Within every mistake, there is a lesson. This week, I learned a good lesson at work.

I’ve been listening to Lis Wiehl’s Winning Every Time: How to Use the Skills of a Lawyer in the Trials of Your Life. It’s a good book covering the tactics lawyers use to build their case. Such tactics have real life applications outside of the courtroom. For example, by correctly choosing your juror, and building a solid case, you could win an everyday argument like getting credit for returning a product. For example, talking to a part-time store associate who didn’t want to be working at the store in the first place probably is going to be a waste of time. S/he is not going to care. A store manager, who’s focused on profit and store traffic, may be more inclined to listen to you in hope to keep your loyalty.

Another lesson I learned was that lawyers ask a lot of questions in the courtroom. However, good lawyers never ask a question that they don’t already know the answer to! This is powerful!

This week, I walked into the big boss’s office, asking for her approval on a piece of creative. I’ve done so so many times before, and generally such reviews go okay. This time was a little different. For reasons still unknown to me today (I was just having an off-day), I walked into her office completely unprepared. I did my homework. I checked the boxes and crossed the to-do list. I knew that my creative was solid on delivering on what the team wanted. However, I also knew that it was a much focused piece that intentionally left something off. I should have known that this could have been a point of discussion. I should have had my “evidence” ready. I should have had my “counter arguments” ready. I had them, but somehow, at that moment that matters, I just didn’t perform! I didn’t frame my argument. I didn’t present my evidence. I froze. And the review went very differently than what I had initially imagined.

This taught me that no matter how many times you’ve done something in the past. No matter how many times you’ve won the game (to borrow an Olympic inspired analogy). You have to be 100% prepared and ready to perform your best every single time! Every meeting is a trial. You’ve won if you achieved your objective. You’ve lost if you did not. In order to win, you need to present your argument with evidence. Every meeting is a trial; no exceptions.

When I asked my boss what she thought about the piece, I should have known the answer. Again, never ask a question that you don’t know the answer to. I should have known that she would contest the points that were intentionally left off the piece. In order to secure a winning judgment from my boss that day, I needed to address why certain points were intentionally left off. I needed to establish that the points we chose to include on the piece were the most impactful one for delivering on our needs. I should have framed my argument carefully, slowly leading her to the conclusion I wanted. If I had acted like a lawyer, I would have presented a logical argument that would have left her no choice but to must award me the decision I sought. A winning verdict for that piece of creative.

Every meeting is a trial. Every meeting has juror(s). Every one of us has a lawyer inside that could help us win our everyday cases!

Photo credit: Joe Gratz

Recently, I read / listened to via audiobooks How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer and Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. Both of which were really great books, and I’d highly recommend both. Instead of posting plain book reviews of these two books, I’d like to highlight what I’ve learned.

1. From How We Decide, I learned that people can only be expected to take into consideration seven facts. Therefore, when managers ask for analyses that include everything but the kitchen sink, most of that information just becomes noise. In fact, such noise may distract the decision makers from the facts that are truly impactful, and they may end up making the wrong decision as a result. This is also the root cause of what sometimes people referred to as “analysis paralysis.”

2. From How We Decide, I learned that we should listen to our gut. Sometimes, we unconsciously pick up clues about a particular situation that allow our subconscious mind to lean toward a particular opinion. The example in the book was that a trained operative was able to pick up a delay in a particular radar signal that he could not consciously realize. But he followed his gut instinct and made the right decision. However, the important key to this was that your instinct has to be honed. In Outlier, it was established that it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in a subject matter. Therefore, if you work 10 hours, 5 days a week, and 50 weeks a year (assuming 2 weeks of paid vacation), it’d take four years before you’re an expert in that particular subject. But, if you have that experience, go ahead and trust your instincts. They may be more finely tuned that you realize!

3. From Outlier, I learned that to be exceptionally successful, you have to be at the right place at the right time. For example, to be a Bill Gates, you have to be born at precisely the right time, so you get to be at the forefront of technology. If you were born too early, the technology wouldn’t be available. If you were born too late, someone would have been ahead of you. However, I also learned that “big breaks” are really just the opportunity to work really hard. All those who had become exceptionally successful had put in a lot of hours to hone their craft! I don’t know if I have been born at the right time, but I am going to work really hard. Even if I am not going to be wildly successful, honing my craft will help hone my instincts!

