Tests & Tastes: January 2015

52 Weeks 52 Tests - Week 4 - Florida, Chicken & Waffles, Key West and sipping Margaritas at South Beach Miami

OK, 4th week of the year and 4th week of trying new stuff.

After 24 hours of plane waiting, plane flying and plain boring, I landed in Orlando, Florida.

I took the chance of the annual kick-off with my company to take a few extra days in the Sunshine State, ahead of the global corporate mass.

Every new place you go to normally comes with an healthy amount of discoveries and it's just not possible to list them all, so I'll just focus on few of them for now.

Dinner time was coming after a whole day in St Petersburg, Florida, wandering in awe in a brilliant Dali + Picasso exhibition, at The Dali

The Dali Museum

Inside the Museum

Dali is my favorite artist, by far. Since taking pictures inside the museum was prohibited, here is a link to the portfolio of the great Salvador on Artsy

We also sampled the local micro-brewery scene,

Arriving at Cycle Brewing

all this with Adam, the singer, guitarist and songwriter of the band Part Time Models who was kind enough to be my host for 2 days... Thanks a lot dude ;)

By the way, please check out Adam's band sound below, I really like it. They will be releasing their LP soon, I really look forward to it.

**** Update from March 11th: Part Time Models has now released their EP "Harlot Drama" and it's available for download on Bandcamp. If you like rock n' roll, you should listen.

I badly needed a USA grade beef steak and Adam suggested we tried getting our protein fix at Z-Grille, who has excellent meat, a nice setting, veggies choices, and even, Chicken & Waffles.

Wait, whaaaat? Chicken & Waffles ??? Together in the same dish??? You must be FFFing kidding me. WHAT IS THAT?

Like struck by lightning, I knew I could not back down and not try this dish for the #52W52T challenge...

So here it comes, the original Chicken & Waffles!

The Original Chicken & Waffles

Interestingly, Chicken & Waffles is a classic dish in the Southern American Soul Food cuisine, a form of cuisine derived from the various influence of Afro-American tastes that blended in the south.

Like most chicken in the USA, it came deep fried, which I am in general not fan of, but this time, the cornflake & sage frying coating made it more interesting. The waffle underneath was a bit soggy, I guess because it was covered by an onion & bacon sauce, and lying on top the grits. Now, grits is another new food for me, a sort of polenta made of corn. This grits is a cheddar one but I did not find it too cheesy and a bit on the bland side. The pink peppercorn ice cream was funky! Very buttery but it added a more refined fragrance to the dish.

All together, this Chicken & Waffles was not incredible, but very filling, American-sized.
I was actually quite happy to help Adam finish his one pound rib eye...

Just a lot of beef

After St Petersburg, I headed straight to Key West, the southernmost point in continental USA, a tourist mecqua, and a very clean, chilled tropical atmosphere.

After two half days and a night in Key West, I jumped in my rental Chrysler again and drove straight back up north. to Miami: just for the sake of driving into Miami and grab a drink at South Beach.

Miscelaneous comments and notes to self about Florida and the USA

- Vasectomy specialists advertise on huge billboards by the highway.

- Mc Donald's are literally at every gas station, and only terrible fast food choices are available.
- Debt collectors are everywhere on the FM stations and their ads are the closest thing to a total brainwash to exist in the universe.

- You can buy Visa and Mastercard cards from a self-serve shelf, ready for you to top-up. Never saw that before...
- SiriusXM satellite radio rocks, saved my long hours of driving...
- Fuel is cheap (20$ for full tank!) but tanks are small.

- People in the USA are huge in all X, Y, and Z axis. They are also so vocally enthusiastic for basic things that it's almost hard to believe, especially in comparison with Singapore where waiters and store staff barely speak to you at all.

Some hot spots for a nice crawl in St Petersburg, Florida

Kahwa Coffee for your morning fix
The Dali Museum, for an impressive collection of paintings by the great Salvador
Ale and the Witch for an incredible selection of crafts, many of them coming from Florida itself.
Z-Grille for a surf n' turf restaurant vibe, surrounded by skateboards.
Cycle brewing to taste their Freewheel session IPA.
The Emerald Bar for a cheap beer, and a game of darts listening to rock n' roll and live music in this old and classic bar of St Pete

Talking about crawl, check the Crawlpal project of my friend Pras: you can

Next: See my trial for Week #5, or have a look from my experiments so far.

Book Review: Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim & Renee Mauborgne

I just finished reading Blue Ocean Strategy, a fantastic business book for anyone interested in creating breakthrough product with a market of their own far away from any competition. It is clear that a fantastic research job has been done to come to the findings of the book, and probably an even bigger job at reducing the book to digestible core essentials, illustrated with real business cases that the reader can relate to.

I am not sure I have ever read a better business book. Warmly, warmly recommended.

