Category: General news

 

Author: Cam Wayland – Channel Dynamics

In 1906, Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto created a mathematical formula to describe the unequal distribution of wealth in his country. He had observed that 80 percent of the property in Italy was owned by 20 percent of the people. It was Quality Management Pioneer Dr Joseph Juran however who suggested the principle within his field and then made the assumption that it could be applied to broader concepts. His theory was that 80 percent of the results of any situation are due to 20 percent of the contributors.

This idea is often applied today to data such as sales figures i.e. 80 percent of the sales results come from 20 percent of the clients. Given Juran’s broader application and development of the 80/20 rule it is argued that Pareto’s Principle has actually been inaccurately attributed to Pareto rather than Juran. Despite the possible misnaming of this rule, Pareto’s Principle can be a very effective tool to help you manage yourself and the channel effectively.

What It Means

The 80/20 Rule means that in anything a few (20 percent) are vital and many (80 percent) are trivial. In Pareto’s case, it meant 20 percent of the people owned 80 percent of the wealth. In Juran’s initial work, he identified 20 percent of the defects causing 80 percent of the problems.

Project Managers know that 20 percent of the work (the first 10 percent and the last 10 percent) consumes 80 percent of your time and resources. You can apply the 80/20 Rule to almost anything, from the science of management to the physical world

Within the context of a channel program, you can look at the channel partners who are generating the majority of the sales results and you will find that the same principle applies. That is, twenty percent of your partners will be generating 80 percent of your sales results. The challenge is how you manage your portfolio of partners to ensure you “don’t have all of your eggs in one basket”. You need to ensure you decrease your risk, while still having the time to manage your internal and program resources wisely across the most appropriate partners.

Here is what people forget about with regards to the Pareto Principle. You know 80 percent of your channel sales will come from 20 percent of your channel partners. However, 20 percent of your channel partners will also cause 80 percent of your problems. The principle works both ways.

How It Can Help You

The value of the Pareto Principle for a channel manager is that it reminds you to focus your resources on the 20 percent of the channel partners that really matter. That is those 20 percent that can or should produce 80 percent of your results. Identify and focus on these partners. If something in your schedule or program has to slip, if something isn’t going to get done, make sure it’s not going to affect the focused 20 percent.

With that said, focusing entirely on your top 20% of partners is not practical in the real world. The business environment and circumstances change over time and you should not overlook those partners that have the potential to be in your top 20%. By also working with these partners the result will be that you will have a larger number of partners making up your top 20%, as your partner base as a whole grows and becomes more diverse. Doing this will therefore eliminate some of the risk of just strictly sticking to the Pareto Principle concept.

Helping a partner with potential become a significant contributor is a better use of your time and resources than helping an already great one become slightly more productive and terrific. Apply the Pareto Principle to how you manage the channel, but use it wisely. Don’t just “work smart”, work smart on the right things with the right partners and you will get the results you are looking for.

Best Practice Channel Management Ideas Using the Pareto Principle

1. Define what the characteristics (beyond revenue) of the top 20% should be i.e. What makes a key account, is it the most profitable, key location, the largest, most potential, etc.
2. Review your partner’s results and rank them monthly. Know who the top 20% are and who the remaining 80% are. Make sure you know why they are the top (or focus) 20% and re-prioritise quarterly at a minimum.
3. Ensure you are measuring all of the required information to get the full picture, not just the good news or sales results.
4. Ensure you are not only focusing on the existing top 20%. Implement KPI’s as part of any incentive scheme to help groom those partners with potential to move into the top 20%.
5. Align your channel support programs in the same manner. 80% of your resources should focus on 20% of the channel in order to provide more “bang for your buck”.
6. Implement a quarterly review mechanism to professionally remove those partners that are not supporting you and have no further potential to move into the top 20%. If this is not done you will not have the required resources to grow your channel profitably.

