Productivity Management: An Essential Capability for Maximizing the Value of Operational Excellence
-Operational Excellence (OpEx) is a term that embodies many things that CEOs seek to achieve, such as consistent strategy execution, profitable growth and sustainable cost reduction. While there are many definitions of the term, most would agree that it entails focusing on customers, cross functional execution and consistent delivery of outcomes that create value for customers and shareholders. Whatever label is applied to these aspirations, organizations frequently fall short of fully achieving them. Especially in global organizations that exhibit the complexity characteristics shown below in Exhibit 1. Exhibit 1: Complexity Characteristics – As the number of complexity characteristics increase, Operational…
The Antidote for VUCA is OODA
-The date is September 15, 2008. The crisis in subprime mortgages had been going on for a little over a year. It was triggered in the last half of 2006 when house prices began to fall as the housing bubble in the United States burst. This caused those who had taken NINJA (No Income, No Job, or Assets) loans to buy their home, with the expectation that prices were going to increase five per-cent year on year forever, to default. This accelerated the decline in home prices which, in turn, accelerated the number of defaults – a financial and economic…
Procurement’s Technological Insanity
-“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” –Albert Einstein. Over on Sourcing Innovation, the Sourcing Doctor has an excellent series of posts on driving adoption of Procurement technology. As someone who spent most of the last 15 years in the field of Procurement technology: in a Procurement organization, as a user first and, then, as a project manager driving implementation projects, working for a provider and helping customers in their projects, The topic covered by the Sourcing Doctor is a topic that is close to my heart. Also, I have been working, at the end of last year, on a white paper…
Professional Development and Networking using Social Media
-If you are reading this, you probably engage in professional networking on social media. And if you are like me, you have been engaging for a very long time. The motivation is probably similar to mine. You want to learn and understand what’s going on in your profession, your industry, your community – and probably the world at large – so you can remain aware and up to date on the latest information and knowhow. And you want to meet people who can support you in your endeavors and aspirations and, hopefully, you want to help others in a similar…
Transformation vs Disruption
-Transformation… I am hearing more and more talk about how companies are seeking to transform themselves, or that they are launching a transformation initiative. And as expected, there is the corresponding increase in transformation conferences, symposia, articles and books. But what is “transformation”? One definition for transformation is; “a thorough or dramatic change in form or appearance.” “… thorough and dramatic…” Seems rather subjective. In essence, transformation occurs when something that was turns into something completely different. In nature, we can see examples of transformation when a caterpillar turns into a butterfly or when a volcano creates…
The Fault Lies Not in the Stars, but Within Ourselves
-I hear all too often from professionals in Continuous Improvement how “Senior Leadership does not give me the support I need”. Some go further by making the claim that “Senior Leadership just doesn’t understand”. And some go further still and make the suggesting there is a conscious, if not curious, effort by senior leaders to sabotage the Continuous Improvement programs. In the most extreme circumstances, some (mostly consultants) go as far as to position themselves, their profession, and their efforts as some sort of higher cause, almost as a religion, and look down upon the non-believers with a level of…
