6 Popular Ideas That Fail
你不能不认识：SWOT 跟它的6 个好朋友们
以前在卖企业IT 软件的时候，最怕的就是跟IBM 打对台，因为CTO 只要说：「买IBM 就像买保险一样，如果出事了，顶多跟老板说，我都已经买顶级的IBM了！」你就没辙了。但其实这句话是很有问题的？它显示出的不是IBM 的厉害，而是这些老板的无知和漠视。
而身为创业者，这就是你的机会。只要你很清楚的知道自己在干嘛，你就有可能比这些恐龙有效率，你就有可能有一天打败他们。今天刚好看到一篇文章，作者分享了6个常见的「错误管理方法」，我觉得非常值得你们参考，加入了我自己的意见，整理如下：
SWOT 分析
台湾的教育特别重视「套公式」，所以很喜欢滥用这些管理学工具。回台湾的一年，我看到SWOT模型被用在政府专案、商业计画书、比赛申请表，甚至连求职履历表，都要SWOT一下。天啊！你们到底知不知道SWOT在欧美根本已经被证实是一个无用的工具吗？每次看到典型的SWOT结论：「我们的Weakness可以转为Strength,我们的Threat也是我们的Opportunity」，我就又气又好笑。既然都是一样的，那你还分析个屁，别再浪费时间了吧。
绩效奖金
这也是另一个普遍被误解的工具，事实上，除了「业务」之外，一般的员工，尤其是当你在做网路创业这种创造新知识的工作，根本无法事先定义「绩效」，然后事后再依据这些定义来「奖励」员工—你怎么可能在半年前就知道你要pivot呢？所以，还不如让每个人都成为公司的股东，一起为美好的未来打拼，有效率多了。
头脑风暴(Brainstorming)
做头脑风暴就像说「我今天要来创新」一样，根本完全是本末倒置的行为。好的ideas不是叫一群人到会议室，把他们关在里面72小时就可以生出来的。相反的，好ideas往往是在执行的过程中不断的碰撞后，突然有一天跑出来的。所以别再迷信「头脑风暴会议」了，叫大家去实作，做着做着就会有更好的ideas 出来了。
广告投报率(ROI)
现行大多的「广告投报率」，往往是媒体公司为了要抢广告主的预算，所硬生出来的假科学量测方式。曝光、流量、到访、点击数、点击率、CPC… 这些对你一点都不重要，你要的是买单的客户、付钱的消费者，就这么简单而已，千万别再傻傻的被媒体代理商牵着走了，他们也不知道自己在干嘛。
Facebook 粉丝人数
另外一个最近常见到的行销军备竞赛，就是看哪个品牌的Facebook粉丝人数比较多。天啊！你不知道有一种东西叫作「僵尸」吗？粉丝数再多，如果他们不是活跃的，对你根本一点意义也没有。重点是这些人会不会买你的东西，会不会向他们的朋友推荐你的品牌。大企业钱很多，傻傻的叫Facebook 营销公司去帮他们买粉丝，那是他家的事。身为创业人，你千万要知道，粉丝贵在精，不在多，千万别落入了这个陷阱。
专家和大神
台湾人常常对「专家」有莫名的崇拜，喜欢没事就叫人家「大大」、「大神」，好像这些人都不用吃饭、不会犯错、讲什么都对一样。更奇怪的是对大学教授 的尊崇，说真的，他们也只不过就是多念了一些书，多读了写了一些论文，如此而已，并不是样样都行的。(上一次我们听一个「专家学者」的话投票选总统，结果 你还记得发生了什么事吧？) 要知道，这世界上没有谁一定是对的，也没有谁一定是错的。人家跟你讲一件事，你要去了解背后的原理和因果，然后形成自己的判断。如果连这样都做不到，只会 傻傻的照单全收，那我看你还是别出来创业了吧！
以上，就是SWOT 和它的几个好朋友，希望能够给你们一些思考，加油！
6 Popular Ideas That Fail
“Nobody ever gets fired for buying IBM” was once a popular belief that seems quaint now. It’s hard to imagine that people used to buy IBM products simply because they were so dominant.
We are all, however, chauvinists for our own age, caught up in our own
moment. We take refuge in the safety of numbers. We don’t trust the
short line at the store. Quantity has a quality all of its own.
The following is a list of seven ideas that, like choosing IBM a few
decades ago, won’t get anyone fired. Nevertheless, they probably
should.
1. Pay For Performance
One of the things you hear with metronomic regularity in the business world is the importance of performance pay. However, as Daniel Pink reveals in his book Drive, there is an enormous gap between what science knows and what business does.
