Michael MaozThere is usually a time during a long distance road race when I encounter a curtain of doubt that threatens to draw itself closed in front of me. It is the combination of muscle fatigue and the very natural question that creeps into the mind: ‘why am I punishing my body like this?” There are similar signs in Social CRM and Social Media projects today that many are beginning to doubt both the wisdom of the initiative and our resolve to see it through.
Here is what happens in the race: you begin to reason with your brain’s dark side (or healthy mechanism for self-preservation). You say: let’s just get to the next water stop. Let’s try to make it up this hill. Let’s see where #42 is – she was right ahead just a while ago. We’ve only got 60% remaining – soon it will be half of the way there. It’s going to be so fun after the race. Wow, I am amazed that my limbs can carry me like this. Hey, I’ll do it for my grandmom who never had this chance.
What am I saying? I am suggesting that small signposts and tiny goals are critical, as is re-assuring yourself that there is a method to this apparent madness. Look: more people are posting. They enjoyed the response of their peers. We fixed a small glitch on our website. We finally put in a rating system. Our social media team is really engaged. There are more hits on our product catalog. There are more mentions of us on Twitter and Facebook.
You will face a wall without slicing up Social CRM into addressable bits. But if you do convince yourself that you do not need everything to be momentous, that there can be greatness in a grain of sand, then you will push through that curtain of doubt and create a self-sustaining culture of measuring each tiny milestone. That will give you the energy to reach the next flat area, conquer the next hill, and enjoy the journey rather than hope for a finish line.
What do you see out there that motivates your team?
Category: CRM Customer Centric Web Innovation and Customer Experience Leadership Social CRM Social Software Strategic Planning Twitter Tags:
1 response so far ↓
1 John Burton April 13, 2011 at 9:18 pm
Hi Michael,
Hey, great analogy. Long-distance running is the perfect metaphor for Social CRM projects (or really, for any type of IT project where the ROI is not immediately measurable). Often the tendency is either to quickly get overwhelmed by the magnitude of the task in front of you, or else to just rely on blind faith without the assurance of any regular mile markers. So your advice about “small signposts and tiny goals” is spot on.
Getting back to your metaphor, I do a lot of long distance “ultra marathon” running in the mountains. In the middle of a 100 mile race, the worst thing you can do is think to yourself “only 50 more miles to go, that’s just two marathons”. Just the thought of that would stop me dead in my tracks. Rather I just tell myself, “make it to the top of this hill, make it to that tree, make it to the next corner, etc.”. Relentless forward progress in tiny, measurable increments.
John Burton