Throughout my forty-plus years as The Turnaround Guy, working with companies on the brink of bankruptcy, I kept running into a fascinating challenge that I came to call Persona Management.
In a turnaround — and arguably in all problem-solving — we need to come at problems, solutions and ideas with our very best thinking – obviously. But without persona-awareness, and persona-management, many leaders and team members defaulted to predictable roles that sharply limited critical and creative thinking. Instead of staying open to possibilities, people often responded through the lens of their persona — the identity they’d built within the group. A new and daring idea would barely hit the table before The Skeptic shot it down. Or The Penny Pincher would jump in to say it’s too costly — before we touched on its potential. These knee-jerk reactions dampened creativity and silenced contributors. Exactly what we don’t want in a brainstorming session.
That worried me. Because my most powerful tool in turnarounds — and in consulting and coaching generally — was brainstorming: taking a problem or goal and hitting it with a barrage of ideas – hunting for that one big idea (or two) that could change everything.
Beware the usual suspects: The Skeptic. The Critic. The Joker. The Cynic. The Optimist. The Pessimist. The Diplomat. The Analyst. The Promoter. The Penny Pincher… and more!!
At first, I’d ask dissenters to hold their fire until we reached the consensus stage. But that wasn’t enough. I had to name the issue and deal with it directly. If we were going to do our best thinking, we had to stop letting our personas do our thinking for us. We needed to practice persona-management.
Here’s an example of persona at play:
Client: A leading edge, genuinely customer-driven company providing cyber security education and solutions for small and mid-size business.
Company population: 24
Services: Securing networks, devices, and data; developing cybersecurity management plans, and providing employee training.
Positioning Statement: “We want to be described by clients as cyber space educators, and trusted advisors, not just service providers.”
Situation: The company was thrown into a downspin by a deep recession. Clients were cancelling their managed cyber security contracts; new sales were dropping dramatically; creditors were hounding the owner, who struggled to make payroll despite laying off more than half his team.
The scene: Company boardroom – where I was facilitating a brainstorming session – looking for ideas to fuel a turnaround.
A bright idea: One participant suggested they go back in time and re-run a business owner education program – a three-session morning program that was wildly successful when they first launched the company.
Disposition: Instead of getting a green light, the idea was shot down in seconds.
The idea was shot down thanks to a single participant with a reputation – a persona – for playing the skeptic role. He told the group that the original program was successful only because its three sessions were free of charge, and they served a hot breakfast with each one. Now, he said, they couldn’t afford a free breakfast – or even the rental of a hotel meeting room. And, he said, because we’re in a recession, he doubted that cyber security would be high on business owners’ priority lists any way.
This must have sounded like good advice, because the group indicated a wish to just move on. But I stepped in. I had learned of the program in my initial interview with the owner – and I was surprised that he, and others, were ready to let it go so easily. I reminded the group that 70% of participants in the original series were so impressed with the content of the workshops – and the urgency to take protective action in the form of a cyber security review, makeover and employee training – that they booked an initial consult before leaving the meeting room. And that over half of these prospects went on to become clients. In other words, if we allowed history to repeat itself by finding a way to make this happen without the high cost of the original program, it would likely be very well worth doing. What we needed – urgently – was persona-management and lateral thinking.
Introducing lateral thinking: the antidote to persona-based thinking and decision-making
As we know, lateral thinking is the practice of looking for alternatives when the usual approaches won’t work. In essence it means switching our thinking from “We can’t do it,” to “We could do it, but not that way.” I describe lateral thinking as a skill that systematically makes the impossible possible. In my work, this bit of mental trickery has saved many hundreds of great ideas – and often meant salvation for companies on the edge.
I offered the group a brief recap, then turned to the person playing the skeptic role and asked him to suspend judgment for a few minutes while I used the current situation to illustrate the practice – this time focusing on how we could derive the benefits of hosting the event – without the high cost of its previous iteration. Here are some of the ideas they came up with…
- A team member said that one of their clients, a safety training firm, had a large classroom that would be a perfect venue. Why not ask if we could use their facility in exchange for X months of our services? (They asked and the client agreed whole-heartedly).
- Another person suggested that we could target businesses least affected by the recession – such as accounting, finance and law; home improvement; auto repair, pet care, and more!)
- Their salesperson – who was with the company when the original program was offered – said she used the invitation process as a door opener in calling prospective clients. Rather than making ‘sales calls’ she would be making ‘invitation calls’ – asking who to send her invitation to and requesting their email address. She said this approach built their data base – and led to a number of conversations that turned into sales even before the workshops were held.
- She noted that she still had her invitation lists from the original program, and could start there.
- She added that she would start by inviting the business owners who attended the first time and asking them to invite their business owner friends.
- Another said we could, indeed, serve a hot breakfast once again – but instead of a $35 hotel breakfast, it could consist of inexpensive fast foods – like breakfast burritos? Or warm muffins? Or?
- The owner said they could do this quickly, offering a lead time as short as two to three weeks.
- Another said they could ask their Chamber of Commerce to announce the event – and perhaps run an article about it in their newsletter and perhaps even partner with us.
- Another suggested they could offer the program in one session instead of three, sharply reducing the commitment of time for participants.
- And dozens more great ideas!
The bottom Line? Of course they could do it, and they did. The program was a resounding success and became the foundation for a complete turnaround strategy that rapidly reversed their downward spiral and saw them come back strong. (What a relief!)
Your call to action:
This week I encourage you to monitor every discussion or meeting that you lead or participate in. Watch for people shooting down (or talking up) ideas without careful consideration. And, of course, monitor yourself. Can you be overly negative, or positive, without due diligence? Could you have a persona that sometimes does your thinking for you?
See you next week
Neil
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