 

The 80/20 rule is both useful and diverse, and particularly applicable to channel partner management. Using it wisely as outlined above will enable you to focus and assign your channel resources appropriately in order to yield the best sales results for your company. The principle can also be used to reduce your business risk through continually growing and developing partners that could be in your top 20%. Business environments are dynamic and reviews of partner’s direction and performance should always be ongoing.

Church is about God isn’t’ it?

Or so I thought until a few weeks ago when I first attended the Brisbane Sunday Assembly.

I’d read a little of Alain De Botton’s 2013 book “Religion for Atheists: A Non-believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion”, but still wondered what a god-free ‘church’ would be like, and why you would want one in the first place.

I put these questions to Anne Reid, who I had met when she was the Secular Party candidate in Griffith in the 2013 election, and she invited me along to the Brisbane Sunday Assembly to see for myself.

So, on a wet Sunday on April 13 I joined Anne and a small enthusiastic group in Ashgrove. I felt a bit like an intruder, especially as I was planning to write this story, but after warm greetings at the door, I immediately felt welcome.

Anyone stumbling into a meeting of the Sunday Assembly for the first time could be forgiven for thinking they were in a church.

The meeting commenced with music provided by a live band (clapping and singing along), followed by a reading, a key speaker, then a word of testimony, more singing, and some silent contemplation. The group meets in a school hall but so do a lot of religious groups these days.

This structure was familiar to me from my past life in a Protestant community church. The similarities stop however with the outwards trappings. The songs were not hymns: on the day I attended, songs included Cat Stevens’ ‘Peace Train’ and John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’. The reading was not from the Bible: it was a poem titled, “A Square Deal” by iconic Australian, CJ Dennis. The key speaker was not a minister or priest, but a professor of quantum physics (and the custodian of the world famous Pitch Drop Experiment) at the University of Queensland. Professor Andrew White did not present us with a sermon or a homily; instead he gave an amusing and accessible overview of an aspect of his work.

This was certainly not church as I had known it.

In the final segment of the meeting, Chrissy Dunaway, one of the founders of Brisbane’s Sunday Assembly, explained why, as an atheist, the concept and practice of Sunday Assembly is important to her. Brought up in the Mormon Church in the United States she came to a point where she could no longer accept the religious dogma and she left. Her mother, she said, characterised her life after Mormonism is a being like “a ship without a rudder” and that, she said, was a fair description of how she had felt. Ms Dunaway said that what she had been looking for was a philosophy and a supportive community; the very things that she had lost when she had left the church.

The concept for Sunday Assembly began just one year ago with UK comedians, Sanderson Jones and Pippa Evans. They say on their website that, “they wanted to do something that had all the best bits of church, but without the religion, and awesome pop songs.” In the short time that has followed, Sunday Assembly groups have been established in a number of UK and US cities, as well as in all mainland Australian capital cities. The Brisbane Assembly attracted over 200 people to its first meeting and around 100 people routinely attend its monthly meetings.

Grant Richards, well known in Brisbane as “Grant the polite guy”, told me that he first encountered Sunday Assembly as an invited speaker. Once homeless himself, Grant is the founder of Signal Flare which runs barbecues and raises funds for the homeless. Sunday Assembly and Signal Flare have since developed an ongoing relationship, with Sunday Assembly helping at barbecues and providing clothes and toiletries and other essentials for homeless people living in and around Brisbane and Ipswich.

When I asked Grant if he is happy with the non-theist basis of Sunday Assembly, he said, “I love the community spirit here, and the three point philosophy: ‘live better, help often, and wonder more’.” Adding, “It is awesome, it’s the community coming together to celebrate life”.

Commenting on the Assembly’s work with Signal Flare, Ms Reid said that some people think that charity is the province of the churches, “but I have been openly atheist for some time and I have been involved in a lot of charity work”. “In that [charity] scene”, she said, “the question is always about what church you belong to. The assumption being that only the religious do charity work. I would very much like to change that perception”.

Ms Reid considers that in the future Sunday Assembly could provide a base for the many overseas students she meets. Such students, she said, are often in need of a community in Australia and they are frequently drawn to the churches for support. She thinks that it could be important to have non-religious organisations available to these students to help them navigate the basics of living in a foreign country without the associated belief system.

