CRM Done Right

From Havard Business

The Idea in Brief

Frustrated by high costs and dubious payoffs, managers that used the first customer-relationship management (CRM) systems came to view them as overhyped IT investments. Accordingly, CRM spending plummeted between 2001 and 2003. But now CRM system sales are soaring, as executives from a wide variety of industries tout CRM's value.

What's changed? Rather than trying to transform entire businesses through full-scale CRM implementations, companies are applying CRM in disciplined, focused ways--and getting more from it. How to realize the same benefits from your CRM initiatives? Use CRM to solve highly specific customer-relationship challenges--such as accurately diagnosing call center customers' problems. Invest in real-time information--the holy grail of CRM--only where it's needed. For example, a hotel manager requires real-time data on room availability, not on customers' opinions about room decor. Equally crucial, use what you learn from successful smaller CRM projects to tackle larger problems.

By knowing where in your business to deploy CRM, and how, you stand to score impressive revenue gains--as companies like Kimberly-Clark, Ingersoll-Rand, and Brother have done.

The Idea in Practice

To decide where and how to use CRM technology, ask four questions:

Is It Strategic?

Before spending a dime on CRM, identify the processes that most support your company's strategy. Target them for improvement through CRM.

Aircraft-parts distributor Aviall Inc. needed a well-trained sales force to achieve its strategic objective: becoming the premier industry provider of supply-chain management services. The company installed only those CRM elements required to enhance sales-force and order-entry productivity.

Sales representatives now had instant access to customers' credit history, a streamlined order-processing system, and the ability to deliver firm quotes immediately. They tripled their daily number of sales calls and expanded their customer base by one-third. The number of orders handled daily more than doubled--with no staff increase. And Aviall won an unprecedented ten-year, $3 billion supply contract with engine maker Rolls-Royce

Where Does It Hurt?

Where in your customer-relationship cycle do performance-sapping problems arise? Is it when you're seeking to stimulate initial purchases? provide after-sale service? retain customers? Focus CRM efforts on your pain points.

Consumer-goods giant Kimberly-Clark's pain point lay in its retailer promotions. Running thousands of promotions annually, it couldn't discern which promotions strengthened retailer loyalty and sales. It installed a modest CRM system that enabled managers to track the return on investments in individual promotions. In the initiative's first year, Kimberly-Clark streamlined budgets and increased profits by redirecting $20 million in promotion spending.

Do We Need Perfect Data?

Accessing and responding to real-time information requires expensive, complex systems. Distinguish between activities that truly demand perfect data and those that don't.

Japanese equipment maker Brother International's U.S. arm faced high product-return rates stemming from customers' dissatisfaction with call-center service. The company launched a new CRM system that enabled service reps to identify customers when they called, quickly locate their purchase records, and provide codified responses to common questions. Call times shrank by 43 seconds, saving $855,000 annually. Product returns fell by one-third over three years.

Where Do We Go from Here?

Don't rest on your CRM laurels. Rigorously analyze system-generated data to pinpoint new, well-defined opportunities to extend CRM's power.

Diversified manufacturer Ingersoll-Rand recognized that customers who purchased its golf carts might like to buy other divisions' products, such as Bobcat mini-excavators and loaders. The company spurred cross-selling by expanding its golf-course division's CRM order-taking function to include other divisions. The initiative generated additional orders of $6.2 million in its first few months.

Copyright 2004 Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved.

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Further Reading

Articles

Is Your Company Ready for One-to-One Marketing?

Harvard Business Review

February 2001

by Don Peppers, Martha Rogers, and Bob Dorf

The authors offer additional guidelines for applying CRM in a disciplined, focused way. For example, before implementing a CRM effort, assess your company's readiness. Using responses to questionnaires filled out by managers, employees, and customers, discern whether your company is prepared to: 1) identify end-user customers' habits and preferences, 2) differentiate customers based on their value to you, 3) interact with customers through affordable channels that yield additional information about their value and needs, and 4) customize products and services based on what you've learned.

They Bought In. Now They Want to Bail Out

Harvard Business Review

December 2003

by Eric McNulty

This article provides experts' commentary on a fictional case study of one company that failed to use a focused approach to implementing CRM. Menswear chain Mathews & Co.'s Chief Technology Officer Barry Golding is angling for funding to implement CRM software. He has championed the effort for months, touting CRM's huge potential to department heads. But during the latest planning meeting, the executives express disappointment when they see that the initiative won't give them everything on their wish lists. Barry has fallen victim to the "blue sky paradox" that can derail CRM efforts: To "sell" the project, you have to get people to dream big. You encourage expectations so high that they can't be met--setting people up for disappointment. Top CRM experts provide advice for saving Barry's CRM project.

Book

Building Business Benefits from CRM: How to Design the Strategy, Process, and Architecture to Succeed

Gartner Research Report

May 2003

Gartner, Inc.

This guide provides additional insights to help you get the most from your CRM initiatives. The volume presents valuable findings from research--including technology trends. It provides suggestions for creating an integrated CRM strategy, fashioning optimal CRM business processes for automation, rescuing failed CRM initiatives, and preventing future disasters. The book also explains how to evaluate and select vendors, and it contains case studies of successful CRM initiatives and best practices.

About the Authors

Darrell K. Rigby is a partner with Bain & Company and directs the firm's Global Retail practice.

Dianne Ledingham is a partner and leader in the company's Technology and Performance Improvement practices. Both are based in Boston.

Communicating well

To communicate well really means to communicate so that other people understand what you are saying. You are able to communicate well when you can convey your thoughts and others can, in turn, understand them. Not an easy task. It does require substantial effort, but once you are willing to put in the effort, it will pay large dividends.

In order to convey your thoughts and ideas to others, you must simply communicate clearly. Many of the suggestions given in this article may seem simplistic, but communicating well is nothing more than a simple conveying of one idea from your mind to the recipient's mind. It may seem simplistic, but is well worth a look because your thoughts and ideas and delivery of what you wish to impart to your audience will improve if you follow these simple suggestions.

---

Examine your efforts. For writing, one way that you can know if you have communicated well is to read something that you have written in the past—maybe material from several years ago if you have those documents. Do you understand what you had written? Do you clearly know what your take-home message(s) is/are?

If you don't have any of your past documents, you can just try it now. Write something and then read it a few weeks later (or if you can't wait that long, sooner). See if you understand what you have written. If even you yourself did not understand perfectly what you wrote, it means that the passage was not clear enough. In that case, you should rewrite it so that you understand it. On the other hand, if you understand exactly what you have written, congratulations! In either of these two cases, you can now proceed to the next step. Ask someone to read what you wrote. Have them explain exactly what you meant. If it is not what you had wanted to communicate, it either means that that person cannot communicate his thoughts well himself, or he misunderstood something that you wrote.

For giving speeches, the easiest thing to do is to stand in front of a mirror to give a talk. It may be necessary to up it one notch by using a camcorder to tape-record yourself and then watch it later. Alternatively, you could use a tape recorder and then play it back just to listen to your voice. One of the biggest problems of speakers is to speak too fast. Speak at a well-defined, moderate pace filled with pauses so that people can take in the information.

Organize the information well. Perhaps one of the most effective ways to have others digest your information is to organize it well. So frequently, however, people organize their reports, essays, or speeches, in such a horrendous way that it makes it extremely difficult for the audience to digest the content. It certainly is possible to digest it, but it requires a lot of effort on the part of the reader or listener. It is almost as if the writer or speaker is asking the audience's mind to organize their article or speech for them.

When you organize your report for them, it allows them to concentrate on the content so that they can take home the message more. Good organization means that you do not overwhelm the reader with unrelated facts, but instead group items into broad categories so that they can take in the information more easily. You effortlessly flow through one related topic after another. Use smooth transitions while in the process.

