Mailing Systems Technology - January/February 2009 - (Page 31)

awareness fosters an understanding that you know you are making a choice every time you perform this action. You are choosing what you value more: the payoff or the trade-off! Going forward, each time your operation continues with whatever the bad habit is now, there is a choice to be made. The organization has to actively choose. Which do you value more? Do you value more the status quo of interdepartmental squabbling supported by the print delivery gamesmanship, or do you value organizational optimization and high productivity? Do you value longer breaks and less challenging shifts or providing best-in-class, highintegrity communication delivery services? packages, the operations may decide to add sequence control numbers visible in the address window and barcodes, tools that are used on more accountable transactional customer communications. The new habit that you substitute isn’t as important as whether you and the operation feel better about the choices made. After all, the reason it’s considered a bad habit is because it leaves a bad feeling. Your Time to Decide By now, the realization that the only way for your organization to continue with its bad habits indeﬁnitely is to sink back into denial of why they occur in the ﬁrst place. Each time the operation reverts to old patterns, the thought will pass through your mind that organizationally we are trading X for Y each time that action is performed. Operationally, you will be forced to make a choice, about continuing those habits, either good or bad. What choices will you make? The one that makes you feel bad about yourself or the one that makes you feel good? Kemal Carr is the President of Madison Advisors, an advisory ﬁrm that specializes in print and electronic communications. Kemal also acts as a principal analyst for Madison Advisors. He provides project-based advisory services designed to assist clients with business strategy and technology selection decisions. To contact Kemal, email kemalcarr@madison-advisors.com. For more information on Madison Advisors, visit www.madison-advisors.com. a A Better Way The whole reason that your organization formed these bad habits in the ﬁrst place is because they ﬁlled a particular need. There was interdepartmental tension that needed relief or an erroneous belief that high quality wasn’t compulsory. As your organization breaks the old patterns, it still necessitates a venue to fulﬁll all of these needs. You will not only be making an active choice to not do the old, “bad” action, but in addition, you will also be making a conscious choice to execute a better, alternative action in its place. Rather than print operations squabbling with ﬁnishing, both groups might decide to jointly devise a more effective workﬂow that eliminates obstacles on both ends. Instead of dismissing the damaged direct mail www.MailingSystemsTechnology.com a JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2009 31 http://www.madison-advisors.com http://www.MailingSystemsTechnology.com http://www.MailingSystemsTechnology.com http://www.MailingSystemsTechnology.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Mailing Systems Technology - January/February 2009

Mailing Systems Technology - January/February 2009 Contents Editor's Note Real Life Management Software Bytes Employing Technology Everything IMB Ship It Best Practices What You Think From the Source Combat "Do Not Mail" Getting to Know Mail.dat How NOT to Run Your Operation Reality Check New Products & Services Advertiser Index Pushing the Envelope

Mailing Systems Technology - January/February 2009

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