Bobby Guy, an attorney in Nashville, practices bankruptcy law. How often do entrepreneurs get to hear from a person who understands business failure from the inside before they start their ventures? He likes to give a talk called “A View From Down-Under: The Top Ten Reasons Companies That Should Make It…Don’t.”
And here are his Top 10: (drum-roll please....)
10. Over-expansion
9. Poor Capital Structure
8. Failure to Control the Controllable Costs
7. Failure to Prepare for Volatility of Uncontrollable Costs
6. Add New Products or Divisions that Drag Down the Profitable Ones
5. Poor Internal Controls and Execution
4. Poorly Designed Business Model
3. Reliance on Critical Financing that Dries Up
2. Failure to Adapt to a Changing Market
AND THE #1 REASON? Top Management in Complete Denial......
BOTTOMLINE: Hmmmm.....What if an organization would use a systematic business-building methodology, designed to focus on execution - along with integrated Internet technologies to make the repeatable processes practical - along with a local business coach who helps the organization keep on track?
Not only would the organization be in a better position to avoid these Top 10 reasons, they'd have a built-in process to continually improve it.
(Thanks to Dr. Jeff Cornwall at The Entreprenurial Mind for this one)
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Forbes Magazine On Business Planning
As mentioned before in Be Excellent, Tim Berry knows business planning. (He's the successful founder of Palo Alto Software.)
A few key points from the interview with Tim in Forbes Magazine:
Business-building involves the integration of key management elements, including strategy, planning, measurement, execution, learning and leadership.
A few key points from the interview with Tim in Forbes Magazine:
- "There is a myth that a business plan is about starting a business, getting a loan or attracting capital. But many businesses may not need to raise capital, so they think business plans are a waste of time. They use it once and stick it away in a drawer."
- "Business planning should be a process that allows for regular review. A good business plan is never done. It is a projection of what you think you're going to do, after which it becomes a tool for comparing, month by month, what you did to what you thought you were going to do. It becomes a guide. "
- " The plan contains as many measurable objectives as possible. Sales by product, cost by product, basic financial stuff. But we'll also look at other markers like the number of tech support calls every month, things that don’t show up in the financials. Maybe a couple dozen data points."
Business-building involves the integration of key management elements, including strategy, planning, measurement, execution, learning and leadership.
About Lasting Excellence And Decision-Making
To quote Jim Collins (author of Good to Great and Built to Last):
"Lasting excellence in corporations seems to stem less from decisions about strategy than decisions about people, and seeking consensus is not the way to make the tough calls."
In this Fortune Magazine article, (subscription required) Collins reveals the one theme discovered by looking at the decision-making process was:
"the greatest (business) decisions were not 'what' but 'who.' They were people decisions."
BOTTOMLINE: For an organization to achieve lasting excellence takes strategic decisions - the most important of which are those based on your organization's key asset - your people.
Interesting, though, that Collins' books are runaway best-sellers.....they focus on telling you what and why - but very little on HOW to make it happen in your OWN organization.
"Lasting excellence in corporations seems to stem less from decisions about strategy than decisions about people, and seeking consensus is not the way to make the tough calls."
In this Fortune Magazine article, (subscription required) Collins reveals the one theme discovered by looking at the decision-making process was:
"the greatest (business) decisions were not 'what' but 'who.' They were people decisions."
BOTTOMLINE: For an organization to achieve lasting excellence takes strategic decisions - the most important of which are those based on your organization's key asset - your people.
Interesting, though, that Collins' books are runaway best-sellers.....they focus on telling you what and why - but very little on HOW to make it happen in your OWN organization.
The Winning Spirit: Principles That Drive Performance Excellence
"Widely considered the best NFL quarterback of all time, Joe Montana personifies performance excellence and personal integrity both on and off the field. Since his retirement a decade ago, he has become a popular motivational speaker sought out by corporations nationwide, speaking to capacity audiences as large as twenty thousand.
Now making his message available to a broader audience, Montana teams up with performance coach Tom Mitchell to extend to all areas of life the truths of success on the field. " The Winning Spirit: Sixteen Timeless Principles That Drive Performance Excellence" by Joe Montana, shows that ultimately performance excellence is fueled by personal integrity."
A few examples from the book:
Now making his message available to a broader audience, Montana teams up with performance coach Tom Mitchell to extend to all areas of life the truths of success on the field. " The Winning Spirit: Sixteen Timeless Principles That Drive Performance Excellence" by Joe Montana, shows that ultimately performance excellence is fueled by personal integrity."
A few examples from the book:
- Know What You Want: First, identify goals, then turn clarity into action.
- Strive for Excellence: Surpass expectations and reach new heights
- Fail Fast and Move On: Take chances, learn from mistakes, and keep pressing forward–don’t let fear or regret take you out of the game.
- Remember the “I” in Team: Make yourself the priority–because intense preparation is the individual responsibility of each member of the team.
- Welcome Pressure: Want to be the best? Work with or compete against the best!
- Walk Like a Champ: Your life is not just about achieving success, but also about having a purpose and creating significance.
The Time for Action Is Now: Execution is the Key
Todd Sattersten, who works for business book vendor 800-CEO-READ recently published this short entry at FastCompany.com on the importance of Action (i.e., Execution):
"The ever common debate is "What is more important -- the idea or the execution?" I have recently come on the side of action.
I have never found the idea part difficult. If you are a student of business, you can find inspiration all around you. Read the business media. Go to conferences. Good ideas are everywhere." (Read the rest here.)
BOTTOMLINE: Ideas are everywhere. The key is to execute on the right ideas, continually, consistently and systematically. Execution is the fundamental design principle behind Six Disciplines.
"The ever common debate is "What is more important -- the idea or the execution?" I have recently come on the side of action.
I have never found the idea part difficult. If you are a student of business, you can find inspiration all around you. Read the business media. Go to conferences. Good ideas are everywhere." (Read the rest here.)
BOTTOMLINE: Ideas are everywhere. The key is to execute on the right ideas, continually, consistently and systematically. Execution is the fundamental design principle behind Six Disciplines.
Monday, August 21, 2006
Organizing To Execute
"Thankfully, organizational DNA can be changed or modified, a distinct advantage when the behavior of certain managers, for example, throws programs or goals off the rails. But like human DNA, the organizational variety has building blocks.
The latter, however, can be changed by manipulating and modifying those blocks. These authors explain how it can be done."
BOTTOMLINE: "Any attempt to address a business weakness or strategic opportunity must explicitly address the underlying organizational reasons the current strategy is not working.
The attempt cannot begin, as many traditional approaches do, with the conclusion that the problem lies in the strategy itself or the culture of the company.
While culture plays an important role in organizational performance, it is an outcome of the organizational system, not an input. Adjust the building blocks, and you change the system. Change the system, and you change the culture. Change the culture and you unlock strategy by enabling execution."
The latter, however, can be changed by manipulating and modifying those blocks. These authors explain how it can be done."
BOTTOMLINE: "Any attempt to address a business weakness or strategic opportunity must explicitly address the underlying organizational reasons the current strategy is not working.
The attempt cannot begin, as many traditional approaches do, with the conclusion that the problem lies in the strategy itself or the culture of the company.
While culture plays an important role in organizational performance, it is an outcome of the organizational system, not an input. Adjust the building blocks, and you change the system. Change the system, and you change the culture. Change the culture and you unlock strategy by enabling execution."
Thursday, August 17, 2006
Strategy, Planning and Execution
Success in business is really not that complicated.
In business - there are only three requirements.
You need three things, clear and unambiguous, no less, no more and - in exactly this order.
In business - there are only three requirements.
You need three things, clear and unambiguous, no less, no more and - in exactly this order.
- A Strategy. As Michael Porter conveys it: "What value are you to deliver to what customers and how are you going to be different?"
- A Business Model. As in "and how are you going to use your resources to deliver that value and how are you going to keep some of the value yourself?"
- A Way to Execute.
BOTTOMLINE: Sometimes... simplicity is best.
Motivating Team Members
From Entrepreneur Magazine comes this article on Motivating Your Burned-Out Employees .
If you have employees who've held the same job for some time, it's quite likely they're bored and their job performance is below par.
Frederick Herzberg, author of The Motivation to Work, said that employees can best be motivated by three techniques: job rotation, job enlargement and job enrichment.
If you have employees who've held the same job for some time, it's quite likely they're bored and their job performance is below par.
Frederick Herzberg, author of The Motivation to Work, said that employees can best be motivated by three techniques: job rotation, job enlargement and job enrichment.
- Job rotation involves cross training employees, or teaching employees each other's jobs.
- Job enlargement involves giving a wider breadth of tasks and responsibilities.
- Job enrichment involves increasing the depth of your employee's responsibilities, not by increasing the number of tasks -- but by increasing the complexity of the tasks.
BOTTOMLINE: One of the most basic elements of improving performance is understanding what needs to be done, and how it ties to the organization's strategy and goals. Key to this understanding is the simple, yet very powerful tool called the Individual Plan, as described in Discipline IV. Work The Plan.
13 Keys To Keeping The Right People
These days, it's hard enough to find the right people.
It can be even harder to keep the right people.
Here are 13 must-dos to keep the right people - "the result will be long-standing workplace success. "
It can be even harder to keep the right people.
Here are 13 must-dos to keep the right people - "the result will be long-standing workplace success. "
Management Styles and Small Business Growth
Fortune Small Business offers this short article detailing the results of a study by the Gevity Institute, a human resources outsourcing firm in Bradenton, FL.
The results?
The results?
- Small businesses that granted workers more autonomy grew at more than four times the rate of those that relied on tight top-down controls.
- Superior HR and management decisions could mean the difference between an explosive business and a sluggish one.
- Companies that met all its criteria had an average revenue growth rate 22 times higher than those that didn't meet any, a profit rate 47 times higher - and one-sixteenth the turnover rate.
15 Warning Signs of A Company's Failing Reputation
From the folks at CEOGO.com, comes this free 35-page e-book download "Cures for The Company Blues: 15 Early Warning Signs of A Company's Failing Reputation."
The early warning signs?
The early warning signs?