How do you organize your reports and speeches? You must have central themes. One central theme should be the general purpose of the article, which should run throughout the article. More minor themes should be present within each section of your report or speech.

mpart a point to each message. You should have a general point for people to take home. Make it very clear what that point is. For each subtopic, you should also have a point. Hint at it or discuss it at the beginning of the subtopic. Throughout your presentation, gradually make point after point. The flow of the presentation should make sense as you traverse your way through a progression of ideas—one after the other, the ideas should progress as if you were walking down some steps on a stairway. Repeat what a point is when you finish the subtopic. Therefore, even if the audience has drowsed somewhere within your report or speech, they will once again become engaged as you make the final point clear to them before proceeding with the next topic. In doing this, your work will also be much more organized.

Make people laugh, if possible. Humor is always an effective way to grab someone's attention. When people laugh, it makes them more receptive to what you say next. It also makes them happier and more relaxed, which further facilitates their intake of additional information. This is not to say that you should blatantly tell a joke, but the humor should merge seamlessly into your document.
Not everyone knows how to use humor, however, but you may want to study it from professionals. Be careful not to be offensive. If you do not feel comfortable using humor, though, you may want to refrain from applying it.

Be concise, clear, and specific. Communicating in generalities is one of the common plagues that infest most people's writing or speaking. Say your point loudly and clearly, but at the same time, not vaguely. Long sentences or phrases are also become quite confusing, so it is best to avoid them. State your thought concisely, clearly, and specifically. You will be able to impart your message much more readily that way.

Bla bla......Forget about the long winded speech.

HERE is the summaries :

To communicate effectively you should try to:

A. Examine your efforts.

B. Organize your information.

C. Impart a point to each message.

D. Make people laugh

E. Be concise, clear, and specific.

These are also really useful in a presentation!

Business Startup planning

This is a good presentation from a previous business consultant ,Tim Berry, founder and President of Palo Alto Software, speaks about business planning for ongoing businesses in this webcast for Peachtree.

Eight Ways to Build Collaborative Teams

Key ideas from the Harvard Business Review article by Lynda Gratton, Tamara J. Erickson

The Idea in Brief

To execute major initiatives in your organization--integrating a newly acquired firm, overhauling an IT system--you need complex teams. Such teams' defining characteristics--large, virtual, diverse, and specialized--are crucial for handling daunting projects. Yet these very characteristics can also destroy team members' ability to work together, say Gratton and Erickson. For instance, as team size grows, collaboration diminishes.

To maximize your complex teams' effectiveness, construct a basis for collaboration in your company. Eight practices hinging on relationship building and cultural change can help. For example, create a strong sense of community by sponsoring events and activities that bring people together and help them get to know one another. And use informal mentoring and coaching to encourage employees to view interaction with leaders and colleagues as valuable.

When executives, HR professionals, and team leaders all pitch in to apply these practices, complex teams hit the ground running--the day they're formed.

The Idea in Practice

The authors recommend these practices for encouraging collaboration in complex teams:

What Executives Can Do

Invest in building and maintaining social relationships throughout your organization. Royal Bank of Scotland's CEO commissioned new headquarters built around an indoor atrium and featuring a "Main Street" with shops, picnic spaces, and a leisure club. The design encourages employees to rub shoulders daily, which fuels collaboration in RBS's complex teams.

Model collaborative behavior. At Standard Chartered Bank, top executives frequently fill in for one another, whether leading regional celebrations, representing SCB at key external events, or initiating internal dialogues with employees. They make their collaborative behavior visible through extensive travel and photos of leaders from varied sites working together.

Use coaching to reinforce a collaborative culture. At Nokia, each new hire's manager lists everyone in the organization the newcomer should meet, suggests topics he or she should discuss with each person on the list, and explains why establishing each of these relationships is important.

What HR Can Do

Train employees in the specific skills required for collaboration: appreciating others, engaging in purposeful conversation, productively and creatively resolving conflicts, and managing programs.

Support a sense of community by sponsoring events and activities such as networking groups, cooking weekends, or tennis coaching. Spontaneous, unannounced activities can further foster community spirit.

Marriott has recognized the anniversary of the company's first hotel opening by rolling back the cafeteria to the 1950s and sponsoring a team twist dance contest.

What Team Leaders Can Do

Ensure that at least 20%-40% of a new team's members already know one another. When Nokia needs to transfer skills across business functions or units, it moves entire small teams intact instead of reshuffling individual people into new positions.

Change your leadership style as your team develops. At early stages in the project, be task-oriented: articulate the team's goal and accountabilities. As inevitable conflicts start emerging, switch to relationship building.

Assign distinct roles so team members can do their work independently. They'll spend less time negotiating responsibilities or protecting turf. But leave the path to achieving the team's goal somewhat ambiguous. Lacking well-defined tasks, members are more likely to invest time and energy collaborating.

CEO,CFO,COO,How about CCO (Chief Culture Officer)

from cnet news

There's no question that Google is a trendsetter. The company made Web search sexy, and lucrative. It established the foundation for an ecosystem that allows any old little Web site to make money off advertising.

With its lava lamps, simple doodle design, pampered employees and millionaires in its rank and file, it has become a cultural icon and an emblem of the gold-rush promise of the Web.

Google was ranked by Fortune magazine as the best place in the U.S. to work, and it has reached another zenith by becoming the most popular Web site. It's even become a verb in the dictionary.

And it may even have started a new trend by creating a job that carries the title "chief culture officer." Stacy Savides Sullivan is that person at Google. (Editors' note: Google doesn't seem to be unique with that title, rare though it is. A quick Google search--what else?--turns up a handful of institutions that have, or once had, a chief culture officer, including IT services company Kanbay International and AegisLiving, an assisted-living program in Redmond, Wash.)

Sullivan's mission is simple: retain the company's unique culture and keep the Googlers happy. In an exclusive interview, she tells CNET News.com how she does just that.

Q: How long have you had that title?
Sullivan: I've had that role since last summer, and in addition to being chief culture officer I'm also director of human resources.

What do you do as chief culture officer?
Sullivan: I work with employees around the world to figure out ways to maintain and enhance and develop our culture and how to keep the core values we had in the very beginning--a flat organization, a lack of hierarchy, a collaborative environment--to keep these as we continue to grow and spread them and filtrate them into our new offices around the world.

We want all of our employees to play a part in being involved in keeping our culture the way it is today but also growing and developing it. So some of it is coming up with different programs or processes, and just being there to talk with people when they have issues, setting up Web sites where people can report bugs in their culture and ideas on how to improve it, and those types of thing.

It's hard to imagine how you can keep a flat organization with 12,000 employees. But what are the characteristics of the Google culture in general?
Sullivan: I would characterize the culture as one that is team-oriented, very collaborative and encouraging people to think nontraditionally, different from where they ever worked before--working with integrity and for the good of the company and for the good of the world, which is tied to our overall mission of making information accessible to the world.

When I'm doing the interview myself I always start by telling them that we will try to assess how successful they are going to be at the company and how much they are going to enjoy it and how much they are going to thrive.

Who came up with the idea of having a Google chief culture officer?
Sullivan: It was something that (Google co-founders) Larry Page and Sergey Brin came up with last summer.

Do you know of any other chief culture officers?
Sullivan: No.

What are some of the challenges you are finding in your role, maybe related to the hyper growth of the company?
Sullivan: I think one of the hardest things to do is ensure that we are hiring people who possess the kind of traits that we're looking for in a Google-y employee. Google-y is defined as somebody who is fairly flexible, adaptable and not focusing on titles and hierarchy, and just gets stuff done.

So, we put a lot of focus in our hiring processes when we are interviewing to try to determine first and foremost does the person have the skill set and experience potential to do the job from a background standpoint in addition to academics and credentials. But also are they going to be good culture or team fits.

Can you give me an example of a question that might be posed to someone during an interview to determine whether they are Google-y enough?
Sullivan: You know, there are no standard questions that I know of. But we might ask a question. This is just hypothetical, but it could be "How many bread boxes could you fit in an airplane?" or something like that. That's certainly not going to show if somebody is adaptable or flexible, but it's certainly going to show someone's thought process and reasoning, the way they can rationalize a true answer to something. Obviously, there's no right answer, but we're just trying to figure out how people think and the kind of the steps that they take.

