#14 Efficient-SEE, or Efficient-DO?

"I don't know if I'm allowed to say this, but he's kind of an A-hole."

Wow. Okay, I thought.  But, "tell me more," is how I replied. 

I was doing a 360° review for a COO client.  At this point, he was one of the better operators I'd gotten to work with up close.

I really liked him and admired his style. So this was surprising to hear from his direct report, the Head of Product.

"What in particular makes you say that?" I probed.

"I don't know, it's just like his style, or everything, or just something." She said.

I was not making progress.

"Is it that his projects or processes are biased?" I asked. "Or self-serving? Are there trust issues? Do you worry about the team? Has he said something personal?" 

“No, none of that. He's a great operator and leader–one of the best I've ever worked for actually."

Okay, phew. At least I didn't read that part wrong.  We kept going, as I worked her towards more specific detail, and guess what I learned:

He uses the thumbs-up emoji for text replies, and his emails are really short.

The answer was suddenly obvious. What are all of the best operators obsessed with?

Efficiency. 

I also knew my client wouldn't care. I knew he would say–and he did say–that he has no interest in wasting words and prefers "efficient communication."

I've heard this phrase (usually as a value or excuse or both) far too often in the last 20 years from people who are just way too smart to be saying something so silly. 

Silly?? Hear me out.

To most of us, the word "efficient" has come to mean fast, or short. Or simple. 

Less is more, right? Not quite.

For the engineers among us, and scientists, mathematicians, or anyone who fully remembers the ninth grade: efficiency is an equation. 

It's math. Specifically, efficiency is output divided by input.  

That means “efficient” isn’t a real adjective, it’s a comparison. There’s no such thing as efficient communication.

Instead, in reality, things have a specific efficiency. Everything does, all around you.

Your furnace has a specific efficiency. If it’s over 90%, the law requires your vent pipes to be stainless (because lower exhaust temp = corrosive condensation). Yet 89 is just fine. And if your furnace’s efficiency is under 78, then you bought it on the black market.

Your communication is no different. It will only ever have a specific efficiency.

Communication efficiency = output (what happens), divided by input (what you said to make it happen).

Let me put it this way.  In the equation of efficiency, the denominator is you saying something. And the numerator is what makes you money. 

As I've overheard one certain successful C-something say, "fools focus on denominators."

I slightly disagree since reducing waste is critical to scale, and lowering your word count is important. But in almost all cases of the thousands (upon thousands) I've ever seen in my entire career: high efficiency communication will require you to ADD WORDS you think are unnecessary.

Soooo….which ones??

If I had to quit this newsletter right now, quit my whole job, shut down the company, and leave you stranded with only 1 piece of advice to completely replace me, it's this:

Repeat yourself. 

Repeat stuff all the time. Say it five different ways, and then try ten. Repeat, repeat, repeat. 

I like it so much I printed it on my pencils. 

But you know who hates repetition? Business people thinking about their input.  Not output. Denominator people.

(a lot of smart people also hate repetition because they get tired of their own voice, but that’s a future issue of this letter)

I've even met business people who believe in this thing called “MECE,” pronounced “Me See,” like the Harvard MBA's version of this classic. 

MECE stands for “mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive.” It’s a beautiful concept for biologists naming butterflies, but it’s PURE RISK in your computer code, catalogues, or communication.

Redundancies and backups get damaged planes to the ground and good rockets into space.

Repeat yourself. All the time.

Does your company have a mission statement? See if you can repeat it, naturally, in every email you send your team for a year. Great leaders do this masterfully, some by instinct and some by intent.

You'll be amazed at the results—the output. The actions, beliefs, and commitments you inspire.  So repeat yourself.

All the other advice on increasing your efficiency is where this gets hard.

Good stories have lots of stuff in them that they aren't "about." Great communicators have an instinct for what. (It may sadly be my only marketable skill.)

The rest of us just get better at it as we go. How?

By paying closer attention to what we want to happen than what we want to say. 

In the case of our Product Head above? It's a brutal epilogue. 

Not long after our call, she quit. Replacing her was easily an $800K problem, between head hunters, HR, and each of their special types of inefficiency.  

Then, after only a few more years, the problem went from $800K to existential. 

Enough time innovating in the wrong direction, combined with the expiration of our unnamed defector's noncompete, and….Abracadabra! [Jesse waves magic wand], Presto!! That magic trick is called the disappearing numerator. 

For the less-mathy, remember zero divided by anything is zero. 

And all that from one fast-movin' fella who couldn't be bothered to ask his team about their weekend, or tell them two extra sentences about why he said something.  

There’s no need for a formula here, just spend a little extra time on your audience.

This is always a balance. And lord knows I can be wordy. But it would really be an A-hole move to just leave you hanging.

So tell them why you think something. Repeat what they said to make them feel heard. Bake someone cookies if you have to. It’s one fucking cookie, but they might taste it for months.

And repeat yo self,

Jesse

PS: Did anyone get some time this holiday to play with AI?? I've been working on a bot(s) that can clean my hot tub. Except it’s not for me, it’s for our hot tub company who clearly can't figure it out. 

I doubt I'll succeed at this, but it’s really fun trying to build software with entirely AI teams to support, sell, and scale it. All with no real coding experience. That is our future, which excites me.

And I’ll keep you updated on my progress. I do think we’re at the coolest inflection point in my 20 years in tech. PLUS, is there anything on earth that can make you feel younger and happier than learning??

-J

PSS: Or, do you hate thinking about AGI deploying an army of bots who make your entire net worth, money itself, and physical security obsolete?? Well it’s also nice to just brick your phone and make bread.

I have just a few of these left, and I’ve transitioned my woodworking time (aka meditation) from making those to making Emily a beautiful table out of our wedding tree, and now restoring a wooden boat as winter rolls on. If you’d like a float in that boat this Spring, come fly fish in Idaho.

PSSS: Please send this to your friend who’s too damned efficient.