- There is low employee morale
- Internal politics are more important than doing the job well
- Top executives depart
- CEO celebrity displaces CEO credibility
- Employees speak of customers as nuisances
- Employees stop telling positive stories about the company
- Leaders stifle initiative
- Leaders talk about growth but focus on cost-cutting
- Bureaucratic procedures impede flexibilit
- There is a tendency toward superficiality
- Problem-makers outnumber problem-solvers
- Internal documents leak
- There are few rewards and recognition
- Management spends more time inside than outside headquarters
- Employees spend too much time writing internal memos
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Formal Definitions of Leadership
From LeadingToday.Org comes this article on Formal Definitions of Leadership.
Their premise?
Leadership is a term which is hard to define. Because of this ambiguity it is also often misdefined and abused. The modern media is usually guilty of labeling the term "leadership" on any individual or group that controls, commands others or maintains positions of power. To help us define leadership, it may be helpful to remember what Warren Bennis wrote almost 50 years ago…
"Always, it seems, the concept of leadership eludes us or turns up in another form to taunt us again with its slipperiness and complexity. So we have invented an endless proliferation of terms to deal with it . . . and still the concept is not sufficiently defined."
Sadly, what was written by Warren Bennis in 1959 is still as applicable today as ever.
BOTTOMLINE: There is no single phrase or definition that incorporates all the traits or qualities of effective leadership. Yet, by examining these diverse definitions we can come to a better understanding of what leadership is, and how it influences others.
Some excellent definitions of leadership are reviewed here!
Their premise?
Leadership is a term which is hard to define. Because of this ambiguity it is also often misdefined and abused. The modern media is usually guilty of labeling the term "leadership" on any individual or group that controls, commands others or maintains positions of power. To help us define leadership, it may be helpful to remember what Warren Bennis wrote almost 50 years ago…
"Always, it seems, the concept of leadership eludes us or turns up in another form to taunt us again with its slipperiness and complexity. So we have invented an endless proliferation of terms to deal with it . . . and still the concept is not sufficiently defined."
Sadly, what was written by Warren Bennis in 1959 is still as applicable today as ever.
BOTTOMLINE: There is no single phrase or definition that incorporates all the traits or qualities of effective leadership. Yet, by examining these diverse definitions we can come to a better understanding of what leadership is, and how it influences others.
Some excellent definitions of leadership are reviewed here!
Strategic and Execution
At Six Disciplines, a core business process we have business leaders learn is that of strategy formulation - and, of course, execution.
But what exactly is strategy?
According to Henry Mintzberg:
"Strategies are to organizations what blinkers are to horses."
"Strategy doesn’t necessarily come first (‘think’ then ‘do’): it’s not that simple a divide. Strategy and Execution intertwine, so stop separating them in your head.
“Virtually everything that has been written about strategy-making depicts it as a deliberate process. First we think, then we act. We formulate, then we implement. The progression seems so perfectly sensible. Why would anybody want to proceed differently?" he writes.
He goes on: "While it is certainly true that many intended strategies are ill conceived, I believe that the problem often lies one step beyond, in the distinction we make between formulation and implementation, the common assumption that thought must be independent of [and precede] action…Smart strategists appreciate that they cannot always be smart enough to think through everything in advance.”
Why do so few other get this? Including some of those billed as the biggest experts on strategy in our time?
BOTTOMLINE: "Breaking the distinction between Strategy and Execution frees leaders up to be more agile and flexible."
But what exactly is strategy?
According to Henry Mintzberg:
"Strategies are to organizations what blinkers are to horses."
"Strategy doesn’t necessarily come first (‘think’ then ‘do’): it’s not that simple a divide. Strategy and Execution intertwine, so stop separating them in your head.
“Virtually everything that has been written about strategy-making depicts it as a deliberate process. First we think, then we act. We formulate, then we implement. The progression seems so perfectly sensible. Why would anybody want to proceed differently?" he writes.
He goes on: "While it is certainly true that many intended strategies are ill conceived, I believe that the problem often lies one step beyond, in the distinction we make between formulation and implementation, the common assumption that thought must be independent of [and precede] action…Smart strategists appreciate that they cannot always be smart enough to think through everything in advance.”
Why do so few other get this? Including some of those billed as the biggest experts on strategy in our time?
BOTTOMLINE: "Breaking the distinction between Strategy and Execution frees leaders up to be more agile and flexible."
The Advantages of Franchising
According to the 2006 FranData study published in Franchising World magazine, the franchising world is booming!
Here are some highlights:
Here are some highlights:
- Of the 18 industries covered, 17 saw an increase in the number of new business concepts being franchised.
- Over the past three years, over 900 new business concepts started franchising their operations.
- Not surprisingly, the fast food industry offers the most franchised units, followed by retail and service businesses.
Why franchise?
We can learn much about achieving excellence from successful franchises. The appeal of a franchise is rooted in two promises.
First, there a very clear promise to the customer that's reflected in their brand. (Think: Starbucks, JiffyLube, McDonalds.)
Second, there's a promise to the franchise owner of a well-considered and proven business model that delivers on the customer promise.
The result is two-fold.
- It delivers something of excellence to the customer (Starbucks - a steaming hot, fresh brewed cup of coffee; JiffyLube - quick oil changes)
- It also delivers something of excellence to the franchise owner (a predictable return on investment, established business procedures, training, staffing plans, physical location layouts, marketing strategies and interested prospects)
BOTTOMLINE: The point isn't that all businesses should be franchised; the point is that all businesses would benefit from taking the same holistic approach to excellence that franchises take. Franchised businesses recognize that there are really two products - the product or service that the customer buys, and the business which the investor buys.
A goal of Six Disciplines is to help business leaders work on their business so they can be as satisfied with their businesses - as their customers are with their products or services.
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
Strategic Planning - Time To Begin
When should you do your strategic planning?
While the answers vary, there's a trend toward doing the strategic planning about two - three months in advance of the annual budgeting process.
Most choose to do their advance strategic planning in the September through October timeframe, having a much clearer course to follow when you do your annual budgeting in November and December.
Many of the top-performing organizations we work with every day - have expressed a real need to not only develop a strategic plan” but also - how to implement it.” Take a quick minute – and consider the following key questions:
While the answers vary, there's a trend toward doing the strategic planning about two - three months in advance of the annual budgeting process.
Most choose to do their advance strategic planning in the September through October timeframe, having a much clearer course to follow when you do your annual budgeting in November and December.
Many of the top-performing organizations we work with every day - have expressed a real need to not only develop a strategic plan” but also - how to implement it.” Take a quick minute – and consider the following key questions:
- Is implementing a strategic plan your challenge?
- Does your staff help develop a strategic plan and forget it the next day?
- Do you have measures in place to know how you are doing compared to your strategic plan?
- Do you believe an ill-defined strategic plan can be overcome by execution?
- Do you know your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) as they relate to your company?
- Do you know what is important to improve your bottom line?
Five Pillars of Organizational Excellence
H. James Harrington, CEO of the Harrington Institute Inc., offers his insights into what it takes to achieve organizational excellence:
Pillar 1: process management
Pillar 2: project management
Pillar 3: change management
Pillar 4: knowledge management
Pillar 5: resource management
According to Harrington, common threads that run across all five pillars must be managed to achieve excellence:
• Communication
• Teamwork
• Empowerment
• Respect
• Honesty
• Leadership
• Quality
• Fairness
• Technology
BOTTOMLINE: "To become an excellent organization, each of these resources needs to be managed in its own special way. The big question is, "How do you pull all these different activities and improvement approaches together and prioritize them?" To solve this question, you must have a very thorough, total-involvement approach to strategic planning--one that involves everyone, from the chairman of the board to the janitor, from sales to personnel, from development engineering to maintenance. This is a total-involvement approach to strategic planning; it is both bottom up and top down. A total strategic planning process (i.e., a business plan) includes directions, expectations and actions."
Hmmm....sounds like......Six Disciplines?
Pillar 1: process management
Pillar 2: project management
Pillar 3: change management
Pillar 4: knowledge management
Pillar 5: resource management
According to Harrington, common threads that run across all five pillars must be managed to achieve excellence:
• Communication
• Teamwork
• Empowerment
• Respect
• Honesty
• Leadership
• Quality
• Fairness
• Technology
BOTTOMLINE: "To become an excellent organization, each of these resources needs to be managed in its own special way. The big question is, "How do you pull all these different activities and improvement approaches together and prioritize them?" To solve this question, you must have a very thorough, total-involvement approach to strategic planning--one that involves everyone, from the chairman of the board to the janitor, from sales to personnel, from development engineering to maintenance. This is a total-involvement approach to strategic planning; it is both bottom up and top down. A total strategic planning process (i.e., a business plan) includes directions, expectations and actions."
Hmmm....sounds like......Six Disciplines?
Monday, August 14, 2006
On Attitudes
One of the best short pieces on attitudes ever written (I've had this posted near my desk for over 20 years now.....)
“The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude to me is more important than facts.
It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than success, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, gift, or skill.
It will make or break a company…a church…a home.
The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past…we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the string we have, and that is our attitude.
I am convinced that life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent how I react to it. And so it is with you…
We are in charge of our attitudes.”
-- Charles Swindoll
(Hat tip to George Ambler for the reminder on this one!)
Leadership In Sports: Knight and Krzyzewski Compared
Take two of the all-time best basketball coaches - compare their leadership styles, and what do you get?
Different styles, yes, but the results are similar: After long careers, both have similar win-loss records for their teams and are acknowledged as top coaches in the collegiate ranks. So what do Knight and Krzyzewski tell us about leadership?
In Harvard's Working Knowledge article "On Managing with Bobby Knight and "Coach K" you'll see key differences in leadership style, yet similar end results.
Great reading here!
Different styles, yes, but the results are similar: After long careers, both have similar win-loss records for their teams and are acknowledged as top coaches in the collegiate ranks. So what do Knight and Krzyzewski tell us about leadership?
In Harvard's Working Knowledge article "On Managing with Bobby Knight and "Coach K" you'll see key differences in leadership style, yet similar end results.
Great reading here!
Small Business Trends and Growth Opportunities
Rhonda Abrams is the author of "The Owner's Manual for Small Business' and other books for entrepreneurs, and offers these insights into small business trends and opportunities as a result of her work with the Institute of the Future.
Here are the top trends and related growth opportunities for small businesses:
(Tip of the hat to Dane Carlson at Business Opportunities Weblog)
Here are the top trends and related growth opportunities for small businesses:
- Retirement businesses
- Continuing rapid pace of change
- Rising health-care costs
- Entrepreneurship education
- Immigrant entrepreneurs
- Reluctant entrepreneurs
(Tip of the hat to Dane Carlson at Business Opportunities Weblog)
Excellence - Sports Quotes of the Day II
Here's a recent interview with Joe Torre, manager of the New York Yankees, in which he offered these gems:
"Competing at the highest level is not about winning. It's about preparation, courage, understanding and nurturing your people, and heart. Winning is the result."
