Marketing in Real Life

My company has a lot of internal dashboards.  We love metrics and keeping our eyes on them on a daily basis is what helps us be successful.  But lately some of the most important metrics we watch have started being sent around by our interns.  Don’t get me wrong, our interns are great. But is that really the best way to communicate?  Here are three reasons I think the answer to that question is no. 1) Loss of importance.   Again, I love interns but regardless of how great they may be I know that I am more likely to pay attention to something sent by a higher level employee.  Having a senior level person send the metrics also allows r some qualitative color to be added to the numbers. 2) What’s the feedback loop?   If I have a question about what I am looking at I’m not sure who to ask.  Do I ask the intern?  Their manager (if I know who that is)?  The fact that I’m not sure who to follow up with is a problem in itself....

There’s a classic sports phrase “offense wins games, defense wins championships." (There’s also the notion that fans hate that saying, but that’s for another day) In business, it plays the other way. Defense leads to complication, slow decisions, and reasons NOT to do something. Offense leads to creative ideas, aggressive tactics, and the difference between good and great. So if you want to win for your company or career, play offense and make stuff happen. Defense won’t get you far. Photo credit: The atlantic