Roman's miles

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly News

I'll start with the ugly news. Last couple of weeks I've been so busy with my job and studying that I didn't have time to blog whatsoever. At SAP we have tons of planning work for 2007 with my group and next week I'm on a global kick-off meeting in Singapore with the team. I also had my first test on Financial Analysis class yesterday and its preparation stole a good chunk of time (hope I passed it:-); another work is due tomorrow (on Strategic Business Communication). I'm very happy with the quality and the level of discussions in the class, the homework materials, which are hefty but very inspiring; and the professors are just amazing! Still the MBA consumes all my free time and nothing was left for blogging last weeks.

The bad news is I broke my marathon schedule.  Last Sunday I scraped out only a slice of time for a 11 mile long run (instead of planned 18) and missed this week's Wednesday-Friday short ones. I'm taking off to Singapore Sunday afternoon and hope to have a workout early morning. Really bad news is that in two weeks I have another week long business trip to Israel so the preparation is seriously under the threat - the marathon run is on March, 4.

The good news is about my family. After almost 7 years of  the "rest" we're again expecting! Our fourth baby's go-live date has been forecast yesterday as September, 22 (so Lia is on her 8th week). It's seems too far today and I don't know who's waiting it more - me, the kids, or Lia; she's struggling with either constant sickness or faltering, twinkling, spontaneous, and vanishing requests to eat - so she doesn't know exactly what she wants.

I guess this year will be a bit "under pressure" for me since there have been so many things happening together. But anyhow I'm very excited and sure we will be good (maybe with an exception for the marathon:-(

THE vacation is about to end

The vacation is about to end. We're flying back with Lia after six nights in Singapore and I'm writing an account on the trip sitting in seat 81C in Lufthansa - we're on our longest leg of this trip back - SIN-FRA. Just as Scoble invited  calling him while he's on road I invite you to call my skype (rytrom) or googletalk (roman.rytov@gmial.com) or drop me an email. There is a long way yet to go: 11 hours to FRA then almost a 5 hours stop-over and 4 other hours on FRA-TLV. I'm connected everywhere, thanks to Lufthansa, so the odds are good you'll reach me if you want.

Before we booked the trip I'd asked a forum how to spend my miles in the most efficient way: how to fly and where to stay . Now it's my turn to contribute back to the community. So this blog is mostly for the forum habitants and aimed to address their points of interests.

We opted for Hilton Singapore basically because we thought it's better in terms of the price/quality comparison (in plane English it was just significantly cheaper than Conrad). The result of this experiment is "A-" for Hilton. I'm really satisfied with everything in the hotel and gave a small minus simply to recognize some direction to polish it to perfection.

The hotel is located in a great place from any perspective - Orchard street - the hart of the shopping area, the sign of modern (Americanized?) country, a concentration of many exquisite and rather modest restaurants, parks, cinemas, cafeterias, night clubs, and, did I mention the shopping gravitational fields of Singapore? Orchard metro station just a couple of blocks down the street; buses, taxis - transportation neither is a problem in Singapore in general nor in this place in particular. The hotel is one of the best of Hilton (at least of those where I've been) and it was recently renovated. We were upgraded to an executive floor (I'm still a diamond in Hilton this year!). The 18th floor has a spectacular view and a spacious room. Other things are quite standard.

The gym of the hotel is one of the best. It has all the equipment a professional athlete needs: 5 treadmill, a few bike machines, tens of different devices for weight lifting, a mirror room for aerobics, and two saunas - a dry and a wet one. On the roof there is quite a big pool (I'd guess about 15 meters) and none of the facilities is ever crowded. Now the really good thing about all the above is it's open 24 hours/day! During working hours there is a professional instructor in the gym but if you struggle from a jet-leg or want to come there bright and early everything is easily accessible - just make a call.

For executive members there is a lounge which is very poor. Breakfasts include only a selection of juices, muesli, and fruits so if you're used to have meaningful breakfast plan to eat outside. The hotel service was just great. Very fast to satisfy any caprice, willing to help, and absolutely friendly. No hint or soliciting for tips as some on the forum alerted.

