I know it sounds kinda funny after a year at PlanHQ to think an organisation dashboard is a revolutionary idea… But I’ve been thinking recently about how to ensure we never get behind in a small business where none of us ever have any time or inclination to put in more than a minute to track our progress.

Yesterday, while I was at a morning seminar run by the Results Group, the idea of a quick business dashboard came up. I LOVED it. I am gong to make one. I know it can be done in a web app, I know there are probably a million startups working on it right now. But I want it on my wall, so I’m not buying.

We’re going to get some big colored dots and list all our tasks and then every week change the dots around so that we know where we are on everything.

You can have dashboards for measuring anything, and what I love about paper ones is that you can completely customise them to your business AND that they glare at you from the wall when they are covered in red and orange - The idea being that simply SEEING where you’re going wrong, leads to an automatic re-adjustment to set it right.

Don’t laugh at it’s simplicity, I just saw a roomfull of business owners fall in love with the idea.

A customer of mine and I have been waging a 2 month long battle against a domain registrant over a domain name he has owned for several years.

Through one reason or another, the domain expired and he didn’t notice until after the grace period. I rang up and the nice lady said that the domain was about to be auctioned and to email a particular email address and ask if we could have an exemption due to the mistake and the length of time he had owned the domain.

No reply. After about 12 emails from me, 12 from him and numerous phone calls from both of us, we still could not get through to anyone who was responsible for the domain.

Now, I assume coinciding with another grace period expiring, he has received a very polite email from “Brian”, and I quote:

“Our client owns this and current asking price is $22,788.

Please let me know if you’re interested in making a purchase.

Kind regards,

Brian”

I have a sneaky suspicion that they refused to talk to us until this time because they knew once it had passed they could resell him his domain name for this much money. (They actually can’t is only reaction was to laugh).

Is that unusual/wrong/dodgy or just one of those lessons you have to learn about domains?

The Decisive Flow team headed along to the Webstock mini conference on Tuesday night.

Apart from now knowing more about tag clouds than we ever thought we would, we also learned about living on the fringe. And the fringe is an exceptional place.

I loved the quote “We didn’t think we’d make any money off it, and we didn’t think it would last”

What a brilliant way to form an idea or start a company. I’m not being sarcastic. To do something purely for the love of it. How could you not be successful? Despite the fact Wellington is so small everyone is like your next door neighbor, the world is quite large, large enough for other people to share your passion and buy your stuff.

People who live on the fringe don’t start something for the sake of the ability to call themselves an ‘entrepreneur’. In fact I don’t even think they would consider themselves entrepreneurs.

People on the fringe don’t care about success. Success to them is living the life we all dream of.

People on the fringe, it seems, very quickly get off the fringe, upon achieving traditional success (Bill Gates was a fringe dweller, now his company is a fringe blocker)… Unless they are a special type of person who was born to decline adoration in favor of a good time.

People on the fringe probably can’t smoothly get their ideas across and charm investors (Which I DO believe was the point of the CodeBlacks team in the Half baked Challenge), but they prove that slick presentations mean nothing in comparison to just going out there and doing it.

Despite what the speaker said (and I’m sorry, I’ve completely forgotten his name, I’m terrible with names), I don’t believe companies CAN harness the fringe. It’s like when people catch hackers and try to train them up to work for the ‘good guys’. You gotta numb the fringe and tame the beast before they can work in your world. And when you have done that, they are no longer what you are after.

What I love about the people on the fringe is that you probably will never pick them. They wont be at the very events we go to to figure them out, they don’t talk up a storm about their achievements - they don’t even look at their achievements as achievements, just something they love to do. I think that’s what I found funny in the speech, the very concept of this type of person flies in the face of coming up with any strategy to harness their power. We know they are there, but no one can do anything about it. That must freak out the big guys.

I LOVE holidays. I don’t love my business failing because I’m on holiday. This is an interesting point in life.

As you get bigger, I suspect there are people there to back you up and take over, while you are small, your business is kind of dependent on you being there ALL the time. And since I’m not sure IF we want to get too much bigger, I want a solution that doesn’t require size.