"I believe anybody who is not afraid to fail is a winner."
"Still, even with all the talent and resources we have here, having heart is what really makes a difference. As a manager, or if you're running a company, you want to know that you can ask somebody to do something and that they are going to find a way to get the job done. That's the essence of a competitor."
"A winner is somebody who goes out there every day and exhausts himself trying to get something accomplished. Being able to get the most from their ability. That's what characterizes a winner."
"Competing at the highest level is not about winning. It's about preparation, courage, understanding and nurturing your people, and heart. Winning is the result."
"I believe anybody who is not afraid to fail is a winner."
"Still, even with all the talent and resources we have here, having heart is what really makes a difference. As a manager, or if you're running a company, you want to know that you can ask somebody to do something and that they are going to find a way to get the job done. That's the essence of a competitor."
"A winner is somebody who goes out there every day and exhausts himself trying to get something accomplished. Being able to get the most from their ability. That's what characterizes a winner."
Making Business Improvement Last
It's surprising that in most professions, there are accepted methods and processes for being proficient -- even extremely skilled - or excellent.
Think of what it takes to become an expert engineer, cabinetmaker, architect, musician, athlete, lawyer or accountant.
It takes years of education, mentoring, coaching and on-the-job training.
Yet - shockingly - for small businesses, there has been really no practical way to learn how to build an excellent business -- and keep it that way.
That is, until now.
Unlike most business improvement systems, that describe WHAT the challenges are, or WHY your business needs to continually improve, Six Disciplines shows you HOW to get there.
Six Disciplines incorporates best practices of strategic planning, quality management, business process automation, people performance management and measure-driven improvement in a unique system that is optimized for smaller organizations.
It's a systematic way for the whole organization (not just the leadership team) to learn how to set, and more importantly, execute strategy.
By following Six Disciplines' repeatable annual, quarterly, weekly and daily cycles (as part of the Business-Building Calendar), team members continually learn and grow at their own pace.
Six Disciplines is a way for everyone in an organization to increase in understanding about about to work on the business, not just in it. And with that realization comes the understanding of the value of having a step-by-step busness improvement method that makes business improvement last.
Think of what it takes to become an expert engineer, cabinetmaker, architect, musician, athlete, lawyer or accountant.
It takes years of education, mentoring, coaching and on-the-job training.
Yet - shockingly - for small businesses, there has been really no practical way to learn how to build an excellent business -- and keep it that way.
That is, until now.
Unlike most business improvement systems, that describe WHAT the challenges are, or WHY your business needs to continually improve, Six Disciplines shows you HOW to get there.
Six Disciplines incorporates best practices of strategic planning, quality management, business process automation, people performance management and measure-driven improvement in a unique system that is optimized for smaller organizations.
It's a systematic way for the whole organization (not just the leadership team) to learn how to set, and more importantly, execute strategy.
By following Six Disciplines' repeatable annual, quarterly, weekly and daily cycles (as part of the Business-Building Calendar), team members continually learn and grow at their own pace.
Six Disciplines is a way for everyone in an organization to increase in understanding about about to work on the business, not just in it. And with that realization comes the understanding of the value of having a step-by-step busness improvement method that makes business improvement last.
Strategy Execution
One of the major arriers to achieving lasting business excellence is how little formal effort organizations put into learning how to execute strategy.
This capability is critical, because service offerings and product lines come and go, but the core competence to define and execute a strategy is forever.
Warning signs related to not being "strategy focused" within an organization include:
This capability is critical, because service offerings and product lines come and go, but the core competence to define and execute a strategy is forever.
Warning signs related to not being "strategy focused" within an organization include:
- Team members don't understand the difference between working on the business and working in the business.
- There's no defined process for working on the business itself.
- Team members don't understand the strategy itself, and goals communication is infrequent and inadequate.
- People, systems, processes, policies and/or capital are not aligned with the strategy.
- Reward systems are misaligned with goals.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Small Business Organizational Entropy
Webster's Dictionary defines entropy as "a measure of the degree of disorder in a system."
When a small business makes plans, the chaos of everything changing around it gradually erodes those plans -causing unchecked organizational entropy or "decay."
Small businesses must have a systematic and ongoing way to to offset these forces or it will eventually become ineffective to the point that its survival will be at stake.
Here are some organizational entropy warning signs:
When a small business makes plans, the chaos of everything changing around it gradually erodes those plans -causing unchecked organizational entropy or "decay."
Small businesses must have a systematic and ongoing way to to offset these forces or it will eventually become ineffective to the point that its survival will be at stake.
Here are some organizational entropy warning signs:
- A lot of red tape is required to get things done (GTD) - it takes too long or costs too much
- Inadequate tome is alloted for planning
- People don't know what is expected of them
- People aren't held accountable for their responsibilities
- Results aren't measured, so decay goes unnoticed or unchallenged - and learning is inhibited
- Inadequate resources are allocated to keep systems/processes working properly
BOTTOMLINE: Unchecked organizational entropy is one of the barriers to lasting excellence. The others are:
- Poorly understood strategy
- Weak strategy execution
- Lack of a systematic approach
- Impractical execution methods
- People are not engaged
Baby Boomers and Executing Strategy
According to this research from the Conference Board, the aging workforce and approaching retirement of the "baby boom" generation is changing how companies plan and execute their business strategies, with a greater emphasis on workforce planning as a way of improving competitiveness and boosting productivity.
The Conference Board has found more companies are spending more time and effort analysing and forecasting the talent they have or need to acquire in order to execute their business strategy.
Strategic workforce planning, in essence, is aimed at helping companies make sure they have the right people in the right place at the right time and at the right price.
To engage senior executives in workforce planning, the process needed to focus on understanding the strategic business plan and its broad implications for the company's workforce.
"Strategic workforce planning enables the organization to slice-and-dice its workforce data to discover critical issues, compare different groups, understand patterns and trends, home in on critical segments of the workforce such as mature workers and top performers, and customize its approach to managing different segments of its workforce."
"By enabling leaders to see across lines of business, workforce planning can leverage talent within a company. Ultimately, the same workforce planning database tools will enable employees to shop for new jobs, assess their own developmental needs, and prepare for career moves inside the organization."
The Conference Board has found more companies are spending more time and effort analysing and forecasting the talent they have or need to acquire in order to execute their business strategy.
Strategic workforce planning, in essence, is aimed at helping companies make sure they have the right people in the right place at the right time and at the right price.
To engage senior executives in workforce planning, the process needed to focus on understanding the strategic business plan and its broad implications for the company's workforce.
"Strategic workforce planning enables the organization to slice-and-dice its workforce data to discover critical issues, compare different groups, understand patterns and trends, home in on critical segments of the workforce such as mature workers and top performers, and customize its approach to managing different segments of its workforce."
"By enabling leaders to see across lines of business, workforce planning can leverage talent within a company. Ultimately, the same workforce planning database tools will enable employees to shop for new jobs, assess their own developmental needs, and prepare for career moves inside the organization."
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
Effectiveness Can Be Learned
According to Rob May, Peter Drucker's The Effective Executive offers ideas that are useful to almost anyone, particularly entrepreneurs.
Be warned that they are not easy things to implement, and require lots of practice and discipline, but all that hard work is exactly why you end up a more effective entrepreneur.
Drucker's premise?
(Tip of the hat to Rob May, the BusinessPundit for this one!)
Be warned that they are not easy things to implement, and require lots of practice and discipline, but all that hard work is exactly why you end up a more effective entrepreneur.
Drucker's premise?
- Know Thy Time
- Focus on Contribution
- Make Strength Productive
- First Things First
- Make Good Decisions
And the 6th?
6. Effectiveness Can Be Learned
"Effectiveness, in other words, is a habit; that is, a complex of practices. And practices can always be learned. Practices are simple, deceptively so; even a seven-year-old has no difficulty in understanding a practice. But practices are always exceedingly hard to do well."
BOTTOMLINE: "Drucker said there is nothing worse than doing something well that shouldn't be done at all. Be effective, and get the right things done."
(Tip of the hat to Rob May, the BusinessPundit for this one!)
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
Performance Management: The Next Breakthrough
DM Review offers this interesting look at the major breakthoughs in performance management.
From Alfred P. Sloan's take on customer segmentation to the most recent performance management issues, including:
From Alfred P. Sloan's take on customer segmentation to the most recent performance management issues, including:
- Harvard Business School's Alfred D. Chandler Jr.'s Organizational Structure
- Harvard Business School 's Michael E. Porter's Theories of Competitive Advantage
- Total Quality Management from W. Edwards Deming, Joseph Juran and Phil Crosby
- Michael Hammer's Business Process Reengineering
- Peppers and Rogers' Customer Relationship Management
- Peter Senghe and Organizational Learning
- Kaplan and Norton's Strategy Maps and Balanced Scorecard
So what's next?
Professor Tom Davenport of Babson College authored a January 2006 Harvard Business Review article proposing that the next differentiator for competitive advantage will be predictive analytics.
BOTTOMLINE: "In conclusion, performance management is not just about better managing performance, but improving performance. Integrating systems and information is a prerequisite, but applying predictive analytics is quite possibly the critical element necessary to achieve the full vision of performance management."
Monday, August 07, 2006
Fundamental Principles About Organizational Change
Jerry Pounds of Management-Issues brings this great article about organizational and motivational change to the forefront.
His premise?
"Most organizational behavior experts, gurus and consultants weave their incantations from the motivational theories of "authorities". If you trace these back to source, you wind up reading B.F. Skinner, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Alfred Adler and Carl Rogers. "
"Alternatively, you can skip the primary theorists and move to their well-known translators - and the darlings of every college management class - Abraham Maslow and Douglas McGregor."
"Apparently, psychology's basic truths are known only by a privileged few – and they're not talking. Meanwhile, the field of applied psychology remains a battlefield where there are no victors but instead an endless conflict of assertion and rebuttal. "
For organizational change, herein lies the fundamental problem:
"If you review the history of any large organization you'll find that such a framework conspicuous by its absence. In its place is an eclectic mishmash of performance improvement programs, motivational initiatives and behavior change practices which are usually based upon mutually exclusive theories about human motivation."
