Let me tell you a story first. I use this story often in my Creative Blockbusting© workshops. (http://www.ideasrs.com/workshops/creative-block-busting/)

I have a friend Natarajan (Nat to his friends) who is also a Tambrahm (Tamilian Brahmin) like me. He is a senior manager in one of the Indian Multi-Nationals. He and his family are vegetarians.

Nat has a nice practice. Every month he takes out his family – wife, teenage daughter, and son- for dinner. This has been going on for years.

Nat had his favourite restaurant list and would choose one from his favourite list every month. However, his daughter was not happy with his choice of restaurants.

One month she said, “Dad, I will take you to a different restaurant this month. It is of course 100% vegetarian.”

“Which one is this?”

“Little Italy”

“What cuisine do they serve?”

“Authentic Italian food.”

Before Nat could respond, his son jumped into the conversation and “Wow! Dad we must go there.” When he looked at his wife, she nodded and said, “Why don’t we try it? The children seem to like it.”

Nat said “Why not? I am all for experimentation. Let us go for it.”

On the appointed day, both his daughter and son asked his permission to bring their best friend. Nat readily agreed. (He was somewhat relieved too. He was constantly running out of subjects to talk to his children. What he found interesting, did not interest them.)

When they settled down the children were the first to get off the mark. They seemed to know the items on the menu pretty well. Nat looked at his wife and she smiled and said, “I will go by your choice.”

Nat read the menu card once again and was completely lost. He had never been to an Italian restaurant before. He did not feel comfortable to talk to the manager and find out more about the items on the menu. What will his children and their friends think?

Nat then beckoned the steward and told him “My wife and I are not happy with any of this. Can you organize for some nice dhal, chawal, jeera aloo and a raita for us? We are sick and tired of our sambar & rice you see. This will be a good change.”

I stop my story here but use the story to explain what happens in organizations that start looking for break-through innovations, but end up with incremental improvements. Very often the culprit is the senior management.

The CEO declares that he is all for experimentation and will support any innovation, provided of course it is relevant. (This is like Nat saying ‘I am prepared to experiment with any cuisine, provided it is vegetarian.’)

This is a good beginning. However, what happens when the CEO is presented with outstanding ideas – ideas that have never occurred to him or his board members. If these ideas are implemented the benefits will be immense. Some of them could be game-changers.

Then the CEO and his colleagues on the board, start analyzing the ideas. They look unfamiliar, and they make them feel quite uncomfortable. They start making the ideas familiar by changing couple of features and introducing features that they like.

Finally, they have something marginally different from what they normally do. However, the ideas are not disruptive and will not cause any discomfort. Everyone is happy now.

They followed Nat’s formula and settled for “Dhal Chawal”. They even felt happy that they made progress from their usual, predictable ‘Sambar Rice.”

This is what I call ‘Dhal Chawal Innovation’. Incremental improvements like a marginal change in the menu. Status quo will be intact and safe.

I am not disdainful of improvements of any kind. However, I feel frustrated when I see outstanding ideas transform to become ‘Dhal Chawal’, because the senior management did not want to put in the effort make the big idea happen. “Too much work, too many changes” says the CEO dismissively. What annoys me even more are the ‘I know all’ attitude and a refusal to look at new things with an open mind.

The last straw on the proverbial camel’s back is when the CEO delivers a speech on Innovation at some forum and gets a standing ovation!

‘Dhal Chawal Innovation’ is the staple food for many CEOs who could make a big difference to the culture of innovation in their organizations. Sadly, they constantly signal to the people that ‘Dhal Chawal’ is good enough!