Actually, I gave the minus to the hotel not because of the poor breakfast but the Internet. It's not free neither in the rooms nor in the business center(!). I met a similar situation only in Double Tree hotel in Washington DC. I think the Internet is supposed to be free when a hotel charges you 250$/day, let alone a business center. It is like this even in Europe in most of the big brands but in Singapore the norms are apparently different. Again, all in all, we were very satisfied with the hotel and recommend it to everyone who's seeking a place in Singapore.

Now the flight part. I had a dilemma on how to fly there from Israel: either on a first in Lufthansa or in a business in Singapore Airlines. Since the money (miles) was quite the same for both options I stuck to the first of LH (never ever tried it before nor their new HON lounge in FRA). What can I say? The service is great, but in a business of LH it's not any worse. The seats are, hm, strange, comparing to their new business. I'm a bit disappointed by the first class (comparing to the business, of course). I think it's a waste of money (looking at the delta in the prices between the business and the first). It's cool to get a pyjamas, an additional appetizer (compared to the business), and, hm, that's all! The seats are flat, but in the (new) business they're almost the same flat either. The drinks, the choice of movies, the personal attention, what did I forget? - I feel it's a new business flight on an old first class chair. Don't misunderstand me - it's a great pleasure to fly in the first of LH. But I'd say it's like if a Audi A8 were cost 60K and a BMW 750 - 90K. There is no 50% of superior quality between two brands (so I didn't find between the business and the first).

Where the difference IS though is the lounges. The HON lounge is much, much, much better than the senator ones in every single parameter of comparison. No welter (as in any SEN lounge), the number of drinks (I guess it's 8 times more in the HON), the food and snacks (again, the factor of 8 in favor of HON), the environment, the bath (instead of a shower), the coolness(?!). If I really liked anything in flying the first then it's the HON lounge of FRA:-) It seems the ideal way is to be just a HON of LH and fly in a business. By the way, I hardly foresee my next trip in a first on my own or the company's expenses (unless I'm luckily upgraded from a business).

In the last point I want to say it was a great way to spend my LH and Hilton miles collected hardly during last years and answer to Jeff Opdyke's article. I offer my way to compensate our wives for long and frequent business travels we ought to have. Spend the miles with her and for her. I'm saying a big thank to Lia whose tolerance and acceptance of my choice for the sake of my career (eventually - our family) made it's all possible. This time it was much better than a business trip and a real vacation.

Presentation killer - monotonous speaking

I'm sure each of us has attended a really bad presentation at least once . If I'm asked to accuse the most bitter and relentless presentation killer I'd point to the lack of vocal variety. Monotonous speaking is an indispensable component of every bad presentation. A great flow, interesting content, appealing examples, expressive body language, eye contact - everything can be in a speaker's arsenal. But if a modem can  beat her at the vocal variety the odds that the audience will listen to her, focus on the topic, and remember anything the next while after the presentation ends are none.

Convincing speaking voice is a trump in a speaker's pack of means to positively influence her audience. Unintelligible words, squeaky or too loud voice can distract the listeners from the message one is bearing. But if the right pronunciation or an efficient tone of the voice is a flaw relatively easy to rectify, perfecting vocal variety is something one needs to sweat for.

The theory says we have three "sliders" to tune and vary our voice: volume, pitch, and rate. Think on where to speed up and slow down your voice, where to speak up or rather whisper, where to go up or down. All these colors are available on the palette of a speaker and without them the picture will be primitive, gray, and boring.

Rate. Too slow pace will lull the audience and too fast will waste its attention on unnecessary word parsing and buffering. You should find a pace when you express yourself with clear articulation, normal breath, and acceptable volume. Typically a low-pace speaker says 120 words a minute and a fast speaker shoots about 180 at the same time. Your rate depends on your character - there is no golden means - and the key here is rate variety. There is no hard rule on the use of timing but it's accepted to express sad feeling (solemnity, depression, sadness, frustration, etc.) at a lower rate than the regular speech. On the contrary, exciting parts of the message should be delivered with a higher speed. You may want to make short pauses before or after words that you want to attract additional portion of attention to; this also makes easier for the audience to catch unusual or new words if they're preceded by a short pause.

Volume. Moderate loudness is acceptable for the majority of the speech - you don't need to whisper or boom your speech at the audience to keep its attention grabbed all the time. It's trivial, though, to use both extremes to emphasize special messages and have dramatic impact. Heightened emotions are conveyed with a loud voice whereas depressed feelings pass through with subdued voice. In business presentations tough and challenging questions can be asked in a lower voice to set up dramatic and vital scene. Accomplishments, motivation, requests, or anger - these feelings can be expressed through increased volume.

