designs simple: Avoid “Feature/Scope Creep”
It is said that when the original iPod was being designed Steve kept returning the prototypes to the designers saying that it had “too many buttons”.  This may have frustrated the engineers, but it ultimately led to one of the most innovative interfaces of its time: the iconic iPod “wheel” control pad.  (See: iCon - Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business ) When designing, we need to realize that a “really cool addition” to us, may be perceived as “unnecessary clutter” or “added confusion” to our audience.  I really like our toaster - it turns bread into toast.  That's all it does and that's all it needs to do.  Simple.

2.       Keep presentations simple: Avoid “Slides as Documents”
A Steve Jobs presentation has been referred to as a “rockshow”.  This may be due in part to the hype of the passionate Apple fans, but I think it is also due to the way that it is presented.  Check out the slides at the iPhone launch:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uW-E496FXg  If you are in an audience, who’s slides would you rather look at?  Yours or Steve’s?  I know we don’t have a team of graphic designers working our presentations.  But we can learn an important lesson: slides are good for pictures and graphs – not sentences.  Too many people design their presentation slides as if the slides are going to be used as documentation for future use.  Slides aren’t documentation.  Slides are digital wallpaper. 

3.       Keep presentations simple: Avoid “Utilizing Enormously Oversized Verbiage Selections” 
        (aka: Avoid “Using Big Words”)
A Steve Jobs presentation has been referred to as a “rockshow”.  This may be due in part to the hype of the passionate Apple fans, but I think it is also due to the way that it is presented.  (How many of you just looked up at #2 wondering if I made a copy-paste error?)  I know, it sounds like I’m repeating myself... I am.  A Jobs presentation is a case study in verbal communication.  Steve uses words that anybody can understand and he’s not afraid to show excitement.  How many times have you used the word "cool" or "awesome" in a presentation?  Big words don’t make you look smarter.  They make you harder to understand and the build a barrier between you and your audience.  Keep your language simple.   Check this out: The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs: How to Be Insanely Great in Front of Any Audience

4.       Keep your look simple: Avoid falling into the “Nerd Trap”
Let’s face it.  Most engineers are not the most fashion-minded people in the world.  Some actually seem to be proud of the fact that they are not “slaves to fashion”.  However, your “look” is part of your “brand”.  A person that looks bad and smells bad is a person that willfully builds in barriers in terms of effectiveness.   Does this mean that we all need to run to Fifth Avenue or Rodeo Drive and spend millions on a wardrobe?  (OK, you are engineers: I’ll give you some help... Fifth Avenue is in New York, Rodeo Drive is in Beverly Hills)  Back to the question, the answer is “No”.  Steve Jobs totally redefined the concept of a CEO’s “look” – and he did it by keeping things simple.  Black shirt.  Blue jeans.  Classic.  Timeless.  Simple. 

Here's a simple conclusion:

Steve Jobs will be remembered for product legacies: the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad.  I think he should be best remembered for keeping things "iSimple".

Rock on.

Rockin' the House

Presenting the “Big Project” to the “Big Guys”...

Charlie was a bit nervous heading into his project review.  He’s spent the last 9 months working on the X17 warranty problem.  (How’s that for a generic-sounding project?)

The X17 was pretty much falling apart as soon as the customer took it out of the box.  What? Still no clue what an X17 is?  That’s ok, it’s totally made up.  There is no such thing. I’m just using it as an example to tell a fictitious story.  A story that repeats itself all too frequently…




Charlie sat nervously at the head of the table in the conference room as the chief engineers and other department giants finally arrived along with a few other engineers from the project.  (The first “big guy” arrived 2 minutes early, but the other two were 5 and 10 minutes late respectively).  He only had an hour and these guys were already cutting into his time!  Charlie didn’t make eye contact as he felt these guys were out of his league.  Fortunately for him, there was WiFi available in the room and so he buried himself in his email – though he really couldn’t concentrate on anything on the screen.  But at least he didn’t have to try to interact with those guys.


Finally, everybody was there and Charlie stood and pulled up the first of the 41 slides that he’d been working on for the last three weeks.  The slide read “X17 Warranty Issues and Strengthening Improvements to Case Moldings”.  Charlie began by saying “OK.  So today I’m going to talk about X17 Warranty Issues and Strengthening Improvements to Case Moldings”.


It went downhill from there.