He draws on decades of studies that show that for problem solving and creative tasks (i.e. most of what professionals do today), incentive pay often decreases productivity. He recommends that giving employees opportunity for autonomy, mastery and purpose is far more effective.
My experience suggests that he’s right. Incentive pay is more likely to result in efforts to “game the system” than to create value and I have found that, even with salespeople, individual performance pay often backfires. I’ve had better results with group bonuses, but even then you need to be careful with structure and not give them too much weight.
That doesn’t mean that that incentives have no place at all. They can signal priorities and help people keep track of how they are doing. However, in general they’re overdone and more qualitative forms of feedback can be far more effective. After all, if employees aren’t intrinsically motivated, you have bigger problems than compensation.
2. Brainstorming
Another standard practice that is taken on faith is brainstorming. However, again there is little or no evidence that it works and a there is a vast body of evidence to the contrary. This paper(pdf) suggest that brainstorming results in fewer and poorer ideas and cites studies dating back to 1958.
Others suggest that brainstorming results in more ideas, but is less likely to result in a viable solution (this is more consistent with my experience – 150 crappy ideas that are quickly forgotten).
Either way, the fact remains that brainstorming sessions rarely result in productive outcomes. While in some circles the practice takes on a mystical significance, almost akin to a séance in which the spirits of brilliance will magically appear on white-boards, there are much better ways to unlock creativity.
3. SWOT Analysis
SWOT analysis, the identification of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats has become nearly universal in strategic discussions. However, like brainstorming, there is little evidence that it works. This article by J. Scott Armstrong at the Wharton school cites research that shows that the method is more likely to do harm than good.
Nevertheless, whenever anybody wants to put on their strategic hat, you can expect some form of SWOT analysis to follow. The result, at least in my experience, is some silly conclusion like “Our strengths are our weaknesses and our opportunities are our threats.”
In other words, a complete waste of time.
4. Marketing ROI
Okay, maybe this isn’t so ridiculous. Marketing is an investment and some effort must be put forth to determine return. However, ROI as normally practiced usually obscures more than it reveals.
Too often, the discussion about ROI revolves around myths rather than reality. This is especially true when it comes to digital ROI, which invariably ignores the fact that the bulk of budgets remain offline.
Worse, ROI is commonly used as a sales tool by media owners, who for some reason think that it’s helpful for clients to receive a dozen or more ROI estimates from as many salespeople. These usually employ incredibly convoluted calculations in the name of transparency, seemingly in an attempt to redefine the term “oxymoron.”
There are, of course, some sensible ways to approach ROI. However, they entail having full access to marketing data. So if you’re not a marketer yourself or an agency with an ROI contract, it’s an exercise in futility.
5. Social Media Followers
An interesting offshoot of the ROI madness has been the extremely misguided use of metrics in social media marketing, particularly with respect to the number of followers.
As I wrote before, adding followers won’t build your community. What’s really important is how engaged they are in their interactions with each other. So rather than focusing on what numbers show up on your Twitter profile or Facebook page, try and give them something to talk about.
Be interesting, have a story and help them connect with each other. It’s internal links that drive social networks rather than simply how many people you can get to link to your brand.
6. Experts and Experience
We all have to come to terms with our own ignorance. No matter how hard we try, there will always be vast chasms of dark space in our knowledge. So, it’s understandable that we’re constantly on the lookout for experts. However, their value is often overstated and can sometimes even be negative.
First of all, research suggests that people often get worse with experience, so the fact that someone has been doing something for a long time doesn’t necessarily make him good at it. Second, innovative breakthroughs happen when people cross domains and usually not by through expertise in just one area.
Finally, as I wrote about in my post on elegant gurus, just because someone comes with impressive credentials doesn’t mean that they have their facts straight. In actuality, some seem to think that having a gold-plated resume means that they no longer need to be diligent and rigorous.
Don’t Believe Everything You Think
Why is it that practices become so widespread with little or no evidence to support them? Bertrand Russell had this to say:
“If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for acting in accordance to his instincts, he will accept it even on the slightest evidence. The origin of myths is explained in this way.”
In other words, we tend to search for information that supports what we already believe and disregard evidence to the contrary. Brainstorming feels creative, therefore it must be. We like having big numbers next to our names, therefore it feels good when we have a lot of followers.
When called on to make a choice between our beliefs and our well being, we have a strange tendency to choose our beliefs.
The foolishness, of course, doesn’t stop with the six examples cited above. Stanford professors Jeffery Pfeffer and Bob Sutton have uncovered a wealth of popular yet mistaken management notions and advocated for what they call evidence based management.
The moral is clear: Don’t believe everything you think.
