Adam’s Daily Post

If cutting costs on customer support saves a little bit of money…

Or changing your terms & conditions to grant you greater rights…

But you lose a customer in response, due to unfair terms or inadequate support…

What did you save?

Some want new technology to make their work easier.

Others want new technology to unlock harder tasks.

We all get to choose which path we want to take.

If a service strains your team, design things differently so it’s a joy to send and receive.

If a helicopter landing starts messy, it’ll end messy, so start the landing procedure again.

If you’re baking cookies and they taste all wrong, don’t add frosting, bake new cookies.

There’s a time for pushing ahead with what you have.

But there’s also a time for allowing yourself to start anew, no matter how deep you are.

Don’t stay the course if the course leads somewhere worse.

Doing my financial reports is a service. Adding a summary and personal note makes it a gift.

Making a marketing report is a service. Turning it into a comic book so I’ll understand and enjoy reading it makes it a gift.

Attending a Zoom call is a service. Attending a call with a Starbucks cup in your hand after sending a gift card to their inbox the day before so you can “get coffee together” makes it a gift.

Are you offering services, or giving gifts?

Demographics are data.

Psychographics are taste.

To truly understand your customer, you need both.

The job of a craftsman is to create great work.

The job of a leader is to help craftsmen create great work.

The job of a business is to create an environment where leaders can help craftsmen create great work.

Not many achieve any of these goals. Most settle for less. Not you.

“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is so out-of-fashion these days.

Yet I’ve used:

• The same PM software for ~15 years
• The same design tools for 23 years
• The same text editor for 11 years
• The same terminal for 11 years
• The same web framework for 14 years
• The same email system for 20 years
• The same accounting tool for 13 years

If. It. Ain’t. Broke. Don’t. Fix. It.

There are so many things that deserve our time and attention to fix.

Fix those instead.

When everyone has features…

And everyone promises outcomes…

But everyone has a lacking/mediocre/abdicated user experience, desperate to be lower-touch with customers?

Which do you think is the area that’s going to make the biggest difference in your go-to-market?

If AI can create, why don’t we relate to it?

We relate to creativity because of the work, athe story behind the work, and the story we tell ourselves about that work.

Generated work has no stories.

That’s why it feels so hollow, sterile, and lacking in comparison.

They say a bad team will ruin your business.

But there’s something worse.

An average team.

A bad team will shut you down…

But an average team will keep you stuck for years.