October 2023
Dear Publishing Professional,
I'm just back from visiting my daughter the Captain in Hawaii, and as I adjusted to reality on the long flights back, I used the time to try to apply things I learned on the trip to the business of publishing. I hope you find it useful.
This week I have a special announcement from Creative Licensing International. There's a link at the bottom. Please take a look (after reading this letter!)
Lessons from Hawaii
Maps. When Europeans first met Polynesians, they were astonished to find them scattered across an enormous ocean, and befuddled about how they were able to traverse such distances. It's still not entirely clear how they did it. The attempts by Europeans to learn Polynesian navigation seem to have been hindered by the fact that Europeans thought of maps and locations in terms of fixed references like longitude and latitude, while Polynesians may have thought in terms of the process of getting from one island to another. Concepts like north and south may have been less useful than "with the wind" or "toward the mountain."
Lesson. There are many ways to look at the same information. Learn to conceptualize data, processes, and solutions from completely different points of view. A radical change in perspective might give you and your customers a competitive advantage.
The tyranny of the present. The Polynesians not only settled islands separated by enormous distances, but claimed to have travelled between them in the not-too-distant past. By the time they met Europeans, that art seems to have been lost, and it's hard to imagine (even today) how it could have been done with the technology they had. So … are the stories true?
Lesson. The world changes. Something that seems impossible today might have been possible under different circumstances. For example, if there were more sea turtles, whales, or migratory birds to follow.
Kids today can hardly conceive how my generation was able to meet and do things without cell phones. Keep an open mind about what's possible and what data can be applied to a problem.
Also, you never know when you might gain or lose a tool that's crucial to your business. Be prepared to make contingency plans.
Story vs. geography. It was fun to run around Oahu and then watch movies and TV shows set in the same locations (50 First Dates, Hawaii Five-O), although sometimes they got the details wrong. E.g., you can't see that island from that beach.
Lesson. It's okay to fudge details to tell a better story. We don't want to lie or misrepresent, but complete accuracy isn't always the preeminent virtue. Mark Twain didn't always use proper spelling.
Multiple working hypotheses. When a sea turtle lays its eggs in the sand, warmer sand tends to produce more female hatchlings and colder sand more males. Therefore, some marine scientist told me, if we don't address climate change all the sea turtles will die.
Lesson. The climate has changed several times in the 150 million years that sea turtles have graced our oceans. If they couldn't adapt to change, they wouldn't still be here. That's not to say we should mess with them or their habitat, but to illustrate the need to look at things from multiple points of view, and to check one set of facts against another. For example, your customer data platform may say one thing about your visitors, but your analytics may say something else. Cross check your conclusions.
By the way, this is an example of how story is more important than the details. I heard the sea turtle thing in Florida, but remembered it in Hawaii when we saw one in the wild.
Alcohol topics
Pay by the ounce. Most bars offer a 12- or 16-ounce pour of beer. Some offer "flights" of 5-ounce pours. But when the beer comes out of a tap, it's possible to charge by the ounce (with special equipment). At one bar they issued a bracelet with a chip that activated the tap and recorded how much you poured of each beer.
Lesson. Don't limit your offering based on irrelevant or out-dated factors like the size of a bottle or a glass. Also, think of all the data you can collect if you allow people to do exactly what they want to do, rather than forcing them into your prefab configuration.
Labor-saving apps. Another bar had a QR code at each table. You scanned it to order and to pay. This cut the workload of the servers, although the app didn't work that well, and I prefer talking to a person.
Lessons.
1. Is an efficiency gain from technology worth the loss of human contact?
2. Make sure your app works properly.
3. Consider how a labor-saving app will change people's price expectations.
Chocolate-wine parings. A wine bar paired local wines with local chocolates. It was somewhat astonishing how drastically the different chocolates changed the flavor of some of the wines, but in one case I disagreed with the curated pairing.
Lesson. Consider how you can bundle complementary services – especially if the pairing makes one or both of them better. But don't force a particular bundle.