When I'm doing the interview myself I always start by telling them that we will try to assess how successful they are going to be at the company and how much they are going to enjoy it and how much they are going to thrive. We know that they're qualified, that they're likely capable to do the job because they've gone through screening processes, but there are other questions we're trying to ask people around preferences, past experiences and areas they've really excelled in.

I've heard about a happiness survey at Google. Can you tell me more about that?
Sullivan: The last few years we've been doing a happiness survey as part of our annual global company survey. Four or five years ago, Larry and Sergey wanted to find out how happy people are and what it's going to take to keep them working at the company.

We're trying to figure out how committed people are to the company, what's causing that commitment level to be high or low, what makes a difference to them and their management and direct managers. The results ended up being centered a lot on career development and growth. So career development is more of a focus than giving more stock options or increasing salaries.

What do you think is the most appreciated perk? What do you get the most positive feedback on?
Sullivan: It would have to be the food. We have some type of lunch in every field office right now, every Google office. In places where we have room to have a cafeteria, we have our own and we hire our own chefs. But in many of those places we just bring in catered food. Here in Mountain View, we started having the cafes back in '99. And the reason why it is such an incredible perk is it keeps people on campus, it's all organic, it's healthy. At the headquarters we have breakfast, lunch and dinner.

How are you dealing with the possibility that there will be an exodus of people leaving when their options fully vest after four years?
Sullivan: Well, we have people now that are hitting their fourth year, actually, last year and this year. So, we are tracking it and watching for when different people are coming up each month and we're starting to touch base with them, asking: how are you doing? Are you working on something interesting? Do you like what you're doing? If not, what is one or two things that would make your life better here or increase your commitment level?

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So we're trying the personal touch approach right now because for many of these people providing more money or stock isn't really going to be the key driver to keeping them at Google. So to answer your question, yes, we're definitely concerned about it and we will continue to be concerned about it, probably forever.

So how is the transferable stock-option program going (which lets employees sell their vested options in an online auction and make money now rather than risk making less if the stock price falls)?
Sullivan: It's too early to comment. People are excited that we're trying it, though, and the idea has been well-received.

What's the most fun or crazy part of your job?
Sullivan: I think planning the ski trips over the years has been crazy. We've done Google-wide ski trips since 1999. Different groups go up and we spend the night and there's a lot of team-building and bonding. Those have actually been the most memorable and actually the most fun (events).

What have we not covered that you think is germane to what you do at Google?
Sullivan: I think for any company that is growing as quickly as we are the work-life balance component is actually quite high. We don't typically have early-morning meetings or late-night meetings. And people are welcome to do things via conference call at home and we pay for people to connect from home. We have a good paternity-leave policy where the dads can take off a couple of weeks when their spouse has had a child and we pay for peoples' meals when they have new babies for the first few weeks.

We've all heard about the ability for people to bring their dogs to work. And you have such a litany of perks and benefits and things that would encourage people to stay or even join. And we have a benefit where we reimburse people up to $5,000 if they buy a hybrid or electric car. And we have shuttle service (for commuters) to and from San Francisco, the East Bay, Santa Cruz.

Youtube - Sucessful Internet related company story

YouTube is a free video-sharing website on which users can distribute their video clips – short films in video format primarily found on the Internet. The site was founded in February 2005 by American-born Chad Hurley, Taiwan-born Steve Chen and Jawed Karim, born in East Germany of Bangladeshi decent. All three were former employees of PayPal, the Internet payment-transfer company. A preview of the YouTube website was presented to the public in May 2005 and officially launched six month later with the initial headquarters in San Mateo, California.

The venture gains
YouTube was initially funded by a so-called angel investor, a wealthy individual who provides business start-up capital, usually with a share in ownership. In November 2005, Sequoia Capital, the venture capital company founded by Donald T. (Don) Valentine invested US$ 3.5 million in YouTube. Don had previously funded various other successful technology companies. Roelof Botha, a partner in Sequoia Capital and former PayPal financial director, joined the YouTube executive board. Following impressive growth within a few short months, Sequoia Capital invested a further US$ 8 million in YouTube

Protests provide impetus
YouTube’s rapid expansion quickly caught the attention of the traditional media. Despite official YouTube policy prohibiting uploading of copyrighted material and the company’s efforts to regularly remove uploaded content infringing copyright laws, a large amount of such content continues to be uploaded. In February 2006, NBC requested removal of its copyright content from the YouTube website. Although YouTube complied with NBC’s request, the incident hit the news and the increased publicity gave even more impetus to YouTube expansion.
NBC then realised the truth of the old saying “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!” and in June 2006 announced a strategic partnership with YouTube. An official NBC channel would be set up on YouTube presenting promotional clips of the TV series ‘The Office’ and YouTube would also promote NBC’s videos on its website. CBS, which had previously also requested the removal of various video clips, followed suit in July 2006. Nevertheless, copyright lawsuits are likely to plague YouTube sooner or later.

Fast lane to fame
YouTube’s success has also catapulted a number of unknowns to Internet-celebrity status. One is Peter Oakley, known as geriatric1927, from Leicester in the UK. The widowed pensioner, born in 1927, gained instant popularity with a series of autobiographical videos entitled ‘Telling it All’, revealing various aspects of his life including his service in World War II. YouTube has also provided a launching pad for new bands and their music. OK Go, the rock band from Chicago and Washington DC, and Sick Puppies, the Indie rock band from Sydney, Australia both became famous almost overnight through YouTube.

Googled
In summer 2006, YouTube became one of the fastest growing websites in the world, rated as the fifth most popular website by Alexa, a company providing web-traffic statistics to other sites. Surveys conducted in July 2006 showed that 100 million clips were viewed daily on YouTube, 65,000 new clips were uploaded every 24 hours and the website was visited 20 million times each month.

In October 2006, it was announced that Google would acquire YouTube for US$ 1.65 billion. The company would continue operating independently and keep its co-founders and all employees. The deal went through on 13 November 2006, marking Google’s biggest purchase to date.

Wikipedia - Sucessful Internet related company story

Imagine a world in which every single person is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing. This is the statement published on the website of the Florida based, non-profit-making Wikimedia Foundation Inc., the parent organization of various free-content projects, including Wikipedia – the award-winning free online encyclopaedia. Wikimedia’s aim is to provide free knowledge to everyone throughout the world. To achieve this, it relies on public donations to run its wiki-based projects.

Wikipedia, founded in 2001 by American Jimmy Wales, allows anyone with Internet access to edit its articles. The assumption is that this so-called “open source” content is just as valuable as information from professional sources. In a personal appeal, Jimmy Wales says “Wikipedia is based on a very radical idea: realization of the dreams that most of us have always had on what the Internet can and should become. Thousands of people, from all over the world and from all cultures, working together in harmony to share clear, factual, unbiased information… a simple and pure desire to make the world a better place.”

Sabotage or stupidity?
Wikipedia, now available in over 100 languages, has become a very popular research medium. By 2005, within five years of its launch, it had become one of the world’s top 30 websites, with almost 4 million entries. But just how accurate its free content actually is has been brought into doubt by totally misleading articles published on its website. For example; in the publication ‘USA Today’, publicist John Seigenthaler severely attacked Wikipedia for an anonymously written article posted on the website for four months that linked him to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert. The article based on Wikipedia information also spread to other websites. Because of the anonymity guaranteed by Wikipedia, the author of the article in question remains unknown. The New York Times has apparently banned its reporters from using Wikipedia as an information source. Is Jimmy Wales’ idealistic dream of a free encyclopaedia for every individual on the planet realistic. Or will it be shattered by saboteurs or sheer stupidity?