"But don't expect the management gurus to clarify the disparities between these theories. After all, their stock and trade is the creation of entertaining perspectives on management and leadership. Uncertainty and ambiguity is the breeding ground for new books and the fads they produce. "
BOTTOMLINE: To understand organizational change, three simple laws emerge:
His premise?
"Most organizational behavior experts, gurus and consultants weave their incantations from the motivational theories of "authorities". If you trace these back to source, you wind up reading B.F. Skinner, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Alfred Adler and Carl Rogers. "
"Alternatively, you can skip the primary theorists and move to their well-known translators - and the darlings of every college management class - Abraham Maslow and Douglas McGregor."
"Apparently, psychology's basic truths are known only by a privileged few – and they're not talking. Meanwhile, the field of applied psychology remains a battlefield where there are no victors but instead an endless conflict of assertion and rebuttal. "
For organizational change, herein lies the fundamental problem:
"If you review the history of any large organization you'll find that such a framework conspicuous by its absence. In its place is an eclectic mishmash of performance improvement programs, motivational initiatives and behavior change practices which are usually based upon mutually exclusive theories about human motivation."
"But don't expect the management gurus to clarify the disparities between these theories. After all, their stock and trade is the creation of entertaining perspectives on management and leadership. Uncertainty and ambiguity is the breeding ground for new books and the fads they produce. "
BOTTOMLINE: To understand organizational change, three simple laws emerge:
- Any work behavior (verbal or physical) that works (pays off, is successful, gets us what we want) is repeated.
- Any work behavior that avoids a negative experience (criticism, needless effort, appearing dumb, avoids something we don't want) is repeated.
- Any work behavior that leads directly to a negative experience (discipline, embarassment, needless effort) is not repeated.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
QLog Reviews Six Disciplines for Excellence
Thom Quinn, over at the QLog, offers his review of Six Disciplines for Excellence.
Some excerpts:
"The Six Disciplines for Excellence: Building Small Businesses That Learn, Lead and Last by Gary Harpst is a different and much needed animal for several reasons. First, it was written specifically for smaller shops (including local non-profits) which intrinsically have fewer resources. Second, this book provides a very systematic approach for a company to follow in order to achieve all of its objectives. Third, it is based on real-world experience (vs. theory from a B-School Professor) as the author was CEO of Solomon (now part of Microsoft) and this company was a test bed for the ideas in the book."
"Unlike most business books which focus on a few techniques, The Six Disciplines provides a true recipe for success."
"I highly recommend this short, but very dense volume. A lot of valuable ideas are found here! The Six Disciplines can be used as a guide book for any small enterprise as the majority of the text is a ‘how to’ manual with very clear instructions."
BOTTOMLINE: Go read the entire review here, and check out the rest of Thom's very insightful blog!
Some excerpts:
"The Six Disciplines for Excellence: Building Small Businesses That Learn, Lead and Last by Gary Harpst is a different and much needed animal for several reasons. First, it was written specifically for smaller shops (including local non-profits) which intrinsically have fewer resources. Second, this book provides a very systematic approach for a company to follow in order to achieve all of its objectives. Third, it is based on real-world experience (vs. theory from a B-School Professor) as the author was CEO of Solomon (now part of Microsoft) and this company was a test bed for the ideas in the book."
"Unlike most business books which focus on a few techniques, The Six Disciplines provides a true recipe for success."
"I highly recommend this short, but very dense volume. A lot of valuable ideas are found here! The Six Disciplines can be used as a guide book for any small enterprise as the majority of the text is a ‘how to’ manual with very clear instructions."
BOTTOMLINE: Go read the entire review here, and check out the rest of Thom's very insightful blog!
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Making Time for Strategic Thinking
If you want to make a difference as a leader, you've got to make time for strategy.
Michael Porter, Harvard's guru of strategic thinking, is covered in this FastCompany article.
Among the gems in this article:
(Tip of the hat to the good folks at MBA Depot)
Michael Porter, Harvard's guru of strategic thinking, is covered in this FastCompany article.
Among the gems in this article:
- Business keeps moving faster -- but you better make time for strategy
- Of course strategy is hard -- it's about making tough choices
- Technology changes, strategy doesn't
- Strategy hasn't changed, but change has
- Beware the myth of inflection points
- Great strategists get a few (big) things right
- Great strategies are a cause
BOTTOMLINE: "The chief strategist of an organization has to be the leader -- the CEO. A lot of business thinking has stressed the notion of empowerment, of pushing down and getting a lot of people involved. That's very important, but empowerment and involvement don't apply to the ultimate act of choice. To be successful, an organization must have a very strong leader who's willing to make choices and define the trade-offs. I've found that there's a striking relationship between really good strategies and really strong leaders."
(Tip of the hat to the good folks at MBA Depot)
Geoffrey Moore Returns
For those of you who were in technology marketing and strategy in the 1990's, who could possibly ignore Geoffrey Moore's "Crossing the Chasm" and "Inside The Tornado"?
Moore is back with "Dealing With Darwin: How Great Companies Innovate at Every Phase of Their Evolution."
His new volume, aimed mainly at corporate strategists, cuts across all industries and geographies.
The book's central question is: How can companies innovate continuously?
"Evolution requires us to continually refresh our competitive advantage, sometimes in dribs and drabs, sometimes in major cataclysms, but always with some part of our business portfolio at risk and in play. To innovate forever, in other words, is not an aspiration; it is a design specification. It is not a strategy; it is a requirement."
BOTTOMLINE: Discipline V. Innovate Purposefully, embraces Moore's concepts. Dealing with Darwin is full of caveats about the difficulties in executing these strategies. It's left to readers to customize them to fit their own situations. So this is less a cookbook than a detailed menu of meals that can be prepared to turn your competitors into dinosaurs.
Moore is back with "Dealing With Darwin: How Great Companies Innovate at Every Phase of Their Evolution."
His new volume, aimed mainly at corporate strategists, cuts across all industries and geographies.
The book's central question is: How can companies innovate continuously?
"Evolution requires us to continually refresh our competitive advantage, sometimes in dribs and drabs, sometimes in major cataclysms, but always with some part of our business portfolio at risk and in play. To innovate forever, in other words, is not an aspiration; it is a design specification. It is not a strategy; it is a requirement."
BOTTOMLINE: Discipline V. Innovate Purposefully, embraces Moore's concepts. Dealing with Darwin is full of caveats about the difficulties in executing these strategies. It's left to readers to customize them to fit their own situations. So this is less a cookbook than a detailed menu of meals that can be prepared to turn your competitors into dinosaurs.
Secrets To His Success
Whether you like his controversial commercials aired during the Super Bowl, it's hard to argue with his success.
Bob Parsons, the serial entrepreneur who started LeaseAmerica, Parsons Technology, and most recently, Go Daddy.com, offers his 16 Rules To Live By:
Some really great ones in there!
Bob Parsons, the serial entrepreneur who started LeaseAmerica, Parsons Technology, and most recently, Go Daddy.com, offers his 16 Rules To Live By:
Some really great ones in there!
Friday, July 28, 2006
Ten Ps of Productivity
Thom Quinn, over at the QLog, presents his well-crafted list of the "Ten Ps of Productivity":
- Purpose
- Passion
- Positive
- Possible
- Prepare
- Plan
- Prioritize
- Persistence
- Performance
- People
Read all about them here.
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Organizational Change and Transformation
The newest McKinsey Quarterly online survey (subscription required) sheds new light on what drives a successful transformation in organizational performance.
Their premise?
Their premise?
- Transformations appear to produce the best results when executives mobilize organizational energy and communicate their objectives in a clear, comprehensive, and engaging way.
- Certain change mechanisms also were correlated with executives' satisfaction with transformation.
The survey, which covered a range of contexts from turnarounds to restructuring, highlights the mixed emotions felt by those on the receiving end of deep-rooted change.
Respondents with the most successful transformations reckon that their company was conspicuously more effective than the others at raising expectations about future performance, addressing short-term performance, engaging people at all levels of the organization, including a clear and coordinated program design, and making the change visible—through, say, new IT tools or physical surroundings.
Emotions play a leading role in a performance transformation. Overall, the respondents report negative and positive moods in roughly equal proportions, with anxiety (mentioned by 46 percent of all respondents) as the most common negative feeling, well ahead of confusion, frustration, fatigue, and resistance. Among the positives, a sense of focus, enthusiasm, and feelings of momentum occur roughly equally. Not surprisingly, more of the top performers report experiencing the positive emotions—especially focus and enthusiasm.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Changing Behaviors And Processes
"Fixing or otherwise improving a process usually involves changing it in some way."
But....Which Comes First: Process or Behavior?
"One failing is a tendency to develop ideal processes on paper, without addressing elements of human behavior. I suspect it’s a by-product of being trained in a highly data-driven methodology (like Six Sigma). We expect that if we can use good data to demonstrate that a process change will result in an improvement, then people will automatically change their behavior."
BOTTOMLINE: For any change to take place, behaviors (habits) need to change before processes can successfully be changed.
But....Which Comes First: Process or Behavior?
"One failing is a tendency to develop ideal processes on paper, without addressing elements of human behavior. I suspect it’s a by-product of being trained in a highly data-driven methodology (like Six Sigma). We expect that if we can use good data to demonstrate that a process change will result in an improvement, then people will automatically change their behavior."
BOTTOMLINE: For any change to take place, behaviors (habits) need to change before processes can successfully be changed.
- To grow your business... something needs to improve.
- To improve performance... something needs to change.
- To change effectively... it needs to last.
- To make it last… you need Six Disciplines™.
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
State of the U.S. Workforce
From the 2006 Employee Review by recruiter Randstad (as reported by Management-Issues) we see the following trends about the U.S. workforce:
- 75% of employers said that staff development was important, but only 50% of employees felt that their organization delivered on it.
- Almost 90% of employees said that feeling valued is an critical factor in job satisfaction, but barely 30% of them felt that they were valued by their own employers.
- only 25% of employees felt that their organizations felt any loyalty towards their staff and barely more than half (56%) felt any loyalty to their organizations in return.
- While the majority of employees and employers agreed that the top source of productivity gains was increased employee efficiency, only half of employees of all ages said that leadership practices in their organisations fostered employee development.
BOTTOMLINE: "The survey shows a widening gap in employee expectations and respective employer delivery," said Genia Spencer, managing director of operations and human resources for Randstad USA.