What bugs me

It bugs me

1. that people never return my calls  or sms messages or answer e mails unless I remind them
2. that people ask for a lot of information and then don’t read it when I  send it to them
3. when I have put together a terrific presentation and the client says cut out the presentation, give me the gist in five minutes (he had originally given 60 minutes!)
4. ceos don’t have time for important things
5. when I see people wasting time in meetings (with gas, gossip and gobbledygook)
6. when people can’t write in a  simple clear manner
7. when people use jargon to hide their ignorance
8. when secretaries question me endlessly before passing on my call to their bosses
9. when I call domino to order a pizza and they harass me by asking questions for their database
10. when intelligent people behave stupidly and justify their stupidity
11. when people feign helplessness when they have  all the power to set things right
12. when I land in a city and the car meant to receive me is not there (worse still – the driver is waiting there the placard is folded neatly and kept in his pocket!)
13. when I  discover that I have no cash –  only credit cards
14. when airport lounges refuse to accept some credit cards (Mastercard yes, but standard chartered no)`
15. when I have to chase payment for  my bills
16. when I forget things
17. when people make me wait in spite of giving me appointments (they asked for the meeting in the first place)
18. when I can’t  can’t find the comb
19. when I  find that I  have forgotten  to check the   toothepaste
20. when people ask me to block dates but never get back unless I remind them
21. when I am in a conference room in a hotel, and there is constant noise from the kitchen or service area
22. when people send me chain mail in the name of god or good luck
23. when people send viruses through their mail and don’t know it
24. when people keep ringing the door bell relentlessly, till you open the door
25. when my dog barks just when I am on an std call
26. when my cell phone signal goes weak in the midst of an important conversation
27. when people call but don’t leave a message on the answering machine
28. when people leave incomplete messages on the answering machine
29. when people call on phone and start talking without saying who they are
30. when people call you on the phone and say “Guess who?”
31. when the new telephone systems asks you millions of questions before you can speak to some one
32. that the new telephone systems ask for extension numbers but people’s visiting cards don’t carry them
33. when people are never in their seats and their secretaries never know where they are
34. when I have to fill complicated forms for anything (and the instructions are confusing)
35. when my e mail messages bounce  for no reason at all
36. when websites ask me to fill unnecessary details to register
37. When I get a new request to join some new community, network or birthday reminder service
38. when I forget my password and I have no easy way to remember it
39. that I can’t lose weight without diet or exercise or both (and someone else in the family seems to have done it)
40. that I can’t get the best choice  in ready-mades because my waistline is beyond 38”
41. when I can’t hear a word of the announcements made in airports and railway stations
42. when couriers insist on my giving them the telephone numbers when I receive a parcel (why can’t signature alone do?)
43. when people throw the rule book at me without listening to what I have to say                                                                                                                             44. when banks send bundles of notes stapled all over and I end up tearing a few notes
45. when door men in hotels hang around my car door waiting for tips

What bugs you?

“Who is Diya?”

“Good morning, Prasna*. I was hoping you would raise the question.”

“Answer the question please.”

“Diya is the daughter of a sex worker.”

“Why I should I give her a chance? Chance to do what?”

“Girls like Diya are drawn into the sex and drug trade, if they are not rescued. An NGO called ASSET India Foundation is giving a chance to Diya and hundreds of children of sex workers and girls rescued from trafficking in India.”

“Interesting. Only yesterday I read about courts lamenting about the status of such children, not getting proper education. This is laudable. Tell me more. What exactly does ASSET India do?”

“They teach these children English and computer skills. The children get more confidence, become employable and get a chance to break free from the tyranny that chains them. Asset India has already trained several hundred such children and placed them in decent jobs with BPOs, Banks and insurance companies.”

“It is nice of those companies to hire them. It is good to know that companies think beyond profits and involve themselves in such social causes.”

“You are right. ASSET India’s work has impressed a lot of people. Here is an excellent documentary on their work by well known film maker. It is just about 3 minutes and gives you a very good idea about ASSET’s work. The best part is that it is not predictable and it ficuses on the solution rather than the problem.”

“Where do I see it?”

“You just  click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCw_KvOpBiM. It is on Youtube.”

“OK, I will see it. I trust your judgment; it must be good. Now why don’t you come to the point RS?”