Surprisingly accurate
The acclaimed natural-science magazine “Nature” published the results of a comparison of Wikipedia’s “amateur” information with the professional information contained in Encyclopaedia Britannica. 42 natural-science topics were chosen and scrutinized by experts. The result was that they found 162 mistakes in Wikipedia, but also 123 in Britannica. Despite the relatively limited random test, “Nature” considers Wikipedia’s information to be surprisingly accurate. “The number of mistakes in a Wikipedia natural-science entry is not substantially larger than in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, which is considered to be the leading work of reference.”

Whenever errors are mentioned, Wikipedia fans maintain that these have long been corrected. The appraisal by “Nature” and similar quality assessments are of limited use because of the constant changes. Wikipedia is an on-going exercise and mistakes are quickly rectified - but new ones are constantly being added. Articles quality also varies considerably. Because it is impossible to guarantee top quality in each individual case, some people consider Wikipedia to be unsuitable as a work of reference. However, the results of “Nature” tend to show that Wikipedia can be valuable, providing some caution is used.

Anonymity a weakness
Anyone creating a Wikipedia article must now register, but this merely takes a few seconds. All that is required is a user name and password. Many authors identify themselves but quite a few do not - such as the one who created the bogus Seigenthaler posting. True accountability is still lacking and Wikipedia’s inherent weakness is anonymity. But that is likely to change.

Yahoo- Sucessful Internet related company story

The name Yahoo! is an acronym for "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle," but Yahoo’s founders David Filo and Jerry Yang say they chose the name because they liked the dictionary definition of a yahoo: "rude, unsophisticated, uncouth."

The beginning
The founders of Yahoo!, David Filo and Jerry Yang, Ph.D. candidates in Electrical Engineering at Stanford University, California, started their system in February 1994 as a way to keep track of their personal interests on the Internet. Soon this was taking up more of their time than their doctoral studies. Eventually, their records became so unmanageable that they had to break them down into categories and then subcategories. The basic concept began as a web site called "Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web" but this was later renamed Yahoo.

The breakthrough
Word spread quickly and soon hundreds of people were accessing web sites, using David and Jerry’s system, from far beyond Stanford University. By autumn 1994, Yahoo had achieved its first million-hit day. It was soon clear to David and Jerry that they held the key to a potentially successful business. In March 1995 they set up their business and went in search of investors. In April 1995, Sequoia Capital, a well-regarded investment company, agreed to fund Yahoo with an initial investment of almost $2 million.

The stock market launch
Yahoo grew very rapidly. David and Jerry hired a management team and in autumn 1995 secured further funding from investors Reuters Ltd. and Softbank. Yahoo! made its highly successful stock exchange debut in April 1996 and already had 49 employees.

Today
Yahoo is now a leading global Internet communications, commerce and media company, offering a comprehensive branded network of services to over 230 million people each month. It employs well over 3,000 staff. The company also provides online business and enterprise services designed to enhance the productivity and web presence of Yahoo!'s clients. These services include Corporate Yahoo!, a popular customized enterprise portal solution; audio and video streaming; store hosting and management and web site tools and services.

Google - Sucessful Internet related company story

Google is a play on the word googol, said to have been coined in the 1940s by Milton Sirotta, nine-year-old nephew of American mathematician Edward Kasner (1878 – 1955). It is equivalent to 10 raised to the power of 100 or in other words - 1 followed by 100 zeros. The name Google reflects the company's mission to organize the immense, seemingly infinite amount of information available on the web.

The beginning
Google's founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, both graduates in computer science, met at Stanford University, California in 1995. Larry, then 24, was on a weekend visit from the University of Michigan and Sergey was 23, amongst a group of students showing him around. They apparently didn’t particularly hit it off, arguing strongly on several topics. However, they did find common ground in their approach to solving the colossal complex challenge of retrieving relevant information from an immense mass of data. Their mission became to organize the world's information in such a way as to make it universally accessible and useful.

By January 1996, Larry Page and Sergey Brin had begun collaboration on a search engine called BackRub and just a year later its reputation as the new search technology was already growing.

Finding a partner
During the first half of 1998, Larry and Sergey continued on perfecting their technology. Having little interest in starting their own company, they then began looking for potential partners to license what they now considered to be the best search technology available. Despite the technology boom, interest in Google, as it was known by then, was very limited. Friend and Yahoo founder David Filo encouraged Larry and Sergey to start a search engine company and develop the service themselves.

Go for it
Unable to raise interest and find a partner, Larry and Sergey made the decision to go it alone. But they badly needed cash to move out of the dorm and pay off credit card debts run up for development. They postponed their Ph.D. plans, formulated a business plan and went in search of an investor. A faculty member put them in touch with Andy Bechtolsheim, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems.
Following a Google demonstration, Andy immediately recognized its enormous potential. But being a busy man he had to leave in a hurry saying “I don’t have time to discuss details, why don’t I just write you a Cheque?” He made one out for $ 100,000 to Google Inc.

Made it!
This created a small problem. Google Inc. did not exist. The cheque couldn’t be turned into cash. So over the next couple of weeks, Larry and Sergey were busy with the task of setting up a company and finding other founders. Ultimately they raised almost $1 million.

On 7 September 1998, Google Inc. opened its doors in Menlo Park, California. Its first employee was Craig Silverstein, now Google's director of technology.

Google was already answering 10,000 search queries every day and in December 1998, PC Magazine named Google one of its Top 100 Web Sites and Search Engines. Google was moving up in the world. They’d made it!

Since then, the company has expanded enormously with over 1,900 employees worldwide, and a management team representing some of the most experienced technology professionals in the industry.

Today, Google is widely recognized as the world's best search engine.

Stock market launch
Following months of speculation, confusion and unforeseen problems, Google finally made its stock market debut in August 2004. Google had decided upon a launch using an innovative Dutch auction process - where investors who bid at or above the market-clearing price pay that price. At first, Google’s share auction seemed to run to plan confirming reports that most bids were around the suggested price range of $108-135 per share and valuing the world’s biggest Internet-search company at up to $36 billion. But then came the dramatic news that Google had cut the size of its initial public offering (IPO) by almost 50% and was telling investors to expect a price of $85-95. Google finally priced its shares at $85, valuing the entire group at just $23 billion. Shares rose a little above $100 on the first day of trading but the price was still well below the level hoped for by Google's bosses. Did the mishaps on the way to flotation cause the sharp drop in value? Or a general weakness in dotcom shares? Or was an auction the wrong method? Or was $135 a share simply overpriced? Google is the clear leader in online searches and its revenue is expected to soar but the question is raised – will its profits do likewise?

Google shares – one year on
When Google made its stock market debut, the share price was $85. This soon rocketed - to the surprise of many pessimists. But a restriction - known as a lockup - had been imposed before the launch, to prevent quick dumping of shares on to the market. After about three months, some employees and investors took the first opportunity to sell their shares, making a handsome profit and causing a slight dip in the share price. It stood at around $170.

However, just over one year after the launch, one share now costs well over $300, making Google worth about $85 billion. More than any other media company and even ahead of Time Warner! And some analysts are predicting a further substantial rise.

Google remains one of the fastest-growing companies and the most-used search engine in the world, earning the lion’s share of its income from online advertising.


Not just a search engine
Google also serves corporate clients, including advertisers, content publishers and site managers with cost-effective advertising and a wide range of revenue generating search services.

In addition to the straightforward search engine, Google also provides many other services. For example: Ask a Question – a service involving over 500 carefully screened researchers, University Search – giving detailed information on specific schools. Mail-order catalogue browser, Directories on various topics, Froogle shopping site, News search – updated news from 700 sources, Discussion forums and many more.

Google Earth
You can now virtually explore the world from the comfort of your own home. The computer age and Google Earth make it possible. Imagery and 3D data show the entire world - and it’s absolutely free for personal use!

Simply point and zoom to anywhere on the globe, download onto your PC and you’re off on your travels. Satellite images and local data are at your finger tips and zoom into view. You can zoom in on a specific address or search for a restaurant, hotel, school or hospital etc. Just type the address into the “Fly to” box and click on “search”. At the moment (2005), street addresses are limited to the U.S. UK and Canada. You can tilt and rotate to see 3D views of buildings and terrain, look up driving directions and even fly along a route.