He said "I have a lot of material to cover so I'll take questions at the end." Charlie’s first 8 slides (and 11 minutes of talking) presented the costs associated with the warranty returns as well as a geographic breakdown of where the issues occurred.  He laid out a pareto indicating which suppliers are associated with more failures than others.  Charlie’s next 29 slides (and 33 minutes of presentation) dealt with details of 7 design options that were considered and discarded.  Some of them were considered only on paper and never built.  Some of them looked like they may have only been considered on the back of a napkin at McDonalds.  Others couldn’t be built and a few others were built, but failed the testing.  Charlie shared spreadsheets full of data indicating the serial numbers of failed tests, the cost data for each failed design as well as statistical analyses of the measured results.  He went into great detail as he discussed the mathematical significance of one factorial study that he performed.  He even used all the right terms like “elastic modulus”, “correlated input factors” and “non-Gaussian statistical behavior”.

Unfortunately, after all of this, Charlie finally presented his solution to the problem.  It was actually a very clever design that wasn’t just stronger, but also saved material and manufacturing costs.  Too bad for Charlie, though.  By then is audience was in some far, far away place as they too had discovered that the room had WiFi and they were totally tuned out.  Others had to leave early in order to get to their next meeting - having never actually seen his really good slides of the proposed solution.

OK, back to the real world…  Here’s an exercise for you.  Pick out everything that was wrong about this story.  Think of it as one of those childhood picture puzzles: find 10 things wrong with this picture.  Here’s a hint – the chief engineers checking their email is not one of them.  At the end of this article I’ll list the ones that I found.  (OK.  It was easy for me to find all 10 since I wrote it.)

Presenting like a Rock Star - Principle #1:  First-First Impressions

First impressions mean everything.  In a meeting you actually get two chances to make a first impression.  Rock stars nail them both.  The first chance to make an impression is when people come into a room.  When the Chief Engineer enters don’t run and hide behind your laptop screen.  As the expression goes: “he puts his pants on one leg at a time” – or maybe more appropriately “he fills his pocket protector one pen at a time”.  In any case, he’s a human being, just like you.  Treat him as such. 

Here’s a little-known social dynamic:  He’s walked into your conference room for your meeting.  Think of it as your living room and you are in the position of “host” – you should be the one to welcome him!

Here are some things to consider when the big guy walks in the room.

1.       You may know him (since he’s “famous” in the department), but there is a very good chance that he may not know you. 
Face it.  You may be a little guy in a big organization.  He’s a busy guy and many not remember you.  He knows that some “Charlie” is presenting some “project” in room 437D. Be a rockstar and take the initiative.  If there is any doubt that he may not know you, step up and introduce yourself.  Here’s a simple way to get there: Make sure that your opening slide has the project title and your name on it.  (It should be showing on the screen as people arrive.)  Then greet him with “Hello (insert chief engineer’s name here), thanks for coming to my presentation today”.  What’s cool about this approach is that you don’t have to go through the awkwardness of recollection.  By all means NEVER, NEVER, NEVER go to a superior with a line like “Hi Jim, remember me?”  Do not EVER put him in a position whereby his credibility or confidence can be damaged.

2.       You’re catching him while he’s “fresh”.  A rockstar will find a way to get him talking.  You’ll have your time to talk later.
If you can show interest in your audience, there is a better chance that they will show interest in you when you need it.  Don’t just think of meeting prep as preparing slides and data.  You need to also think of the “opportunity” that the meeting presents and you need to prepare for the “social” aspect as well.  You are going to be in a room with people that can change your career path.  Plus they are coming into a new room for a new meeting.  This is the prime time to connect.  What are they interested in?  Find out.  What are they working on?  Find out.  Here are some clues for conversation starters.  Can’t choose?  The best ones are ones that you are mutually connected to. 

Have you seen them around town?  A restaurant? An event?

               Hey I saw you at the _____ last week.

Do they wear anything indicative of a college or a sports team? 

                Did you catch the ____ game last week?  How did the ____ do last weekend?

What was the last thing that they communicated to the department?

                How is the ____ program going?

What is the big initiative that the company or department is working on?

                How is the ____ launch going?

Has he been on a trip?

                How was your trip to _____?  What's it like there?

A good friend of mine has been very successful in several management positions.  He has always made it a priority to get to know some basic things about each of him employees.  He remembers their name, wife’s name (if applicable) and at least one other thing about the person (where they live, etc.).  This an amazing tool for him when it comes to conversation.  What’s even more amazing is that, at times, he’s been able to achieve this with more than 200 people reporting to him.  You may not be able to go this far, but having a few notes about your audience will go miles in terms of your ability to rock the room in the coming presentation.

First-First Impression Hint:

When you are working on your presentation and making your notes, also spend some time working on your audience and making some notes about them.

First-First Impression Resources:

Good in a Room: How to Sell Yourself and Your Ideas and Win Over Any Audience by Stephanie Palmer.  It’s far from an engineering book, but she really does a great job addressing the importance of the social aspects of meetings.  I highly recommend it.

