If a hotel can become famous for leading ducks across their lobby at 11:00 then certainly your business can become more well-known for some simple ritual that customers like to photograph and tell others about and reporters love to cover.

In fact it’s surprising that so few businesses and other organizations see the power of memory-making rituals that we keep talking about the few that do. And instead of creating a new ritual a sister hotel simply imitated the duck walk. You can do better.

1. Think quirky

As all actors know, a cute kid or animal almost always steals the show.  For example the annual ritual that raised $120,000 this year in a town of just 2,404 is the weiner dog race.  That’s right. Long, cute dogs. People and their pets came from all over the country for the chance to compete.

2. Create community around your ritual

The race is a great example of what the beneficiary of the race, the Lions Club calls a “core belief – community is what we make it.” It has been an annual tradition around which dog owners (and their families and friends) meet to compare notes and catch-up. Hint: the more fervent the community the more valuable your participation can be for your organization.

3. Offer the unexpected

Instead of “just” offering a loaner car like the one you are getting serviced a British Volvo dealership also offers bikes as loaners. The dealership enjoys two benefits  – deepening the loyalty of its eco-minded customers and attracting worldwide media coverage.

4. Reduce your cost of providing that ritual by partnering

Volvo’s ritual was then topped by Fiat in Spain. By partnering with electric bicycle maker Trek it could make the same offer yet without the cost of buying and maintaining the bikes. Trek benefits by getting a warmed-up introduction to possible customers.

The bonus benefits are that many of the people who saw the cyclists heard also saw the message on the bike and many of the cyclists told their friends about their experience.

5. Give a souvenir sample whenever people have to wait – or even pause

For a client years ago I set up an experiment in which those waiting in a movie theater line were greeted by smiling, good-looking college students and offered a free ice cream bon bon on a silver tray. One each. The students simply walked down the line, saying, “Like a tasty bon bon while you’re waiting? If you like it there are more inside.”

The results of that study were so positive the theater chain intermittently continued the practice. (Intermittent rewards create more happiness, perhaps because of the hedonic treadmill effect yet we crave the certainty of constancy – “the ducks will walk across at 11″). When bon bons are offered movie theatre snacks go up an average of 26 percent.

For the owner of seven upscale restaurants in London we did a similar experiment with wine.  Per customer sales went up as average of 23 percent.

Then we suggested that the restauranteur approach his wine distributers to offer them the opportunity to provide their wine, at cost.  Several agreed so he could rotate the kinds of wine he gave waiting guests.

For this sampling ritual, the wait staff, while offering the tray with the glasses of wine, showed the bottle and said the vinter’s name.   That was so successful that wine makers now vie for the opportunity to give their wine for such samplings. They also began offering samplings to delighted diners during their meal.

That way more customers get free wine and often wind up ordering more wine.

The participating vintners get their wines introduced in a relaxed, convivial atmosphere.

Cost-saving Hint: Make your ritual so popular that you can attract partners that want to participate in it.  That way you can offer your customers that ritual more often yet at a lower cost to you.

Conclusion

Most any consumer-serving place can create a small, simple-to-execute ritual that:

• Gives an unexpected experience to customers, one they can brag about – and others can see them enjoying.

• Increases sales.

• Attracts media coverage.

• Demonstrates the value of partners participating so the cost of offering that ritual go down.

See more ways to profitably partner and then create your own, unique, customer-attracting ritual – with the right partners.

“’There was this joke that when the women who worked in the lab were stressed, they came in, cleaned the lab, had coffee, and bonded,” Dr. Laura Cousin Klein told Gale Berkowitz.  ”When the men were stressed, they holed up somewhere on their own. I commented one day to fellow researcher Shelley Taylor that nearly 90% of the stress research is on males. I showed her the data from my lab, and the two of us knew instantly that we were onto something.”

It turns out that the oft-quoted “Flight or Flight” response to a stressful situation applies more to men than women. Also, women under stress are more able to read other’s facial expressions and men are less accurate in reading emotions in another’s face.