“Like most NGOs ASSET India too needs money to pay for the cost of training these deserving children - including computers and teacher salaries.”

“Oh God!. Finally it is the same old story. NGO wants money; just  the reason is different.”

“For once you are wrong Prasna. You jumped to your conclusion too fast. They do not want your money!”

“What? If they do not want money what do they want? Just my sympathy?”

“Prasna be patient and let me complete what I wanted to say. ASSET India is not asking for money; they want your vote. Let me explain.

ASSET India is competing in the JP Morgan Chase Giving Facebook voting contest. The prize money is US $ 1 million. They have cleared the first round, won $25,000 and now it is tight contest amongst the top 100 charities.”

“Oh! This is a nice twist. I can help this NGO without spending money. I just have to vote. When and where do I vote?”

“The voting for the final round started at 10.30 am on Friday January 15, 2010 and ends at 10.30 am January 22,2010. Just click on  http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/717045 and vote for ASSET India. The 30 seconds you spend on voting could change the life of  Diya and many others like her,  forever. This will be your way of giving Diya a chance in life.”

“I have one more question. Why are you involved in it?”

“40 years ago, a management consultant gave me a chance when I was just 19 and had not even graduated. I often wonder what might have happened, if he had not. This my way of paying to society.”

“I will certainly vote. What else can I do, now that you made me listen to the full story?”

“You can do two things. First vote now. Second is to help by reaching more people. Therefore, simply forward this message to your entire address book, forward it to your Yahoo and other networking groups. Every vote counts.”

“What about those who voted in the first round? Can they vote again?

“Of course. They must vote this time too and make ASSET India win.”

*Prasna is my invisible friend who asks uncomfortable questions and stretches my thinking.

(How to help a charity without spending money )

 ”Do you have to be talking in riddles all the time? How can 3 clicks change lives?”

“Prasna, I know you are upset because I have not written for a long time. However it is true that you can change some people’s lives with just 3 clicks on your mouse.”

“OK tell me. It better be a good story.”

“It is a good story, but a trifle long. I need to tell you all that before you get ready to click thrice on your mouse.”

“Why don’t you just get on with it?”

” Ok here it is. ASSET India Foundation (Achieving Sustainable Social Equality through Technology) was started by my niece Nita Umashankar, (who is finishing her PhD in marketing Strategy at the University of Texas in Austin) my elder  brother Umashankar and his wife Sushila Umashankar. The purpose:  to educate Children of women in prostitution and girls rescued from trafficking for prostitution in major cities in India. They do this  by providing computer literacy for alternate livelihood and as a means of AIDS prevention. This way these children can free themselves from being chained to the flesh trade. They place the students in internships/jobs after the training.

ASSET India Foundation is taking part in the Chasegiving contest on Facebook.  My brother wrote to find out if I could write to associates and friends and request them to vote for ASSET India in the contest.

“What is this Chasegiving contest on Facebook?”

“Ok Prasna, this is the situation. In the current economy, fundraising for non-profits in the U.S has become very difficult. Hence Chase Giving, a US charity and others have organized contests to engage more young people to participate through social networks such as Facebook. There are a number of research studies that have indicated that using social networks directly for fundraising has not been effective. Chase Giving therefore has organized the voting contest. The winner gets the prize sponsored by Chasegiving – it is $25,000 in Phase I, $100,000 in Phase II and $ 1 Million in Phase III. You vote by a 3-click process. You click on the link at the end of this blog, then become a fan of Chasegiving and then click to vote. That’s it.”

“That is it? How do people know about ASSET India’s credentials?”

“Prasna, my brother anticipated  you will raise this question. So he has already sent the details.  He raised the two questions: Who benefits from the prize,  and why should  any one vote for ASSET over others and what has ASSET done so far?”

” I hope you learn from your brother.”

“I will. Here are the answers to those questions. Tangible facts, Prasna that no one can ignore.

 Who will benefit from this prize?