Below are key extracts from the book that I have captured for you to quickly absorb its concepts.

Analytical Tools and Framework

The Strategy Canvas

The strategy canvas is both a diagnostic and an action framework for building a compelling blue ocean strategy. It serves two purposes. First, it captures the current state of play in the known market space. This allows you to understnad where the competition is currently investing, the factors the industry currently competes on in products, service, and delivery, and what customers receive from existing competitive offerings on the market.

Figure 2-1 captures all this information in graphic form.

Once you have established the strategy canvas for your company / product, you need to use the four actions framework to differentiate yourself.

The Four Actions Framework

If you apply the four actions framework correctly, you should be able to establish a differentiating value proposition for your product, as for instance, the Australian brand [yellow tail] in the wine market

3 Characteristics of a good strategy

Focus + Divergence + Compelling tag line

Formulating your Blue Ocean Strategy

" Reconstruct Market Boundaries

Companies tend to narrow down their competition and addressable market to its existing playing field. It is important to look out of the box for untapped consumer needs, untapped niche, and differentiating factors that draw from a larger perspective."

(...)

"To guide this research, 6 paths are proposed:

1 - Look across Alternative industries

Ex: Netjets : shared time private jets.

2 - Look across Strategic groups within industries

Ex: Curves: cheap suburban gyms

3 - Look across the Chain of Buyers

Ex: Novo Nordisk, focusing on end users (diabetics) versus prescriptors (doctors)

4 - Look across Complementary Product and Service offerings

Ex: Barnes & Nobles, offering cultural experience on top of book selling, with lounges and coffee bars....

5 - Look across Functional or emotional appeal to buyers

Ex: QB House switching haircutting from highly emotional to functional one. Or inversely Cemex cement company turning the purchase into promise of well-being for families.

6 - Look across Time

Ex: iTunes saw the inevitable rise of digital music or CNN 24 hours information channel riding on globalization trend.

Once you have established a differentiation formula, you need to get the strategic sequence right, in particular through a strategic pricing-to-cost tactic, and through thinking about adoption upfront.

To make sure you are providing excellent value at all stages of the customer experience, evaluate your product through the Buyer Utility Map

In order to price your product right, look across alternative form and function of your product, identify the price corridor of the mass, and then set your ideal price within the corridor depending on the sensible positioning of your value innovation.

Your product mix is now set, but several hurdles might lie ahead of you. To be successful, you need to exercise what the authors call "tipping point" leadership.

Executing the Blue Ocean Strategy

My take on this is that you could also call this 20-80 leadership.

Basically, you need to:

- Understand where the misunderstanding gaps are (if any)

- Identify what the disproportionate influence factors lie (your 20% that influence 80% of your results)

Overcome key organisational hurdles

- Lack of resources: redistribute resources to your hot spots, from your cold spots

- Lack of team motivation: Identify your kingpins (key influencers), put them in a fishbowl (making their actions and inactions visible) and atomize your objective (break it down into attainable, bite sized smaller objectives)

- Political hurdles: Secure a consigliere in top management, leverage your angels and silence your devils.

Et voila!

Here were the key points from Blue Ocean Strategy, but I could not recommend more the reading of this book, which is really pleasant thanks to the amount of real life examples used.

52 Weeks 52 Trials - Week 3 - Power Napping in the Business District

I am a huge fan of power naps.

Not everyone is. Or rather, not everyone dares to claim their love. And therefore, the mentality have not evolved as fast as the scientific evidence backing up its goodness for attention, thought clarity, information retention and overall well being.

In Mediterranean countries, "la siesta" is an institution, and stores are usually closed in the early afternoon to give everyone a break.

A good ol' siesta (copyright amymluke.blogspot.com)

Unfortunately, this practice has not yet been trending all over the world, and too often, a nap room or sleeping pod (such as Podtime's), remains the kind of perks only the coolest and most enlightened start-ups offer.

A Podtime sleeping pod

Unless your accommodation is close enough to your office, you have no other choice than being ultra creative in finding your sleeping hideout:

- car (best solution, but in Singapore, it would require to turn on the engine, so that you can put the air-condition on - not a very eco-friendly practice)

- toilets (gross)

- meeting room (risky)

- desk (uncomfortable and unfavorable to your reputation).

- desk + Ostrich pillow (more comfortable, but still not good on a reputation level).

...

Luckily, I was handed out a flyer by a girl in a robe the other day...

And today, I felt a bit sleep deprived, so it was the occasion to do something new!

I struggled a little bit to find the small door to enter the building at 110 Robinson Road (very different to the grand, luxurious, office lobbies in that street), and took the lift up to the 12th floor to get to the massage salon.

The atmosphere was quaint and I was showed to a room, where a robe (a different one, hopefully) had been put on the massage table for me to wear. The bed was comfy enough but I rapidly realized that the soft music played in background was going to hamper my chances to knock off. I went to ask for ear plugs, but since they had none, the lady at the counter kindly proposed to simply turn off the music.

