A local hero to recall on Memorial Day

Somehow I missed this local news article about two years ago on the 72nd anniversary of D-Day.  The details of a D-Day jump with the 82nd Airborne Division (and subsequent trip back to Normandy 72 years later) is told in this Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article by Meg Jones.   Yesterday, I met the gentleman who was the subject of that piece, Mr. Ralph Ticcioni of New Berlin, Wisconsin. (Disclosure: Ralph is Uncle to one of my brothers-in-law).  

French Legion of Honour recipient, Ralph Ticcioni
John Maddente photo

As I listened to the 95 year old veteran speak about his experience, I marveled at his deep humility.  As a paratrooper that fateful day, Ralph along with thousands of his comrades were dropped behind enemy lines.  Unlike his comrades, he landed smack onto a farm rooftop in Cherbourg, France whereupon he had to cut himself loose from his own parachute which was entangled on a weather vane.  Some history readers and viewers of the movie, Saving Private Ryan will recall that Cherbourg was a location of importance during the invasion.  Speaking of the movie, Ralph told me that when he viewed the first twenty minutes of the film; he thought he was watching an actual news reel of the event.  (Many D-Day veterans have expressed a similar reaction to that segment).   

Ralph could easily recall the gear he carried that day, including the amount of ammunition and all the weapons he was issued which included a sidearm (.45 caliber semiautomatic pistol), several hand grenades and a Thompson sub-machine gun (which was swapped for an M1 Carbine rifle after paratroopers reunited with American supply units).  

So pleased to have met this man yesterday.  To all like him, living or not, God bless and thank you for defending freedom!

More than a napkin

Below is a humble cocktail napkin from a recent flight.  The inscription -- which I failed to notice at first -- has a richer significance. 

John Maddente photo

After I buckled up, a man next to me begin to banter with our flight attendant who obviously loved her work (I'll call her Laura).  Although he gave me permission to identify him for this post, I recall only his last name -- Weingarten.  Back to the flight...

Laura and Mr. Weingarten appeared to know one another rather well.  When Laura left to serve other passengers, Mr. Weingarten pointed out that both of our napkins contained this friendly, hand-written, greeting and that she had produced one for him on a previous flight.  What I learned next was my inspiration for this post.

Mr. Weingarten explained that on a previous flight, two other flight attendants took notice of Laura's gracious attitude toward her customers and criticized her napkin gesture (not knowing they were within earshot of Mr. Weingarten) because it made them look deficient. 

Shortly after Laura's colleagues finished upbraiding her, Mr. Weingarten motioned Laura to come over for a private word which he concluded with this counsel... "Don't let them crush your spirit".

The story continues.  A busy executive who travels over 150 days per year, Mr. Weingarten found a portal the airline uses to garner customer feedback.  He supplied his flight details and Laura's real name in order to extol her exemplary service and attitude. 

Airline managements take these passenger inputs quite seriously.  Laura was commended as a result.  I know not whether the other two attendants were cited in Mr. Weingarten's message, but this post is dedicated to all the Laura-types in our midst.  Don't let them crush your spirit.

Of small plates and anxious diners

Restaurants matter!  Since childhood, I’ve had an almost religious attraction to restaurants serving tasty Chinese food, Italian food, steaks, etc.  Now in my late 50s I’m speaking out against a form of dining that started to proliferate across the U.S. about 10 years ago.... a restaurant concept called, “small plates”. 

It’s not the portion size that bothers me.  OK, part of the problem is size-related, but one can obviously consume as many little bites as one wishes and leave satisfied.  Nor is the problem entirely due to flavors (I've enjoyed tapas and other tiny treats served at many small plate eateries).  The problem is the convoluted experience of the small plate "dinner".  Dinner in this case is a misnomer.  It's more like playing gastronomic chess and I don't like it.  Here's what happens at a typical small plate experience....

Small plates photo -- Wikipedia

After eyeing a group of baby plates spewed across a table that's invariably too small to accommodate them or the rest of us -- I’m drawn to some of these culinary strip teases much more than others.  Now -- how many pieces of the great stuff shall I eat?  

I want to be mindful of my fellow diners, but if I ignore the less appetizing small plate items, I'll leave hungry. I can do that or fill up on marginal stuff.  Some choice.