In threatening or otherwise stressful situations with others men and women also react differently, according to studies yet two of the findings cited seem to be somewhat contradictory:

1. Men initiate connection. Women accept offers to connect.

Men are more willing to expose themselves to the risk of making an overture; yet women are more likely to reciprocate an overture once it’s made.

2. Men Withdraw. Women reach out.

“Men get  antisocial under pressure, but women tend to react in the opposite way: they ‘tend and befriend.’” (The article has a link from “anti-social”, when describing men, to an article on the behavior of psychopaths. This seems sexist or at least not relevant).

The article seems to focus on the first responses to threats or other stress when around others rather than on what unfolds at first and over time – toward connecting and collaborating or not.

Without any research to back me up, I agree with Sahar: “Women instinctively tend to be more social perhaps due to the need for support; men like to be more independent.  Under pressure, we first follow those instincts.”  

Men are more likely – in general – to propose action and press for quick response and women – in general – are more likely to support the group in finding a path towards agreement on what to do together.

Men will focus on getting it done – and place a priority on being respected and productive. Women will spend more effort on helping people feeling comfortable with each other; they perform better when they feel liked and appreciated –and they worry more. Both sexes act worse when others do not appear to be acting fairly through this tense time.

What’s your experience in attempting to connect and collaborate in stressful situations where both women and men are involved?

By the way, in other studies, psychologist Mara Mather found that “acute stress increases sex differences in risk seeking.” Women become more moderate in their habits and avoid risks. Men are more likely to gamble, drink, have unsafe sex or take other risks.

There are exceptions of course.

To reduce your stress and savor your work more cultivate a satisfying work relationship with a partner – female or male.

Emulate a valuable partner by adopting the traits that the Gallup organization found to be most helpful, described in The Power of 2: “If you want to have great partnerships, be a great partner.

Get beyond yourself. Give up the notion that you are well-rounded, and stop expecting your colleagues to be universally proficient. Incorporate someone else’s motivations into your view of the accomplishment. Loosen up. Put aside your competitive nature, your prepackaged view of how the thing should be done, and your desire not to be inconvenienced with the imperfections of a fellow human being.

Focus more on what you do for the partnership than what you get from it. Demonstrate trust in more people, and see if they don’t surprise you with their trustworthiness. Be slower to anger and quicker to forgive. And along the way, communicate continuously.”

“You know your work partnership is truly unselfish if you feel genuine satisfaction at each other’s success, if you and your partner will risk a lot for each other, and if your collaborator is like a brother or sister’ to you.” ~ Rodd Wagner and Gale Muller

“.. .she pointed the audience to people who were great examples of living their dreams with a very motivating and empowering attitude,” Heather Parlato wrote about Colleen Wainwright.

Praising individuals in the audience is especially helpful when facing a tough crowd as I described in a comment here. Bill Clinton, at his best, is a master at giving praise as Sean Stephenson suggests, dubbing his approach “the carwash phenomenon.”

Conversely, criticizing others leaves an indelible stain on one’s reputation in this increasingly connected world. When you throw mud you get dirty.

Yet, ironically one of the easiest ways to be seen in a positive light is by shining a spotlight on a remarkable side in someone else as Colleen and Heather did. The multiplying power of praise happens as people tell others about such incidents, as I am in this post.

Tip: Praise individuals for praising others.  This is a vivid, credible and becoming approach to bringing out the best in all of us. Heck, even waiters who compliment customers get three percent bigger tips, on average.

Try some of these ways to magnify the power of your praise:

1. Shine a spotlight on someone in unexpected yet relevant times and places.  After witnessing such an experience at Harrods in London Gretchen Rubin wrote about it thus shining a priceless spotlight on the soul of the store.

2. As a variation of  1. put your sticky note of praise in a place where it will be seen by that that person – and by others who are important to them.

3.  Give a present to that special person in front of people from a different part of their life than the part you share.