I am off to Vietnam in September. I’ve done 1 week trips before. This is looking like 2-3 weeks. I don’t need a full holiday - I’m totally happy to work my way around but worry that some days I wont be completely there and don’t want everything to fall apart at the seams.

I know when you own a small business, you’re meant to grit your teeth and bear it, but holidays got me thinking…

At my age, people start talking about babies. I am a female, so chances are, I’ll be the one doing the pregnancy and birth thing. The current theory among people I trust is that it would be best to start on this plan before 30, for health and lifestyle reasons (I would love it if someone could say this is wrong and in fact you’re as safe having children at 40 as you are at 30, but for now accept this fact).

So sometime in the next 5 years, I’ll be having some big time off. I need to start the planning now in order to ensure my life remains as cool as it is now.

So the next few months will be spent planning how to:

a) Get 2 weeks off on a working holiday this year
b) how to ensure within the next few years this can extend a lot further or my role can be far more flexible

Isn’t that awfully sensible?

I hate public speaking, which may sound weird given that in private, you can’t stop me. Over the years I have come to realise that the ability to clearly articulate your ideas in front of an audience is a key to success… You can quite literally have a average idea that is presented well, and it will be worth a lot more than a great idea without the charismatic unveiling.

It kind of makes sense, but is unfortunate for those of us who go weak at the knees at the thought of getting up in front of an audience. If you can’t talk it up in front of an audience, you create your own glass ceiling.

If you can… You can successfully cover up a lot of your weaknesses and have a very strong impression on people.

At the very least, in the next year I will be talking at a wedding. This has prompted me to figure out how to not feel like my stomach has turned into a butterfly farm for the weeks leading up to the event (I do not want to sacrifice my time as chief bridesmaid!)

So what are good techniques? I know it’s simply a confidence thing and have heard that:

• Going to a professional public speaking course can change your life
• Force yourself to just do it and it will get easier
• Just imagine you’re talking to a couple of friends

But am wondering if anyone has experienced a breakthrough ever and how it happened?

After a 6 week battle with Paypal, my account limitation has finally been lifted. I had almost $7,000 in there sitting for 6 weeks with absolutely no security that I would get it back. Unlike other annoyances I write about, this really freaked me out. That is a lot of money to me and my business and even though it was rightfully mine, I was powerless to get it.

The thing is, I don’t actually really mind that Paypal limited my account. I would rather they did that than find out they welcomed in some fraudster with open arms, but the way they go about it makes their customers feel so vulnerable, I now completely understand how those people who create ‘I Hate Paylpal’ sites feel.

1. It is Paypal POLICY to limit EVERY new account that received a large amount of cash (and $7k is determined to be large

This is to stop international thiefs and suchlike filtering money around the world and I think that is probably a good idea.

BUT

If it is policy, maybe they would like to TELL me it is policy, so I can do a couple of small transactions first or decide to use another method. Even if they don’t tell me before hand, when the account is limited, maybe that would be a good time? The most frightening thing for me is simply the not knowing and the fact if they chose to, they could wipe all record of me and my money and WHAT could I do??? Take them to court? If they JUST let me know. I wouldn’t panic.

2. Paypal Doesn’t Communicate

When a large company has stopped you accessing your own money for about 3 weeks and you have done everything they have asked of you and you STILL haven’t heard from them… You start to wonder if this is about security at all or if it’s really about getting interest on someone else’s money. Because I’m not in the mood for conspiracy theories, I will put this down to bad communication.

I emailed sooooo many times. I called even more times and was faced with the MOST ANNOYING mechanical answer service I have EVER experienced. I received a list of options, none of which was what I was after and none of which led to an actual person. I literally spent half an hour figuring out how to hunt down an operator on each phone call and if I made the wrong choice, I’d get “Paypal thanks you for your call… Goodbye.” … And be forced to start the process again.