Presenting like a Rock Star - Principle #2:  Making a Second-First Impression

I enjoy the topic of “teaching” and am interested in “what makes a good teacher”.  Several years ago I heard a great teacher talk about how he gets copies of lessons taught by other teachers.  These teachers send them to him – hoping that he will send constructive feedback.  One thing that this teacher said was “I can tell a good teacher in the first 4 minutes”.  I think that the “4 minute” window is a bit too generous today.  It is way too easy to get on WiFi or check your smartphone in today’s conference rooms.

The opening of your presentation is a second chance to make a first impression.

Here’s a simple principle.  To make the best opening – start with what matters… and that’s not necessarily what matters to you.  Start with what matters to the audience!

In the above example, does Charlie really think that the big guys can’t read?  Then why did he read his opening slide to them?  Stupid move on his part.

How about this new and improved opening:

“It’s no secret that the X17 has been causing us serious problems and I’ve been working hard on this for the past several months.  I’m pretty excited today as I think I have a solution that not only is strong enough but uses less material and is also less costly to manufacture. Let’s check it out…”

This opening totally changes the tone and flow of the meeting!  In fact these three sentences cover everything that needs to be said or will be said in the hour to come.  In fact, the audience can get up and leave early (as they often do) and they will still have gotten “the main point”.

Here’s what a great opening does:

1.       “It’s no secret that the X17 has been causing us serious problems“

It establishes “where we are”.  There is no point in going into history if everybody knows it.  In fact, reviewing history is a painful waste of time.  You may have 8 slides on the warranty history, but please don’t force them on the audience unless they ask for it.

2.       “I’ve been working hard on this for the past several months.”

Let them know where you are coming from and your role.  Audience members need to know who you are and why you are presenting this.  Be able to answer their question of “why am I taking my time to listen to this guy?”  You definitely don’t want to go too far here and you don’t want to forget mentioning your team members at some point.  But, this is your chance to establish “who you are relative to the project”.

3.       “I’m pretty excited today…”

Listen very closely to these next 6 words… IT IS OK TO BE EXCITED.  Got it?  Now repeat after me: “IT IS OK TO BE EXCITED.”  Good.  Now don’t forget it.  Here’s the deal.  You’re an engineer.  Chances are good that your audience in this setting is made up of engineer-types.  These are people that are genetically designed such that they get excited about cool solutions to technical problems.  So why not show some excitement?  It will go miles toward building a positive dynamic in the room.  Here’s an absolute must-read book:  The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs by Carmine Gallo.  Get it.  Read it.  Live it.

4.       “…as I think I have a solution that not only is strong enough but uses less material and is also less costly to manufacture”

You know where you want to take the meeting.  Tease it!  Have you ever watched a show where they set up something incredibly interesting only to cut to a commercial?  If you haven’t experienced this, you need more than this blog to help you.  This concept is called “teasing”.  You give away just a little information to whet the appetite of your audience.  This is way to keep an audience from checking their email and/or smartphones.  One caution: overuse of teasers will absolutely destroy your audience.  Use this craftily and you will be a rockstar.  Overuse this approach and your jerk-icty (see the last posting) ratings will increase significantly.

5.       “Let’s check it out…

Here’s a huge, important point: dive into the solution!  Your audience doesn’t care that much about all of the work that you’ve done.  They care about solving the problem.  Thomas Edison said, “If I find 10,000 ways something won't work, I haven't failed. I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.”  However, here’s a clue for you.  You’re not Thomas Edison and even if you were, this isn’t the time to talk about all of the things that didn’t work.  This is the time to sell your solution – which will ultimately “sell” you and raise your rockstar quotient.  You’ve still got your 29 slides (I never said to delete them) in case someone asks questions about various options that may be worth considering.  I know that you want to show that you worked hard.  Unfortunately for you, your management doesn't care that much about how hard your worked.  They care about results.

That’s a killer opening… but what about slides?  Here’s a recommendation: slides are great for pictures and picture-like content (e.g. graphs).  They are lousy for text.  If you put text on a slide people must use their eyes to process a written words while using their ears to process your spoken words.  Not a good combination.

So try this opening slide scheme:

(Slide) Photo of a broken part
“It’s no secret that the X17 has been causing us serious problems and I’ve been working hard on this for the past several months.  I’m pretty excited today as I think I have a solution…”

(Slide) Photo of the new part
“…that not only is strong enough but uses less material and is also less costly to manufacture. Let’s check it out…”

After the opening… get on with selling the solution.  Maintain the energy and don’t waste time on things that don’t matter.  Wait!  Did you catch that word in the first sentence?  To some people “selling” is a bad thing.  But that is exactly what we as engineers need to do in this setting.  We have a product (our solution.) We have buyers (those that are evaluating the solution.) And we need to “sell” it.  Present your ideas as such!