The competing non-profits such as ASSET India Foundation will receive funds based on the number of votes. Chase Giving has approved each participating non-profit including ASSET. ASSET is registered with the Internal RevenueService in the U.S and has official tax exempt status. ASSET raises funds to support its work in India. (Thus the money comes for charity work in India).

Why ASSET over other charities?

“When we came back from India with the idea to help children of sex workers and girls rescued from trafficking, we did extensive research on what NGOs were doing in this area. The only skills provided were sewing, vegetable vending, bag making etc- earning Rs.500 per month which not enough to keep the girls out of the flesh trade. That’s why we started ASSET. We not only provide the training but also place the students in jobs. To date we have placed more than 150 students in companies such as FirstSource  (BPO), Cafe Coffee Day, Phoenix Software and several smaller companies. In addition I am pestering CEOs about the skills their companies need at the entry level so that I can incorporate them in our training and thereby reduce training costs for the companies. The starting salary is between Rs. 2,500 to Rs. 4,000 in Chennai and Rs. 4,000 to Rs 6,500 in Mumbai.

ASSET also provides instruction on Health & Hygeine, managing money and brings speakers from the industry to talk about the importance of staying in school and opportunities in the IT field. The very reputable SMILE Foundation based in Delhi manages all the ASSET centers in India. SMILE staff oversee the centers. I transfer the funds to SMILE and they in turn disburse the funds to NGOs running the centers. SMILE provides regular financial statements as well as progress reports. ASSET has no paid staff in the U.S and its and its annual tax filing is public. ”

“What about some concrete proof that this is working?”

Umashankar continues ” Major donors include Dell, IBM, Intel, Sooch Foundation, Global Giving Foundation, Saxena Family Foundation, SHG Foundation.(ASSET website: www.assetindiafoundation.org)

Here is our first batch placement report for our Mumbai center, located in Kamathipura red light district.  Placement Status of 1st Batch:

1. Mrs. Arpita A Salunke – Aditya Birla Minacs

2. Mr. Akshay R Berde – Aditya Birla Minacs

 3. Mrs.Suvarna M Pawar – Aditya Birla Minacs

4. Ms. Shraddha M Vyas – Navjeevan Centre

5. Ms. Rekha J Gaikwad – Bombay Teen Challenge

 6. Mrs.Vidya H Chandorkar – Bombay Teen Challenge

 7. Mr. Shailesh M Gurav – Swimming Teacher at Lower Parel

8. Mr. Suresh Om Prasad – Video Shooting Work

Faculty: Mr. Prakash Moraye, Management &  Ms. Laxmi – Computer Instructor at Class

Placement Status: Sr.No. Name Date of joining Company Post Salary

1 Ms. Sneha Gaikwad 7/9/2009 Dreamz Management Tele-calling Operator 4500

2 Ms. Ravina Kachankar 7/9/2009 Dreamz Management Tele-calling Operator 4500

3 Ms. Radhika Shrigadi 7/9/2009 Dreamz Management Tele-calling Operator 4500

4 Ms. Bhavana Rathod 7/9/2009 Dreamz Management Tele-calling Operator 4500

5. Ms. Fehmida Sheikh 7/9/2009 Dreamz Management Tele-calling Operator 4500

6 Ms. Amrapali Katarnaware 14/9/09 West Side Sales 4800

 7. Ms. Chanchal Mishra 14/9/09 West Side Sales 4800

8 Ms. Pramila Puralkar 14/9/09 Loot Store Sales 4200

9 Ms. Vijaya Narayan Parab 22/09/09 IP INDIA COMPANY Data entry operator 5000

10 Mr. Uttam Das 21/09/09 Café COFFEE DAY Tr.TM 5000

11 Mr. Sanvidhan Katarnaware 21/09/09 Café COFFEE DAY Tr.TM 5000

12 Mr. Ramdas Ovhal 4/10/2009 Asha Mahila Sanstha Field Worker 6500 Promoted

13 Mrs. Savita Pacharkar 4/10/2009 Asha Mahila Sanstha Field Worker 6500 Promoted

14 Ms. Sangita Kamble 4/10/2009 Asha Mahila Sanstha Field Worker 6500 Promoted

15 Ms. Anita Baban Jadhav 1/11/2009 BPL Mobile Tele-calling Operator 4000

What other proof would you like?”

