6 Ways I'll Make a Better Professional Blog

I recently wrote a blog post (here) that I shared with several people.  Some liked it and were "with me" yet others wrote somewhat lengthy feedback about how I needed to improve my delivery method.  They were commenting more on my style more than the content.  So I guess I'll focus on style for the moment. 

Here's what I'm going to do about it.  I hope you'll take what I'm  learning and apply it to your own experiences writing, blogging, and career management. 

Thanks to Don L. and John S. for their feedback and insight.

How I'll Offer More Quality Content to My Audience:

1. I'll get to know my audience better and understand their needs and desires in order to offer more relevant information and conversation about the topics that interest me most. 
2. I'll be more clear about my point and ramble less.  I'll try to capture the audience's attention ASAP, get to the point and get out the information that I'm trying to convey as compactly and rapidly as possible.  Maybe I'll use more graphics (see this post).
3. I'll be more precise and specific and cite references more. I'll read more as an input.
   
4. I'll have a call to action if possible, directing my audience to next steps, further reading, engagement, etc.
   
5. I'll build a community and drum up input from them on my delivery and content (effectiveness).  
6. I'll tell more people how to sign up for my blog and think of other methods of reaching my audience (podcast, email, speaking engagements, etc.)
   

My overall goal online here and professionally is to create a dialog and debate with my audience about topics that matter a great deal to me.  I'm trying to learn and help my audience as much as I can with insight that matters to them.  I'm seeking insight from them on the topics that matter most to me and also looking for feedback on delivering the best way possible.  Thanks for your patience and participation in this process.

Developing the Right Metrics Matters the Most

There are several ways a person could view an organization:

• As a collection of business processes (activities) that the business has to perform to meet its strategic objectives
• As a collection of IT applications that support the processes
• As a collection of people and suppliers who provide the resources necessary to achieve the organizational objectives
• As a collection of metrics or measures that describe the performance of the organization

Although each of these perspectives is equally real, only one is RIGHT in my opinion. Which one? METRICS, I say. Unless we boil our organizations into numbers and shared things that people can understand -- not complex and changing things like systems, processes, tools, and people -- can we really manage our organization as a program. I'm not making an argument for ACCOUNTING, per se, I'm talking about those facts and figures that tell us whether or not our business is being successful at achieving its objectives.

Therefore, it's my contention that a key part of the strategic planning and communications processes is to define and communicate about the key performance indicators (KPIs) of your business. KPIs are a bit of a cliche term but they're critical. The fundamental question we have to agree upon is, "How will we know that we are doing well?".

The more we develop this language of numbers and measurement, the more clear we will be together on our perception of what matters and how to allocate our resources and attention.

How to Continuously Improve

Deming tells us to plan, do, check, then act. Is that all there is to it? Yes. But it's not that easy for a lot of people to do this. Why?

In more detail, here's the algorithm I use:

1. Plan a project or action based on your conversations with powerful and legitimate stakeholders.
   
2. Do the project or action according to plan. Do not deviate. Almost always there will be a gap between what was expected and what actually happened.
   
3. Check how big this gap is. Get feedback from the stakeholders. Note what to keep doing, stop doing, and start doing for next time. Make a plan to support what you want to keep, stop what isn't necessary, and start what's required.
   
4. Act on the plan.

Does this work for you? How do you modify this or do it differently? How does technology affect this? What tools do you use to support this process? Is there a different process? What is the hardest part about this? What makes this process break?