Contractors I talk to sometimes ask me why we don’t do our web sites in Flash. Well the truth of the matter is we would do a website in Flash if we felt it appropriate to achieve some kind of artistic experience that reflects the brand identity of the contractor, architect , or other type of client we’re working with but we would still at the very least still want to do another HTML site in parallel.

Okay,…why?

Let me tell you this little story to explain. The other day I pointing out to some close friends that I ran across what I thought was one of the best looking most well executed Flash based web sites I’ve ever seen for a builder/remodeler/contractor. It has an excellent design, smooth well designed transitions and animations and the light jazz background music is pleasing comfortable and I think it does a great job of communicating a "kool & classy" brand image. The "Press" section includes several videos produced about the company that when the video starts or ends the background music fades appropriately in or out. It’s just a damn excellent presentation.

The problem with it is let’s say I was with those friends of mine in a local restaurant having dinner and while waiting for our meal to be served I told them I had found this excellent contractor that I thought they should check out for the project they are considering. So I whip out my iPhone and type in DevitoBuilders.com and unlike the great presentation you get on your computer if you clicked on the link to see the site you get this on your iPhone:

Yes, I know not everyone has an iPhone but there is a significant number of people that do and there are other reasons we don’t recommend a Flash only web sites that I’ll get into shortly.

Basically what I am saying is that a Flash only website without a HTML alternative running alongside of it says to some potential clients "we don’t like your phone, you can try contracting us again when you get a different phone" and any chance for some positive ohs and wows in a conversation looking at the company’s portfolio of work was lost for the sake of using Flash exclusively.

I was reading an article Flash, iPad, Standards by the noted web designer Jeffrey Zeldman the other day on the lack of flash in the recently announced iPad and iPhone where he wrote:

Lack of Flash in the iPad (and before that, in the iPhone) is a win for accessible, standards-based design. Not because Flash is bad, but because the increasing popularity of devices that don’t support Flash is going to force recalcitrant web developers to build the semantic HTML layer first. Additional layers of Flash UX can then be optionally added in, just as, in proper, accessible, standards-based development, JavaScript UX enhancements are added only after we verify that the site works without them.

As the percentage of web users on non-Flash-capable platforms grows, developers who currently create Flash experiences with no fallbacks will have to rethink their strategy and start with the basics before adding a Flash layer. They will need to ensure that content and experience are delivered with or without Flash.

Developers always should have done this, but some don’t. For those who don’t, the growing percentage of users on non-Flash-capable platforms is a wake-up call to get the basics right first.

[...]

Zeldman clearly isn’t saying "don’t use Flash" but he is saying instead of using it as you primary and/or only delivery vehicle use Flash elements judiciously in a website designed with a semantic HTML framework. In a follow post a day or two later (Ahem) he writes:

The first part of my post of 1 February was not an attack on Flash. It described a way of working with Flash that also supports users who don’t have access to Flash…

… My point was simply that if you’re an all-Flash shop that never creates a semantic HTML underpinning, it’s time to start creating HTML first—because an ever-larger number of your users are going to be accessing your site via devices that do not support Flash.

[...]

Using any content that requires a platform specific technology or asks requires the viewer to have, or download, some kind of specific software such as Flash will alienate or turn off some visitors and they’ll just click out of your site and move on perhaps to one of you local competitors who is willing to talk to them on their terms at that moment.

You want to make to make your marketing message(s) easy to find and as assessable as possible which brings me to my next point on why we don’t like Flash.

A Flash website while it maybe technically and artistically flashy isn’t SEO friendly (Search Engine Optimization). Search engines also have a very difficult time indexing Flash content, and so your website might not rank as well if Flash is used. The robots that search and index the web instead of seeing the appropriate keywords that a builder, remodeler, trade contractor, architect, or interior designer or what have you should use in the text of a web site with good semantic HTML will instead see a jumble of text , numbers, and symbols. The result is poor to nonexistent set of search engine rankings.

Because of this, we don’t generally produce or recommend web sites built entirely in Flash. Nowadays almost all of the animations and actions that you see done in Flash can also be done using jQuery a lightweight cross-browser JavaScript library.

Despite the drawbacks, however, there are a few good use cases for using Flash that don’t have the negative factors. Most online video is done with Flash. A lot of online advertisements also use it. In these instances, we recommend using Flash.

That said however if you really want to and have your heart set on delivering your marketing messages via a Flash based website you should at the very least consider building a alternative semantic HTML web site along side that delivers the same content and message for the segment of the public that would otherwise just skip over and ignore you.

I’ve was working cleaning up my computer files the other day and I ran across a PDF of a Harvard Business Review article had downloaded a while back entitled How to Be a Good Boss in a Bad Economy by Robert I. Sutton.

Bob Sutton is the author of the excellent book The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn’t (which is a book so many contractors I know really need to read) and writes the blog Bob Sutton Work Matters.

Getting back to the article Sutton writes in the intro:

The Idea in Brief

• It’s not easy being the boss during a downturn. Your natural impulse is to focus on your own well-justified concerns, but your people are watching your every move for clues to their fate.