You can also call up information on businesses: an address, how to get there and links to detailed information on a specific business.

Google Earth helps you:
· Plan a trip
· Get driving directions
· Measure distances
· Locate a house or apartment
· Locate a local business
· Explore the world
Fancy a quick virtual trip to New York? Or would you prefer London? Or maybe Paris?
Google Earth

Apple - Sucessful Internet related company story

In December 1974, the magazine ‘Popular Electronics’ pictured the Altair 8080 on its cover, headlined ‘World’s First Microcomputer Kit to Rival Commercial Models.’ But it was left to the consumer to actually put the kit together, get it working and write the software! The private computer market was about to take off. The magazine article was the spur which led to the founding of Microsoft, after Bill Gates struck a deal with Altair manufactures Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems to produce software for the Altair.

The birth of Apple
The magazine also caught the eye of Steve Wozniak who at the time worked for Hewlett Packard, producing calculators. Wozniak spent his spare time playing with early computer kits similar to the Altair and considered them all too complicated for hobby computer freaks. He also realized that computer parts such as microprocessors and memory chips had fallen in price to such an extent that building his own computer was no longer a mere dream – it was now within financial reach. He got together with fellow computer buff Steve Jobs. On 1 April 1976 they released the Apple I computer and launched Apple Computers in Los Altos, California together with another friend Ronald Wayne, who dropped out a few months later.

Apple I was displayed at a meeting of “The Homebrew Computer Club” – a computer hobby group to which Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs belonged. A local dealer ordered 100 Apple I computers with the proviso that Wozniak and Jobs would do the assembly – to which they agreed. They built and sold around 200.

In April 1977, the Apple II was released and shown at the first West Coast Computer Faire in San Francisco. Apple Computers were firmly established, quickly pulling ahead of two other PCs launched that year – the TRS-80 and Commodore PET. Although more expensive, the Apple had the advantage of colour graphics and a floppy disk drive. Over two million Apple IIs were sold.

When Apple went public in 1980, its stock value was $117 million.

Jobs goes
In May 1980, the Apple III was launched as the company competed against IBM and Microsoft, who gained a considerable share of the computer market in the early 1980s.

In 1984, Apple launched the Macintosh or Mac as it became widely known, with a $1.5 million commercial shown during the Super Bowl XVIII. Sales at first went well but repeat orders were poor. However, sales quickly picked up after the introduction of the LaserWriter printer. With this, the PageMaker programme and advanced graphics, the Mac got a firm footing in the world of desktop publishing.
In 1985, Jobs resigned from the company following an internal power struggle which he lost. Jobs founded NeXT Inc. Steve Wozniak also left Apple to pursue other interests but remains a major shareholder.
In 1989, the portable Macintosh computer was released, but its bulk meant that Apple had to rapidly rethink the design. With the input from industrial designers including Sony, in 1991 they came up with the PowerBook 100 – the forerunner of today’s laptop. During these years, Apple’s technological innovations made its products market leaders.

Jobs returns
But Microsoft was not sleeping and Windows development began to overtake the Apple Macintosh - to the extent that Apple sued Microsoft for theft of intellectual property. The case dragged on for years before being finally thrown out of court. At this time Apple’s management was in chaos and various product flops caused the public to lose faith. Apple continued to lose ground to Microsoft Windows.
In the mid-1990s, Apple teamed up with IBM and Motorola in an attempt to counteract Microsoft’s advance. The Power Macintosh was released in 1994 using IBM and Motorola hardware and Apple software. But through the mid to late 1990s, the various attempt at improving Apple’s operating systems seemed to go awry. Apple considered using various operating systems including Microsoft’s Windows NT and NeXT’s NeXTSTEP OS. The latter was finally chosen, bringing Steve Jobs back to Apple. In July 1997, CEO Gil Amelio was fired after considerable financial losses, Steve Jobs took over as interim CEO and restructuring began.

Back in the black
In 1998, just one year later, the iMac computer was introduced. A new all-in-one Macintosh aimed at a general market, featuring an innovative new design with a translucent plastic case, initially in Bondi Blue and white and later in other colours. It was a huge success, selling 800,000 pieces and bringing in a $309 million profit in that year - the first profitable year for five years. The Power Macintosh was redesigned along similar lines and its development continues.

In May 2001, Apple opened Apple retail outlets in prime locations in the U.S.A, to have a more direct influence on the market and thus increase sales. Apple continued to be innovative. In November 2001, it introduced the iPod portable digital audio player, with sales of over 42 million and Apple’s iTunes Music Store offering online music downloads at 99 US cents. By early 2006, 1 billion downloads had been chalked up.

In June 2005, Steve Jobs announced that Apple was to produce Intel-based Macs. The MacBook Pro notebook computer and a new iMac were released in January 2006, both with Intel’s Core Duo chip technology. The Intel chip allows the latest computers to run the Windows operating system.

It is clear that Apple, with Steve Jobs at the helm, will continue to be innovative and keep many customers who are totally devoted to the brand.

There is no doubt that Apple is a computer cult.

***

Stephen Wozniak was born on 11 August 1950 in Los Gatos, California, where his father was a Lockheed engineer. The area, now known as Silicone Valley, was then already a centre for technology.

Inspired by his father, Steve “Woz” Wozniak was into electronics from a very early age and constructed various devices from kits or from scratch, including a voltmeter, ham radio, calculator and games. After leaving high school he went to the University of Colorado but quickly dropped out. While working for Hewlett-Packard producing calculators he met Steve Jobs, another computer hobbyist obsessed by electronics. They joined forces to found Apple Computers.

Although Steve Wozniak made a fortune, it was the technical aspect of the business which fascinated him. In 1981, a plane he was piloting crashed on the runway and it took two years for him to recover from his injuries and amnesia. During that time he became involved in other ventures, sponsoring concerts and pursuing New Age interests. In 1983 he returned to Apple, but left for good in 1985. He then attended Berkley University, where he earned his bachelor's degree in computer science and electrical engineering. In 1985, the two Steves, Wozniak and Jobs, received the National Technology Award from President Reagan.

Steve Wozniak started various other businesses and donated considerable sums to charitable causes, his local school in Los Gatos, technology museums, and universities. In 2005, he received an honorary Doctor of Engineering degree from Kettering University in Flint, Michigan.

He now once more lives in Los Gatos, California with his wife and six children.

***

Steve Paul Jobs was born on 24 February 1955 in San Francisco, California to an American mother and a Syrian father. They later married and gave birth to Job’s sister, novelist Mona Simpson, whom he first met as an adult. Steve Jobs was raised by adoptive parents, Paul and Clara Jobs, first in Mountain View and then in Los Altos, California. His adoptive father was a machinist at Spectra-Physics, and Steve’s early interest in technology was inspired by his father's work.

During his schooldays, Steve Jobs attended after-school lectures at Hewlett-Packard in Palo Alto, California. He also worked there as a summer employee with Steve Wozniak, with whom he later founded Apple Computers. After graduating from high school, Jobs enrolled at Reed College in Portland, Oregon, but dropped out after just one semester.

He went back to California and in 1974 joined the Homebrew Computer Club with Steve Wozniak. He got a job with Atari, manufacturer of video games in order to save some money. He used his savings to backpack through India with Daniel Kottke, a Reed College friend, before returning to his job at Atari.

It was around this time that Jobs and Wozniak developed the Apple computer. They launched the Apple I and Apple Computers Co. on 1 April 1976.

In 1985, Jobs resigned from the company following an internal power struggle. Jobs founded NeXT Inc. Steve Wozniak also left Apple to pursue other interests but remains a major shareholder.

But in 1997, following considerable financial losses by Apple, Steve Jobs once again took over the helm of Apple and today is as innovative as ever.

Steve Jobs is married to Laurene Powell and the couple have three children. Steve Jobs also has a daughter from an earlier relationship.

