The meat of the Business Case is the “Summary of Financial Impacts” section where I get to use such interesting concepts as Net Present Value, IRR, and Payback Method. Needless to say, in this economy, executives definitely focus on the six, seven, or eight figure financial impact when prioritizing a project. This of course means that projects that are directly tied to revenue streams or straight-forward cost cuts are pretty cut and dry. The issue I am running into is how do I put a financial value on an avoided risk.?

So lets say its been estimated that there is a 1% chance that if my company does not do a project, then the company could lose a million dollars. So one solution I read was to simply multiply the probability by the amount, and therefore place a annual benefit of $10,000. Another solution was to create multiple scenarios where the benefits could range from 0 to $1 Million with$10K being called the median scenario.

I am currently leaning towards running three different scenarios where in the perfect world, a project would only have X benefit. In a normal world, the project has an X+$10K benefit and in a high risk world the project would have a X +  $1Million benefit. What do you guys think?

So CNN had an article a few days ago about the concept that there is a certain class distinction between the folks who use Facebook and Myspace.  I thought the article was pretty interesting yet a little inaccurate. Two years ago, I think the article would have been accurate. In my own personal life, all of the people I went to college and worked with were on Facebook, and the people I knew from parties, bars, and places like there could only be found on MySpace.  Now, I don’t think thats necessarily true. I think everyone has been willing to trade in the custom backgrounds and annoying profile music for a stable social network that is extremely usable and whose settings on things like privacy, photos, and apps are pretty simple to figure out.

Let’s be honest, I logged into my old Myspace on 2 consecutive days. There were a total of three status updates from my friends over a span of 24 hours. Two of them were really twitter updates, so in reality, of my 120 friends on Myspace, only one of them actually updated their Myspace status. I suspect Myspace will join the exclusive company of Webvan, Geocities, Angelfire, and Lycos very soon.

I had a buddy who said he received some of the “best” career advice when he was younger. That advice was “In meetings, always have something to say no matter what. People will think you are smart if you say something“.  Granted I don’t know if you co-workers will think you are smart, but they will defintely have an opinion of you.

Perhaps the worst advice I was ever given was as a college kid I worked at a national retailer over the summer and christmas breaks trying to make some extra money. I guess I was decent at customer service and found a way not alienate our customers so he felt that I had some potential. Anyways so one day a manager comes up to me and says, “Have you thought about quitting school and working here full time? After a year, maybe I can get you into the management training program, and then after a few years, you can be making the big bucks like me“.

Needless to say I didn’t take him up on the offer, especially if you knew what his version of “big bucks” was.

Fear the OWL

The question made me think a bit. While my boss had already told me that no raise in salary will come as a result of the MBA, I do feel that I did get a little raise in self confidence in the workplace. Granted I am making sure I am not being the annoying “I got an MBA so I know it all” guy like Ryan on The Office, but I do feel more confident in trying to find value in the projects that I am working on for the business as a whole.  Of course confidence does not have an intrinsic value, but it does translate into making a bigger contribution to the success of the company, which can lead to salary raises and/or promotions.

Of course as I mentioned before, I am making a concerted effort not be one of the “annoying MBA types” that we run into often in the Product Management / Online Marketing world. Here in Atlanta, these are the grads who feel as if the world is owed to them since they have a graduate degree.  I have worked with and for plenty of individuals with MBA’s and Masters in Marketing who were pretty much idiots and/or frauds.

Then again, if a company is willing to offer me six figures, a corner office, and an executive assistant…

I think the same thing can be said about relationships as well.  When I was younger, I would blame many of my actions or attitudes on various bad experiences I had in the past. When in reality, my actions, attitudes, and emotions were really only owned and controlled by me.  Sure previous stimulii can influence future behavior, but in reality, the actual control of oneself is what makes us alive right? The concept of Free Will seems to be part of American Culture that is ingrained in almost every marketing message on television. (i.e Just Do It)

I guess in some way, Popular Culture has convinced us that we ourselves are not to blame for our own shortcomings. Parents, Neighborhoods, Status, and Ex- Boyfriends / Girlfriends/Spouses are to blame for us being unhappy, or unable to think positve thoughts or maintain positive relationships. Don’t get me wrong, I understand the concept of chemical inbalances, behavior disorders, etc, but at some point, when we think about who is responsible for the direction that we are going in life, or how we have reacted to our previous mistakes or misfortunes, I think the only being that can be found is the one in the mirror.

Surely I can kick your ass because I am a fan of Chuck Liddell

So after my company softball team went on a hitting spree and scored 25 runs on the other team (ignore the fact the other team scored 21), we decided to have a post-game Margarita at a popular Mexican place here in Atlanta called El Azteca.  While we were enjoying our win, we noticed two guys ages 21 to 29, face to face, in a heated conversation with each other. While we were secretly hoping that those two tools would start swinging, we couldn’t help to notice the nice and shiny graphic tees both were wearing. We also had a good chuckle when one of them said something to the effect “Well I would just tap out”.  Since when do bar fights have referees?

So I found the Graphic Tee Fan Club on Facebook and a game that you should play everytime you see a graphic tee…

1) Determine % of shirt covered in graphics. This decimal value is your ‘graphic’ modifier. 

For instance, a value of .01 would be for your typical plain t-shirt with perhaps the logo of the clothing company on it. This shirt is very loosely qualified as a graphic tee and as such, not eligible for consideration as an ultimate graphic tee. 

A value of 1.00 would signify a t-shirt completely covered in graphics (this however, is not physically possible in this reality, for if it did, our universe would collapse in on itself and we would cease to exist)

2) Skulls: Add up the number of skulls present on the graphic tee. 0-5 skulls scores 1 point, 6-10 skulls scores 2 points, 11-15 skulls scores 4 points, and more than 16 skulls scores a whopping 8 points (unheard of!).

3) Animals: If there is a bird present, score the following for each bird: 1 points for a raven/crow, 2 points for an eagle, 3 points for a mythical bird, for example a griffin or phoenix. If it is a mammal, score the following for each: 1 point for a dog, 2 points for a horse/bull/bear, 5 points for a skeleton dog/horse/bull/bear.

4) UFC: Subtract 5 points for any UFC fighter’s name present on the shirt. Drinking a 12-pack and wrestling in your living room with your buddies after UFC 91 doesn’t make you Randy Couture, it just makes you gay.

5) Biblical: Add 2 points for the Grim Reaper or any other devils. Subtract 2 points for any angels…unless they are badass angels.

6) Rivets: If the tee has metal rivets on it, you get two bonus points + a free high-five

7) Reflective Lettering/Graphics: If any part of the graphic tee has shiny lettering and/or graphics, subtract 1 point, unless you wear your graphic tee while jogging at night and need it for safety sake.

In summary:
(Skull + Animal- UFC penalty + Biblical + Rivet Bonus – Reflective Penalty) X Graphic Modifier = AWESOME GRAPHIC TEE SCORE

(Let it be known I go to Chik-Fil-A because of its better tasting food and superior customer service)

Eat Mor Chikin

Yesterday, a co-worker of mine was kind enough to point out that my requirement of “the system shall display a Modal Window” was totally incorrect because I was butchering the true meaning of the word. So needless to say I did what most people would do…I went to Wikipedia…

Modal Window – “a modal window is a child window that requires the user to interact with it before they can return to operating the parent application, thus preventing the workflow on the application main window.”

Pop-Up – A context menu (also called contextual, shortcut, and popup or pop-up menu) is a menu in a graphical user interface (GUI) that appears upon user interaction, such as a right mouse click. A context menu offers a limited set of choices that are available in the current state, or context, of the operating system or application.