Monday, July 24, 2006
Why Change Efforts Can Fail
In his best-selling book Leading Change, John Kotter points to lack of urgency as one of the most significant factors in failed change efforts.
While your senior leadership team may be on board and in agreement with moving in a new direction, you need to invest some time and energy in getting buy-in from the rest of the organization.
Complacency with the status quo turns out to be one of the most powerful barriers to change initiatives -- even when leaders confront it head on.
"If you keep doing what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got."
BOTTOMLINE: If you're initiating a change effort within your organization, create a sense of urgency:
While your senior leadership team may be on board and in agreement with moving in a new direction, you need to invest some time and energy in getting buy-in from the rest of the organization.
Complacency with the status quo turns out to be one of the most powerful barriers to change initiatives -- even when leaders confront it head on.
"If you keep doing what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got."
BOTTOMLINE: If you're initiating a change effort within your organization, create a sense of urgency:
- To grow your business... something needs to improve.
- To improve performance... something needs to change.
- To change effectively... it needs to last.
- To make it last… you need Six Disciplines™.
The Challenge of Processes
Ann Michaels, over at Manage To Change, offers some great insight into the challenge of processes.
Her assertions?
Her assertions?
- Process and rules applied correctly are invaluable. They insure resources are allocated effectively. They create consistency. They allow everyone to know what they’re supposed to do and when and how to do it.
- In order to accomplish all of this, they’re often very inflexible.
- Process is created to support specific values and assumptions. When those change, the processes that support them must change as well. Otherwise, they will exert pressure to keep things exactly the way they are.
BOTTOMLINE: "What can you do about it? When evaluating the potential impact of change, don’t forget to evaluate established processes and rules. If your change effort is challenging values or “best practices,” chances are, it’s going to be in conflict with some of your established processes. Identify them. Highlight where and how the conflict exists. Decide how you’re going to handle it."
Small Business Success: What It Takes
Dave Lorenzo offers this list of core competencies required to be successful in starting (and running) a successful small business:
There are ten personality traits that successful business owners possess – at least to some degree. Read the list below and see how many of them apply to you:
There are ten personality traits that successful business owners possess – at least to some degree. Read the list below and see how many of them apply to you:
- Willingness to Sacrifice
- Service Orientation
- Leadership Ability
- Business Intelligence and Creativity
- Management Ability and Organization
- Optimism
- Persistence
- Competitive Nature
- Sales Orientation
- Confidence
BOTTOMLINE: "If one or more of these traits is not second nature to you, don’t fret. During the next two weeks we will be discussing each of them in detail. We’ll talk about ways to leverage your current skills, knowledge and experience to make up for a lack of strength in one or more of these areas."
Thursday, July 20, 2006
A Reviewer Talks About Six Disciplines
Scott Young is one of the most prolific and detailed bloggers out there on topics like goal setting, time management, discipline, and personal development . He has an obsessive passion for personal development.
Recently, he was able to spend some time and read Six Disciplines for Excellence.
Here's what he had to say:
"I finished the book a few days ago. The book is great with a lot of excellent ideas. Unlike a lot of the books I've read which tout theories this actually goes into specific detail for implementing ideas. Being heavily biased towards implementation myself, I appreciated a more detailed look at how to run a small business that wasn't just platitudes and feel-good messages."
Scott also added:
"Unfortunately the precision in the book is also the reason I wont be able to publish a review. I hold myself to a strict standard of not promoting ideas I haven't been able to test. Although there are hundreds of excellent ideas here I won't be able to test them until I am in the position of running a small business."
Why the hesitation/reluctance?
You see, as amazing as it seems, Scott just recently graduated from high school! I encourage you to visit his blog and spend some quality time there.
Recently, he was able to spend some time and read Six Disciplines for Excellence.
Here's what he had to say:
"I finished the book a few days ago. The book is great with a lot of excellent ideas. Unlike a lot of the books I've read which tout theories this actually goes into specific detail for implementing ideas. Being heavily biased towards implementation myself, I appreciated a more detailed look at how to run a small business that wasn't just platitudes and feel-good messages."
Scott also added:
"Unfortunately the precision in the book is also the reason I wont be able to publish a review. I hold myself to a strict standard of not promoting ideas I haven't been able to test. Although there are hundreds of excellent ideas here I won't be able to test them until I am in the position of running a small business."
Why the hesitation/reluctance?
You see, as amazing as it seems, Scott just recently graduated from high school! I encourage you to visit his blog and spend some quality time there.
Be Excellent™ Mentioned in USA Today
Jim Hopkins, the editor of USA Today's Small Business Connection blog, includes a mention and link to Be Excellent™ in his article "Trying to sell to female entrepreneurs? Better listen up!"
"For one thing, they recognize that female entrepreneurs really want to be listened to -- and that once heard, their wishes will be respected. Blogger Skip Reardon ranks "listen to learn" No. 1 on a list of seven essential skills to become a greater leader. In my interviews with women, they tell me that -- more than men -- their management style is to sound out employees, listening carefully for ways they can build consensus on major decisions."
Thanks for noticing, Jim!
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Core Components of Performance Management
What does performance management mean to you? What’s the difference between managing performance and driving performance?
What does it mean to create a performance-driven organization?
Mark Stiffler, CEO of Synygy Inc. offers these insights:
A unified approach to performance management—one that ties together the organizational and individual aspects— consists of the following components:
What does it mean to create a performance-driven organization?
Mark Stiffler, CEO of Synygy Inc. offers these insights:
A unified approach to performance management—one that ties together the organizational and individual aspects— consists of the following components:
- Align the objectives, resources and budgets of the different parts of the organization and the goals, opportunities and quotas of individuals.
- Measure organizational and individual performance.
- Reward individuals for performance.
- Report organizational and individual performance.
- Analyze organizational and individual strategy execution..
BOTTOMLINE: "For many organizations, becoming performance-driven might cause a cultural upheaval that, at least in its early stages, results in turmoil, a perception of chaos and a lot of discomfort. It can trigger turnover of long-time employees who do not like to be held accountable for goal achievement and who feel entitled to a certain level of pay regardless of their performance. And it might cost money as you make the initial investments.
But with the leadership and commitment of senior management, becoming performance-driven will lead to dramatic improvements in performance in financial terms, with respect to employee productivity and morale and in the flexibility to quickly adapt to change. The effort will be well worth it."
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Comparing Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses
Seth Godin, a marketing genius (who has the ability to make very complex things - simple), offers this explanation of the differences between entrepreneurs and small business owners, in his article: "So, what's wrong with small business?"
According to Seth, entrepreneurs:
According to Seth, entrepreneurs:
- Think big thoughts and do big things
- Try to make money while they sleep, and does it with someone else's money!
- Build a business bigger than themselves, that scales for a long time, that is about processes and markets
On the other hand, small business owners:
- Settle, working their way through the day to day
- Are basically freelancers with support
- Someone who understands the natural size of their business and wants to enjoy the craft of doing it every day.
Collin Powell On Leadership
Colin Powell’s principles of leadership described in the book The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell include the following:
(Tip of the hat to George Ambler at The Practice of Leadership)
- Being responsible sometimes means honking people off.
- The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help them or concluded that you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.
- Don’t be buffaloed by experts and elites. Experts often possess more data than judgment. Elites can become so inbred that they produce hemophiliacs who bleed to death as soon as they are nicked by the real world.
- Don’t be afraid to challenge the pros, even in their own backyard.
- Never neglect details. When everyone’s mind is dulled or distracted the leader must be doubly vigilant.
- You don’t know what you can get away with until you try.
- Keep looking below surface appearances. Don’t shrink from doing so (just) because you might not like what you find.
- Organization doesn’t really accomplish anything. Plans don’t accomplish anything, either. Theories of management don’t much matter. Endeavors succeed or fall because of the people involved. Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds.
- Organization charts and fancy titles count for next to nothing.
- Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.
- Fit no stereotypes. Don’t chase the latest management fads. The situation dictates which approach best accomplishes the team’s mission.
- Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.
- Powell’s Rules for Picking People: Look for intelligence and judgment, and most critically, a capacity to anticipate, to see around corners. Also look for loyalty, integrity, a high energy drive, a balanced ego, and the drive to get things done.
- Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate and doubt, to offer a solution everybody can understand.
- Part I: Use the formula P=40 to 70, in which P stands for the probability of success and the numbers indicate the percentage of information acquired. Part II: “Once the information is in the 40 to 70 range, go with your gut.
- The commander in the field is always right and the rear echelon is wrong, unless proved otherwise.
- Have fun in your command. Don’t always run at a breakneck pace. Take leave when you’ve earned it: Spend time with your families. Corollary: surround yourself with people who take their work seriously, but not themselves, those who work hard and play hard.
- Command (leadership) is lonely.
(Tip of the hat to George Ambler at The Practice of Leadership)
Monday, July 17, 2006
Top Reasons For Business Failure
From Entrepreneur Magazine and Yahoo!, comes this list of the top reasons for business failure:
Here they are, in order of their importance:
Here they are, in order of their importance:
- Lack of direction. Business owners often fail to establish clear goals and create plans to achieve those goals, especially before starting out, when they fail to develop a complete business plan before launching their company.
- Impatience. This occurs when business owners try to accomplish too much too soon, or expect to get results far faster than is truly possible. A good rule to remember is that everything costs twice as much and takes three times as long as expected.
- Greed. When entrepreneurs try to charge too much to make a lot of money in a short period of time, failure isn't far behind.
- Taking action without thinking it through first. An entrepreneur acts impetuously and makes costly mistakes that eventually cause the business to fail.
- Poor cost control. An entrepreneur spends too much, especially in the early stages, and spends all their startup capital money before achieving profitability.
- Poor product quality. This makes it difficult to sell and difficult to get repeat business.
Insufficient working capital. An entrepreneur expects--and requires--immediate, positive cash flow that doesn't occur, leading to the failure of the business. - Bad or nonexistent budgeting. An entrepreneur fails to develop written budgets for operations that include all possible expenses.
- Inadequate financial records. An entrepreneur fails to set up a bookkeeping or accounting system from the beginning.
- Loss of momentum in the sales department. This leads to a decline in cash flow and the eventual collapse of the enterprise.
- Failure to anticipate market trends. An entrepreneur doesn't recognize changes in demand, customer preferences or the economic situation.
- Lack of managerial ability or experience. An entrepreneur doesn't know or understand the important skills it takes to run a business.