Photo Credit: Suchitra Prints

Seth Godin recently release an e-book WHAT MATTERS NOW, in which he asked a few of his friends to discuss what matters now. May it be Change, may it be Sleep, may it be Productivity.

To me, two things matter most: Passion and Curiosity. Passion had been wonderfully covered by Derek Sivers, an entrepreneur and programmer, within the e-book. But Curiosity was curiously missing! Allow me this opportunity to express what I believe matters now:

Curiosity

It is an emotion.

It allows us to grow.

Seth’s full e-book available for download via this link.

Photo credit: hapal

You’ve been waiting for this one. The final primal code highlighted in Primal Branding by Patrick Hanlon. We’ve discussed in previous posts the creation story, the creed, the icon, the rituals, the pagans / nonbelievers, and the sacred words. What else is left?

The Leader

Every brand needs a captain. Someone to steer the ship. Someone to set the direction. Someone to make decisions.

Don’t confuse the leader with the icon. This person is not necessarily the spokesperson, or the face of the brand. This is the person that truly decides how to put all the elements of the brand together.

Without this necessary element, all the other part of the brand would fall apart. Without someone with a vision, the icon would not work with the sacred words. Without someone who knows how to listen, the rituals would not leverage the pagans.

I could dedicate not just this post, but this entire blog on leadership. However, taking my tip from Marketing Job Search 101: Read Seth Godin, read Tribes. Alternatively, read this stable on many manager’s shelf, One Minute Manager.

And here you have it: The entire primal code. The code is designed to help a brand tap into the existing emotion of a consumer, to help them to believe you so they could follow you and your brand.

• They need to know where you came from – the creation story
• They need to know what you believe in – the creed
• The physical attributes of your brand would become your icons
• Drive repeated interactions between your brand and your consumers with rituals
• Acknowledge that you can’t be all things to all people and accept the pagans
• Give those who follows your brand a language all to their own – the sacred words
• Have someone who could put all these elements together – the leader

Related articles online

• Book Review: Tribes (LearnThis.ca)

I’m starting a series of posts on job hunting. Why? Well, for my particular career path, marketing for a big CPG, recruiting season is right around the corner. If I could offer anything that I’ve learned along the way to help my readers get into the field, I’d be happy to offer it.

To launch this series, I thought I’d recognize a marketing legend: Seth Godin.

Anyone reading this blog probably has read enough posts about how important it is in the job search process to become more knowledgeable about the industry. Well, you reading this blog is already a good start Allow me to share with you another one of the easiest ways to become more knowledgeable if you’re trying to get into marketing.

Go to your library, borrow a book by Seth Godin. He publishes a book each year, so there are plenty to choose from. I personally recommend Purple Cow or Tribes. These are two of his books that are the most frequently referenced right now. Purple Cow is a book on innovation, and it may be Godin’s most popular book. Purple Cow has literally become a proper noun in the industry. (If you’ve been following my Primal Branding series, think about how Seth Godin has created his own sacred words.) Tribes is his latest book on leadership.

Why is reading Seth Godin one of the easiest ways to get knowledgeable about marketing?

Because first and foremost, Seth Godin is a recognized marketing guru. He is even an action figure! Who in marketing has action figures? (Unicorn shown above sold separately.) The fact of the matter is that basically anyone in the industry would have heard of him. If you’re going to pick a book to read, may as well pick one that you could causally drop into conversation with another marketer…

Secondly, they are short! I know how much time you need to dedicate into the job search process. For some of you, you’re trying to do this on top of being a student full-time. There are other books out there that I’d recommend for generally reading pleasure (such as Patrick Hanlon’s Primal Branding), but they are too long and involved to be considered as “one of the easiest ways” to become more knowledgeable about the industry.

Lastly, Godin posts on his blog everyday. You can subscribe to it. Then, the next time you talk to a recruiter, you could open with “Hi, so what did you think about Seth Godin’s post today?”

Photo Credit: Seth Godin Rides A Unicorn, originally uploaded by zoomar. Technorati: pmqw25z8sy

Related articles online

• Seth Godin Talks Tribes (enquiringmimes.com)
• Tips for Job Hunting During a Recession Part I (halliecrawford.typepad.com)
• The Best And Worst Cities To Look For A Job (techcrunch.com)

Continuing with my series on Primal Branding by Patrick Hanlon. I’ve discussed in previous posts the creation story, the creed, the icon, the rituals, and the pagans / nonbelievers. This week, I’ll be focusing on the sacred words.

