Creativity and Purposeful Innovation

"Creativity, a quality more traditionally associated with artistic endeavors, has been slow to find its acknowledged place in the business world. "

So begins an article from the Harvard Business School's Working Knowledge site called "Getting Down to the Business of Creativity."

Key points:

• Business leaders must manage and support creativity just as they would any other asset.
• People have their best days and do their best work when they are allowed to make progress.
• Their research suggests that most managers are not in tune with the inner work lives of their employees.
• For the longest time, creativity was considered the work of a genius operating on their own, however, there's a construction of creativity that involves many other actors.

BOTTOMLINE: Creativity, when sought after and encouraged, MUST be done purposefully. Innovation, another name for creative problem-solving, must be done in such a way as to support the overall strategy of the organization. Discipline V - Innovate Purposefully, detailed in Six Disciplines for Excellence, is not an isolated event in an annual or quarterly cycle; it's a mindset that permeates the culture of an excellent organization.

Be Excellent Named To Best Blog List

According to Benjamin Jones, editor at entrepreneurial blog Ben-Means-Business:

"There are thousands of small business and entrepreneurship blogs in the blogosphere. Unfortunately, many of them are not at all useful to the experienced or aspiring entrepreneur. We've all seen them. The great majority of which are e-commerce "pros" masquerading as entrepreneurship experts. This makes finding solid, useful information for the traditional small business owner very difficult. Therefore in my frustration, I have decided to create what I like to think of as "The A-List" of entrepreneurship and small business blogs."

At Be Excellent, we're humbled to have made Ben's list.

Check out The 41 Absolute Best Blogs about Entrepreneurship and Small Business.

Strategy Execution Expert Gary Harpst Launches An Execution Revolution

In support of the upcoming July release of his newest book, Six Disciplines® Execution Revolution, successful serial entrepreneur, CEO, and author Gary Harpst forsees a revolution brewing within America’s small and midsized businesses.

“A revolution is about to start that will provide a leapfrog opportunity for small and midsized businesses in the way they execute their strategy,” said Harpst. “Knowing how to plan and execute, while overcoming today’s inevitable surprises, is the most foundational capability any successful organization can learn. To accelerate this revolution, we’ve established a publishing division and supporting websites designed to educate business leaders on how they transform their businesses and maximize their ability to execute strategy,” added Harpst.

Harpst’s newest book, Six Disciplines® Execution Revolution: Solving The One Business Problem That Makes Solving All Other Problems Easier, is scheduled to be published in July 2008. In Six Disciplines Execution Revolution, Harpst details the elements of a complete strategy execution program, explains why it could only have happened now, and clarifies why such a program will become a mainstream requirement for successful small and midsized businesses. The new book is now available for pre-order from http://www.sixdisciplinespublishing.com/.

Harpst’s first book, the highly-rated Six Disciplines for Excellence, received the 2007 USA Book News Best Books finalist award, and was rated the No. 1 business book for 2007 by The Center for Workplace Excellence. Six Disciplines for Excellence is also consistently ranked in the top ten books of the Organizational Learning category on Amazon, and is also available from Six Disciplines Publishing.

In addition, Harpst’s new website, http://www.garyharpst.com/, offers insights into Gary’s successful background, his companies, his books, videos, podcasts, his newsletter on strategy execution, speaking engagement calendar, and his personal blog on business excellence topics.

About Gary Harpst
Gary Harpst, a highly successful entrepreneur and CEO, spent twenty years as leader of Solomon Software, which implemented more than 60,000 businesses management systems in small and midsized businesses, before it was eventually sold to Microsoft. Today, as founder and CEO of Six Disciplines, Harpst and his team have developed the first complete strategy execution program for small and midsized businesses, which includes a repeatable business-building methodology, local accountability coaching, an innovative execution management software system, and the accelerated advantages of community learning.

Harpst is also the author of two highly-respected business improvement books, Six Disciplines® Execution Revolution and Six Disciplines for Excellence. A highly-regarded speaker, Harpst uses his 30 years of business leadership and entrepreneurial experience to provide a fertile inventory of hard-hitting, real-world examples that pepper his presentations and engage his audiences. Visit http://www.garyharpst.com/ and http://www.sixdisciplines.com/.

About Six Disciplines Publishing
Six Disciplines® Publishing, a division of Six Disciplines, LLC, is responsible for the creation and distribution of materials and media covering the broad topic of strategy execution. Headquartered in Findlay, Ohio, Six Disciplines Publishing develops content across a wide variety of media: printed books, audio books, blogs, whitepapers, web sites, podcasts, speeches, presentations, and videos. With integrity, excellence and respect for lasting relationships, Six Disciplines Publishing, in conjunction with its Partners, creates a winning combination of design, publishing, production, distribution, publicity, public relations and marketing services. Visit http://www.sixdisciplinespublishing.com/.

Creating A Culture of Execution

Creating organizational cultures don't just happen by chance.

Indeed, the innovative folks over at 37 Signals argue that "You Don't Create A Culture" at all.