Ebay- Sucessful Internet related company story

The story goes that founder Pierre Omidyar wanted to call it Echo Bay, but the name had already been registered by a Canadian company mining for gold in Nevada. So Pierre Omidyar chose eBay.

The Mac days
Pierre Omidyar is the founder of eBay. He was born in Paris in 1967, the only child in a French-Iranian family. At the age of six, the family emigrated to the United States and he grew up in and around Washington, D.C. Pierre was bitten by the computer bug at a very early age, sneaking out of the gym to teach himself on his science teachers cheap computer. He later graduated to an Apple II and got paid to computerize the school’s library catalogue.

n the mid-1980s, Pierre Omidyar went to Tufts University near Boston. His main subject was computer science and Apple programming became his obsession. Apple had become a sort of cool trendy alternative to the major computer companies. Pierre did all his work on a Macintosh from his dorm room, rather than use the PCs in the computer laboratory. He created his first Mac programmer’s utility tool for other programmers. He got a summer job as an intern in Silicon Valley with Innovative Data Design, a company which wrote image programmes for Macs. This led to a full-time job and Pierre Omidyar took the following semester off to continue working. After completing a further semester at Tufts University, he moved to the University of California-Berkeley, where he finished his degree.

A bit of business pays off
In 1991, Pierre Omidyar teamed up with a colleague to found the Ink Development Corporation producing software for pen-based computers. This was the technology which - it was thought - would replace the keyboard with a stylus. It did not! However, Ink Development had also developed some software tools for online commerce. They changed direction and re-launched as an electronic retailer – eShop.

In 1994, things weren’t moving fast enough for Pierre Omidyar and so he left eShop. He kept a fair- sized stake in the company and when it was bought by Microsoft two years later, became a millionaire before the age of 30.

A story
As legend has it, in summer 1995 Pierre Omidyar was dining with his fiancée, Pam Wesley, when she mentioned that she was having problems finding PEZ collectors with whom to trade. PEZ, originally breath-freshener mints (later fruit-flavoured sweets) in dispensers with character heads, had become collectors’ items. This, so the story goes, gave Pierre the eBay idea. But actually it is not true. The fact is that Pierre Omidyar was following all other computer freaks in trying to find a use for the Internet.

The dawning
Though Pierre Omidyar had never been to an auction in his life, he believed that an auction could be an interesting marketing tool. Place an advert giving a minimum price and if several people show an interest - why not let them bid?
At the time, Pierre Omidyar was employed by a company called General Magic and so had to do his programming in his spare time. Over a long weekend, he created an auction web site. It didn’t look very appealing, nor did he have a clue as to what the public might want to auction. He just created various categories: antiques, books, comics, computer items, electronics……. and called the site AuctionWeb. At the beginning the site was free and slowly began to attract visitors.

Traffic on AuctionWeb steadily increased through the autumn of 1995 and by the end of that year AuctionWeb had hosted thousands of auctions with over ten thousand bids.

Time to cash in
In 1996, Pierre Omidyar decided to start charging sellers a percentage of the final sale price. He had no idea whether it would be accepted or not, but soon the cash and cheques came rolling in. AuctionWeb was one of the few to make a profit right from the start. By June, revenues had doubled for the fourth consecutive month, reaching $10,000. Pierre Omidyar’s hobby had become a business. He left General Magic and hired his first part-time employee, Chris Agarpao.
It’s said that at this time, the staff sat around on folding chairs and DIY style desks were delivered in cardboard boxes to be screwed together by the employees. It is also said that there was only one single telephone and the staff were not allowed to answer it. Anyway, the number was kept secret because Pierre Omidyar wanted to keep costs to a minimum. The intention was that any customer with a query should send an e-mail.
By August, AuctionWeb was so successful that it was joined by Jeff Skoll, a go-getting entrepreneur who had done some consulting work for AuctionWeb. Pierre Omidyar believed that Jeff Skoll was the man to develop and drive the business. Around this time, the laidback dot.com types were faced by men-in- suits with economic degrees, who had the task of making money while the more relaxed Omidyar tended the AuctionWeb web site and community.

In 1998 eBay as it was now called, was launched on the stock exchange. Although the launch was very successful Odymar was not particularly satisfied. He had envisaged an auction in typical eBay style with the eBay community having a bite of the cherry, but Wall Street and the American stock exchange laws saw it differently.

But in 1999, the casual approach almost brought ruin. Technology had been neglected and on 10 July, the whole computer system crashed and stayed down for 22 hours. Without backup! Luckily the company weathered the storm, got the system back up and running and very quickly invested millions in state-of-the-art technology.


A few years later
Today it’s clear that Pierre Omidyar’s perception has paid off. He quite simply believes that the human race is basically good. At the beginning, many prophesied that it could not work – complete strangers dealing with complete strangers. But it is now obvious that it does. He also believes that the Internet community should remain the central philosophy, fearing a steady commercial takeover. But some things have changed. Pierre Omidyar never wanted advertising on the web site. However, these days eBay is one of the favourite sites for banner advertising. Now known as eBay, the San Jose-based company has become the largest person-to-person online trading community. eBay used the web to create a totally new market in the form of an auction. It now has over 1,000 categories and bids are placed at the rate of over 600 per minute. It is said that over 250,000 items are added daily and that it has sold over 45 million items since its conception in 1995. The site has about 50 million registered users and employs a staff of over 2,500.

One of the most expensive items to be sold (as yet) was a Gulfstream II jet for $4.9 million! Despite his wealth - he is now a multibillionaire - Pierre Omidyar remains a modest man. In 2004 he was still driving around in a beat-up VW convertible.

Amazon - Sucessful Internet related company story

The early days
In summer 1994, former investment banker Jeff Bezos left New York for Seattle, Washington to create an online bookstore. The web site was launched in July 1995 to sell books through the Internet. These were the early days of Internet and the web site was unattractive. However it worked quite well despite a lack of key information such as publication dates. And Tom Alberg from the Madrona Venture Group was impressed enough to invest $100,000 in Amazon in 1995.

Amazon quickly became more than an online bookstore. It soon became a community in which customers could create book reviews online and research others before buying. It became not just a case of buying books but also of sharing opinions.

Rapid growth
In 1996, its first full financial year in business, Amazon generated $15.7 million in sales. In May 1997, Amazon.com raised £54 million in an initial public offering as it launched itself on the stock market. In October 1997 Jeff Bezos himself hand-delivered Amazon’s 1-millionth order to a customer in Japan.

One year after its stock market launch, Amazon added music CDs and videos to its web site. It then followed up with five more product categories – electronics, software, toys, video games and home improvements.

This was growth at absolutely breakneck speed and many onlookers thought that the rapid growth policy would indeed “break their necks”. But early investors, such as Nick Hanauer, were convinced that Amazon would make a profit. However, profits didn’t come quite so quickly. Instead Amazon grew at express speed and profits were waived for the sake of growth to make it impossible for others to duplicate their achievement. It’s said that Hanauer’s initial $40,000 investment was at one time valued at $250 million. Hanauer apparently still keeps an old T-shirt from Amazon’s early days that reads: "Eat another hot dog, get big fast!"

The end of 1999 saw annual sales reach $1.6 billion and on 10 December, Amazon’s stock closed at an all-time high of $106.69. And in the same month, Time Magazine named Bezos "Person of the Year," calling him the "King of Cybercommerce."

But just one month later, the “King's” crown slipped badly.

Amazon.toast
Amazon fired 150 workers as part of a reorganization plan. Five days later, they reported a loss of $323 million for the fourth quarter, but promised lower losses in future. But the subsequent fourth quarter saw losses exceed that amount by more than $200 million.
By the summer of 2000, Amazon's share price had dropped by almost 70% and analysts began to criticize the company for venturing into too many products and spreading itself too thinly. Speculation on Wall Street suggested that Amazon would file for bankruptcy or be bought out. Some even clearly warned investors to avoid buying Amazon stocks. Gloom and doom mongers gave the company various labels such as Amazon.toast or Amazon.bomb as the collapse of the world’s largest e-tailer was predicted. In early 2001, when Amazon reported a huge fiscal loss of $1.4 billion - the company's worst-ever annual performance - Jeff Bezos finally came up with an answer.