Both Ms Reid and Brisbane Sunday Assembly President Cameron Reilly said that criticism of Sunday Assembly has mostly come from other atheist organisations which consider it is too similar to a church. Ms Reid said this was a pity because, “atheists come in all ‘makes and models’ and all outlets of atheist expression should be encouraged.”

Mr Reilly said, “We really do like people, and we like community, and we want to help other people. This criticism that atheists should not get together as a community, just doesn’t make a lot of sense to me”. He added that the structure of the meetings is intentionally similar to a church service, “we deliberately take what we think are the best parts of religion, because it works. What a lot of people are looking for is community and that sense of knowing your neighbours, and having a group of people you care about, that care about you…that you share some common interests with”. “The thing with Atheism” he said, “is that it tends to be a solitary thing. You may be part of a music group, or a sports group, but nothing that really talks about how you live your life, about how you support one another in times of need; what your philosophy is. I think there are a lot of us that are yearning for something like that.”

De Botton says much the same thing about ‘Religion for Atheists’: “For too long non-believers have faced a stark choice between either swallowing lots of peculiar doctrines or doing away with a range of consoling and beautiful rituals and ideas”.

I asked Mr Reilly whether Sunday Assembly will create its own rituals to mark life events, such as births, marriages and deaths. He said that he and his partner have a baby due in 3-4 weeks, and they have been talking about how Sunday Assembly will welcome this new life. “Those sorts of rituals are an important part of the human experience, and an important part of being a community: celebrating and supporting people through major life events”.

Sunday Assembly meets each month. For more information on their meeting times and events, see the Sunday Assembly website or look them up on Facebook.

For Signal Flare’s next event see their Facebook site.

I’d like to thank Jo Stevens for providing the images that accompanying this story.

The last two years have been the hottest in our history, according to the Australian Climate Council.

The Climate Council report finds the last 24 months are shaping up to be the hottest in Australia’s recorded history, further evidence that climate change is already influencing our weather.

“We have just had an abnormally warm autumn, off the back of another very hot ‘angry summer’,” says Climate Councillor Professor Will Steffen.

“The past two-year period has delivered the hottest average temperature we have ever recorded in Australia.”

“Climate change is here, it’s happening, and Australians are already feeling its impact,” says Steffen.

The findings are contained in the Climate Council’s latest seasonal analysis report, Abnormal Autumn, released by Professor Steffen on Monday 2^nd June.

The report outlines weather records, including the recent “warm wave” in May, and says it is likely the country will experience an El Niño event in the second half of the year, with the potential to exacerbate the climate-change driven warming trend.

“El Niño events usually make life tougher in rural Australia, often triggering drought, water restrictions, extreme heat and increased bushfire risk. When it comes on top of two years of climate change-related record warmth, you have to be concerned,” says Steffen.

The Climate Council’s report highlights the records that were broken in May 2014.

Sydney had 19 consecutive days of 22 °C or above from 10 to 28 May. That is 10 days longer than the previous record.

Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide also broke records for number of consecutive days of 20 °C or above.  Sydney had 28 days, Melbourne 13 days and Adelaide 16 days.

I often experience serious grievous reasons to doubt what I am going to say, but let me tell you what I secretly really believe.

My mate, Mike Riddell, says that ‘everything alive is moving, even that which appears to stand still. Call it evolution if you will. Call it creation if you prefer. The engine that drives the universe forward is not natural selection but the dreaming of God. God’s dreams pervade the world as a song haunts your mind; summoning, luring, calling. Where they find resonance, there is movement. God calls the tune; some of us dance. This waltz between God and the world is the source of all that is, and more importantly, what is yet to be.’[i]