“The case rests RS. Why don’t you write to your associates and friends?”

 The people Umashankar has listed above will have a new life due to ASSET.

Impressed? Now why don’t you vote by logging in to Facebook after clicking on the link below and then pass on the link to ten of your friends? The logging into Facebook and 3-click process takes a minute and you are  changing someone’s life forever. The link is: http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/717045

The voting deadline is Dec 11, 2009. They need around 5,000 votes to win. I would be grateful if you cast your vote for ASSET and make them win. The desrve every vote they get.

The clock struck two as we entered our prospect’s office that afternoon. My team and I were pitching for new business from a very important client. We had got this appointment after chasing the client for nearly three months. We were presenting to the CEO, his marketing chief and a team of young brand managers. We approached the receptionist and mentioned that we had an appointment with the CEO. They were expecting us and she immediately directed us to the conference room.

We had half-an-hour to set up our equipment. Just as we finished setting up and testing everything, the CEO and his team walked in. After the customary introductions were completed I stood up to start the presentation. Just then Mr. Murphy decided to join the presentation and the lights went off.

“Who is this Murphy?”

“Prasna, this is Murphy of the Murphy’s law fame.I think the law says ‘Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong sooner or later.’”

“Oh! What happened then?”

“We thought that it was a temporary failure but soon realised that the transformer next door had burst. It was a major problem and there was no chance of restoring power for the next three or four hours.”

“Let me guess what you must have done. You must have asked for rescheduling the meeting. Is that right?”

“Yes, that is what I did. However the CEO said that rescheduling was not possible because everyone would get busy with their budget planning work. It would be impossible to put this entire team together. So he insisted that we carry on with the meeting. I mentioned to him that our entire presentation was in the computer and it was not possible to present without the slides.”

“What did he say?”

“He said something that made us think. He said ‘Why do you need the powerpoint slides? I am sure you know the business and all your case studies by heart. Just talk to us about what you do, what you can offer us and why we should give our business to you.’ ”

I realised he had a point. I asked for fifteen minutes to get ready. He organised for coffee and used the time to quickly catch up on couple of issues with his team. Meanwhile my team and I huddled together to decide what we should do. One of my partners read out the three questions he had asked; she had made a note of that. Another produced a printout of the slides. We had 170 slides and several case studies. We also realised that the presentation did not answer his three questions.

“This is a blessing in disguise.” I said. We quickly decided some of the things we would do.

1. We will focus on the client’s issues and not about us.
2. We will share case-stories and not case-studies.
3. We will make a compelling offer. We will not ask for the business in a predictable manner.

“What is a case-story? How is it different from a case study?”

“A case-story is like a narrative, Prasna. We explain the whole case using the 5W + 1H, like how a journalist would approach a story. A typical case study may be more matter of fact.”

“What is 5W+1H?”

“It stands for who, what, where, when why and how. A good story answers these questions.”

We decided to focus on three big issues that the client had mentioned in his conversation when we met him first, nearly three months ago.

1. How do we improve sales call productivity
2. How do we retain our high-value customers
3. How do we build more business with existing customers

We decided that I would set up the context and one of my team members would narrate the case-story. I would summarise the key points for each case. We then decided to do two more things. We tried to guess the questions the client and his team might have. We wrote down those questions. We also decided to make a compelling offer to move the client to make a decision.

The case-stories format worked very well. I discovered that I had brilliant presenters in my team who could engage an audience in very interesting ways. The stories had drama, humour and even suspense! The client spontaneously broke into an applause after this section.