Changing focus
In January 2001, the company’s chief executive promised a profit by the year-end. But expenses had to be cut and the business restructured. 1,300 workers (about 15 percent of its work force) were laid off. Two warehouses and a Seattle customer-service centre closed. Jeff Bezos gave orders to get rid of “crap” and cease selling unprofitable products. The company concentrated on streamlining its storage, packaging and delivery operation. It boosted its online offer by becoming an online shopping portal, offering and selling products from companies such as Toys ”R” Us and Target. It also competed with eBay through Amazon Auctions.

By the end of 2001, Jeff Bezos had kept his word. Amazon reported its first profit with fourth-quarter earnings of $5 million. It was clear that one quarter of profits would not be enough but since then profits have steadily improved. This was only achieved by continuously pushing sales and increasing business efficiency and also expanding the products offered on the web site.

10 years on
Nearly 10 years on and Jeff Bezos’ name remains synonymous with the company. Hanauer, who describes his long-time friend as “the smartest man in the world” is pretty sure that Jeff Bezos will head Amazon for some time to come. "He remains as single-mindedly focused on Amazon now as he ever was” says Hanauer. Amazon has survived and is also making a profit - a fact that many analysts and observers doubted would ever happen. The company has grown into a multibillion-dollar business and is now not only the undisputed leader of Internet commerce but also reaping a profit. Its community of almost 40 million customers will help it retain its market lead.

Becoming a Master of Persuasion

Persuasion power can help you get more of the things you want faster than anything else you do. It can mean the difference between success and failure. It can guarantee your progress and enable you to use all of your other skills and abilities at the very highest level. Your persuasion power will earn you the support and respect of your customers, bosses, coworkers, colleagues and friends. The ability to persuade others to do what you want them to do can make you one of the most important people in your community.

Fortunately, persuasion is a skill, like riding a bicycle, that you can learn through study and practice. Your job is to become absolutely excellent at influencing and motivating others to support and assist you in achieving your goals and solving your problems.

You can either persuade others to help you or be persuaded to help them. It is one or the other. Most people are not aware that every human interaction involves a complex process of persuasion and influence. And being unaware, they are usually the ones being persuaded to help others rather than the ones who are doing the persuading.

Persuasion Through Motivation
The key to persuasion is motivation. Every human action is motivated by something. Your job is to find out what motivates other people and then to provide that motivation. People have two major motivations: the desire for gain and the fear of loss.

The desire for gainmotivates people to want more of the things they value in life. They want more money, more success, more health, more influence, more respect, more love and more happiness. Human wants are limited only by individual imagination. No matter how much a person has, he or she still wants more and more. When you can show people how they can get more of the things they want by helping you achieve your goals, you can motivate them to act in your behalf.

President Eisenhower once said, "Persuasion is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do, and to like it." You always need to be thinking about how you can get people to want to do the things that you need them to do to attain your objectives.

People are also motivated to act by the fear of loss. This fear, in all its various forms, is often stronger than the desire for gain. People fear financial loss, loss of health, anger or disapproval of others, loss of love and the loss of anything they have worked hard to accomplish. They fear change, risk and uncertainty because these threaten them with potential losses.

Whenever you can show a person that they can avoid a loss of some kind by doing what you want them to do, you can influence them to take a particular action. The very best appeals are those where you offer an opportunity to gain and an opportunity to avoid loss at the same time.

Getting What You Want
There are two ways to get the things you want in life. First, you can work by yourself and for yourself in your own best interest. You can be a "Robinson Crusoe" of modern life, relying on yourself for the satisfaction of your needs. By doing this, you can accomplish a little, but not a lot. The person who looks to himself or herself completely is limited in his or her capacities. He or she will never be rich or successful.

The second way to get the things you want is by gaining and using leverage. Leverage allows you to multiply yourself and get far more out of the hours you put in rather than doing everything yourself.

There are three forms of leverage you must develop to fulfill your full potential in our society: other people's efforts, other people's knowledge, and other people's money.

1. You leverage yourself through other people's efforts by getting other people to work with you and for you in the accomplishment of your objectives. Sometimes you can ask them to help you voluntarily, although people won't work for very long without some personal reward. At other times you can hire them to help you, thereby freeing you up to do higher-value work.

One of the most important laws of economics is called "Ricardo's Law." It is also called the Law of Comparative Advantage. This law states that when someone can accomplish a part of your task at a lower hourly rate than you would earn for accomplishing more valuable parts of your task, you should delegate or outsource that part of the task.

For example, if you want to earn $100,000 a year, in a 250-day year, you need to make $50 per hour. That means you must be doing work that is worth $50 per hour, eight hours per day, 250 days per year. Therefore, if there is any part of your work--like making photocopies, filing information, typing letters or filling out expense forms--that is not valued at $50 per hour, you should stop doing it. You should persuade someone else who works at a lower hourly rate to do it for you. The more lower level tasks you can persuade others to do, the more time you will have to do tasks that pay you more. This is one of the essential keys to getting the leverage you need to become one of the higher paid people in your profession.

Management can be defined as "getting things done through others." To be a manager you must be an expert at persuading and influencing others to work in a common direction. This is why all excellent managers are also excellent low-pressure salespeople. They do not order people to do things; instead, they persuade them to accept certain responsibilities, with specific deadlines and agreed-upon standards of performance. When a person has been persuaded that he or she has a vested interest in doing a job well, he or she accepts ownership of the job and the result. Once a person accepts ownership and responsibility, the manager can step aside confidently, knowing the job will be done on schedule.

In every part of your life, you have a choice of either doing it yourself or delegating it to others. Your ability to get someone else to take on the job with the same enthusiasm that you would have is an exercise in personal persuasion. It may seem to take a little longer at the beginning, but it saves you an enormous amount of time completing the task.

2. The second form of leverage that you must develop for success is other people's knowledge. You must be able to tap into the brain power of many other people if you want to accomplish worthwhile goals. Successful people are not those who know everything needed to accomplish a particular task, but more often than not, they are people who know how to find the knowledge they need.

What is the knowledge that you need to achieve your most important goals? Of the knowledge required, what knowledge must you have personally in order to control your situation, and what knowledge can you borrow, buy or rent from others?

It has been said that, in our information-based society, you are never more than one book or two phone calls away from any piece of knowledge in the country. With online computer services that access huge data bases all over the country, you can usually get the precise information you require in a few minutes by using a computer. Whenever you need information and expertise from another person in order to achieve your goals, the very best way to persuade them to help you is to ask them for their assistance.

Almost everyone who is knowledgeable in a particular area is proud of their accomplishments. By asking a person for their expert advice, you compliment them and motivate them to want to help you. So don't be afraid to ask, even if you don't know the individual personally.

3. The third key to leverage, which is very much based on your persuasive abilities, is other people's money. Your ability to use other people's money and resources to leverage your talents is the key to financial success. Your ability to buy and defer payment; to sell and collect payment in advance; to borrow, rent or lease furniture, fixtures and machinery; and to borrow money from people to help you multiply your opportunities is one of the most important of all skills that you can develop. And these all depend on your ability to persuade others to cooperate with you financially so that you can develop the leverage you need to move onward and upward in your field.

The Four "P"s
There are four "P"s that will enhance your ability to persuade others in both your work and personal life. They are power, positioning, performance and politeness. And they are all based on perception.

The first "P" is power. The more power and influence that a person perceives you have, whether real or not, the more likely it is that that person will be persuaded by you to do the things you want them to do. For example, if you appear to be a senior executive, or a wealthy person, people will be much more likely to help you and serve you than they would be if you were perceived to be a lower level employee.

The second "P" is positioning. This refers to the way that other people think about you and talk about you when you are not there. Your positioning in the mind and heart of other people largely determines how open they are to being influenced by you.

