I realize there have been a thousand articles posted on this, and I suspect my thoughts aren't terribly unique. However below is my response to a young guy who I've known for several years and who is well on his way to success in the business world. His question: What have you found to be [...]
It only takes a cursory search of many of the leading management strategy journals and periodicals to figure out that this notion of ‘innovation’ is on the mind of many senior and influential leaders within the business world and has been for quite a while now. We are finding however that with a presumed lack of [...]
I suffer from this. I am guilty of often investing too much time to make something “perfect”. I remember the president of a company that had acquired mine years back who was known to often say, “don’t let perfect be the enemy of good”. I used to think, “yes, but our clients pay us substantial sums to be [...]
Have you ever worked in a company that seemed to change of the sake of change? Maybe they are continually and overly influenced by the latest article in Harvard Business Review such that every month brings with it a new strategy, vision or focus? I find that all too often the goal is to simply create change in [...]
I don't mean to be abstract, but I wonder sometimes if lack of engagement with (or even awareness of) Corporate Strategy has something to do with our delivery and positioning, and much less with the message itself. Vitruvius' three principles of firmitatis utilitatis venustatis, from his semenal work De Architectura, roughly translates as durability (it should be robust), utility [...]
If there is one thing missing from so many otherwise great organizations I’ve worked with, it is strategy execution. Many managers understand that a strategy is essential for success over the long-run, but surprisingly few are capable of mapping that to operational terms meaningful to the rest of the organization. Robert Kaplan (co-creator of the Balanced Scorecard) suggests [...]
I travel quite a bit, as much as 1-2 times per week albeit primarily regional travel. As such though I spend more time in airports than I would prefer and am always looking for opportunities to minimize time in line ups, minimize baggage and minimize any other aggravation. Many of you road warriors probably use [...]
I love simple ideas that seem so obvious after-the-fact, but have real and immediate impact to business problems. This was one of those solutions and the problem is fairly common, even outside of this industry. We’ve all experienced it. You show up at 7pm at a restaurant that you have your heart set on only [...]
I just met with a former colleague who explained that one of objectives of his role was in simplifying the complex. We explored that concept a little further and agreed that sometimes simplicity is not really the desired outcome. In fact, some organizations are just plain complex. How do you distil the manufacturing processes of [...]
A business is simply a collection of related services that together produce and deliver value. Even within manufacturing, energy, agriculture and other resource-based organizations, it is the effective management of services that distinguishes the good from the great.