Hello & welcome to the latest issue of the ABEO e-newsletter! In this edition, you will find:

- You don't know what you don't know

- Tips for writing better business requirements to avoid rework

- Introduction to a new service

- How we helped one client kick off a project by eliminating barriers & preventing costly delays  

Thanks for reading! Remember - if you don't understand the requirements, any solution will do!

Karen McIsaac,  

President & Managing Director   

The Four Stages of Learning

Sometimes we just don't know what we don't know. In business, this can be costly in terms of not doing the right things, missing out on opportunities or simply consuming time trying to persuade people to change or take action.

Here is a "we don't know what we don't know" analogy that we can all relate to - learning to drive.

Stage 1 - You see your soon-to-be 16 year-old teenager looking at your car, thinking, "No more walking, no more rides from mom and dad - I'll be free!"  At this point in time they don't know that they don't know how to drive. They are at Stage 1 in the four stages of learning. They are Unconsciously Incompetent.

Stage 2 - Your teen reaches driving age, it's the morning of their birthday, they get in the car, they can't get the engine going, they are badly coordinated, they stall the engine - at this point they get a wake up call - now they know, they don't know how to drive. They are Consciously Incompetent.

Stage 3 - Now your teen takes drivers' education passes the test and, although lacking experience, the teenager knows they know how to drive. They have reached Conscious Competence.

Stage 4 - Have you ever got to the office in the morning, sat at your desk and suddenly thought, "Gee, I don't even remember which way I came into work or if I ran any red lights."  At Stage 4, you don't know, that you know, how to drive.  You are on auto-pilot, driving is second nature, almost instinct. You are Unconsciously Competent.

So what has this analogy got to do with business? Well, you try telling a teenager, that he/she does not know how to drive - your message is falling on deaf ears, try and tell an experienced driver who has never even had a parking ticket, they could be a better driver - deaf ears again.

At Stage 1 and Stage 4, human nature makes people unwilling to be receptive - they don't see the need to listen, to be open-minded, to consider changing or doing something different - how can they, if they don't know that they don't know?

Sometimes when we are trying to drive change or new ideas within our organization, we take it for granted that our peers and subordinates are onboard when they aren't. Often the first stage of driving any major change is to move people from Stage 1 to Stage 2 or from Stage 4 back to Stage 3 because its only when people are either Consciously Incompetent or Consciously Competent that they are truly receptive and listening.

Ian Farmer is a supporting partner of The ABEO Group. He has over 30 years international sales, business development and general management experience providing sales effectiveness, sales transformation and go to market expertise to organizations large or small, local or global. He can be reached at ifarmer@theABEOgroup.com.

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Addressing our client's challenges - a new service  

Now that the economy isn't quite so volatile and we're all regaining some confidence, we are willing to bet you're thinking about implementing some type of change within your organization. You may be asking:   

- What do we do first?   

- We want to ensure that we solve our problems, not automate them - where do we start? - What is the real business problem we're trying to solve?   

- Does my team have the skill-set required to implement this change?

Working with our clients, old and new, we researched the early stages of REALLY successful projects. We found that we addressed the above questions much quicker when we had a structured, systematic project discovery phase.  

We have now formalized how we assess and kick off projects with the ABEO Discovery Workshop to ensure our client's success.  Click here for more information.