We then wrote all the questions on the white board and I asked “Do these questions reflect the questions you have in your mind? Do you want to add any? Delete any?” In a few minutes we shortlisted five questions. We answered all of them in the order of priority given by the client.

I then made the final offer “Here is an offer for you. Give us a brief today on an issue that is keeping you awake, and we will get back to you with a comprehensive presentation in the next seven days. You have no obligation to place any business after seeing the presentation. The only condition is: you have to give us a brief now!”

Three brand managers wanted to brief us and the CEO chose one for us to work with.

We realised how dependent we were on powerpoint slides. On our way back one of my colleagues said something very insightful.
“A powerpoint is not the presentation”.

“That is good observation RS. I have a problem with this story though.”

“Why?”

“This seems like an exception than the rule. You cannot wish away powerpoint slides. Everybody uses them, everywhere.”

“Prasna, it is not about wishing away powerpoint slides. It is about using them intelligently. Let me give you an example. I was asked to coach a board member of a large bank on presentation skills. She was going to the US and she wanted me to see her presentation and help her improve it. I suggested that she should make the presentation to me and we video-tape her presentation. When we reviewed the footage she was horrified to see that she had her back to the audience most of the time and she was virtually reading the slides. So I asked her to try an experiment. She had to sell me something that she was passionate about. It could be a product, service or even her pet cause. The only condition was that she cannot use powerpoint slides.”

“What did she do?”

“She persuaded me to buy stocks in her bank. When we later saw this pitch on video she was zapped. It was just five minutes but her passion, conviction and persuasion were unmistakable. She was just brilliant. She then said something I can never forget – ‘I know what went wrong. The slides must support my presentation. Instead I ended up supporting the slides.’”

“Good one.”

“The next thing that people forget is that the moment you decide to ‘present’ anything you are trying to move people from point A to point B. You don’t make presentations to keep people informed. If you do that, it is a waste of time. So every presentation is a pitch of some sort. The slides must therefore help you make a case. As David Ogilvy says ‘you can’t bore people into buying.’ Are slides the best way to make your point? Can you do it better in any other way? No body asks this question. That is why most powerpoint presentations are disasters. Do you know there is even a book called ‘Death by Powerpoint’.”

“Have you read it? Do you recommend it?”

” I have not read it. What caught my attention is that somebody thought of a title like that. Use ‘death by powerpoint’ for a search in google you get some very useful material.”

“You made a passionate case RS. So what is your take home message.”

“When someone says create a powerpoint presentation, stop and ask. Is there a better way? How can you be different and effective?”

This is an outstanding book about how one should look at his career.

There are many things good about the book. However, what I found most useful is a section called ‘Targeting Talents. This section helps us identify our talents and start thinking about how we can put them to work building the kind of world we want to live in. It points out that talents are more than abilities related to writing, music or dance.

Talents include a wide variety of natural abilities. It argues that our talents are unique to us but skills are often as much the result of someone else’s is doing as our own. Skills are often acquired to fulfil someone else’s view on what we must become or what we must do.

Here is a verbatim quotation from the book: “You may have undiscovered talents. With a relatively small degree of talent, and considerable training and technical skill, you achieve competency, perhaps even a high degree of commercial success. However if you pursue what you have real talent in, you will experience the joy of being fully alive in your work.

Often we have so much invested in training and developing our skills that we are unwilling to admit we have little real talent for the area. When we admit it, we feel a sense of relief. For now we can go on to discover our genuine talents and pursue them with a passion. Developing talent is the road to your creative best.”

The book suggests that when we are looking for our talents, we must look for

1. What we enjoy doing

2. What we enjoy thinking about

3. What we enjoy learning about

4. What we enjoy as a process

The book features a Talent Quiz with 75 abilities listed. We rate ourselves on each on a scale of one to ten, and arrive at out top ten talents. We also get feedback from others who know us well to check if our self-assessment is right.

I find this a very powerful exercise, which can shape the way we think about our future.

“So what do you suggest?” asked Prasna.

