There are two very large books of information sitting on my door step. Usually, I like books. These two are almost completely useless to me. They are the Yellow and White pages. Bastions of a era that has passed.

With my recent move to Brisbane, I’ve been hunting around for new services. Searching for basic things, like doctors and accountants.

Five years ago, I used the physical Yellow Pages.

Two years ago, I used the Yellow Pages web site.

Today, I use Google.

Well, almost. I first ask people I know for their experiences. Then it is off to the court of public opinion - Page Rank.

If a business does not have a web site, they are obviously behind the times, so I’m not interested. If a business doesn’t have a high page rank for a targeted search, then they are not valued by others.

Having worked previously in a related industry, I pondered what it was that the Yellow Pages were missing. For me, it was ranking. The Yellow Pages is to businesses as the old Yahoo Directory was to the internet: A structured list.

Google has shown that isn’t good enough. For now, a list sorted by a vague sense of relevance wins. Ideally, there would be some way of having users rank businesses in a directory. Something akin to the coverage of Yellow Pages crossed with a community based ranking system.

Scoble gets it. Why don’t the Yellow Pages?

The catch is revenue. Yellow Pages makes its money by advertisers. With community ranking, there is the risk that their business won’t rank well. This would require a change in business model from the Yellow Pages - not likely. And so the Yellow Pages will drift into irrelevance.

I’m still not sure what to do with the books. Recycling seems the best option, and yet a waste at the same time.

They shouldn’t have shipped in the first place.

I’ve blogged about management before, and still don’t have any answers. What I do have, is a range of ways of improving.

1. Mentoring — Learn from others.

   You don’t need to have a formal mentor relationship; you don’t even need someone’s permission to learn from them. What you need is to identify one or more people who have managed you well, or who you respect the way they manage others.

   Spent time with these people!

   Odds are, someone who is good at managing people, is happy to receive help. Offer to help out. Show interest in their problems and, most importantly, how they deal with them. Offer suggestions. You will learn in spite of yourself, just don’t expect to be right most of the time.

   If you aren’t in a position to offer suggestions, at least think of decisions you would make in a similar situation, and why. You may not always agree with the resultant decision, and it is worth investigating why you differ. Mentors are human too, and you can learn from their mistakes as well as your own.

2. History — You are not the first.

   People have gone before you, some were good, some were bad, many wrote books. Find them.

   Your mentors may be able to recommend people to start with. Read blogs of people you respect, and find out who they recommend.

   If in doubt, start with Peter Drucker.

   Another good approach is to check the references and notes sections of management or business books you are reading. If there is a key point that resonates with you, often there is another book or article waiting in the wings to expand your knowledge.

3. Current practices — Things change.

   Management continues to evolve in terms of what works. New theories come and go. Changing dynamics of the work force introduces new challenges. Keep up to date on current thinking.

   Books are a good source of knowledge for this. Try and find books recommended by others.

   One that I’ve found useful recently is Evidence Based Management. The key thing from this book is a way of filtering out other business related knowledge.

   Business magazines may assist with current trends. This is not a path I’ve followed. Although, I do read the Economist - a magazine that does a good job of tracking the business world as well as world events.

   Blogs provide lots of opinion on a range of current topics. Subscribe to ones that interest you, and also subscribe to ones that challenge you.

4. Experience — Learn by doing.

   Whether your are in an official position of management or simply working in a team, try out what you’ve learnt. You will make mistakes, it is part of the process. The aim is to learn from your previous experiences, be they successful or not.

   Volunteer for tasks outside your normal scope of work that will allow you to develop. This provides a good way of gaining a range of experience in more than just your domain. The experiences will help you in your own domain.

5. Diversity — management is all about people. All the theory and best practices in the world won’t help if you can’t work with people.

   Spend time having interests outside of work, you will become more approachable. More importantly, spend time finding out what other people’s interests are.

   A clichéd book perhaps, but Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends & Influence People is the definitive book on interacting with others.

6. Podcasts — A free lunch.

   With the advent of podcasting, people are giving away knowledge. You can listen to interviews with founders of successful companies, lectures from the best universities and a constant stream of news.

   The following podcasts I’ve found useful and inspiring, ordered roughly in terms of utility:

   • Stanford - lecture series on entrepreneurship, that covers leadership and management.

   • Venture Voice - interview series that covers how business owners manage their companies and the people who work for them.

   • Harvard - bi-weekly broadcast that covers topical areas in business, including reviews of recently released books.

   • 12 Byzantine Rulers - history of how the leaders of the Byzantine empire dealt with the management of the entire empire. Provides a good historical perspective.

   • Knowledge@Wharton - another business news podcast from the business school at Wharton.

For a closing truism — the more you learn, the more you’ll know, thus the more effective you’ll become. Stay open to learning new things, however you learn them.

If you have an experience to share, or an avenue of knowledge that has worked for you, please leave a comment.

To take photographs means to recognize — simultaneously and within a fraction of a second — both the fact itself and the rigorous organization of visually perceived forms that give it meaning. It is putting one’s head, one’s yes and one’s heart on the same axis.

As far as I am concerned, taking photographs is a means of understanding which cannot be separated from other means of visual expression. It is a way of shouting, of freeing oneself, not of proving or asserting one’s own originality. It is a way of life.

— Henri Cartier-Bresson

Barry Schwartz presented a very compelling meme at the Google campus, the Paradox of Choice. In a nutshell, choice is good, lots of choice is bad.

His presentation has been bouncing around in my head for a few days now. I strongly recommend that you have a look. The premise that additional choice adds an overhead is something that feels intrinsically right, and Schwartz backs it up with evidence. A good sign.

I was thinking about strategies that I use in day to day life to make decisions simpler in a sea of choices, and the common theme I found - Brands.

My experience with a particular brand reduces the amount of thinking I make about a product. Some have negative connotation, some positive. Apple tempts with with new products as I trust the brand, but I am hesitant to buy a Dell due to what they represent.

Brands make supermarkets simpler, clothes shopping possible and music fun.

In reality, brands are just one level of filter that we rely on in modern life. There is a wide range of other filters. With the advent of the internet exploding the level of information and thus increasing the need for filters, it is an area seeing rapid change in recent years.

Aside: filters is a much bigger topic, but tends to delve in to Web 2.0 examples such as del.icio.us, last.fm, etc - so I thought I’d avoid it for now and talk about branding.

Although, a good example of filters is how I found the video in the first place. I’m using Google’s own staff as a filter for talks I’m interested in. They kindly share their in-house seminar series. Thank you!

From Seth:

If marketing is the art of spreading ideas, then teaching is a kind of marketing.

Atex is a company that understands this very well.

They make a very complex and hard to understand set of products. Training is kept as an in-house competency. In fact, training is often included for a select group of key staff within a newspaper as part of the pre-sales process. The training isn’t conducted by an outsourced company, or by a junior employee, but by the best expert available on the system.

This makes the sales process much smoother, as the customer now understands the product and the value that the product brings to their business.

Do not underestimate the value of training, it may just help close your next deal!

Bonus Links (both from Creating Passionate Users):

• You can out-spend or out-teach - “The most important skill today is… teaching”
• You ARE a marketer. Deal with it. - “You’re in marketing. Now go kill yourself.”