- Indecisiveness. An entrepreneur is unable to make key decisions in the face of difficulties, or decisions are delayed or improperly made because of concern for the opinions or feelings of other people.
- Bad human relations. Personal problems and conflict with staff, suppliers, creditors and customers can easily lead to business failure.
- Diffusion of effort. An entrepreneur tries to do too many things, thus failing to set priorities and focus on high-value tasks.
Improve Your Business Reviews Six Disciplines for Excellence
Manny Sequeira, over at Improve Your Business, has published his review of Six Disciplines for Excellence.
Here are some excerpts from Manny's review:
"In his book "Six Disciplines for Excellence", Gary Harpst details a roadmap for small businesses to learn, lead and last. The result is a book which is lays out a systematic approach for building and sustaining a successful business - driven by excellence. This systematic approach is what Harpst has termed The Six Disciplines."
"Gary Harpst and his team have put a tremendous amount of work into detailing the steps within each of these disciplines so that this book can really be used as a small business owner's manual. They have succeeded in developing a practical methology for those of us who spend too much time "working in the business, instead of on the business."
"I like the approach and would recommend the book, as it is uniquely tailored for small businesses; it is well written with a lot of substance; and gives business owners a practical tool that they can use to implement business improvement for sustainability, growth and excellence."
Read the entire review here.
Here are some excerpts from Manny's review:
"In his book "Six Disciplines for Excellence", Gary Harpst details a roadmap for small businesses to learn, lead and last. The result is a book which is lays out a systematic approach for building and sustaining a successful business - driven by excellence. This systematic approach is what Harpst has termed The Six Disciplines."
"Gary Harpst and his team have put a tremendous amount of work into detailing the steps within each of these disciplines so that this book can really be used as a small business owner's manual. They have succeeded in developing a practical methology for those of us who spend too much time "working in the business, instead of on the business."
"I like the approach and would recommend the book, as it is uniquely tailored for small businesses; it is well written with a lot of substance; and gives business owners a practical tool that they can use to implement business improvement for sustainability, growth and excellence."
Read the entire review here.
Friday, July 14, 2006
Qualities of a Leader
Over at Whitespace, there is a great collaborative listing of what 75 (and counting....) people think are the Qualities of a Leader.
Some of the better leadership qualities listed?
Some of the better leadership qualities listed?
- Consistency
- Integrity, principles, sincerity, ethics
- Respect, trust
- Sacrifice (servant)
- Humility, diplomacy
- Flexibility
- Responsibility
- Accountability
- Passion, enthusiasm
- Confidence, decisiveness, competence
- Vision
- Clarity, focus
- Execution
- Communication (speaking and listening)
- Wisdom
Seven Essential Skills to Become a Great Leader
Dr. Peter J. Dean offers his The L.E.A.D.E.R.S. Method - the essential skills necessary for any effective leader to practice:
- Listen to Learn
- Empathize with Emotions
- Attend to Aspirations
- Diagnose and Detail
- Engage for Good Ends
- Respond with Respectfulness
- Speak with Specificity
BOTTOMLINE: "When individuals practice good leadership skills and acknowledge change, the entire organization benefits. Management is easier when leadership resides throughout all organizational levels with each person utilizing his or her sphere of influence in a positive way.
These skills allow individuals to develop expertise earlier in their careers and demonstrate greater productivity, resulting in a more enjoyable and positive work environment. People can be excited about going to their place of employment because they are developing their repertoire of leadership skills.
By allowing leadership skills to develop early, both the individual and the company grow and profit."
Reasons for Formal Process Improvement
The QualityGuru suggests the following Reasons Why You Know You Need A Formal Process Improvement Structure:
BOTTOMLINE: The need for formal process improvement can be any one or a combination of these symptoms. And, there are many different business process improvement methods to adopt. Only Six Disciplines is designed specifically for smaller organizations, focuses primarily on execution vs. theory, and is optimized for use over the Internet.
- Fragmented processes causing delays and defects:
- Customer Complaints: For every customer that complains about your product or service, there are 16 more that won’t tell you directly. Word of mouth can kill you!
- Supplier Complaints: Do your suppliers complain about the last minute delays imposed on them?
- Employee’s Whining: What’s stopping your employees from doing a good job? “I could do my job better if ____”.
- Blaming People: The problems are in your processes, not your people.
- Knee jerk Reactions: Managing by Gut feelings. “
- Margins are low, expenses are high, and our growth is stalled.
- Field failures.
- Too many inspectors: You cannot inspect quality in, but you can build it in.
- Absenteeism and turnover: Employees don’t want to do a bad job.
BOTTOMLINE: The need for formal process improvement can be any one or a combination of these symptoms. And, there are many different business process improvement methods to adopt. Only Six Disciplines is designed specifically for smaller organizations, focuses primarily on execution vs. theory, and is optimized for use over the Internet.
Tom Peters: On Excellence
Want to see what Tom Peters says about Excellence?
Check out his PowerPoint from a recent 2006 presentation - where he focuses on Excellence.
WOW!
Check out his PowerPoint from a recent 2006 presentation - where he focuses on Excellence.
WOW!
Putting Values To Work
Fortune Magazine/CNN/Money features an article about business executives putting their values to work building their businesses.
The premise?
The premise?
- Some companies become more socially responsible to protect their brands, to engage their people or to appeal to a certain set of customers who care about reputation.
- But business is personal, too.
- More than the bottom line is driving all these efforts. They are all personal.
- Each of these leaders care passionately about the causes their companies are engaged in.
In a new book called "True to Yourself: Leading a Values-Based Business."author Mark Albion argues that the personal side of business must come first. Only then will profits follow.
"Values-based leaders focus on their impact on people and the planet," he says. "And when they do it well - building a company or division that reflects their values - it results in more meaningful lives and financial health."
Particularly in a startup, Albion writes, the leader's values are crucial. "The day you launch your company, you are its first product," he notes. "You must sell your values, your mission, your uniqueness to others."
BOTTOMLINE: "The way you really make change is by capturing the hearts and minds of your people," says Albion, paraphrasing Jack Welch, the former CEO of General Electric.
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Measurable Progress Toward Excellence
Skip Angel, over at Random Thoughts, poses this thought-provoking entry: "Measurable Progress Toward Excellence"
His premise?
"A strength is defined as a pattern of behavior, thoughts, and feelings that produces high satisfaction and pride; generates mental and/or financial reward; and presents measurable progress toward excellence."
Listen For Yearnings: Like an internal magnet, yearnings pull us toward one thing (strength) instead of another, beginning in early childhood and continuing throughout life. One's life work often begins in yearnings from childhood. Friendly advice can derail us from our strengths when we confuse it for a yearning.
Watch For Satisfactions: Great emotional and mental rewards come from activities we "get a kick out of doing." Satisfactions are not fleeting pleasures, but form our intrinsic motivation. Both satisfactions and yearnings cluster around strengths. Competencies and satisfactions don't always align. If it doesn't feel good, it's probably not a strength.
Watch For Rapid Learning: If you catch on to something quickly, you're probably good at it, and will say, "I feel like I've always known how to do this." A strength is always characterized by initial rapid learning that continues throughout one's lifetime.
Glimpses of Excellence: We see signs of strength in glimpses of excellence within a performance, such as singing a song, writing a letter, giving a speech. A performance is a series of "moments" which provide clues to greatness.
Total Performance For Excellence: The behavior flows and there are no conscious steps in the mind of the performer. The performer is acting on automatic -- time has stopped. Total performance is much more than a glimpse; it is the complete extension of an activity. It happens consistently, and is repeatable.
BOTTOMLINE: Measurable Progress Toward Excellence is a series of activities that are systematic, cyclical, consistent and repeatable.
His premise?
"A strength is defined as a pattern of behavior, thoughts, and feelings that produces high satisfaction and pride; generates mental and/or financial reward; and presents measurable progress toward excellence."
Listen For Yearnings: Like an internal magnet, yearnings pull us toward one thing (strength) instead of another, beginning in early childhood and continuing throughout life. One's life work often begins in yearnings from childhood. Friendly advice can derail us from our strengths when we confuse it for a yearning.
Watch For Satisfactions: Great emotional and mental rewards come from activities we "get a kick out of doing." Satisfactions are not fleeting pleasures, but form our intrinsic motivation. Both satisfactions and yearnings cluster around strengths. Competencies and satisfactions don't always align. If it doesn't feel good, it's probably not a strength.
Watch For Rapid Learning: If you catch on to something quickly, you're probably good at it, and will say, "I feel like I've always known how to do this." A strength is always characterized by initial rapid learning that continues throughout one's lifetime.
Glimpses of Excellence: We see signs of strength in glimpses of excellence within a performance, such as singing a song, writing a letter, giving a speech. A performance is a series of "moments" which provide clues to greatness.
Total Performance For Excellence: The behavior flows and there are no conscious steps in the mind of the performer. The performer is acting on automatic -- time has stopped. Total performance is much more than a glimpse; it is the complete extension of an activity. It happens consistently, and is repeatable.
BOTTOMLINE: Measurable Progress Toward Excellence is a series of activities that are systematic, cyclical, consistent and repeatable.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
The New Rules for CEOs
The Six Sigma master, Jack Welch, was once the undisputed authority in management.
But Fortune Magazine is now finding that today's smart CEOs are following a different set of rules.
The New Rules for CEOs:
But Fortune Magazine is now finding that today's smart CEOs are following a different set of rules.
The New Rules for CEOs:
- Agile is best; being big can bite you.
- Find a niche, create something new.
- The customer is king.
- Look out, not in.
- Hire passionate people.
- Hire a courageous CEO.
- Admire my soul.
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Reasons for New Executive Failure
Candidates for executive positions frequently experience “organ rejection” – being rejected by companies if they don't fit in with its culture, according to research from Salveson Stetson Group, a full-service retained executive search firm.
“Lack of cultural fit is one of the biggest reasons why newly recruited executives fail,” according to Sally Stetson, co-founder and principal with the 10-year-old executive search firm. “Assessing the suitability of candidates to an organization’s culture can significantly improve the success rate of new hires.”
John Salveson, co-founder and principal with Salveson Stetson Group added, “Candidates may have outstanding technical skills, accomplishments that match the job requirements, and have worked at the ‘right’ companies, but their leadership styles, interpersonal skills, and approaches to making decisions may not mesh with the way the company works. A candidate who was enormously successful in one company can fall flat on his or her face with another due to culture fit issues.”