Mike, as he does, goes on. He says ‘the word that defines God, which carries through when all the others have stumbled and fallen, is “love”. Love is God’s essence’. Love is who God is and what God does. Mike concedes ‘the word itself is, of course, sloppy. Teenagers are convinced the rush of hormones flooding their bodies is “love”. The mindbenders have used it to sell chocolate and perfume. Love has been trivialised – like Bach played on a kazoo. Never-theless’, he insists ‘genuine love exists. The river of love between two people is at its deepest point an intimation of the heart of God. (And) the heart of God has gone out from itself to envelope the universe. Love is the source of its exi-stence, love the energy streaming through it, love the end to which it moves’. On a roll Mike cries ‘God is the one who dreamed you into being, danced with joy at your birth,(and) tracked you down the backstreets of your life, whisper-ing to you in the night, calling you (back to your self) from the darkness.’ [ii]

Author, James Olthuis, reaffirms the fact that ’love is the basic design plan for the universe. God’s love is the source of all that is. Because God is love, and human beings are made in God’s image, love is who we are. Love is not first and foremost something we do. It is who we are. Love is the essence of being human. To live is to let love well up and stream through us as the pulse of our lives, connecting us to ourselves, our neighbours, the whole family of earth’s creatures, and God, the alpha and omega of love. To love is to be seeking, fostering and sustaining connections with that which is different and other –  without domination, absorption or fusion – in delight, in care, in compassion.’ [iii]

We are like fish, in a Sufi story, who anxiously swim around looking for water – till they realise they are swimming in it. Once we realise that we are immersed in ‘the river of God’s providential love,’ we can learn to ‘float in it’. To ‘float’ we don’t have to do anything but ‘let go’. ‘Floating is putting our full weight on the water trusting that we will always be supported.’ The confidence we need to have in order to let go  – and float in the river of God’s love – comes from let-ting God’s love wash over us’ and ‘from soaking in the assurances of that love’ which come our way every day – ‘not from trying to believe them’. [iv]

In the Abrahamic traditions faith involves ‘deep trust in the watchful love of God for all God’s children. According to the prophet Isaiah, even in the midst of the most terrible circumstances, those whose hearts are centred in God’s faithful care “shall renew their strength, they shall mount up on wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint”.’ [v]

David Benner reminds us that ‘while human love can never bear the weight of our need for divine love, it can teach us about divine love. Human love can communicate divine love. Experiences of human love make the idea of God’s love believable. The relative constancy of the love of family and friends makes the absolute faithfulness of divine love at least conceivable.’ However, Benner  repeats, again and again, there is ‘no substitute for learning what love really is by coming back to the source. God’s love is the original that shows up the lim-itations of all copies. Only God’s love is capable of making us into great lovers  [vi]

Wayne Muller says ‘it is not the fact of being loved that is life changing. It is the experience of allowing (ourselves) to be loved’. [vii]This experiential knowing of ourselves, as deeply loved by God, deepens our thoughts with new data about our world, and deepens our feelings with new attitudes to-wards our world. In the light of our knowledge of God’s love we know we can trust God, take risks and embrace the world that we live in courageously.

God’s love connects us to all of God’s creation and all of God’s creatures. It moves us ‘from the isolation of self-interest to a connection with life that can-not allow any ultimate divisions. It does not allow (us) to limit (our) interest to those within (our) tribe – whether those tribal boundaries are understood in religious, ethnic or national terms’. Instead it involves us in a ‘movement bey-ond the hardened boundaries of the isolated self to the selves-in-relationship that make up community’ leading to ‘a sense of (our) oneness with all’ life.[viii]

Archbishop Desmond Tutu says, ‘God’s dream is that all of us will realize we are family – we are made for togetherness. In God’s family, there are no outsiders. Black and white, rich and poor, gay and straight, Jew and Arab, Muslim and Christian, Hindu and Buddhist – all belong’. Now, more than ever, we need to remember that ‘God’s love is too great to be confined to any one side of a conflict or to any one religion. People are shocked when I say that George Bush and Saddam Hussein are brothers – but God says, “All are my children.” It is shocking. But it is true.’[ix]

And this is what I believe.