Ready to doze off

The whole place was then very quiet, with only the soft, soothing sound of water flowing down a fountain nearby.

In the end I manage to doze for a few minutes, after my mind had stopped rambling...

I believe it always take some time to find sleep in a new environment, so maybe I'll have another to give it another try. A fun experiment but at 18$ for 30 minutes, you better be very tired or make a lot of $$$ to afford it on a regular basis!

See my next trial for Week #4, or choose from the list of my #52Weeks52Trials challenge

Je Suis Charlie

Words are more powerful than bullets.

52 Weeks 52 Tests - Week 2 - Prosperity Iced Tea

A "tea" with cane sugar, water, dried longan, goji berries and honey (I think)

In the Chinese culture, wishes of prosperity abound when approaching Chinese New Year. And companies have long integrated some degree of customisation of their offering when approaching this key date in the Asian calendar (in 2015, February 19th and 20th).

So appeared the Prosperity Tea at Old Tea Hut, an incredibly successful little stall on Robinson Road. Immense queues line up everyday to get a caffeine fix (I must say that with most varieties of coffees and teas selling between S$1 and S$2 in Singapore's CBD, the value for money is pretty obvious for local white collars).

The dark red colour of the drink (lucky colour as well) is studded with strikingly red Goji berries, dried longans and else. It was very sweet, with a plum sort of fragrance, and I'm not sure there was any tea in it. My favorite part was the Gojis.

Note to self: buy Gojis in bulk to include into food preparation, it's probably a highly versatile ingredient, and packed with anti-oxydants, it seems.

Next?
See my next trial for Week #3, or choose from the list of my 52 Weeks 52Trials challenge

52 Weeks 52 Tests - Week 1 - New Year's Eve in a Rustic, Remote Location

I had nothing planned for this NYE, with most of my friends returning from our remote hometown of Raon l'Etape to their bigger cities and multiple party options. I was already dreading a comfortable, yet very boring eve made of TV watching with my parents... To my surprise, I got a call from my good mate Mathieu at 5 PM, who proposed to spend NYE in an uncommon location: a refuge chalet in the Vosges Mountains.

3 hours later, we jumped in our cars for a 40 minutes of frozen drive up to the mountain pass, where we parked. We wore our boots, warm garments, hats, and grabbed our backpacks packed with food & (mostly alcoholic) beverages, lights and headlamps, and even sleeping bags for some.

After 50 minutes of a sweaty night walk up the mountain, in a gradually increasing amount of snow (up to 50 cm at the top), we reached the small wooden refuge, open and ready to host us for a good night.

The Abri de la Cantine au Roitelet (in the summer and without snow...)

We made fire in the chimney to bring the temperature from 5 deg Celsius to a more bearable 15 degrees, and started eating our basic meals that tastes like a 5 star fine dining in this context: crisps, foie gras, pate, sausages, and washed it all with a nice sequence of beer, wine and champagne.

After playing some games and cracking dirty jokes, we went outside to for the midnight countdown and watched the colored lights from the fireworks shot from the valley spread in the layer of cloud that separated it from us. We shot our own little rockets and screamed at will for the pleasure of hearing our voices echoing on the snowy rolling hills.

A pleasure that only countrysides can offer, and a brilliant, impromptu night of camaraderie.
Thanks Mat.

Next: See my trial for Week #2, or choose from the list of my #52Weeks52Trials challenge

2014 Review and my 10 objectives for 2015

At the end of 2013, I had done a first review of the year that passed (in french), and listed some personal goals for 2014.

My 2014 objectives and what really happened

- Stop smoking definitely
Had a full 3 months long stop, with some nice victories (not smoking at a party where most people do), but then I ended up lighting up one. Felt really terrible about it, especially since I did an anti-bet to prevent me to light up one again. Since then, I have had an occasional cigarette at social events with alcoholic drinks, and up to 5-10 cigarettes in one night in bigger parties, about 5 times in the year. I bought myself an e-cigarette for Xmas, I hope it will help me resist smoking dirty ones during parties.

- Stop Candy Crush, eating up way too much time
Oh yes, I stopped, and I really fell good about it, especially when I see addicted players in the subway who don't realise how much time they are wasting.

- Stop binging on TV series (Suits, House of Cards, etc...)
I believe I watched less of these, especially in the last 2 months of the year due to a faulty TV that I did not replace yet, to my girlfriend's big despair and the benefit of my productivity.

- Work hard whilst continuing to identify what drives me the most and my passions. Work on my weaknesses
In retrospect, I did not set this goal properly: too vague. However, I did not remain passive this year. Back in April, I felt really stuck with the startup I was working for. An opportunity came up with a much larger corporation, still in Singapore, still in software and IT services, but in a whole new industry. I used to know everything about mobile commerce, and now I have to learn everything from scratch about the capital markets industry. To help myself with that, I started watching all the trading-related movies ever made.