Wait, did she order those marinated artichokes as her dish?  OK, how many small plates shall we order for the next round?  One?  Two?  Twenty?  

Who votes for which plates to order?  You going to finish those artichokes?  Should we eat off of one another's plate?  Wait who wants dessert? 

I hear a sharp rebuke coming from the reader who is a Small Plate devotee, “Just order more small plates that you like and don't sweat the rest!”   No thank you.  I’ll go elsewhere and enjoy my own entree in simple, adult-plate-size bliss.  Who was given license to complicate something as wonderful as dining out and serve instead, an unclaimed barrage of appetizers?   

Economics 101 for the rest of us

Warren Buffet and Carl Icahn are famous investors but fewer people may know Ray Dalio.  Mr. Dalio founded an investment firm 40 years ago called Bridgewater Associates.  With $160 billion under management, Bridgewater runs one of the largest hedge funds in the world.

Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio, Bridgewater website

I recently discovered (among 3 million other people) a thirty minute YouTube video that Mr. Dalio produced to explain fundamentals of what he calls the economic machine. 

This video, which he narrates has been translated into several languages and viewed over 3,200,000 times.  The content begins slowly with basic concepts but progresses to explain the primary levers that policy-makers use to manage and stimulate the economy.  You can find it here.  

There are numerous lessons cleverly and clearly explained here.  Example: I hadn't appreciated why economists seem obsessed with Wage Growth until I watched this simple animated video.  The importance of wage growth has less to do with the oft-used and politically-charged phrase, "income inequality" and more to do with our collective ability to consume and deflate credit bubbles.

Also explained, is the concept of Credit, which Mr. Dalio asserts, "...is the most important part of the economy and probably the least understood". Other explanatory notes...

• "A beautiful deleveraging" of our massive debt and deficits is the catalyst for a soft landing we all pray for in order to avert "social disorder" and societal collapse.  
• Spending cuts are generally what people think of when they hear about "austerity" measures exercised by government, individuals and businesses to lower spending on goods and services.  
• Wealth redistribution occurs primarily through higher taxation on upper income Americans.  
• Money-printing refers to Federal Reserve purchases of government bonds and other financial assets ($2T since the Great Recession alone).

So what's the correct mix and emphasis of lever-pulling required for a soft landing?  Perhaps Mr. Dalio will address that question -- and what exactly is meant by a soft landing -- on this same platform at http://www.economicprinciples.org.

I'm hooked on BILLIONS

So little TV is worth watching IMO and that's why I was delighted to discover a SHOWTIME series called Billions. 

SHOWTIME image / Wikipedia

This series is based upon a high stakes dual between a billionaire hedge fund manager and a shrewd U.S. District Attorney.  Within a week, I devoured the entire twelve episodes from season one.  Happily, the show is coming back for a second season.

The two principal characters: U.S. Attorney, Chuck Rhoades (Paul Giamatti) and billionaire investor, Bobby Axelrod aka "Axe" (Damien Lewis), are both wickedly good.  An outstanding supporting cast includes...

Billions writers per Wikipedia

Jeffrey DeMunn (as Charles Rhoades Sr), David Costabile (as Mike Wagner), Maggie Siff (as Wendy Rhoades), Malin Akerman (as Lara Axelrod) and Glenn Fleshler (as Orrin Bach).

Due to the care and talent of the writers (see list at right >>) and a brilliant cast that brings their work to life, these characters are truly multi-dimensional. It's hard to completely love or loathe any of them, but you'll want to watch all of them.

While a certain amount of salaciousness is expected, some scenes in Billions are implausible or gratuitous.  Examples include the Chuck Rhodes' sadomasochistic sex scenes and Wendy Rhoades' willingness to slip into a bath naked with Axe to have a completely platonic business conversation (sure).  These are minor quibbles.  Watch the trailer by clicking here  >>>  or if you are pressed for time, check out this short YouTube video....

The Fed's listening session

The Fed always inspires debates among stakeholders like institutional investors, economists, politicians, financial journalists and industry leaders.

Now the Fed has received an activist group at its annual Jackson Hole symposium to hear their views on monetary policy.  This week, a movement called “Fed Up” sponsored by The Center for Popular Democracy met with Federal Reserve officials including Bill Dudley, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. 