Pitch. A thin, a cartoon-personage's voice lacks authority and may block up the message completely. We need to cultivate deeper tones but going to the bottom level of the pitch scale may result in rumbling and indistinct speech. Playing with this parameter of the vocal variety aims the same target - emphasize certain words, sentences, or ideas in the speech. Heightened emotions go together with a higher pitch whereas depressed feelings or provoking statements reach the audience better by a low pitch.

The theory is great and if you have a speech trainer undoubtedly she'll be spending on that a good chunk of the lessons. But how to improve and polish it you there is no speech coach? I found it efficient to practice self-coaching: you record your speech (better on video, to practice body language as well), analyze weak spots,  make remarks in the speech for vocal variations and do another iteration. Try to think about the three parameters every time you talk and not only during formal public presentations. Listen to great talkers and check how they use the "sliders" of rate, volume, and pitch to deliver their point in a variety of tints. Vocal variety is the hardest skill to train and consummate but if recognizing a problem is the first step to its solution, knowing a solution is the second step, then the third one is to realize it and it all depends only on us.

An excelent way to care for drivers!

How do you find a way in an unknown city? Yes, there are driving directions but they, typically, consist of street, bulevards, platzes, and other city infrastructure names. The problem with them is while you're driving you can't always read these names. In the US in some cities there is a good practice of signing forthcoming crossroads but this nice practice is not far accepted. In Germany usually every crossroad has a sign of both streets. Zurich is terrible in this sense - very few street tablets and signs. Vienna is even worse - few and far between street signs are hung on building and drawn by Gothic which for a foreigner's eye look unrecognizable like Chinese.

It is a great global practice to number exists on freeways. Drivers don't have to pay attention to the names but only to numbers and at the same time they can estimate how far the needed exist is. Ashkelon (Israel) made one step further and applied the same practice inside the city by putting number on traffic lights on main streets. Now when you give or follow directions no need to read street names but simply drive instead to an indicated light. Very useful, simple, cheap, and a great example of taking trouble of guest drivers. By the way, it's also a small step of building a positive image of the city.

Flaws of frequent flyer programs. Part two - going extreme.

Richard commented in his blog to my previous post that to make the programs really working they should be more aggressive. Being totally agreed with the point I want to propose a few directions on making practical steps. Since we don’t plan a weighted program but rather brainstorm different ideas I decided to make the cases more extreme and dream about possible directions of the changes.

As Richard pointed out there is a problem of “over-flying” in the business traveling: "I am sure there are lots of people who take extra business trips, with questionable value to the business, in order to win or retain some privileged status with the airline." He claims that a portion of the business travelers takes flights for the sake of miles. Not possessing the numbers and having difficulties to agree on how significant these numbers are I nevertheless have to confess in general with the point. There is a certain conflict of interests between employers (sponsoring the travels) and employees (flying and struggling in the travels). The employers establish travel policies and try to balance between minimizing travel costs and maximizing convenience of travelers. For instance, it’s quite a common practice to allow booking a business flight on international routes longer than 6-7 hours after a few flights flown in coach. The idea behind it is to provide “humane” conditions to frequent fliers and at the same time not to make such an expensive gift to employees flying just a couple of times a year. 

The problem is although a big part of “seldom” fliers is filtered by this rule from taking expensive business it doesn’t repel frequent fliers collecting miles from odd flights (especially in business). This is relevant to odd nights in hotel as well. So the conflict is present – ones want to save money others want to gain from struggling for the job. 

I think the solution may come from the travel industry. They can together via new offering, new services, new models create a win-win-win situation (a win for them, a win for employees, and a win for travelers). As Richard suggested by decoupling the services, mileage calculation, and actual booking they can stimulate new services and new offering from third-party companies. Let me clarify.

If the airline companies remove most of the standard restrictions for changing, returning, replacing tickets and make the system of requesting, quoting, booking much more open and public (not merely to travel agencies but to the fliers as well) they can beget new services. If my company after I got a ticket (according to its travel policy) allows me to play with my itinerary and change the ticket to save money on it we can split the profit between us. Let’s say instead of taking an international business flight (I’m eligible to take) I’m ready to struggle and fly in a cheaper economy class. A profit of 3000 bucks can be split between me and company. Isn’t it a win-win?