BOTTOMLINE: To increase the success rate of newly recruited executives:
“Lack of cultural fit is one of the biggest reasons why newly recruited executives fail,” according to Sally Stetson, co-founder and principal with the 10-year-old executive search firm. “Assessing the suitability of candidates to an organization’s culture can significantly improve the success rate of new hires.”
John Salveson, co-founder and principal with Salveson Stetson Group added, “Candidates may have outstanding technical skills, accomplishments that match the job requirements, and have worked at the ‘right’ companies, but their leadership styles, interpersonal skills, and approaches to making decisions may not mesh with the way the company works. A candidate who was enormously successful in one company can fall flat on his or her face with another due to culture fit issues.”
BOTTOMLINE: To increase the success rate of newly recruited executives:
- Consider using behavioral assessments (such as those offered by Six Disciplines Leadership Centers)
- Consider using candidate 360 feedback surveys (such as those offered by Six Disciplines Leadership Centers)
- Assess your own organization's culture (consider attending a training session called "Building Company-Wide Accountability" - offered by Six Disciplines Leadership Centers)
- Assess your own organization's hiring process (consider attening a training session called "Finding and Keeping The Right People" - offered by Six Disciplines Leadership Centers)
Friday, July 07, 2006
How To Read A Business Book - Part II
About 3,000 new business books are published each year in the U.S. (according to the Economist). That’s roughly 57 new books each week when, for most of us, reading even one a week feels like an accomplishment.
How do you keep up? How do you read a business book?
Andrew Hargadon offers his tips here:
How do you keep up? How do you read a business book?
Andrew Hargadon offers his tips here:
- Read wisely.
- Don’t read.
- Read efficiently.
- Read skeptically.
- Finally, read the reviews.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
The CEO's Job - Creating Lasting Value
What is authentic leadership for the small business CEO?
We need to spend more time developing the next generation of authentic leaders within our companies.
Failure to develop outstanding successors has forced far too many organizations to look outside for the next chief executive.
Typically, CEOs don’t design anything, make anything or sell anything. Their job is to create the strategies for building the business and to create the kind of positive environment that enables our employees to do these vital jobs.
The only way to build lasting value in our companies is to focus on our missions, our customers and our employees.
BOTTOMLINE: So what will create lasting value?
We need to spend more time developing the next generation of authentic leaders within our companies.
Failure to develop outstanding successors has forced far too many organizations to look outside for the next chief executive.
Typically, CEOs don’t design anything, make anything or sell anything. Their job is to create the strategies for building the business and to create the kind of positive environment that enables our employees to do these vital jobs.
The only way to build lasting value in our companies is to focus on our missions, our customers and our employees.
BOTTOMLINE: So what will create lasting value?
- Building your business by pursuing your mission with a passion.
- Connecting every day with your employees.
- Being out with your customers looking for great ideas for growth.
- Being true to your core values in every decision.
- Building an enduring organization of authentic leaders from top to bottom.
- Getting results for all your stakeholders, not just the shareholder of the past five minutes.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Passion Is Why
"To live is to choose. But to choose, you must know who you are and what you stand for, where you want to go, and why you want to get there….”
In business, our Mission and Values statements spell out who we are and what we stand for.
Our Vision statement gives where we want to go, and our Strategy gives us the how.
But the why is missing.
Passion is the why.
Read the entire article on Beyond Motivation - Passion
In business, our Mission and Values statements spell out who we are and what we stand for.
Our Vision statement gives where we want to go, and our Strategy gives us the how.
But the why is missing.
Passion is the why.
Read the entire article on Beyond Motivation - Passion
Four Questions Every Leader Must Ask
Ed Brenegar, over at Leading Questions, offers up his Impact Leadership Survey.
Rather than focusing on SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats), Ed increasingly talks with his clients about how they understand their impact.
The four questions?
Rather than focusing on SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats), Ed increasingly talks with his clients about how they understand their impact.
The four questions?
- Over the past year, what has been your IMPACT?
- WHO have you Impacted in the past year?
- What OPPORTUNITIES do you have now that you didn’t have a year ago?
- What PROBLEMS or OBSTACLES have You created?
Take the survey yourself ....here.
Productivity and Quality of Life
The Association of Executive Search Consultants (AESC) have revealed a sea-change in the attitudes of corporate high-flyers, with a growing number rejecting long hours and the scramble up the corporate ladder in favour of better quality of life.
Some of their recent findings:
Some of their recent findings:
- 53% of those questioned said they have not achieved a satisfactory work-life balance.
- 46% felt that their work-life balance had changed for the worse over the past five years.
- 60% complained that technologies such as the BlackBerry and mobile phone are further eroding the boundaries between work and personal life.
- 56% of the current generation said that they would strongly consider refusing a promotion if it negatively affected their work-life balance.
BOTTOMLINE: "Top senior executives are hard to come by, and this survey suggests that executives are beginning to carefully measure the cost of their personal lives against the value of their professional goals. Employers need to be more creative and nimble in today's market and some negotiating tactics may include being more sensitive to candidate work-life balance needs. If employers do not listen, their competitors surely will."
Friday, June 30, 2006
Ready for Q3?
April, May and June have flown by a-- nd Q2 ends today.
Did you meet your quarterly goals? And are you on track to meet your annual goals?
James Sagar over at Marketing M.O. provides a great list of things to do (even if you're not in marketing!)
BOTTOMLINE: If you were working from an Individual Plan (IP) as described in Discipline IV. Work the Plan, you'd know exactly where you were toward meeting your goals.
Did you meet your quarterly goals? And are you on track to meet your annual goals?
James Sagar over at Marketing M.O. provides a great list of things to do (even if you're not in marketing!)
BOTTOMLINE: If you were working from an Individual Plan (IP) as described in Discipline IV. Work the Plan, you'd know exactly where you were toward meeting your goals.
Creating An Engaged Workforce
Accenture (the large management consulting firm), revealed in a recent survey of business executives, that 72 percent of these leaders consider employee engagement to be critically important to the competitive success of their companies.
Accenture's research found that workforce engagement can be measured using the following characteristics:
Accenture's research found that workforce engagement can be measured using the following characteristics:
- Satisfaction
- Understanding
- Contribution
- Alignment
- Retention
- Rewards and Recognition
- Human Capital Infrastructure
- Learning Management
- Knowledge Management
- Performance Appraisal
- Workplace Design
- Employee Relations
- Career Development
- Human capital strategy
- Recruiting
BOTTOMLINE: Small businesses can create an engaged workforce -- in fact, small businesses have a distinct advantage over much larger businesses to do so. Many of these approaches for e effective for improving employee engagement are part of the Six Disciplines Methodology.
How To Think About Performance Appraisals
Employee reviews, performance appraisals...they're enough to raise the hair on the back of your neck...unless...
While I didn't meet John Porcaro while I worked at Microsoft, here he offers his 15-year Microsoft-centric view on approaching reviews (from his own perspective):
(Thanks to Max at SuccessFactors for the tip)
While I didn't meet John Porcaro while I worked at Microsoft, here he offers his 15-year Microsoft-centric view on approaching reviews (from his own perspective):
- Take time to reflect
- Think of your review as a living resume
- Be thorough
- Go with metrics
- Make it about YOU
- Don’t worry too much about missing an agreed-upon deadline
- Don’t forget the “extra credit.”
- If there’s something negative to say, bring it up yourself
- Sometimes mistakes can be the best thing
- Realize that half the equation is perception
- Don’t sweat the review
- Ask your manager to edit some of their negative comments
- Don’t put it off until the last minute
(Thanks to Max at SuccessFactors for the tip)
Decker Marketing Reviews "Six Disciplines for Excellence"
In his review, "Six Disciplines for Excellence -- Strategic Prioritization, "Sam Decker, blogger of Decker Marketing, singles out the implementation focus of Six Disciplines:
"Here’s what differentiates this book: it bridges concept and principles to execution.
Most books focus 80% on principles and 20% on implementation. This book is 80% implementation."
BOTTOMLINE: Sam sums up his review: "For pragmatists and those who love execution, I give this book a strong recommend. Buy Six Disciplines of Excellence."
"Here’s what differentiates this book: it bridges concept and principles to execution.
Most books focus 80% on principles and 20% on implementation. This book is 80% implementation."
BOTTOMLINE: Sam sums up his review: "For pragmatists and those who love execution, I give this book a strong recommend. Buy Six Disciplines of Excellence."
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
More On Management Fads
FastCompany is looking into the reasons why management trends (fads, new ideas) don't last long.
Their assessment?
Their assessment?
- Consultants offer services in which they lack expertise
- New ideas come and go faster and faster
- People try to apply the same idea to too many dissimilar problems
- New practices and processes don't work for every organization
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
Leadership Pitfalls
The Top 10 Leadership Pitfalls revealed in a recent survey by Quality Digest:
- 35% - Past and habits
- 29% - Economic climate or budget
- 23% - Company culture
- 20% - Way they work together
- 18% - Senior management team
- 18% - Customers
- 14% - CEO/president lack of confidence
- 13% - Technology
- 11% - Middle management
- 9% - Reputation
- 7% - Human resource management or employees
BOTTOMLINE: Respondents also indicated that the most important things to ensure successful strategy execution include:
- Creating a clear strategy
- Adding a specific plan
- Communicating what the plan is
- Rewarding employees for following the plan
- Continuing employee communication
However, even when companies do the alignment process well, their past and culture can derail execution, as the alignment of people and strategy isn’t enough for long-term success.
High-Performance Workforce Research
Accenture just released its latest findings on the High Performance Workforce. The research, Accenture High Performance Workforce Study, is conducted approximately every 18 months to measure workforce management trends among executives in large corporations in the United States, Europe and Australia.
Among the most recent research findings:
Among the most recent research findings:
- Only 20% of respondents said the vast majority of their employees understand their companies’ strategy and what’s needed to be successful in their industry.
- Just one in 10 respondents reported being very satisfied with the performance of his or her human resources (HR) and training functions (11 percent and 10 percent, respectively.)
- 42% of respondents described capturing and sharing knowledge as a challenge or a severe challenge for their companies.
- 60% of respondents reported that, over the next five years, they expect to begin feeling the impact of the aging workforce and the impending retirement of baby boomers.