You’re probably thinking: “But Mark!  I’ve got an hour and I’ve got all these slides.  I want to show them how good and thorough of an engineer that I am.”

Here’s what I have to say about that:  To be a rockstar engineer you need to realize chief engineers want to get one thing from this setting – and it’s a big multi-syllable word: trustworthiness.  OK let’s just simplify it to: TRUST.  Your job in this meeting is to help them grow to trust you and trust your solution.

Now to really mess with your head…

Instead of preparing 60 minutes of presentation as Charlie did above.  How about using the killer opening, then spending 15 minutes presenting the solution – allowing for interruptions and questions as you go?  By the way, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE do not ever say: “I’ll take questions at the end.”  This is a complete show stopper for people who are sequential learners like I am.  If I have a question, I need an answer before I can move on.  If I can’t get an answer to a question I will tune out fast.

After your 15 minutes (which will hopefully stretch to 30 since your audience is warmed up and conversational) you will not have about 20 minutes in which you can now show leadership in the room and circle back with a phrase like: “I do have field data regarding warranty costs and locations if anybody would like to see it”.  Or “I do have the test data for the other possible solutions” if you are interested.

Now here’s one that will totally kill you…

End early.  Yeah, that’s right I said it.  “End early”.  Yeah, I know that this may be your only chance to “show off” in front of these guys and I know that you don’t want to waste a minute of it.  But do it.  End early.  If you sense that you are losing your room, end early.  If you see the clock approaching the end time, end early.  Don’t wait for the audience – you should maintain your position of control and you should be the one that ends the meeting.  Don’t let the meeting dissolve away with people drifting out as meetings often do.  You can be a rockstar and maintain your role as host – and you can be the one to end the meeting.  Try this: “I appreciate your time and discussion today.  So with that we will wrap things up.  If any of you would like to stick around.  I’d be happy to talk more.”  That’s the stuff of rockstar-engineer legends.

Second-First Impression Hint:

When you are presenting to those that are over you – you should realize that they are interested in one thing: TRUST.  Don’t waste their time on things that they already know or things that don’t solve the problem.

Second-First Impression Resources:

The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs by Carmine Gallo.  Some really good inspiration regarding “not holding back your excitement” and some great tips on slides and “flow”.

The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint by Edward Tufte.  It’s just a few pages, but incredibly powerful stuff.  It is worth reading just for the discussion of space shuttle disaster and the way that the information surrounding this event was presented.

Finally, here's the list of everything that Charlie did wrong (Maybe you can come up with some of your own too!).

1. He buried himself in his laptop before the meeting.  His laptop should be displaying the title slide of his presentation (with his name on it.)

2. Didn't "work the crowd" prior to the meeting.  This is a huge opportunity that was lost.

3. He read his slide to the audience.  Don't do this.  Your audience can read.  Don't treat them like they can't.

4. He told the audience that he would take questions at the end.  This is basically saying "shut up until I'm done.  I don't want to hear from you."

5. He spent too much time on the problem.  Trust me.  Management knows the problems.  In fact they probably know more about the problems than you do.  Don't waste their time telling them things that they already know.  Worse yet, don't waste their time telling them things that they may know more about than you do.

6. He spent way too much time talking about alternatives.  Alternatives can go in an appendix of a report.  Alternatives can be presented if someone in the audience asks for them.  You can say "I have looked at several alternatives and am willing to discuss them, but I want to be respectful of your time."

7. He spent way too little time on his solution.  This should have been the focus and it should have been up front.

8. He used big, fancy words that his audience didn't need.  When I wrote my Ph.D. dissertation I was constantly being told to use bigger words.  When I arrived in industry, I was told that I tended to "talk over people's heads".  Since I've always been interested in effective communication, this really hit me hard.  Think about it this way: two or three small words are far more effective than one big important word.  Two or three small sentences are far more effective than one big, long sentence.  Your audience is working hard to digest and understand your solution. Don't make it harder on them by forcing them to translate words that they don't normally use.  This does not impress them.

9. Charlie lost the room.  Great presenters treat presentations as a two-way conversation.  They pay attention to body language and the "interest" of the room and they do everything that they can to re-engage people that may be slipping away.

10. Some of his audience missed the most important material.  By "saving the best for last", Charlie effectively "hid" his best material from some of the audience.

So let's get plugged in,
...turn on the hazer,
...flip open the dry ice,
...crank up the spotlights...
...and totally rock your next project presentation!