When I ever got through to an operator (I think that was 3 times) I ALWAYS got hung up on while they transferred me between departments. It was a nightmare and more so for their operators who surely must answer calls to find their customers not only with their initial complaint, but a barrage of abuse about their phone system.

On the upside, every Paypal PERSON I talked to was very helpful… Even if they didn’t always do what they said they would.

Paypal also requires a fax machine to use (yes for an online service) I don’t even OWN a fax. They also don’t email you to tell you if the documentation you supplied was incorrect and even when you specify on your fax that you have uploaded the documentation to the correct place, they don’t check, so you have to spend another week going through the heirarchy just to point out that it’s where they wanted to to be all along… Man oh man. Just remembering those times makes me frustrated.

3. Paypal Loses Customers

I’ve used Paypal before, I haven’t really thought about it, and I assumed the weirdos with their weird hating Paypal sites were just idiots who mucked up somehow. Now I know differently. If I ever do use Paypal again, it will be hesitantly. I’d rather pay the extra $25 fee banks charge for international payments (which is a crime in itself) than risk losing my money or not be able to access it.

Which is a shame, because it’s such a good theory. On the upside, I now completely understand my parent’s generation and their nervousness at trusting “the internet” - this will surely help me do my job better?

Everyone who knows me knows that I have been waiting for my sister to get married for the last 10 years (pretty much). And so has my mother.

Now it is finally time, it is amazing at what experts we are and how many plans we have up our sleeves gleaned from watching other people do it. I’m seriously considering becoming a wedding planner so as not to get overly overexcited about Brooke’s big day…. And the more I think about it, the more I think there is a MASSIVE gap in the weddings market (Which is uber lucrative!)

So if you are a wedding venue, a wedding dress shop, a catering company, a cake company, in fact ANYONE who is about to make a fortune out of the happy couple, please take note of my top 3 tops:

Offer them a drink

When people arrive, offer them a drink of bubbly or sparkling grape juice. Not that I’m a huge drinker :) but this is a CELEBRATION people and I think you need to get into the wedding spirit from day one. Especially because it’s normally the bride and groom and close friends and family doing this. Make looking at your company an event in itself. If they choose you, they will pay you thousands, so give them a drink! (and maybe even a card). They WILL remember you and they want to know on their wedding you will be looking after them, so start as you mean to go on.

Be BRIMMING with ideas

There is an AWFUL lot of organising to do, especially if you want everything to be perfect and YOU are the expert so give the couple a break. If you are a wedding venue, SHOW them photos of different setups, different themes, cool little extras people have (like the champagne fountain). Otherwise, it gets a little overwhelming. And once again, you are there to look after the bride and groom. This is like their moment in ‘Pretty Woman’ where they go into the shop with masses of money and everyone falls head over heels to help them. Every girl I know wants just once to have that feeling and this is the time… And every groom I’ve ever known groans at the idea that the ring they just issued results in a year of organising for one event.

We have been to one wedding dress shop and each person has one assistant devoted to their wellbeing. Ours was so nice and fun and fantastic, we had a ball. I felt sorry for the other girl whos assistant was so not into it. The latter will probably result in a couple of thousand dollar LOSS for the company.

Be connected

Yes people want to organise the perfect wedding, but it’s often difficult to know which cars to hire and where to get the best wedding photographer… So if you sell dresses, maybe you should connect (really connect, not just hand out business cards) with photographers who have made your dresses look fabulous in photo albums for years after the event and show them to the bride… Same goes for the music, the cars, the cake and the flowers. Have some connections up your sleeve of other companies that compliment what you’re all about

Early voice recognition systems were calibrated to male voices. Women were ignored.

Early video conferencing systems were calibrated to a male voice, so even if a woman was speaking, the video didn’t even know she existed and instead focused on a man.

The first artificial heart valves were modeled on a mans heart and didn’t FIT in women.

None of these technological advances involved women in the design process. If you’re a male technology entrepreneur and don’t currently have any women in your team, listen to the SXSW talk on how to attract girls into technology or else, you too may find yourself in the embarrassing position of quite literally ignoring half your market.