Where is the win of the airline companies you’ll ask? Let’s keep dreaming. An offer for flier of taking a longer connection flight instead of a direct one with money or award miles compensation is a direct gain for airline companies. They already do it today for virtual money at the checking counters. Why not to expose this option farther and involve all the customers in advance? Promote postponed or connection flights to better utilize your fleet and divide the dividends with the fliers. Why not to offer new services for booking, requesting, quoting, holding, and replacing tickets to customers? Create new tools generating more options and making fliers’ life more flexible. Allow them to convert virtual dollars to miles, allow them to convert miles to actual dollars, allow them to transfer and borrow miles for free, and allow them to sell and buy miles and tickets on auctions, allow them to make a mile exchange if you will! Provide mechanisms for fliers to play with THEIR itineraries, create monitoring and tracking systems, and make it safe for the business.

I suggest the airline companies (and it’s true in regards to the hotels as well) to stop trying to earn money on award miles and using miles for fictitious attraction. Make it just a means of your business and offer additional flexibility to make your company really attractive. Like money is used by the banks as a means (to use real money) use the miles as virtual money for the travel ecosystem (to attract customers, increase efficiency of your business, and eventually earn real money). Create new affiliate programs around it but let fliers, agencies and third party companies partake in processes and business flows - you’ll be surprised how they all will be creative in building new offers on top of it.

Unfortunately without exposing a number of new services all of the above is only a dream. The positive side of this misfortune is the first company implementing it can get a significant advantage of “the first in the market”.

As I said the post may seem too extreme and it doesn’t propose a concrete business plan. But at the same time I’m sure there is a plenty of opportunities in generating new money and making a big joint win for the travel industry, companies, their employees, and just private travelers. They simply have to change the rules.

My startup crew: Cast off! Full speed!!!

So after 5.5 years the SAP ship of the corporate software development has just put me ashore - today was my last day at the frigate. Monday I'm starting a new journey and this time on a new yacht of the startup development. I'm very excited as the voyage is going to be interesting and adventurous but, hey - I've been dreaming about it for a long time! No more complains on a wrong course, no mirages of approaching icebergs and frustrations from busy oficers, no policies and rules made by the general naval staff. This time it's up to me  as I'll be standing at the helm.  

Profisee is the new yacht. These are the guys who created Stratature which after being acquired in 2007 by Microsoft laid a foundation of the current MDM offering from Redmond. The company has today three practices - Financial Analytics, Operational Analytics and MDM, which I'll be leading. Thought the company is young it already has a few sound clients and runs its operations in North America and UK.  

I met Ian Ahern, the founder of Stratature and Profisee, about a year ago and we chatted for a couple of hours about our inspirations, vision, and plans. As a strong believer in the Data Management as a source of opportunities in general and MDM in particular I admitted that the current trend on the market around MDM resembled a gold rush where every vendor tried, all of a sudden, to paint himself as an MDM expert to gain its share of the field. I was thinking then about opening my own practice around SAP MDM but after some time Ian offered me to join his expedition and lead the MDM team in the venture. 

Monday I start! I'm very excited (already said so) and a bit concerned but at the same time very confident that our schooner will reach the land and we'll dig out few tons of gold with the crew:-) My family is slightly nervous: after 5 years of a placid navigation in a first-class cabin of the SAP liner they don't know what it means to be on a small ship and afraid of a (unavoidable and imminent) pitching. Recently Paul Graham wrote: 

 

What keeps people from starting startups is the fear of having so much responsibility. And this is not an irrational fear: it really is hard to bear. Anything that takes some of that weight off you will greatly increase your chances of surviving.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If anything about my weight it only may grow so it's my time to check the guts and take the risks. The new journey starts Monday. Wish us fair wind!

Update: The formal announcement is here

Is crossing the chasm of total freaking hoplessness binary?

Although trying not to repost others' blogs couldn't resist this time. My own transition from SAP to the new home may not seem like crossing a chasm but certainly won't be a walk in a park. I mean when my family will regain the sence of security and my team will get based on its own success confidence in the future.