In everything you do involving other people, you are shaping and influencing their perceptions of you and your positioning in their minds. Think about how you could change the things you say and do so that people think about you in such a way that they are more open to your requests and to helping you achieve your goals.

The third "P" is performance. This refers to your level of competence and expertise in your area. A person who is highly respected for his or her ability to get results is far more persuasive and influential than a person who only does an average job.

The perception that people have of your performance capabilities exerts an inordinate influence on how they think and feel about you. You should commit yourself to being the very best in your field. Sometimes, a reputation for being excellent at what you do can be so powerful that it alone can make you an extremely persuasive individual in all of your interactions with the people around you. They will accept your advice, be open to your influence and agree with your requests.

The fourth "P" of persuasion power is politeness. People do things for two reasons, because they want to and because they have to. When you treat people with kindness, courtesy and respect, you make them want to do things for you. They are motivated to go out of their way to help you solve your problems and accomplish your goals. Being nice to other people satisfies one of the deepest of all subconscious needs--the need to feel important and respected. Whenever you convey this to another person in your conversation, your attitude and your treatment of that person, he or she will be wide open to being persuaded and influenced by you in almost anything you need.

Again, perception is everything. The perception of an individual is his or her reality. People act on the basis of their perceptions of you. If you change their perceptions, you change the way they think and feel about you, and you change the things that they will do for you.

You can become an expert at personal persuasion. You can develop your personal power by always remembering that there are only two ways to get the things you want in life: You can do it all yourself, or you can get most of it done by others. Your ability to communicate, persuade, negotiate, influence, delegate and interact effectively with other people will enable you to develop leverage using other people's efforts, other people's knowledge and other people's money. The development of your persuasion power will enable you to become one of the most powerful and influential people in your organization. It will open up doors for you in every area of your life.

Brian Tracy is the most-listened-to audio author on personal and business success in the world. His talks and seminars on leadership, sales, managerial effectiveness and business strategy provide people with proven ideas and strategies that they can implement immediately for improved results. For more information, visit BrianTracy.com.

Management Secrets of Idea-Friendly Companies

by Brian Libby

New ideas are the lifeblood of many industries, yet dropping everything to pursue any faint glimmer of genius is no way to run a business. How do smart companies balance the two? By setting up standard procedures for collecting and evaluating good ideas, no matter when or where they strike. Whether it’s a company intranet, a regular meeting, or a full-time department, dedicated resources are the best way to make sure brilliant suggestions don’t slip through the cracks. These are the techniques IBM, Toyota, and Motorola use to nurture their employees’ best new ideas.

IBM

Goal:

Collaboration among many employees

Technique:

Online platform that acts as a chat room for ideas

To help connect its more than 350,000 employees around the world, IBM uses software called ThinkPlace, a sort of internal chat board and wiki. Anyone can originate an idea by posting it on ThinkPlace, and others can join in with comments, questions, or suggestions at any time. Managers can also pose questions in hopes of generating creative solutions. For example, Mary Sue Rogers, an executive in IBM’s Human Capital Management division, recently asked how the company might support an increasingly aging workforce.

In the past, new ideas were threaded through multiple layers of IBM management. Now, says Gina Poole, vice president of innovation, “There’s a focus on community-driven efforts: people connecting around the world. An idea starts in Australia and gets picked up by someone in Finland.” Today about 100,000 IBM employees use ThinkPlace to discuss ideas at varying stages of development.

ThinkPlace is also invigorated by a volunteer community of “innovation catalysts” — “IBMers with regular day jobs who are looking for ideas to champion,” as Poole puts it. “They help further ideas and get them adopted.” To select which ThinkPlace ideas and initiatives to implement, IBM has created a consortium of executives called the Ideas to Reality board. Apart from deciding which ideas to pursue, the board’s meetings (be they in person or in the virtual world) are also an opportunity to assign responsibility for new initiatives and prevent inter-departmental confusion.

For ideas that get the go-ahead, the company has a unit called Biztech which distributes the budget and expertise needed to create prototypes. Teams of five to ten employees — most of whom have other day-to-day responsibilities within the company — can spend up to 20 percent of their time working on Biztech-backed initiatives.

Toyota

Goal:

Company-wide participation in efforts to improve operational efficiency

Technique:

Alert systems and meeting templates that empower employees

Toyota has long been recognized as one of the world’s most innovative companies. Its “lean thinking” approach to manufacturing inspired now-common practices such as just-in-time production, which minimizes inventory to keep costs and depreciation down. “The environment inside Toyota’s production system is legendary,” says Tom Kelley, general manager of corporate design and innovation at Ideo. “The leadership says, ‘Show me all your ideas. You’re on the front lines, so you know this stuff better than me.’ Every time workers have an idea, they will have an audience — and they know it’s expected of them.”

Toyota’s management philosophy is based on the Japanese principle of kaizen, which means “continuous improvement.” The basic notion behind kaizen is that progress occurs one tiny step at a time, contrary to the more western notion of producing success in big, bold moves. For kaizen to work, everyone needs to have the authority to help make the company more efficient and prosperous. At Toyota, for example, every employee on the assembly line has the authority to shut the system down using the Andon — a signboard with lights, audio alarms, text, and other displays — to notify management and other workers of quality or process problems.

“The Andon comes on numerous times a day,” explains Mike Morrison, vice president of the University of Toyota, the company’s in-house managerial training facility. “Let’s say you and I are working on one part of the interior, and you detect a rattle of some kind. I stop the line and everyone in our group comes to see how we can resolve it. It’ll be written up and reported.” Such interruptions are viewed as positive, alert moves to assure quality — not as problems that make everybody wait.

The company has also made feedback from its employees a continuous part of the idea-generation process. For example, Toyota utilizes a framework at meetings called a PDCA (for “plan, do, check, act”) cycle. “It’s just a one-page document for displaying problem statements and developing the final move and the result,” Morrison says, “but it’s a useful guide that ensures you don’t skip any steps in the brainstorming process.”

Motorola

Goal:

Pursuing internal ideas in search of the next big thing

Technique:

A program that functions like a venture-capital firm inside the company

Motorola’s Early Stage Accelerator (ESA) program applies venture-capital methodology to ideas within the company. Started by Jim O’Connor in 2003, the ESA uses portfolio theory to assess in-house proposals, treating them like start-ups. “The core purpose of ESA is to save good ideas from being killed and channel them into products as fast as possible,” O’Connor says.

O’Connor identifies three stages of the program: ideation, where the ESA gathers suggestions from employees, vendors, and customers; commercialization, where promising ideas get funding and testing; and market ready, which prepares the final product for commercial release.

At a tech company like Motorola, ideation is the easy part. “Across a company of 66,000 people, 25,000 of them engineers, there are ideas just all the time,” O’Connor says. “But you can’t spend an inordinate amount of time on thousands of ideas.” The ESA studies close to 100 proposals a year. Roughly 30 of those receive funding, and only 15 of those are eventually released for sale.

O’Connor says many ideas still come from old-fashioned conversation — in meetings with customers, during engineering reviews — but like IBM, Motorola also uses a company intranet to capture new ideas. Promising suggestions are assigned to an ESA team member for evaluation, and those that prove worthy graduate to the commercialization phase, where the ESA dedicates funding, assigns a team of engineers, sets milestones, and monitors progress closely. The program also sets an aggressive timeline: the traditional tech development schedule is three or four years; the ESA averages 18 months.

O’Connor and his team use four criteria to assess each proposal: relevance to Motorola’s long-term strategy and targeted markets; projected financial return; execution risk (projects that are aligned with Motorola’s core business tend to work out better); and the previous success of the team behind it. Within each criterion, the ESA has a set of about 100 questions; senior management evaluates the proposals with a software tool called I-Growth, which generates quantitative analysis.

But qualitative assessment remains important, too. “We ask questions like, ‘What is the relevant problem we’re trying to solve?’” O’Connor says. “Sometimes in tech, the tendency is to get complicated. We could be developing a great technology that no one wants to use.”