If you are a female, listen anyway, they are quite good at putting into words EXACTLY why up until the age of 20 I didn’t even like computers and it really makes you think how different technology will be once there are more of us contributing to it.

We have a ‘less-paper’ policy at Decisive Flow. ALL invoices are sent out via email and if a client wants paper invoices, I politely explain they can print them themselves if necessary however storing the electronic file is fine for accounting purposes.

So when I received an email the other day demanding paper invoices from a hosting customer and I went through my spiel, only to receive this:

“We receive upwards of 100 emails a day and many spam as well , it is too easy for things to get buried and of course has to be printed off so no saving in paper or green house gases”

Firstly, they get email spam, but surely they receive emails from people outside of those sending invoices just fine.

Secondly, why do people get so stroppy about people being a little careful with our environment? I cannot understand the psyche that thinks “hmm we have a problem, I wont help, I wont be constructive, I’ll just mock people who do care.”

When you are charging about $20 a month for hosting, the cost of printing off invoices, putting them in envelopes and putting a stamp on them comes to about $1 for materials + $2 for labour (given it would be one of us who do it and we would otherwise be working on client projects). That’s about $3 to simply INVOICE. As opposed to a one click ’send’ function. Outside of the cost to me, there is the cost to our planet of creating envelopes and paper and ink and stamps and I’m sorry, I know it sounds pedantic, but that cost gets way too high for me to feel comfortable.

Every now and then in life, you are lucky enough to meet someone so inspiring that they instantly change some small part about you forever.

I went to listen to George Monbiot talk at the Embassy Theatre on Saturday morning. He wasn’t there actually, we was ‘tele-ported’ in from the UK and just as brilliant on the big screen as I imagine he is in real life (He is he of a number of people who now refuse to board a plane if at all possible). If you EVER get a chance to, go listen to him. I struggled with his book Heat (not so good with non-fiction with my holey brain these days), but his facts on climate change and the simple, clear way he describes the problem, the solution and what he is doing will blow you away.

I took a snippet of video to show you what it was like although I wonder what kind of video link they Embassy was using and if it cost them a fortune. The connection was lost THREE times in an hour, which is not something I have experienced using good old FREE skype (seriously, if they paid a fortune, I just have to laugh - and Geroge himself commented that ALL international business should be conducted through video, but understood that if air travel was as dodgy as video connections are, then nobody would do that either).

Anyway, at the end someone said “Our climate is always changing, throughout history is had warmed and cooled on it’s own, how do you know this time it is us humans?” Just as Claire looked at me and said ‘He must get really sick of that question”, George said “I get REALLY sick of that question.”

He went on to rip apart the sheer arrogance of anyone who had read a newspaper or watched a TV programme or talked to a scientist and thought that was a good enough reason to question the absolute conclusions of the top climatologists in the world who have spent YEARS studying and understanding one of our most complex sciences.

It made me think.

I know a lot of managers who do the same.

I’ve only ever worked in small businesses and whenever people talk about such things, the advice seems to be that eventually, with enough experience the manager will learn to let go. Now I am thinking that is just rubbish.

What kind of arrogance do you have to have to assume you know how to do someone’s job better than they do? Who do you think you are to remove their right to own their work and have pride in it by telling them you know how to do it better or constantly questioning their judgment?

It’s the TOP complaint I hear from employees, and managers who simply let people do their jobs and trust them to complete the tasks they were hired and paid for are actually THANKED. Weird huh?

My dad has managed very large organisations and is of the same opinion as me, your job as a top level manager is strategic. You are responsible for the big picture and that everyone is heading towards it. Your job is NOT to nit pick over details and micro manage every aspect of your organisation (whether it be large or small). That is why you PAY people, you pay them because you think they can take care of their area of your company.

If you don’t think someone can do the job, don’t hire them and wait until you find someone who can. And when you assume you always know better than them or continuously trust your own judgment above theirs in areas of their responsibility, please recognise it for what it is and maybe take a step back. The people you work with will appreciate it.