[i] Michael Riddell Godzone Lion Oxford 1992 p30

[ii] Michael Riddell Godzone p23-4

[iii] James Olthuis The Beautiful Risk Grand Rapids Zondervan 2001

[iv] David Benner Surrender to Love 61-63,79

[v] Wayne Muller Legacy Of The Heart p27 (Isaiah 40:13)

[vi] David Benner Surrender to Love p84-5

[vii] Wayne Muller Legacy Of The Heart p27

[viii] David Benner Surrender to Love p93-4

[ix]Desmond Tutu Desmond Tutu’s Recipe For Peace www.beliefnet.com 2004

The remains of a stone staircase in Orleigh Park becomes a sacred site every year as the local community gathers to honour Sorry Day in West End, Brisbane.

The old concrete stairway is all that remains of the Cranbrook Aboriginal Girls’ Home.

In the late 19th century the Aboriginal girls home was established at Cranbrook at what is now Orleigh Park on the banks of the Brisbane River. It was closed in 1906 after continuous complaints from inmates and public concerns about the living conditions and the treatment of the girls. Girls that were taken from their families were treated the same as orphans and runaways, and experienced incredibly awful and harsh conditions, and severe discipline.

Even a welcoming shower of rain couldn’t dampen the spirits of regular and new guests to this annual commemoration.

The flags were flown at half mast in memory of the late Aunty Doris Pilkington Garimara, author of Rabbit-Proof Fence, who passed away recently.

St Mary’s in Exile was created when priests Peter Kennedy and Terry Fitzpatrick walked out of the St Mary’s Catholic Church in West End and down the road to the Trades and Labour Council Building with almost the entire St Marys Community.

They set up a community built around the mission statement – St. Mary’s in Exile is a community of diverse people who come together in the light of the Christian mystery to act justly and give priority to the marginalised in our society.

I asked Terry Fitzpatrick how he sees faith intersecting with social responsibility.

“It’s at our very core. Even the literal reading of the Christian narrative is a story about the protection of the poor against the excesses of authority. Christ was murdered because he worked with prostitutes, tax collectors and fishermen and stood with them challenging authorities that would oppress them.”

I asked him about the difference between the Catholic Church of the Inquisition, the crusades, Papal Infallibility and oppression of women, all of which appear to be at odds with this view.

“Emperor Constantine was looking for a religion that would bind the people to his cause, that would reduce the cost of subjugating his people and inspiring his soldiers and Christianity ticked many of the boxes. His advisers cobbled together a grab bag of religion’s greatest hits. The story of the Virgin Birth, Three wise men following a bright star to a divine child, the resurrection, and many other Biblical stories all came from other religions.”

We discussed the fact that the political structure of the church – the pontiff, the election process, came from classical Rome. His view that the official church does not represent or live the core of the Christian message explains why St Mary’s is in exile.

Terry describes how the ancient religious scholars were writing at three levels, the literal, the metaphoric and the spiritual. “We take the literal story, as a literary narrative, a container used to express the metaphoric and spiritual message.”

“We maintain the form of the church because that is where we have come from and what works for majority of the community. The fundamental message though, is the same as that coming from many other faith based and secular groups. The message is ‘Awake, sleeper. Let Christ’s all-embracing universal consciousness prevail.” All is one.

He believes that the message goes well beyond social responsibility and the need to protect the less well off from the ravages of the rich and powerful.

“At our core is a stillness, a deep connectedness. This is true at a spiritual and a scientific level.”

He quotes Thomas Berry, patron saint of the Deep Ecologists. “My small self is my large self.”

Terry sees our task in this century to move beyond a dualistic, mechanistic view of the world where we alienate resources for consumption to a holistic, integrated view that revitalises and replenishes the whole.

Nature Reserve and the impact of the Galilee Basin coal mines, through to guerilla gardening. members of the congregation regularly talk about seed sharing and living simply to reduce their footprint.

Social responsibility goes much further than simply caring for fellow humans.

“The task of the individual is to recognise that it is all divine”