What are sacred words? I believe the best example is Apples’ “i”s. iPhone, iPod, iMac, etc. Apple has created a language all their own for their products.

Smaller businesses have sacred words too! Remember that bake shop / candle shop / soap shop that has really smart names for their flavors? That’s sacred words in action.

Have you ever heard the following phrase just roll off of somebody’s tongue? “A grande non-fat sugar-free vanilla latte, extra hot, no foam, please.” That’s sacred words in action.

Allow me to share with you a story. My co-workers and I regularly visit this sandwich shop for lunch. They have many options for the sandwiches. What size? What kind of bread? Cheese? So, we challenge ourselves to go through the entire ordering process without them having to ask us one single question. This is us learning their language, their sacred words. That’s sacred words in action.

Why are sacred words important? Because every culture has a language of their own. To have your own culture, your own cult, your own following, you must create the language your culture / cult / following will use.

As I have done in previous weeks, I’d like to take these primal branding principles to the next level. I’d like to see how scared words are leveraged not only by businesses, but by people. What works for corporate branding should work for personal branding too.

What does sacred words mean for personal branding?

There are two fronts to this question. Are you a follower or are you the leader? At any given time, you are both.

First, you’re a follower in your industry. You must know the sacred words in your industry to fit into that cult. This is to know the jargons. This has obvious implications if you’re looking for a job. Your resume needs to reflect the right jargon. You need to be on the same page, speaking the same lingo, with your interviewer.

Second, you’re a leader in your industry and in your own personal brand. In your industry / company, you define the words your people would use.

Allow me to share another story. A boss of mine used to use the term “EEC”. Always act and speak with EEC. What’s EEC? Energy, Enthusiasm, and Conviction. EEC was his term. This was his scared word.

As a leader of my own personal brand, I have built a reputation of being a good worker with a good attitude. When was the last time you heard someone say “spiffy”? I used to say that all the time when people ask “how’s it going?” In fact, once I didn’t say “spiffy”, I said something along the line of “great”… my co-worker called me out! “Oh, not spiffy?” This was how I knew that “spiffy” was my scared word.

As I grew in my career, I’ve retired “spiffy”. Currently, my default answer is “can’t complain”. Simple enough right? But it’s actually quite powerful when it’s integrated with other aspects of my personal brand. Consider the following conversation that actually happened:

Marketing Director: How’s it going?
Me: Can’t complain.
Marketing Director: Well, you wouldn’t even if you can.

My simple “can’t complain” reinforces my personal brand of being a good worker with a good attitude.

How do you answer “How’s it going?” What are your scared words?

Continuing with my series on Primal Branding by Patrick Hanlon. I’ve discussed in previous posts the creation story, the creed, the icon, and the rituals. This week, I’ll be focusing on the pagans, or nonbelievers.

This is perhaps the easiest code to understand as a marketer. You always go to the market with a single minded message, and this is what this code element is all about.

You need to know what you are. More importantly, you need to know what you are NOT. You CANNOT be all things to all people!

If you’re the creative type, you are not going to be the all about math type.

If you’re selling imports, you are not going to be carrying locally produced goods.

Now, there are several caveats.

One, you don’t have to have just one brand. You could be selling imports and locally produced goods. However, they have to be different brands. You have to have different stores, and they have to have different positioning. On a personal branding basis, this would be harder to execute. In the end, you are your personal brand, and you are somewhat limited to one positioning. Maybe you’re a Jack/Jill of all trades, but you can only be a true expert in one thing. It takes a LOT of work to be a subject matter expert. So, if you claim that you’re an expert in everything, you would have a credibility problem…

Two, this does not give you the license to be bad at something. There is still cost of entry (ie. minimum requirements). Just because you’re the creative type, doesn’t mean you cannot do basic math. You still need to know enough to keep track of your hours, billings, etc. For a business that focuses on imports, this does not mean you could forget about the locally produced goods business. You still need to keep an eye on all your potential competitors, and that often include those that you’re not in direct competition with. After all, there are only so many dollars in your consumers’ wallets, and these dollars move across different categories and segments.

Why is it important to stand for one thing? Then you know who you’re trying to target, and more important who you’re NOT trying to target. It makes your marketing effort more effective.

So, do you know what you stand for? Do you know what you are NOT?

Continuing with my series on Primal Branding by Patrick Hanlon. I’ve discussed in previous posts the creation story, the creed, and the icon. This week, we move onto rituals.

