Min Or Max

Garth Beyer

If you’re Johnny Cupcakes, you pour a lot of energy into your packaging. (From my upstairs office window, I got to watch the mailperson grab a box designed like an oven, smirk with curiosity, and then leave it at my door.)

And that’s just the outside of the box. Even more good design and intention goes into the packing material inside the box.

Now, if Johnny decided to eliminate the packaging or use the same ziplock style clear plastic bags that every clothing chain is using, he might as well just do the minimum packaging he needs to get product out the door. Mailpersons won’t look twice.

Or consider white glove service (HT to Seth Godin for the idea): the moment that continuing with a little smudge on a glove is okay, the company might as well just do the minimum and wear dirty gloves, or none at all.

Standing on the edge of a spectrum is risky – and sometimes it hurts – but it’s not as damaging to a brand as being somewhere in the middle. Every now and then a brand slips through the cracks and makes it big based on being average, but they don’t live long.

Standing for something doesn’t work. Moving on the max of it, sure does. It also lasts a very long time. (Looking at you Patagonia.)

Stay Positive & See You At The Extreme

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While You’re At It

Garth Beyer

It’s a power move; not in the sense of impressing your status on others, but in increasing your status, increasing your impact, and increasing your feeling of fulfillment at the end of the day.

When you’re doing something meaningful, what else can you do while you’re at it?

Naturally, there’s a yin to this yang, too. If you’re doing something with negative effects, what are the things that you might as well be destroying while you’re at it.

This isn’t to get you to do that, but asking what else you can do while you’re at it sheds a light on the light or dark of what you are doing.

Then you’ve got the choice to do more while you’re at it or not.

Stay Positive & More Light Please

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Criticizing The Idea

Garth Beyer

After awhile, criticism can’t help an idea. Not because the idea can’t be improved, though.

Criticism is worth throwing at an idea until one realizes that it’s not the idea that’s the problem, but the objective the idea serves is.

Using trigonometry on a basketball court is a decent idea, but it’s going to get great skepticism. To the point that it’s calculated perfectly and still ineffective. The real problem is the objective of winning a basketball game, which is what makes using trigonometry ineffective. (A game of horse, on the other hand, might better align the objective with the problem.)

The greatest of leaders and marketers understand that the idea and objective have to go hand-in-hand. They’re often the first to recognize when the idea isn’t the problem that’s holding them back, the objective is.

And like a game of basketball and a game of horse, the pivot may only be a minor one.

Stay Positive & Eyes Wide Open

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The Loop

Garth Beyer

There’s always a loop in all we do.

The best organizations find them and fuel them, but some break them.

Not in the sense that what goes around doesn’t come around, but what’s sent into the loop is damaging to it.

Quick example: A city wants businesses to pay for lost revenue of the parking meters they use for their festival. This leads to higher participation fees for businesses, which leads to fewer businesses participating, which leads to a less impactful festival, which leads to fewer people visiting the street for the first time, which leads to fewer people coming back at another time and paying for parking.

The loop is there, but it’s broken because someone didn’t recognize its existence.

What goes around always comes around.

Best be sure we’re keeping our eye out for the loops we participate in and put intention into the “what” of the equation.

Stay Positive & Find And Fuel The Loops

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To Get To The Best

Garth Beyer

To get to the best writing, it starts with writing. Then it goes to saying it out loud. Then it goes to hearing someone else say it out loud.

To get to the best idea, it starts with ideating. Then it goes to saying it out loud. Then it goes to hearing someone else say it out loud.

Same goes for the best design, the best celebration, the best marketing.

The best can’t be achieved in a silo; it can’t be achieved silently; it can’t be achieved without others.

Stay Positive & Notice That It Goes From Little Accountability/Vulnerability To A Lot…

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