From the Marketing Desk: Examples of Why One Size Doesn't Fit All

Last weekend I wrote about silver bullets. Seems like everyone wants a superficial quick fix to everything these days. Truth is, whether it's business or anything else in life, it's just not that simple.

For a short period of time over three decades ago I had a job inside the executive search firm world. I met a fellow who had experienced tremendous success as an executive recruiter. To achieve this success he lived and breathed it night and day. His was a small firm of six but his clients were big, big companies. 

When I visited his office he was often dressed in grey sweatpants with holes in the knees. Sneakers. Well-worn T-shirt. Very casual. He spent his days working the phones and studied hundreds of business magazines to find potential candidates to fill positions. He maintained an incredibly organized filing system with impressive cross-referencing. This was the era before computer databases. He was good at the game and earned substantial commissions when he placed people. 

On one occasion I went to see him -- we'll call him Jack here -- and I was more than mildly surprised to see him in a tuxedo with tails. "Whoa!" I thought, and said something like, "You're pretty dapper today. What's the occasion?" 

Jack replied that he had to meet with a VP of Honeywell to explain why he'd failed to acquire someone to replace an important senior scientist who was retiring at the end of the year. The man who was retiring had given 18 months notice because he understood that he was doing very specialized work and it would not be easy to find someone. 

Now Jack had been paid 30K in advance to get a replacement. He was given 18 months. The knowledge set was so stringent that only 178 people in the whole world were qualified, and they did not all live and work in the United States. He would not only have to find someone who might be interested in leaving their situation, but the family would have to move to Minnesota. In this business the big stickler is that the man's wife and kids are usually already embedded in a community elsewhere, often in the Southwest. They might be living in their dream home, and they were seldom thrilled about Minnesota's thirty-below winter weather. 

Needless to say, the approach to finding this kind of candidate is far different another situation I witnessed a few years later in Duluth.

My wife and I moved to Duluth in the spring of 1986. I didn't have a job lined up at the time but felt confident. I was seeking a writer position at the time and even though the economy was still feeling the effects of the Reagan recession I felt confident because the good writers would either already be employed or would have gone to the Twin Cities, where the economy was in recovery already.

One day the newspaper had a front page story about how the new paper mill in West Duluth had one hundred openings and over 12,000 applicants from all across the Northland.

Upon reflection today its apparent today that although both companies were seeking to fill a position or positions, the approach in each case was very different. The latter was more like the offshore fishermen who for centuries developed a method of locating schools of fish and casting nets. The first required locating one single fish at a time, getting him to take the bait and then wrestling him in, a la Old Man and the Sea.

As the saying goes, different strokes for different folks.

A high school friend has developed an executive training firm that takes lessons from Civil War battlefields and makes vivid their application to business. Every battlefield is different, and the strategies required for victory vary. Though there are features common to all, the lay of the land imposes variables that alter the approach a general or leader must take to attain victory. General Grant's victory at Vicksburg broke the back of the South, but his approach proved very different from what was required to later end the war in Virginia.

What's your situation? Are you developing a strategic plan or are you now in the execution phase. Whether you're marketing a book, or attempting to grow market share, there are a variety of ways to achieve your end. I like to say, "The right way is the way that works." If you're still searching, I hope you'll find it. 

Different Approaches To Art-Making: The Cultural Influence We Fail To Notice

Where does this idea of "making a name for oneself" come from? I've written before about Beethoven creating music that would roll through the ages. From time to time we routinely hear the expression "he had a massive ego" as if this were the key to a writer or artist'
s "greatness." I'm thinking of Hemingway here because I'm just finishing a book about the break-up of his friendship with John Dos Passos as a result of events that occurred during the Spanish Civil War.

As a young art student I myself wanted to be the next Picasso. I didn't want to follow others, I wanted to make my own ripples, like a stone hitting the surface of a pond.

But how do such ambitions square with the virtue of humility. And where do these notions come from that propel people to feel they must make "great art" and write "great books."

These thoughts were pressing on my mind as I reflected on several strands of thought that merged in my mind this past few days. The first notion came from a statement by Alan Greenspan who once proposed that anyone who strongly desires to be president of the United States should be be automatically disqualified. (How ironic that I read this on the eve of last night's GOP debates.)

Combine this with two Tweevenings talks that I heard this past year at the Tweed Museum of Art. Broc Allen's talk titled East Meets West, in which he discusses a totally different approach to making beautiful objects in which the goal is perfection for its own sake, not for the sake of making a name for the artist. In my blog post on this talk I wrote, "It made think of the superficiality of our American quest for celebrity or fame."

Previous to this Ann Klefstad had given a lecture called Double Vision that many similar observations, and questioned our current double standards as regard what should be called art, highlighting Native American items that exhibit craftsmanship, beauty and skill but have often been placed in the anthropology sections of museums rather than being appreciated for their artistic merits.

What are the motives for what we create? I find myself challenged. Are we making art for its own sake or making art to make a name for oneself?  When creating something are we aiming for perfection or self-expression, or both?

I remember as story about a couple who created some kind of craft objects that sold so well they built a business around it. At one point they had 400 employees, and I wondered whether this mass production could be considered art? Perhaps there's a sense in which it could be if it were done in that spirit, but my guess is that most were doing the work to get paid, and it had become a job. Were they paid more when they met quotas? Or were they rewarded for the spirit with which they did the work?

Our culture influences us in ways we fail to notice because we're so immersed in it. Mass production and speed seem at odds with writing poetry or painting a landscape. In what other ways does our culture shape us that we're unaware of?

Just sowing a few seeds.