Last week I heard a story on NPR about CPR protocols in life-threatening situations.  The story starts with Scott Harden, who, just before bedtime, heard his 33 year-old wife gasping for air.

“She was not the right color,” Scott said, and he started giving CPR the way he had been taught 15 years ago: 15 quick chest compressions, then two breaths, then more compressions.  But he said he “couldn’t get the breaths in,” and, guided by the 911 dispatcher, he stuck with the compressions, doing 100 per minute until the paramedics arrived.

Pete Walka was one of the first paramedics on the scene.  According to Pete, Scott saved his wife’s life.  “She’s alive because he did really good compressions until we got there,” said Pete.

A 911 dispatcher in any other state might have given Scott different advice.  Arizona, under the leadership of cardiologist Dr. Gordon Ewy of the University of Arizona, is promoting a compression-only CPR technique, based on Dr. Ewy’s assertion, and research, that it saves more lives.

Dr. Ewy argues that compression-only works better because it keeps already-oxygenated blood pumping.  Stopping compressions to give breaths means, according to Dr. Ewy, that blood stops flowing, leading to worse outcomes.  And the highly-respected medical journal The Lancet conducted a study in which it tracked 4,000 victims of cardiac arrest in Japan: it found that those who received compression-only CPR survived nearly twice as often as those who received compressions plus mouth-to-mouth.

But change is hard to come by.  According to NPR, the American Heart Association has “updated its guidelines to say that compression-only CPR is appropriate for those not trained in the standard method.”   Basically, the AHA is saying, “if you don’t know how to do it the right way, just do the compressions.”  According to Dr. Ewy, these recommendations don’t go far enough, and he’s pushing to have Arizona be at the forefront of a national change in CPR protocols.

On it’s own this is a fascinating story.  For a lifetime we’ve heard that there’s one way to give CPR, so the idea that there’s another, better way out there – lurking behind the unquestioned conventional wisdom – is itself intriguing.  What struck me even more was the argument by Dr. Michael Sayre of the American Heart Association, who helped write the new AHA guidelines.  He said:

“Honestly, I think the research that we have to date shows that the outcomes for patients seems to be very similar regardless of the kind of CPR they get.”

Put another way: if the new way is just as good as the way you’re doing things, and if some data suggests it might be better, that’s not good enough.  The bar is HIGHER when you want to make change.

We hear this argument every day – even though it’s often more subtle.  It’s the “that’s not the way we do things” refrain.

The real reason that “just as good” isn’t good enough is because the people who created the original “just as good” solution have influence and power and something to lose if something better comes along.

So if you’re in the business of making change and stirring things up, you have to keep on hitting a higher bar.  And don’t forget that for many people, “that’s not how we’ve done it before” is argument enough not to change.

The burden of proof is highest for the innovators.

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I got a call today from a headhunter looking to get hired to conduct searches.  It’s the second time he’s called me since March.

First, kudos to him for being on top of things.  He has a list of prospects, tracks things assiduously, and spends his time making cold calls to build leads.  He’s sticking to it, and that’s a hard and often thankless job.  Determination and execution go a long way.

The one catch for me was that the pitch was terrible.  It felt like he was working his way through a list. Here’s roughly how it went:

“Hi, I’m John.  We talked in March and I wanted to see if you need any help with any executive searches.  I’m calling to follow up.”

“Uh, thanks John, we don’t right now.”

“Do you think you might have needs later in the year, when the economy improves…”

“Probably not…”

Etcetera

Why did John make me feel like #38 on today’s list?  Because his pitch was, “Do you need anyone to conduct searches for your firm?”  This is very different from, “Do you want ME to conduct searches for your firm.”  For a “me” pitch, I’d have to know something about John, his firm, their skills, why they’d be a fit…

Instead, it was a volume play: I’ll call lots of people, I’ll have the same pitch for everyone, and if I make enough calls I’m bound to find someone who needs someone for something – and by calling, I’ll become that someone for someone.  If you do the math right (maybe he has), this can work great, for example:

30 calls/hour = 200 calls/day (some calls probably last more than 2 minutes)

1% of calls lead to a next conversation

~10 next conversations generated per week

Etc.

Fair enough, but I was one of the 99% of folks that said “no” today, and by the time I’d hung up I still didn’t even know John’s last name.

Right before he lost me for good, John said:

“Before you go, can I ask you one last question?”

“Sure,” I said.

(DRUMROLL……….)

“Do you have any temporary hiring needs?”

Aw shucks, wrong question.  He’s still working his way through the script.

How about this instead: “My last question is: how did my sales pitch work for you today?  It sounds like you don’t have any hiring needs but you’re also in an awful hurry to get off the phone.  Is there anything I could have done differently?”

(applause ensues)

John would have kept me for another minute, and I’d have shared some thoughts.  He’d have learned something – if not from me from the next person who answers this question.

I’m sure half of his ‘no’s’ would tell him something if he bothered to ask what they really think.  And if John spent just one day taking his ‘no’s’ and turning them into conversations, he’s taking the 99% of calls that were worthless (200+ of them) and making them worth something – to him and the person he’s calling.

Bonus: by asking that question, he’s started a different conversation, and might actually turn a no into a ‘someday,’ someday.

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