Example: The Friday night after Juan worked through the weekend to fix a problem at the start-up where he worked he went to his bike club’s monthly dinner. With prior agreement from the club, his boss, the start-up founder, came in the door, was introduced to everyone by the club president and gave Juan a gift coupon to his favorite bike store, describing how Juan’s astute, hard work the past weekend  saved the fledgling firm’s reputation.

4.  Start with marbles. Mike Rogers heard of a CEO who began practicing giving praise by placing five marbles in his right pocket each morning. Each time he complimented someone, he moved one marble to his left pocket. By the end of each day he planned to move all the marbles.  After awhile he no longer needed to use the marbles.

5. Look for times you can reinforce someone’s confidence and belief in their talents and character with your variation of two phrases suggested by Rich DeVos (who, unfortunately, is also ardent in his criticism):

• “I’m Proud of You.”   • “I Believe in You.”

6. As the most cost-effective and satisfying way to attract more customers, provide multiple ways your customers can praise what they most like about your business or other organization.  Andy Sernovitz offers true stories as examples.

7. Even in asking permission you influence whether someone  is likely to criticize or praise you to others. Here’s an example: A Catholic priest was transferred to a new parish. He approached his superior and asked, “Would you mind if I smoked while praying?”  Not too surprisingly, he was turned down.

You can change the meaning and the outcome of what you say by how you say it. Set the stage for what someone is about to hear from you. Do this by choosing the order in which you say something. That creates the context in which the listener hears the intention behind your words.  The priest, for example, might have secured permission – and a positive first impression –  if he’d made his request this way, “Would you mind if I prayed while I am smoking?”

The effect of praise is so potent that even false flattery sways us more than we think.

When you show you care as you praise others you can transform them and yourself as you can see in this captivating fable Validation: Free Parking.

Perhaps the heaviest thing to carry is a grudge and the shortest distance between two people is a compliment. Praise what you want to flourish in others.

Thank you Guy Kawasaki & team for placing two of my blogs on the top of your Alltop category – Collaboration - How We Partner and this blog.  In celebration of this recognition I finally updated my blog roll here on Moving From Me to We.

Unfortunately, whilst I posted these valuable collaboration-related links I cannot yet get them to appear. I have appealed to my blog design hero Cody McKibben for help) so let me share then with you here right now because, well we can be smarter together. 

Alltop/Collaboration

Beth Kanter

Bioteams

Center for Citizen Media 

Collaborate

Collaboration 2.0

Collective Intelligence

Cognitive Daily

Communities Dominate Brands

The Community Roundtable

Connect NESTA 

Cooperation/Berkman Center/Harvard

Consumer Generated Media 

Conversation Agent

Converstations

Creating WE / Judith Glaser

Creative Class

The Culture of Collaboration

Danah Boyd / Zephoria

Don Tapscott 

Full Circle / Nancy White

Herd 

How We Partner

Idea Architects / Jeffrey Cufaude

Interpersonal Skills Lab

Kolabora

Logic + Emotion / David Armano

Made by Many

mashable

Mass Customization 

Mastermind Group Resources

MIT Convergence Culture Consortium

MIT Center for Collective Intelligence 

Networked Performance

Network Weaving

Ning

Nudge

OpenCongress

P2P Foundation

Public Journalism Network

Putting People First

Resonance Partnership

Shel Holtz

The Situationist

Skoll Foundation

Smart Mobs

Social Customer

The Social Age

Social Edge

Social Media Biz

Social Psychology Network

Social Science Statistics

Society for Industrial & Org. Psych

Trends in the Living Networks

Ugluu

Vizthink

Wikinomics

Winning by Sharing

Wired to Care

To jumpstart your new year in these roiling times, consider this: ”When the economy tanks it’s natural to think of yourself first. You have a family to feed and a mortgage to pay. Getting more appears to be the order of business. It turns out that the connected economy doesn’t respect this natural instinct. Instead, we’re rewarded for being generous. Generous with our time and money, but most important generous with our art.” ~ Seth Godin 

Here’s my three-step approach to put that notion into practice in this ever more Connected Age (please tell me what you think):

1. Discover your main talent (Marcus Buckingham) and re-design your work and life to use it more often.

2. Constantly keep an eye out for problems and opportunities in your profession, market  - or in your life.

3. Recruit the mix of people who can collectively seize that opportunity or provide the solution to that problem.

In short: We’ll get better at methods that create more value, working together  – as a satisfying way of helping each other. That may be the most efficient and satisfying way to generate more value for our work and more meaning in our lives.