“Rituals are the meaningful repeated points of contact between you and your guest, customer, client, or target market.”

These rituals come in many forms. For example, you putting a piece of lime into a Corona is a ritual. It was not based on history or culture or taste. It started as a bartender’s invention. Capitalized by marketers. Once the masses adopted this practice, a ritual was born.

Another example of ritual could be you expecting fare sales in your inbox every Tuesday. Therefore, you faithfully check your inbox or airline websites every Tuesday. That is a ritual.

In the blogsphere, a commonly adopted ritual is to post on a regular basis. If you post every Monday, your readers can build a ritual around reading your blog every Monday.

Alas, I have not adopted posting on a regular basis. I have found with my visitor stats that posting every other day have been most effectively. However, I have not necessarily take advantage of this insight. And really, there is no excuses considering I could write the posts ahead of time, and post-date the publishing.

(So readers, please comment if you think my irregular posting is affecting your blog reading ritual…)

On another front, let’s consider how else a business could apply ritual and build this code into everything you do.

Let’s look at the definition one more time: “meaningful repeated points of contact”.

That is something that happens already! Naturally! The trick is to identify them and to leverage them. Like anything, it is much easily to leverage what organically and naturally happen with your business than to build something new. Leveraging existing rituals is much easier than building new rituals. It would also make your brand more authentic.

For example, if you have a book store. Your products are part of an existing ritual. Your books are part of book club meetings. So, why not capitalize on that ritual and host the meetings? Perhaps suggest the next book to read for the club? Chances are the club would buy your suggestions at your store, rather than your competition.

On a personal branding front, what ritual are you already part of? What do people expect of you?

At work, I keep a candy jar in my cube. Many people think of me when 3pm comes around. That is a ritual, and, yes, there are many ways to leverage this. In addition to just building good will, it also offers me great opportunity to connect with different people in the office that I may not be working with right now. Sometimes, I could just bounce ideas off of them in those moments that they are in my cube.

But like any branding efforts, any mistake could derail the whole campaign. If you are always late to meetings, that would become your ritual and part of your brand!

So, what ritual are you already part of? Is there a way for you to leverage that to positively reinforce your brand?

Continuing with my series on Primal Branding by Patrick Hanlon. I’ve discussed in previous posts the creation story and the creed. This week, we move onto icons.

Icon is something that allows people to able to instantly identify your brand. The iconic yellow boarder lets people know that you’re reading a National Geographic from a distance away. That iconic swoosh tells people that you’re wearing Nike, even if the brand name is no where to be found.

Therefore, in essence, icon is the various physical / tangible attributes of your brand. However, these tangible attributes may very well evoke intangible feelings.

Women can instantly recognize a Tiffany box by its distinctive color. That color evokes a variety of emotions. That color is so important to the Tiffany brand that Tiffany trademarked it.

This is a good video on color, and how color could be applied to your personal brand.

YouTube video: What Color is Your Brand?

But, it’s not just about color or logo. For example, could you recall all the logos / colors of all your utilities companies? There are countless forgettable logos out there. You could spend a lot of time creating one, and it would not resonate with your audience. Why? Because a logo, or color, or any other attribute cannot stand on its own. Like every other primal code, it needs to be incorporated into everything that you do.

Does that mean that you plaster your logo everywhere? YES!

But, is it ever so simple?

The fundamental question you need to ask is what truly symbolizes your brand in the minds of your audience. UPS is brown because UPS has brown trucks, brown uniform, brown everything. Swoosh is Nike because Nike put much advertising dollars toward building up the Swoosh. But it’s all a very carefully orchestrated effort…

Allow me to make up an extreme example to illustrate my point.

You’re a caterer. You painstakingly designed a logo that is an abstraction of a red pepper. It symbolizes so many things about your food. The red represents passion. The pepper is that little extra kick in your food. Also, the veggie represents the fresh ingredients that you use, etc. That logo is on everything. It’s on your website. It’s on your business card. It’s even on your apron, which you wear to every event. You have spent much time networking in the community to build your business, and it has paid off. You get referrals after referrals. At this point, you don’t even need to call people. People call you.

In fact, you’re so successful that your phone number is just on people’s phone / laptop as a contact at this point. People can pull up your number in an instant.

But, this also means that people are not really looking at your business card or website.