“I suggest that people should try this talent quiz. Face the results squarely and take a call on their future career.”

“Why this sudden interest on talent?”

“I had tried this exercise years ago. Recently a set of people who are were working creating a vision for their organisation tried it. It helped them look at their own roles very differently, in the new context.”

“How did that help?”

“It is too early to say. However, the team believes that this exercise will help them to unleash their potential to be more creative, more productive and enjoy their work-life better. “

“Do you believe it?”

“I believe it is not impossible. What will make the difference will be their passion and persistence.”

I was in Bangalore those days. We had one of the leading hotels as our client.

The General Manager introduced an interesting service guarantee for room service. It is somewhat like what Domino does now. If the room service order was not executed in 15 minutes, the guest did not have to pay.

The General Manager thought that it was a brilliant idea. The Room Service Guarantee was introduced but even after a month, he heard nothing from the guests. Therefore, he spoke to a few guests. They were happy with the service but did not think that he was serious about the service guarantee part.

The GM was disappointed. His team felt that the service guarantee idea did not work and should be withdrawn. However, he was keen to pursue it. He was discussing this over a cup of coffee with me.

“Why do you think it is not working?” I asked.

“Because I have not got a single response from guests.”

“What did you expect?”

“I thought guests will be delighted. I thought some of the guests, who have now become good friends, would have spoken to me.”

“Why do you think they have not spoken to you yet?”

“I asked some of them, but they did not even notice the tent card we have placed in the room, about this service guarantee.”

“Tell me again, about how the guarantee works.”

“It works when the service is delayed. Then the customer does not have to pay anything.”

“It is meant to work, whether the order is big or small.”

“Absolutely.”

“Suppose the customer has placed an order and the bill is substantial. The service is delayed by a minute. You will waive off the bill. Is that what your service guarantee is all about.”

“Yes.”

“Have you tested this?”

“Yes, our guys deliver within 15 minutes. The entire system is geared for this.”

“So the guest can never experience the real benefit of your service guarantee. He only experiences fast service. I assume these guests travel around the world and must be used to great service.”

“What is your point?”

“I think the guest will experience the real benefit of your guarantee only when your service is delayed. Imagine I have a few guests with me for dinner. We decide to eat in the room. The room service guys delivers my room service order. I am extending my hand by force of habit asking for the bill I have to sign. He then springs this surprise on me and says ‘There is no bill Sir. I was late by 45 seconds. Our room service guarantee says that if the order was not delivered in 15 minutes, it is on the house. Our General Managers sends you his greetings. Enjoy the dinner sir.’ Can you imagine the impact on me and my guests if this happened?”

“Yes, I get the picture. I now have an idea.”

“Tell me”

“What if we chose one room service order every day. We will choose it carefully. We will ensure that it is slightly expensive and there are other guests in the room. Delay the service by less than minute. Then dramatically announce that the dinner was on the house, in front of every one.”

“Brilliant. What do you think will happen?”

“We will ‘wow’ people and they will talk about this. The free dinner is my investment for word of mouth marketing.”

The General Manager went on to execute his idea and it worked very well.

“Did this really happen?”

“Yes, Prasna.”

“I loved the way you steered the thinking, by asking some smart questions. Good show. See you tomorrow.”

“See you tomorrow.”

“Ah! You want to teach others how to write better. Don’t you think this is audacious?”

“No Prasna. I am going to share a few tips about what I have learnt over the years. These are simple things everybody can use.”

“Ok, then go on.”

The Internet has changed the way people look at reading and writing. You may or may not read books and magazines. However, if you are using the internet, you have no choice. You are subjected to good, bad and indifferent writing. If you happen to write, then you probably inflict the same suffering to others.

Why is good writing important? The first reason is simple. If people do not understand what you say, you cannot influence their thinking or behaviour. In addition, what you write creates an impression in their minds about you. Their perception about you is influenced by the quality of your writing. Spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, incomplete sentences etc signal to the reader impressions about you, which may not be favourable. You may have an important point to make but may lose your reader because of these issues.