- Read more, start again to practice sport in the morning
Again, I could have quantified this goal better. I read 6 books this year versus only 2 in 2013, but it is still very very little... I have 2 main issues: I fall asleep too fast (after 2 or 3 pages in general in the week time), and I read too slowly, but hey, english is still not my native language... My plans to tackle those issues: booked a e-learning class about "super learning and speed reading" on Udemy, and will strive to get to bed earlier.

- Meditate more regularly
Yes, goal achieved! I had always been interested but had never taken it to serious practice. This year, i have had a lot of pleasure meditating for 10 - 20 minutes a few times per week, usually first thing when I'm back from work. Plus, I have now discovered Headspace, and have been meditating pretty much everyday since I have tested it.

- Continue learning malay / indonesian
Failed at that one. Beside a little practice during my trips in Lombok and Bali, I did not improve much my vocabulary, grammar or oral understanding, despite having scheduled time in my agenda to sit down and learn at home. Not sure why, because I love learning foreign languages, the only thing I see is that I prefer the class environment...

- Plan better to travel more often than in 2013
Traveled roughly the same amount as last year, planning was either much better, or much worse.

- Stay in close touch with my close relatives, through hand written letters especially

Failed at that one miserably. Not a single hand written letter.

- Give a bit of volunteering time to a charitable organisation
Also failed at that one. Did not give time, although I increased my donation: UNICEF & made my first loans on Kiva.

Not too bad all together but I can still largely improve! I believe I started the year well, but got sidetracked, as it happens to most people with their resolution.

Of course, many other things happen this year, some pretty cool achievements (although not so spectacular), and many little things not worth quoting, but that make everyday life what it is.

Other things that happened / My year in bullet points:

Professional:

Resigned from start-up and joined a large MNC

Increased substantially my base salary with a much better potential for additional variable earnings.

Projects:

Blog

Re-branded the obscure yet personal Vecteur de Lutece into TestsAndTastes.com
Used a remote freelancer from Pakistan through Guru.com for the new logo.
Reached 3,000 views per month
Ran my first interview of an entrepreneur

Conceptualized plenty of product and service ideas, starting a business plan for some of them, sometimes up to the creation of a mock-up... Among them:

Juice, a take-away powerbank service for smartphone users
ArtNow, a web platform for museums & galleries to provide an advance self-service art guide experience on mobile for its visitors.
SaveMyDay, a home delivery service of comfort food, drinks, and more to rescue from the victims of hangover.
Icone, a range of in-room cosmetic products packed in bottles replicating iconic hotel buildings.
TruRate, a user-curated product review community evaluating brands and products' sustainability and health consciousness.
DipInside, a snack-bar specialized in dips and sharing platters, healthy grubs and good times.
Invest & Indulge, a bespoke travel service for c-suite and high net worth who want to enjoy France through an entirely customized program, beyond the obvious tourist spots, whilst taking the advantage of a bespoke business meetings and/or investor program to expand their business reach in the country.
Mobil Pasar, a promotional B2B / B2C roadshow service for Indonesia, loaded in a double-decker bus featuring customised roadtrip, in-bus hospitality and meeting arrangement service.

Took on the role of community & event manager role for Olympique Gaulois Singapore

Health & Fitness

Played 20+ football match with the Gaulois, scored 5 goals in the league and stabilized position as midfielder

Sprained my ankle playing football in January

Torn my ligament playing football in November, and had to watch from the bench, the win of my team at the final of the Equatorial Football League, after an epic 4-3 win.

Started meditating regularly (15 min /day)

Relationships, Social...

Navigated through the storms with my girlfriend... 4 years now!

Lost touch with a few good mates, out of decision, but also because I failed giving up news to others

Attended a dozen of big parties throughout the year

Organised 3 "Alumnight" for the Singapore-based alumni of ESCE Business School

Travels & Discoveries

Returned to Lombok, Indonesia and climbed Gunung Rinjani (3,728m)

Returned to Bali, Indonesia and showed my parents around.

Returned to Bangkok, Thailand and discovered Koh

Discovered Pulau Cubadak, Sumatra, Indonesia

Tried Karting

Others

Tracked my daily expenses with Toshl Finance, manage to save 15% of my earnings.

Read 7 books (only)
- Ben Casnocha & Reid Hoffman - The Start-up of you (read my review)
- Joshua Foer - Moonwalking with Einstein (read my review)
- Didier Van Cauwelaert - Le dictionnaire de l'impossible
- Rene Barjavel - La Nuit des Temps
- Dany Glover - No more Mr Nice Guy
- Jacques Attali - Devenir Soi (in French)
- Mauborgne & Chan - Blue Ocean Strategy