 Seth Godin and Neil Davidson had echoing posts today about a transition from a not-yet to a quite-yes states. Neil claims that for each of us there is an area where we aren't borned on the right side of the chasm and Seth explains the transitional nature of the cross. Agreeing with both I wonder how to keep ourselves protected from the hurricanes of pessimism and keep riding (and necessarily falling) no matter what unless one day we can answer positively the "have I crossed it?" question. I think that barely recognizing the nature of the trajectory lays a serious foundation to the crossing plan.

I'm back!

Wow, it's been some time since I posted last time here. I've got more gasoline in my tank and I'm back to blogging. So the three most important things that happened during this gap are:

• I've graduated from my business school. Now I'm an MBA with financial concentration. I may write in more details about the experience and served expectations later. The short version is now I can read Economist bumer-to-bumer and enjoy it:-)
• After working for hafl a year with Harley-Davidon I've got my moto license and set up for a biker amateur. The very spirit of the HD team made me think I'd like riding.
• I'm leaving SAP. After 5.5 years of working for one of the greatest sofware corporation my advanturer's soul and gods of risk-takers drawn me back to the startup world. The Mossad vs. French Legion dilemma is swinging to the former again where I was building my career before joining SAP. I'm very excited about it and will reveal more details soon.

I've decided to make the blog personal now and probably will open another one solely for the professional discussions. I'm greatful for my readers (or rather keepers of the blog link) and hope you'll stay tuned in the future.

Flaws of frequent flyer programs and sensitivity to customer needs

There is no company today in the tourist business (passenger transportation, hotels, rental cars, credit cards,  and so on) not offering either its own mileage program or being a member of a big affiliate network. I think the reason is simple - typical middle-class road-worriers won't use their service without award miles or points. Those companies made a very smart observation many years ago and built new channels of attracting new customers and sustaining customer loyalty. They found that though frequent fliers have some travel policy from the management regulating their choice the choice limits them to yet a few competitors in a niche. Those smart companies found a way to influence on that choice and it was the award points programs.

Hertz vs. Avis, Marriott vs. Hilton, Delta vs. Continental - just a few examples. A traveler's company may restrict him in budget or make a subset of business partners he can choose from but typically there is still a choice. The smart companies from the travel industry understood that the company will pay for tickets, car, and hotel, but it's up to the traveler to choose what particular provider to go every time.

What I found though is that not all of them are executing this idea to really differentiate and attract picky customers rather quite formally just to check a V in their program list.

An example is Hilton and Marriott require you to spend 70 and 75 nights per year to achieve the highest status in their network (diamond and platinum correspondingly). But Hilton allows you to do it in any continuous 12 month span though Marrriott only in a calendar year. A new customer choosing a network in the middle of a year will likely go to Hilton since in Marriot he has missed already half of the qualifying period.

 

There are flaws in almost every program. Hertz doesn't let you use your its miles anywhere but in North America (making collecting internal miles meaningless for international vacations). Delta doesn't let you borrow miles (as Lufthansa for instance does). United doesn't let you transfer miles from account to account that precludes from aggregating miles.

Another very obvious step each program can do (and almost none does) is to offer miles/points as a compensation means. They easily can distinguish frequent fliers/travelers from private ones and offer the former miles as a first option to compensate for any inconvenience. It doesn't make sense for problems with the Internet in a room to offer exclude it from the bill - the less bill the less point the traveler gets.

I'm saying a simple thing. If all the companies are hunting for new customers and increasing existing customer loyalty and have made a huge step for that with the miles/points programs why not to do it right and really attract new customers? Most of travelers still have options. Why not to please them with a program that does what the travelers expect from it and makes them very consistent clients?

Taking a sabbatical from bloggin...

I think it would be fair to just claim it.  Our newly born son, the MBA, my new job, a new house take together all my time. I've decided to formally take a blogging sabbatical until I get more room to write on a regular basis.

By the way, we've given birth to our fourth - Michael (מיכאל, in English pronounced Mai-kel, in Hebrew  - Mi-kha-El) was born on the 25th of September, 3.425Kg, 53cm. He's become instantaneously the focal center of the family  during days and of my wife during nights. Hadn't I taken the sabbatical I would've told you how the delivery was (much simpler than in Israel and Russia) but now it's too late:-)

Write to you in the future,
-Roman