• You need to rethink your responsibilities in terms of what your people may lack most in unsettling times: predictability, understanding, control, and compassion.

• By making tough times less traumatic, you’ll equip your organization to thrive when conditions improve—and earn the loyalty of individuals who will remain in your network for years to come.

Those are important points that I don’t most contractors think about proactively. In tough times our employees often talk scuttlebutt amongst themselves and with their peers about the state of their jobs and the companies they work for. The doubt and dissension that kind of talk can generate can destroy productivity and quality just when the business owners can least afford it. It’s always been my idea that a far better policy is to be up front and speak with authentic candor about just what is going on and what lies ahead.

If you are going to have to layoff or furlough staff be up front and let them know so that they can plan for it. The trust that builds will make employees far less likely to run out on you on short notice when it can really hurt you.

Video: Management expert Robert Sutton shares lessons on handling layoffs and teams in crisis.

Twice during the last two weeks I found myself trapped in own neighborhood due to traffic snarls. You see I live on a hill right above a major intersection in northern Westchester County NY where Rte 35 the major East West route in the northern section of the county where the Saw Mill River Parkway ends and intersects with Interstate 684.

What happened the other week was a freezing rain caught weekend Christmas shopping traffic and the highway departments off guard . Two accidents on Rte 35 just to the west of me managed to shut down traffic everywhere so I could even get out on to 35 to head the other direction and a week later an accident somewhere to the north out of site to me shutdown north bound traffic on I684 and cars and trucks trying to bypass the stoppage then backed up and clogged traffic on Rte 35 as they tried to skirt over to nearby Rte’s 22 and 100.

This all got me thinking about project management.

I have a saying I often use that is:

"It only takes a day to fall a week behind"

The funny thing is (or maybe it not so funny) I find I can often find circumstances where I can reframe that expression as:

"It only takes and hour to fall a week behind"

Or

"It only takes a day to fall a month behind"

All this reminded me of a kool traffic simulation tool that I discovered back in March of 2008 while reading Grist which I then posted to the Yahoo CMSIG Group I follow.

The java based traffic simulator you can find over here: Dynamic Traffic Simulation

…and the Grist article also had this neat YouTube video from New Scientist Magazine showing a real life experiment conducted by some Japanese researchers showing how some traffic jams can occur for no apparent reason at all.

Lawrence Leach (the author of the excellent book Critcal Chain Project Management) then replied (the emphasis is mine):

Hi, Jerrald

How cool is that! Thanks.

My mind naturally wanders toward using it for learning about
projects. In some ways I think it might be more valuable than dynamic
Monte Carlo simultions; particularly to help thinking about multiple
projects. I have run such simulations, and get a blah response. Maybe
this works better because we can really relate to traffic flow.

I don’t know yet how well this metaphor works, but I naturally
thought of the vehicles as tasks on a project, and the two main lanes
as the critical chains for two projects flowing along. The on-ramp
represents feeding chains of tasks, of course.

One of the first things to catch my eye was how tie-ups flow upstream
against the flow. Its like problems near the end of one project, or
even on projects released to the field, impacting earlier work on
other projects.

I didn’t fool with it, but one apparantly can show the effect of
queueing, and relate that to capacity buffer sizing.

I think there might be much more to learn from this simple dynamic
simulation. Other thoughts on it?

And again a few days later commented again (again the emphasis is mine):

Hi, All

I have been playing a little with the traffic simulation. I already
think there are some great messages one can put across from it.

BTW, I got the English download through the author, If he didn’t put
it on the original site, let me kwow and I will provide another link.

One of the first things I liked with the basic simulation is that it
shows how the traffic jam flows upstream from the merge point. If we
consider the merge the actual constraint, it means "the pile" can be
well upstream of it.

I also found that when you decrease the inflow, it takes a long time
for the jam to clear. The jam clears from the "front end" forward,
which would look like a moving constraint.

If you throttle in inflow, the system is insensitive to ramp flow,
once the ramp is clear and the oncommers can merge, rather than have
to accelerate.

Overall, it shows the power of dynamic simulation to understand
reality, as compared to the TOC over-simplificaition. It shows most
of the TOC statements reflect a subtle pseudo steady-flow assumption.
(OK, I am prepared to hear the screams of "not so!" on this, but its
my impression.)

I think there is much more to show. I am sure it will show the non-
linearity of queuing, for example.

Regards,
Larry Leach

This all has me thinking again about project management as I drive around and run into holiday traffic and grid lock. Thinking what lessons relative to project magement can I learn from this jam I am in sure beats the stress and anger that some people let get their goat.

Well we changed over to a new web site design on Dec 15th and discovered that a lot of the old CSS code we used in our previous blog posts either wouldn’t fit and work in our new design or just didn’t look as good as it should so we just wanted you to know we are working on fixing all of our old blog posts.