Wind turbines. The North Shore of Oahu is peppered with wind turbines. Whenever I see those things I wonder if they're a good idea. We need to move off of carbon-based fuels, but that doesn't mean every non-carbon energy source is practical. The economics of energy production are far more complicated than "oil bad, wind good." But who can I trust to give me a level-headed answer? "Alternative energy" has become a partisan issue, and it's hard to know if any given report is honest analysis or propaganda.
Lesson. Adopting an ideology is a tried and true way to attract an audience, but it undermines trust.
Shark attack! Many people are afraid of sharks, but there are only a couple dozen shark attacks a year, and most are not fatal. (Not that a non-fatal attack is fun.) On the other hand, up to a thousand die from drowning -- sometimes in the bathtub!
Lesson. People are not good at judging threats. They're scared of snakes but they text while they drive. When considering things like privacy policies, security in your e-store, and what you do with people's data, consider what people actually fear rather than what they ought to fear.
Church topics
Authenticity can be overrated. It was the deacon's turn to preach the homily at mass. As someone who knows a bit about theology, I often cringe when a deacon takes the podium. But this deacon had the sense to use a preaching service, which is a sermon prepared by someone who has the time and talent to do a decent job. It was well done.
Lesson. Know when to get help. Be willing to admit that somebody else – maybe even AI – might do a better job than you can. Yes, there are benefits to authenticity. There's also a benefit in not being terrible at something.
Just sing. Catholic church music sets my teeth on edge and makes my brain hurt, so I had hoped that the contagion hadn't made it all the way to Hawaii. I was wrong.
Lesson. Sometimes an entire discipline can get infected with really bad ideas. Keep that in mind. While we should generally trust experts, there are cases where every expert (in whatever discipline) believes nonsense. Also, you shouldn’t get mad at the individual expert when the entire discipline has gone astray. They're just following their training.
"Do the easy thing first." The water dispenser in the Captain's refrigerator suddenly quit working. She had noticed someone working on a pipe elsewhere in the building, but the water in the sink worked, so that didn't seem to be the problem. I was tempted to be Mr. Fix-It, but the echo of my father's voice saved me.
Lesson. "Do the easy thing first" was one of my Dad's mantras. When something is broken, do the easy fix first, because if you do the hard fix and then find out you could have done something simple, you feel very stupid.
In this case, all we had to do was wait until the plumbing repair down the hall was finished. Fortunately, I had not disassembled the entire refrigerator in the meantime.
Along those lines, when I got home, only one monitor was working on my computer. I had the same problem earlier in the year and traced it to my graphics card. I was afraid I was going to need to replace it. Before going that route, I checked the cables. It was just a loose connection.
Operations matter. Dr. Jordan Peterson advises smart-aleck teenagers and college students to learn to clean their bedrooms before they think they can re-engineer all of modern society with their sophomoric ideas. Along similar lines, my daughter has the image at the right posted in her kitchen.
Lesson.
1. Be competent in the small things.
2. For want of a nail, … a kingdom was lost.
3. Learn how things work before you try to improve them.
4. The person who is faithful in little things will probably be faithful in big things.
Morale in paradise. Taking an assignment in Hawaii sounds like a great gig. The job may be tough, but when you step outside, you're in paradise. Who wouldn't like that?
A lot of people, actually.
Lesson. Don't assume that benefits make up for a crappy work environment. The ability to go surfing on the weekend is nice, but being heard and respected in your job, or feeling as if what you do matters, is more important to most people.
There's a lot more …
I hope you enjoyed this somewhat fanciful issue. I enjoyed writing it!
For more directly publisher-related content, remember to check out my daily podcast, "Something I Learned Yesterday." You can find it on my website, and if you don't like podcasts, just read the "Recent Articles" section, which has the same content.
Also, please connect with me on LinkedIn if you haven't already. I post my podcasts there as well.
Sincerely,
Greg Krehbiel
P.S. – Call me if you have any questions about something in this letter, if you need help with your business, or if you want to sponsor my next vacation!
P.P.S. -- This week I have a special announcement from Creative Licensing International. Please take a look at their brochure, or sign up here.