The Fed Up team merits an A grade for inventiveness.  Such groups often petition the legislative and executive branches of government that control spending and tax policy, but now one has successfully lobbied the The Federal Reserve within spitting distance.  To be fair, the group had some trained economists in their midst and they did nothing disruptive; but do political organizations belong at this annual forum?

http://whatrecovery.org/ website 

Yes, economics and politics are inextricably linked, but Fed actions are logically debated on the long view of what’s good for the economy as a whole.  

The Fed's annual meeting shouldn't become a town hall with listening sessions like one conducted by your local Congressman.  

I haven't seen any reporting of the Fed Up attendees causing problems at Jackson Hole, but Fed officials' willingness to receive them in the first place is unsettling.  

After all, if Fed "independence" is advanced by the number of constituencies it receives in public, they must receive all comers.  Ultra low interest rates and massive bond buying by the Fed have juiced the stock market, but also crushed returns for elderly people living on payments from fixed income investments and cash.  Therefore, should the AARP or another group representing retirees have been granted equal time at Jackson Hole to advocate for monetary tightening?  

The shiny penny syndrome (updated, 12.28.2017)

This post is about business development (BD).

There's a BD ailment in the professional services markets (and other markets I suppose) which I call, "Shiny Penny Syndrome".  

Symptoms include short attention spans, misplaced time allocation and indifference to existing prospects.  The time professionals have for BD is finite and good BD takes time. What often subverts efficient use of their time, is Shiny Penny Syndrome.  It works like this...

We're all so eager to attain revenue goals, that all it takes is a simple distraction to catch our eye (i.e. a shiny penny).  The promise of a hot lead at a new prospect often retards efforts at existing prospects by shifting valuable attention and resources away from them.  Frequently, we drop everything to chase a sale at an unqualified prospect requiring a time consuming proposal with a quick turnaround.  

It's impossible to avoid that shiny coin 100% of the time, but when we pursue them habitually, we're trading higher probability conversions in our existing pipeline, for long shots.  

I'm not advocating slow starts to reasonably-qualified, time sensitive, opportunities. I'm suggesting there's an unacknowledged price to pay when professionals repeatedly turn their energies toward unqualified prospects seeking fast fee quotations, project budgets, proposals, conference calls, etc.  It all takes time.

Professionals can't totally inoculate themselves from Shiny Penny Syndrome -- it requires discipline to walk away from pursuits that appear quickly and often dramatically.  Emotions can run high on both sides of a decision to pursue or not pursue the new "opportunity".  Nobody wants to appear as though they lack aggressiveness.  So how can we reduce our exposure to unhealthy pursuits of shiny pennies?  

One method is to calculate your ROI for these pursuits (and share among market-facing peers).  Total the estimated fees coming from wins of these pursuits over a twelve month period or longer (a dollar value easy to compile because data points will be sparse).  Next, attribute a reasonable dollar value for the sum total of all the time and resources expended on shiny penny pursuits, over the same time period.  Next, divide the estimated fee value, by the total time and resource value.  That's your ROI for these moonshots.

Another method is adoption of an opportunity assessment standard.  Even a few qualification questions consistently considered, are better than nothing.  Use questions to assess unknown, proposal-anxious prospects and arrive at an informed team consensus on how (or whether) to proceed with a given pursuit.

I close with some sample questions below.*  

• Will direct contact with stakeholders and decision-makers occur before proposal issuance?  
• How many competing firms will the prospect allow into this RFP process?  
• What market reputation do we possess for this specific type of work?  
• Do any C-level executives or board members at the prospect, already know us?  
• Does the RFP process more closely resemble a commodity auction run by procurement managers, or a thoughtful vetting of individual firms by key stakeholders? 
• Why were we invited to participate?
• Why is the prospect going out to bid?
• Is there enough time to develop sufficient understanding of the prospect's business?
• Can our experience and existing relationships produce unique value and insights, or merely rates and dates in a proposal?
• To what extent can geographic proximity or reference-able clients, weigh in our favor?

*If you can't obtain answers to your questions, or several answers don't inspire confidence, consider a decision to politely request more evaluation time or decline the RFP invitation (and turn your attention to better qualified opportunities).

(image above by freepik)