Tonight on CNBC there is a two-hour special entitled House of Cards which, to quote Newsday, is “A remarkably clear overview of the financial debacle that has put us all in this fine mess.” While it it scheduled for showing at 8pm 12 am Eastern Time this evening I think I would ‘bet you my house‘ that CNBC will be rebroadcasting it several times in the coming weeks too.

A week or two I also discovered an outstanding program on the finacical crisis entitled The Ascent of Money on PBS which was written and narrated by Harvard professor Niall Ferguson who is the author of the book by the same name entitled The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World. While I don’t know about continuing local broadcasts of the program on local PBS channels the entire program is available to watch online on the PBS web site location I linked to above.

Since we can all stand to understand the economic science(s) of the crisis we are in better I think I can highly recommend our viewing both of these programs.

I’m putting together a Christmas/Winter reading list for 2008-9. It consists both of books I’ve reently read or am reading right now that I would recommend to other contractors and some new books I’ve just discovered and plan to read.

The first book I’ll mention comes from that last category in that I haven’t read it yet but it looked so good I just ordered it and plan to start in on it in just a couple of days. ItsHow Fit Is Your Business?: A Complete Checkup and Prescription for Better Business Health by Mark G Richardson who is President of Case Design/Remodeling , Inc. I’ve been a long time fan of Richardson’s articles and commentary in Remodeling Magazine so this one was sort of a no-brainer i my book but in reading from a preview chapter I discovered on line I spotted a passage that tells me some of the information in the book is going to be particulary apropos for me and a lot of the contractors I work with. Quote:

I’ve long been a beliver that contractors that don’t market and advertise are steering an aimless rudderless ship in terms of directing their business towards the projects they feel they are best suited for and Richardson comment illustrates another problem with the all my business comes from refereals perspective. I’m looking forward to see what else is in the book.

Next on my list is a book I ordered a month or so ago and have worked myself a little over halfway through at this point. It’s entitled Building a Successful Construction Company by Patricia W. Atallah.

While I think a lot of small shop, mom and pop contractors will find the book addresses concerns and planning that they think is beyond them I still find it full of rich ideas and concepts and highly recommend it to the more serious contractor businsess owner regardless of the size of their business.

An excerpt (the introdution) from the book is avaible on the authors website at Building A Successful Construction Company – Book Introduction and in that excerpt the author writes:

I often hear the you have to have “experience” argument being thrown around by a lot of men in the industry and I think that the author, Patricia Atallah, illustrates that business smarts are probably the most valuable asset an individula can have.

Next I’ll mention a group of books written about John Boyd. Science, Strategy and War: The Strategic Theory of John Boyd and two more biographies written about him entiled Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War
and The Mind of War: John Boyd and American Security
.

I first turned on to learning about Boyd through a Yahoo Group Theory of Constraints discussion group I am a member of but you can read a little bit about him and his influence on business here in the Wikipedia article on him.

I found Boyd’s OODA loop based planning similar to Deming’s Plan-Do-Check-Act PDCA Cycle and Boyd’s belief that management defines objectives and strategy. Workers (soldiers, originally) decide how to carry the work out right in line with Deming’s thinking on management too. Boyd believed people are entirly capable of making intelligent decisions, provided they have the right education training and work environment to make those decisions within.

Next on my list I’m going to put a book I haven’t read but only just accidently discovered while I was looking for Mark G. Richardson’s book that I mentioned above. This one is by Mark Richardson which to the best of my knowledge is of no relation and is entitled:Zen and Now: On the Trail of Robert Pirsig and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

I’m a long time fan (30 years) of Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values and consider it to be one of the most influential and seminal books in my life. I’ve only just ordered the book and so I haven’t read it yet so I can’t comment but I’m putting it on the list here for those who feel more intellectually and philosophically inclined to examine juust what is “Quality”.

The Wikipedia article on Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance says ZAMM “is the first of Robert M. Pirsig’s texts in which he explores his Metaphysics of quality.” (more..) One of my favorite quotes from the book that helped reawaken my interest when I heard it again a decade or so ago when it was mentioned by the business guru Tom Peters in one of his books is :

Next on the list I’ll put Run Your Business So It Doesn’t Run You
by Linda Leigh Francis

Now I’ve known about this book for a couple of years now but have never really sat down and read everything in it until this past fall and I find it so valuable I’m going to add it to my Contracting 101 Essentials list.

Run Your Business So It Doesn’t Run You teaches you the same lessons as Michael Gerber’s E-Myth books about the concept that most contracting businesses fail because the founders are technicians (trades men and women) that were inspired to start a business but don’t have the business awareness to run a successful construction business but also provides some actual plans (checklists) and management tools for you to work with in making sure you develop your own systems and don’t fall prey to the “Entrepreneurial Trap” .

Last on this particualr list (there will always be more book lists) I’ll put Reaching The Goal: How Managers Improve a Services Business Using Goldratt’s Theory of Constraints.

This book is rather technical about the practical application of the Theory of Constraints in a service business environement. I recommend it for the folks who have abasic understanding of TOC and who have already read The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement
and/or Critical Chain : A Business Novel and/or Critical Chain Project Management, Second Edition.