BOTTOMLINE: “A company’s ability to manage its workforce strategically and develop its capabilities will set it apart from its competitors. Some companies focus well on one or two aspects of human capital management, such as learning or internal communications, but the best take a broad view of managing their workforce. These are the companies that vastly increase their chances of being industry leaders.”
Monday, June 26, 2006
The World Cup of Leadership
The World Cup is perhaps the greatest sporting event in the world, and truly a global championship. Every four years, after exhaustive qualifying rounds, the top 32 nations in the world compete against each other for the right to be called world champions for the coming four years.
Every match matters. Every win and loss counts towards becoming a true world champion. The team that wins will have some great players, but the team with all the best players does not always win.
As in business, great leaders know these six rules:
- LONG-TERM SUCCESS, SHORT-TERM RESULTS
- CHOOSING THE RIGHT TEAM IS CRITICAL
- WINNING AS A STATE OF MIND
- PASSION, PLANNING AND EXECUTION
- POSITVE LEADER RELATIONSHIPS
- NEVER SATISFIED WITH THE STATUS QUO
Read the entire article here.
Leadership Lessons from Jack Welch
Leadership lessons from Jack Welch (former CEO of General Electric)
- Lead More, Manage Less (lessons 1-10)
- Build a Winning Organization (lessons 11-15)
- Harness Your People for Competitive Advantage (lessons 16-20)
- Build the Market-Leading Company (lessons 21-25)
Friday, June 23, 2006
Vision, World-Class Organizations, and Six Disciplines
According to thought-leader Ken Blanchard, all world-class organizations are driven by three critical factors:
- Clear vision and direction championed by top management
- Trained and equipped people focused on implementation of the agreed-upon vision and direction
- Established recognition and positive consequence systems that sustain the behaviors and performance that the vision and direction require
- Clear vision (Discipline I-D Renew The Vision) and direction championed by top management (Discipline II - Set Goals That Lead)
- Trained and equipped people (Discipline II-D Engage The Team) focused on implementation (Discipline IV - Work The Plan) of the agreed-upon vision and direction (Discipline III-F Align People)
- Established recognition and positive consequence systems (Discipline V-D Recognize Contribution) that sustain the behaviors and performance that the vision and direction require
SMB Trend Wire: Podcast About Six Disciplines
Anita Campbell, the Visionary, TrendSpotter, Futurist, and Editor of Small Business Trends E’Zine, Small Biz Advisor - along with Steve Rucinski of Small Business CEO fame, get together on SMB TrendWire for a podcast interview with Six Disciplines CEO and founder, Gary Harpst.
According to Anita:
“If you have a chance to listen to only one small business podcast, you definitely want to listen to Gary Harpst.
There is nothing like Six Disciplines and I guarantee you will get a tremendous amount out of his talk."
BOTTOMLINE: Listen to the very insightful interview here.
According to Anita:
“If you have a chance to listen to only one small business podcast, you definitely want to listen to Gary Harpst.
There is nothing like Six Disciplines and I guarantee you will get a tremendous amount out of his talk."
BOTTOMLINE: Listen to the very insightful interview here.
Small Business CEO: "There is Always Waste, Find it Now!"
"There's more wasted activity in your organization than you imagine."
These jarring words are part of the advice Gary Harpst received from another CEO that eventually prompted him to found Six Disciplines Corporation.
According to the Steve at Small Busines CEO:
"Six Disciplines is unlike anything I've seen for small businesses.
It's a book.
It's a methodology.
It's technology.
It's a coaching system.
It's something you'll be hearing a lot more about."
BOTTOMLINE: Listen to the entire interview on Small Business CEO: "There is Always Waste, Find it Now!"
These jarring words are part of the advice Gary Harpst received from another CEO that eventually prompted him to found Six Disciplines Corporation.
According to the Steve at Small Busines CEO:
"Six Disciplines is unlike anything I've seen for small businesses.
It's a book.
It's a methodology.
It's technology.
It's a coaching system.
It's something you'll be hearing a lot more about."
BOTTOMLINE: Listen to the entire interview on Small Business CEO: "There is Always Waste, Find it Now!"
Top Ten Innovation Killers
Discipline V. Innovate Purposefully, is unlike the other five Disciplines, because it primarily provides principles and tools that are used in day-to-day execution of the steps in the other disciplines. Innovating purposefully...is a mindset that permeates the culture of an excellent organization." (page 180)
A recent Harvard eLearning Alert stated “70% of all business initiatives fail.”
Joyce Wycoff articulates the Top 10 Reasons for Innovation Failure:
A recent Harvard eLearning Alert stated “70% of all business initiatives fail.”
Joyce Wycoff articulates the Top 10 Reasons for Innovation Failure:
- Not creating a culture that supports innovation
- Not getting buy-in and ownership from business unit managers
- Not having a widely understood, system-wide process
- Not allocating resources to the process
- Not tying projects to company strategy
- Not spending enough time and energy on the fuzzy front-end
- Not building sufficient diversity into the process
- Not developing criteria and metrics in advance
- Not training and coaching innovation teams
- Not having an idea management system
BOTTOMLINE: While it's probably impossible to compute the exact percentage of business initiatives that fail, it is widely acknowledged that most do. After years of research and observation, it is clear that the same reasons for any change initiative failure tend to be the same culprits that make innovation initiatives fail.
Six Disciplines Leadership Center of Central Indiana Names GM
Six Disciplines Corporation today announced that it has named Chip McLean to take the leadership role of General Manager and owner with the newly added franchise of Six Disciplines Leadership Center of Central Indiana, located in Indianapolis.
The Six Disciplines Leadership Center of Central Indiana will service clients in the greater Indianapolis area, extending to the East and West state borders, North to Marion and South to Seymour, Indiana.
The Six Disciplines Leadership Center of Central Indiana is scheduled to be operational in June of 2006. For more information, contact Chip McLean at 317.691.3169 or email CMcLean@SixDisciplines.com. Visit the Six Disciplines Leadership Center of Central Indiana on the web at www.SixDisciplines.com/Indy
Read the entire release here.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Advantages of Small Businesses
Compared to small businesses, large corporations have more money, name recognition and benefits to attract the best and brightest employees. But bigger doesn't always mean better. And small-business owners smart enough to lure them are finding hires eager to help them build their companies.
What are the advantages? Here are lures that are working for small business owners:
What are the advantages? Here are lures that are working for small business owners:
- The chance to make a difference
- The freedom to make decisions
- The sense of teamwork and camaraderie
- The flexibility to balance work and life
- The room to grow
Check out the rest of this June 2006 article from MyBusinessMag.com
Leadership in Sports: Pat Riley
For Pat Riley, head coach of the World Champion Miami Heat, the NBA championship is a promise fulfilled from 11 years ago to Miami Heat fans. He now has a championship ring for all the fingers on hand; the third-most among NBA coaches.
In the waning moments of difficult games, the Heat seemed to indeed get stronger and summon the very best from all their players. The Heat went on to win three more (four consecutive NBA Finals games), becoming only the third team in league history to win despite an 0-2 deficit.
Read more about this "master of motivation" here.
In the waning moments of difficult games, the Heat seemed to indeed get stronger and summon the very best from all their players. The Heat went on to win three more (four consecutive NBA Finals games), becoming only the third team in league history to win despite an 0-2 deficit.
Read more about this "master of motivation" here.
Dealing With Poor Performance
According to a survey by Sirota Survey Intelligence, a company’s failure to deal effectively with its few workers who are consistently poor performers may decrease the extent to which other employees are engaged in their jobs and their companies.
Key findings:
Key findings:
- Only two out of five employees (slightly more so for management) who feel their companies are doing much too little to correct poor employee performance are favorably engaged at work.
- 33% of management and 43%of non-management employees think their companies are not doing enough to deal with poor performers.
- A very small percentage of employees at a typical workplace – usually around only 5% – are ‘allergic to work,’ and do as little work as they possibly can.
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Strategic Planning and the Learning Organization
Harvard Business review's excerpt of "The Origin of Wealth, Eric D. Beinhocker" reveals a radical new of economics as a highly dynamic and evolving system with implications for companies and organizations everywhere.
His assertions?
His assertions?
- Rather than thinking of strategy as a single plan built on predictions of the future, we should think of strategy as a portfolio of experiments, a population of competing Business Plans that evolves over time.
There are some general lessons that can be learned from a portfolio-of-experiments approach to strategy.
- Management needs to create a context for strategy. Constructing a portfolio of experiments requires a collective understanding of the current situation and shared aspirations among the management team.
- Management needs a process for differentiating Business Plans that results in a portfolio of diverse Plans.
- The organization needs to create a selection environment that mirrors the environment in the market. Fourth and finally, processes need to be established that enable the amplification of successful Business Plans and the elimination of unsuccessful Plans.
This shift in perspective implies a major redesign of the strategic planning process:
- First, the process should be focused on structuring in-depth discussion and debate among principal decision makers.
- Second, the process must be fueled by facts and analysis
- Third, there must be other forums clearly designated for decision making.
BOTTOMLINE: "If the strategy process becomes overburdened with near-term decisions on budgets, setting targets, and allocating capital, then learning goes out the window. The decision-making forums should be linked to, but separate from, the strategic learning process. Again, the focus of the strategy forum should be setting context to inform the design and management of the portfolio of experiments."
Monday, June 19, 2006
Leadership Challenges
Management-Issues published a study of more than 1,400 leaders and managers by global consultancy the Ken Blanchard Group, which revealed the following:
- 41% felt inappropriate use of communication or listening was the biggest mistake leaders made when working with others.
- More than 25% felt the major failing was in under or over-supervising people, providing a lack of, or too much, direction and delegating, either too little or too much.
- A lack of management skills was cited by 14%.
- A lack of or inappropriate support by 12%.
- A lack of accountability by 5%.
- 43% cited the most critical skill a leader could possess was communicating and listening (followed by effective management skills, emotional intelligence and empathy, values and integrity, vision and empowerment.)
- A whopping 82% said that of the top five things leaders and managers failed to do when working with others, the one that came up the most was not providing appropriate feedback.
- 81% said failing to listen or involve others in the process was nearly as big a failing.
- 76% felt leaders failed to set clear goals and objectives
BOTTOMLINE: "It seems that many leaders out there do not have even the most basic, critical leadership skills they need to do their job properly and this is bad news for business. We all know leaders hold the key to organizational success. Bad leadership leads, ultimately, to low organizational vitality, high staff turnover and poor customer loyalty."
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