With the right team we can accomplish something greater with others than you can alone.  

Reminder: To be most helpful when being generous, adopt the Golden Golden Rule: Do unto others, not as you would have done unto you, but rather as they would have done unto them.

Two Predictions: 2010 will be the year of…

 1. Vastly increased collaboration everywhere. We may stumble but we will pick ourselves up, be more daring, supportive of strong partners -  and we will try more often, experimenting until we get it right: Right methods + right team.  Look for Peter Sims’ next book, Little Bets.

 2. Quickly-formed project teams.  Some teams will bond and seek more projects. Others will go bust, most likely because of the power of the weakest link.  (Motivation to participate dissipates when one person does not pull his weight and Rules of Engagement were not in place, upfront, to include the rule for graciously booting non-performers off the island.)

Oh and you may want to download What Matters Now, Seth’s free 82-page e-book with contributions from some 70 bright contributors, from Wired editor, Chris Anderson to Eat Pray Love author Elizabeth Gilbert and Dan and Chip Heath, authors of Made to Stick. Then learn how to lead online communities (with pithy advice from those who are) in another e-book created by J.C. Hutchins – Nick of Time.

Job hunting is dispiriting – often lonely and isolating. 

That’s why it was so comforting for job seekers to be in a room full of knowledgeable people who were ready to meet with them, one-on-one, to answer their specific questions. 

From job hunt web sites to career counseling coaches could personalize their advice to each person’s need. Hundreds of unemployed people flocked to this free speed-coaching event in New York. My colleague, transitionist coach Terrence Seamon was one of many coaches who volunteered to sit in “twenty minute sessions, to review their job search campaign strategies as well as their resumes, making sure that they are accomplishments-focused.” The event was the co-created service of The New York Library, Vault and volunteer coaches. 

In this bad economy what top-of-mind topic most concerns your kind of client? 

Recruit a cadre of non-competing and credible experts to coach them in a fast-paced, speed coaching event where participants get hundreds of dollars worth of the specific advice they most seek – and coaches demonstrate their expertise to “pull” prospects towards hiring them.  More than a free for all, “here’s my card” networking event people actually get to meet the individuals they’d most like to know at that time.

You, too, could leverage your value with a custom speed coaching event that serves a hot need or avid interest felt by your kind of clients. Here’s a quick checklist of jumpstart your first popular, speed coaching event:

• What other credible, complementary (non-competing) experts and organizations serve your “mutual market?”

• What preoccupies your clients?  

• When would it be easiest for them to meet?

• What is a convenient and attractive meeting location for them?

• What if you created a helpful meeting momento – an eBook of three tips from each coach plus their bio and s brief description of all partnering organizations, with links to all resources cited in the eBook?

• How long should your event be?  Some are as short as two hours and as long as a day.  One-on-one coaching sessions in different events range from five-minutes to 20-minutes. Collectively choose the length that works best for your kind of attendee and speed coaching theme.

• Consider combining 20-minutes “expert roundtable” sessions for five to eight attendees to ask an expert questions – concurrent with the one-on-one speed coaching sessions. 

Put the coaching sessions on one side of a ballroom or other large meeting place and the roundtables on the other.

• Place large signs behind each coach with their name and/or topic and on roundtables with the table topic.

The more partnering coaches and organizations you involve the lower the per-partner cost and the higher the benefit to them for participating – and the higher the number of people you can reach and serve.

Here is one kind of speed coaching event I co-designed with the astute head of the S.F. chapter of Savor the Success, Ayesha Mathews-Wadhwa.