People do see your apron though. Yes, the bright yellow one with the red pepper logo properly embroidered just above your chest.

Let me tell you how this story ends… the red pepper may be your logo, but it is not your icon, but the yellow apron is.

As for myself, I have found this to be the hardest part to fully activate. I have yet fully developed the look and feel of my personal brand. The first and foremost icon is myself, which makes me wonder if there is a need of a logo. My picture would essentially become my logo. I also try to incorporate a tidbit of my real life into my online representation via the coffee mug images. At the office, my coffee mug is about the twice the size of a normal coffee mug. In all likelihood, any meetings that would take place outside the official office setting would be at a coffee shop. So, I thought coffee would be a reasonable icon to associate my brand with… However, I welcome any suggestions you may have regarding how I could better activate this part of the primal code… How I could have better icons.

A side-by-side comparison of a regular mug and my type of mug at the office.

The other day, I was thinking about all the projects I have going on, and I began to wonder how I would be able to do it all. Well, the simple answer was that I am quite good at multitasking.

Then, I remembered that once, at an interview, I was asked how do I handle multiple tasks? I remembered that I had some answers at that point, but I also remembered that feeling at an interview where you just knew you did not really nail that question…

So, I remembered answering something about prioritizing. They asked, how? I gave some vague answer of depends on the deadline, the requestor, etc. Since then, I read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey, and he explained a great system of prioritization. Basically, divide your works into four groups. 1) Urgent and Important, 2) Not Urgent but Important, 3) Urgent but Not Important, and 4) Not Urgent and Not Important.

His advice was the need to address the first group was quite obvious. The second group would also be important, but since it’s not urgent, we would need to be extra diligent to make time for these tasks. We should learn to say “no” to the third group of tasks. As for the fourth group, we should forget it, but many people would waste too much time on things within this group. I thought this was a great way to frame up how I prioritize. But somehow, I didn’t think this quite answer why I was good at multitasking… I thought there was more to it still.

Then, I read Radical Careering by Sally Hogshead, and she used the term timestacking. She defined it as “extracting every bit of capacity from time for maximum efficiency. Uber multitasking.”

I thought, this was it. I have been timestacking!

But, I still did not quite grasp what that really meant.

Then, the light bulb went off, and I understood how I seemed to be able to do more with the same amount of time.

Remember back in school, a teacher taught you about volume with a glass. She then filled it up with rocks, and she could only fit so much. Then, she filled it up with pebbles, and she found more space. Then she filled it up with sand, and she found more space still in that glass.

That was the essence of my multitasking!

I break my projects into the tiniest little pieces of tasks. This way, I have more flexibility in fitting the different tasks around each other.

For example: A project would be to create a piece of marketing material. A procedure within that project would be to gain legal alignment. Many people stops at this on their to-do list. Then, at 8:29am, you could not get to it before your 8:30 meeting. At 11:59am, if “gain legal alignment” was still on the to-do list, it would get rolled off to after lunch. Then, what would often happen after lunch? Some other things would ambush you and they would occupy the top spaces of your to-do list. So, at 4:59pm, “gain legal alignment” remained on your to-do list and it would get rolled off to another day.

However, what if that procedure was broken down even further? What if what made it to the to-do list was “email copy to lawyer”? At 8:29am, you could still fire off an email to the lawyer before your morning meeting. Then, you would be able to cross of an item on that to-do list, and it would just feel good. But, of course, back on the to-do list would be “awaiting legal reply”. However, this simple step kept the project moving forward. Perhaps at 11am, you got your legal reply. Then, the new thing on your to-do list would be “call agency”. In all likelihood, you still wouldn’t have been able to “gain legal alignment” by the end of that day. If it was so short, simple, or easy, it would have never got put off to begin with. However, I believe you could appreciate how much further along in the process you would be if you would just take it one step at a time.

In addition, with me, I have found that there is another benefit to breaking my projects into tiny tasks. It allows me to be completely focused at the task at hand. Whenever I have worked on mega-tasks, I would get fatigue mentally quicker. I would get distracted easier, probably because I wasn’t able to see the end of the tunnel. With a lack of focus, I would just simply not get as much done…

Also, with a to-do list of tiny tasks, I would never feel like I was unaccomplished at the end of the day. I would always be able to cross off something!

So, try to break your rocks into sand, and fill your days with sand!

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Photo credit: SqC: Jar of Rocks 2, originally uploaded by Yogi.