There is a simple way to start improving the quality of your writing. If you use Microsoft Word, you not only get help on spelling and grammar but also on your writing style. It even gives you a readability report. The report shows how readable your writing is and how easy it is for people to understand. The length of your sentence (the number words in a sentence), affects readability and understanding. The way you use active voice or passive voice in your sentences affects your style and readability. I have been consciously using this feature from Word for several years now. I know it works well because people have commented about my writing. I generally keep my sentence lengths to a maximum of 12 to 15 words. If my sentence is wordy, the software says so. If I use passive voice in my sentence, it says so; and I can correct it. If I use a sentence without a verb in it, it shows up as a fragment. I have to write a complete sentence to set it right. The spell check however may not be reliable. In the last sentence if I had used the word write instead of right, spell check would not have detected it. It cannot make out the difference between their and there. That is a small flaw.

I just checked the readability report for what I have written till here. Here is what the report says:

Number of words: 413

Words per sentence: 11.3

Passive sentences: 0%

Flesch reading ease: 67.1

Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level: 6.6

The Flesch Reading Ease readability score formula rates text on a 100-point scale based on the average number of syllables per word and words per sentence. The higher the Flesch Reading Ease score, the easier it is to understand the document. For most standard documents, aim for a Flesch Reading Ease score of approximately 60 to 70.

Flesch Kincaid Grade Level is a way of measuring the readability of a certain text. In other words, it uses a mathematical formula to calculate the difficulty of the writing and to estimate the grade level that the reader must be at in order to readily understand the text.

There is also something called a Fog scale indicator. The Fog scale is similar to the Flesch scale in that it compares syllables and sentence lengths. ‘Foggy’ words are words that contain 3 or more syllables. The fog score is then composed by taking the percent of foggy words multiplied by 100 added to the sentence length. That result is than multiplied by .4

A fog score of 5 is readable, 10 is hard, 15 is difficult, and 20 is very difficult. However MS Word does not give you this score.

There is one more thing you can do to improve your writing. Draton Bird one of the world’s best direct mail writers suggests that we write passionately and edit carefully. When I worked in Ogilvy we used one more method. For example, I used to share my advertising strategy documents with colleagues who were tough critics. They would tear the document apart but the final output would be excellent. McKinsey employs editors who would subject proposals and documents to tough scrutiny.

“Is that true?”

“Yes, Prasna. I met Jeanne-Subramaniam, who was an editor in McKinsey’s Mumbai office, several years ago.”

“Let us see how many people read this piece!”

I read this statement years ago. I am in two minds about this. Do I accept this or challenge this?

I have seen people like Mr. Xerxes Desai, former Managing Director of Titan Watches. Mr. Desai is a perfectionist and his sense of aesthetics, quality and detail raises the bar on everything. Because of him everybody associated with the Titan Watch project raised his own quality of work. However perfection had a cost. It took longer, required rework till we got things right. It was not easy, it was even frustrating some times. Yet, it was worth all the blood, sweat and tears.

Then I was introduced to a concept called – QFD – Quality Function Deployment. As I understand it, the concept talks about designing things appropriate to the way a product or service might be used. Very often discussions on QFD led to discussions on over-engineering and high costs. It almost suggests that perfection is not relevant all the time. When a man is hungry give him food and don’t worry about the perfect meal, in a perfect setting.

I have also seen many people in a pursuit of perfection. Very often they were trying to perfect one aspect or the other of something already created and ready to move forward. I am guilty of this behaviour. I compiled some of my earlier blog posts and put it together as an e-book called Uninvited Coach. In my view it is still not perfect but I decided to go ahead and publish it. I had given myself a deadline and I was already three months late.

“What are you getting at?”

“Prasna, I am saying that everything does not require perfection.”

“Why don’t you just say it? I think you have made a case already. You do not have to labour over it.”

“Ok, if you say so. The case rests, my lord.”