According to the article: "You don’t create a culture. Culture happens. It’s the by-product of consistent behavior. If you encourage people to share, and you give them the freedom to share, then sharing will be built into your culture. If you reward trust then trust will be built into your culture."

So, if you encourage and reward something (for example, an attitude or behavior) - on a consistent basis - it gets build into your organization's culture.

Sharing, trust, cooperation, engagement - whatever your organization has as its core values - must be encourage, recognized and rewarded, in order for it to become built into your culture.

Same goes for execution. If you value "getting the right things done" - consistently, predictably and in a balanced way, you need to encourage it, recognize it and reward it consistently over time.

BOTTOMLINE: Start today by creating your own "culture of execution". Determine what shared core values your organization has relative to getting things done, align your resources to do so, and begin to recognize and reward attitudes and behaviors (results, not just activities) that reinforce the kind of execution culture you want your organization to have.

The Difference Between Coaching and Consulting

If you have seen professional coaches portrayed on TV or spotlighted in magazines, you may not always come away with an accurate perception of coaching.

Like with any young profession that has experienced rapid growth, misconceptions have surfaced about the nature and purpose of professional coaching. As part of its work to advance the art, science, and practice of professional coaching, the International Coach Federation (ICF) works to educate the public on what to expect from a coaching partnership.

In a recent press release by the ICF, they made the attempt "to correct these inaccuracies by educating the public about our distinct profession and stressing the importance of working with a coach who has undergone formal coach-specifictraining and is credentialed."

One of the common misconceptions about coaching is that "Coaching and consulting are the same."

According to the ICF, coaches are experts in the coaching process and are trained to listen, observe and customize their approach to individual client needs. Whereas, consultants typically give clients answers or solutions based on expertise or knowledge in a certain area, coaches seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful."

At Six Disciplines, we offer our complete strategy execution program through a network of Six Disciplines Centers, which are staffed by professional coaches who are certified on the Six Disciplines methodology. These accountability coaches are not "consultants" in the traditional sense. They offer companies training and assistance on how to adopt the Six Disciplines methodology throughout the organization -- not just at the senior leadership team -- but through an approach of "total organizational engagement." What makes these coaches different from consultants is - they "show" as opposed to "tell" - and, unlike consultants, they don't leave. They are available to the client organizations throughout the adoption and implementation timeframe of the Six Disciplines program.

Visit Six Disciplines for more information.

Achieving Business Excellence

In a newly released PDF that you can download for free from ChangeThis, consultant John Spence condenses his years of consulting and research into six strategies that all great companies focus on, entitled Achieving Business Excellence.

The six strategies:

1. Have a vivid vision: A clear and well-thought-out vision of what you are trying to create that is exceptionally well communicated to everyone involved.
2. Hire the best people: Superior talents who are also masters of collaboration.
3. Create a performance-oriented culture: One that demands flawless operational execution, encourages constant improvement and innovation, and completely refuses to tolerate mediocrity or lack of accountability.
4. Encourage robust communication: Open, honest, frank and courageous, both internally and externally.
5. Create a sense of urgency: The strong desire to get the important things done while never wasting time on the trivial.
6. Encourage extreme customer focus: Owning the voice of the customer and delivering what customers consider truly valuable.

Download the Achieving Business Excellence pdf here.

What You Think Is Your Biggest Problem, Isn't

As Karl Albrecht said in his book Corporate Radar, "The majority is not always right, the conventional wisdom is not always wise, and the accepted doctrine could well be flawed. The more fashionable an idea, the more it is likely to be exempt from critical evaluation. Breakthrough thinking sometimes calls for contradicting the most widely held assumptions and beliefs."

Consider what you think is your biggest business challenge. Is it growth? Competition? Innovation? Cost containment?

We'd like to challenge how you think about your biggest business challenge. In fact, what you think is your biggest business problem, isn't.

The foundational challenge - one that transcends all other business problems - is executing strategy. In other words, building an organization that has the ability to plan and execute, while at the same time, overcoming the inevitable surprises - is the biggest and toughest challenge in business.

The good news? This one problem, if solved, will make solving all other problems easier.

That's what the Execution Revolution....is all about!

Small Business Advocate Interviews Gary Harpst

Want to know how to thrive, not just survive during a slow economy?

Listen to this MP3 as author and CEO Gary Harpst speaks with Jim Blasingame at the Small Business Advocate, with some thoughts on what he thinks is the main characteristic of successful organizations, execution.

Gary Harpst - National Leader of The Month

LeaderNetwork.Org conducts interviews with the nation's top leaders. Previous leaders who have been interviewed include: Dr. Stephen Covey, Ken Blanchard, Lou Holtz, John Wooden, and Zig Ziglar.

For May 2008, Gary Harpst, founder and CEO of Six Disciplines, has been named "National Leader of the Month" by LeaderNetwork.Org.

Harpst was interviewed by Brian McCormick, and the MP3 podcast is available for downloading here.

The written transcript of the interview can be viewed here.