StrategyDriven Management Observation Program Best Practice

Management Observation Program Best Practice 12 – Documented Management Observation Program

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StrategyDriven Management Observation Program Best Practice ArticleEffective performance improvement programs promote alignment of business operations with the organization’s vision, mission, values, and goals. Such programs consistently identify opportunities to improve high value-adding operations and to eliminate low value-adding activities. These programs themselves are highly efficient and capable of producing repeatable results. Documenting the business performance assessment process provides the framework necessary to achieve this level of focused execution consistency.[wcm_restrict plans=”41963, 25542, 25653″]

Components of a Well-Documented Management Observation Process

Well-documented processes are clear, concise, and comprehensive; easily understood and executed by those participating in its performance. Consequently, the management observation process should contain the following documents:

  • Process Procedure containing:
    • Introduction and Overview describing the management observation process, its role in the organization’s overall performance improvement program, and desired outcomes to be achieved
    • Roles and Responsibilities listing the obligations, by role, of those individuals participating in the management observation process
    • Precautions and Limitations listing the risks that may arise during the performance of an observation and the associated mitigating actions to be taken
    • Procedure providing step-by-step instructions on how to perform a management observation
    • References listing supporting documentation, commitments, etcetera
    • Glossary listing acronyms and terms with associated definitions
    • Exhibits providing forms and checklists to be used when performing observations
  • Management Observation Topical Areas Schedules and/or Quotas typically updated on an annual basis
  • Management Observation Program Metrics monitoring overall process execution performance and follow-up improvement activities
  • Management Observation Program Basis Document providing detailed program implementation information including:
    • Program Overview describing the overarching management observation program, its role in the organization’s overall performance improvement program, and desired outcomes to be achieved
    • Program Maturity Model revealing the performance characteristics of a management observation program across five sequential maturity dimensions
    • Roles & Responsibilities listing the obligations, by role, of those individuals participating in the management observation program
    • Global Principles, Best Practices, and Warning Flags applying across the program as a whole
    • Program Performance Measures including definitions
    • Process Flowchart showing activity-by-activity flow of the management observation process including its interrelationship with other programs
    • Process Flowchart Functional Description providing the underlying performance details associated with each program activity
    • Activity Principles, Best Practices, and Warning Flags applying to an individual program activity or group of activities
    • Forms and Checklists including use instructions
    • Glossary listing acronyms and terms with associated definitions
  • Management Observation Training Program for those assigned and potentially performing management observations

Final Thought…

In our experience, it is the function of the Management Observation Program Manager to oversee the development, training, implementation, and maintenance of these documents. Centralizing responsibility for the program in this way further contributes to the consistent performance of individual management observations.[/wcm_restrict][wcm_nonmember plans=”41963, 25542, 25653″]

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About the Author

Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven Principal is a StrategyDriven Principal and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.

Skills necessary to compete in rapidly evolving markets

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Speed, agility, communication, delegation, innovation

You’ve heard the saying “fighting the last war”. It refers to preparing to compete using familiar techniques, against competitors you’ve faced before, in the same markets or industries, only to discover that the rules have changed. Modern business competition is changing rapidly, and to compete effectively, you need to understand the skills that are required to win.

[wcm_restrict]For the last few decades, most companies have met their competition in a head to head, feature to feature battle that creates a significant amount of “me too” products with little differentiation other than price. This lack of differentiation leads to commoditization. In these market battles everyone eventually loses, because quality, customer service and margins fall. The feature to feature competition is called “attrition”, and it’s adopted from the military, where the goal is to overwhelm and defeat a competitor, regardless of the cost. But attrition relies on size, deep pockets and slowly evolving markets in order to succeed. Increasingly, that’s not the competitive landscape most companies are facing.

Instead, what we see now is a demand for more speed, more agility, more innovation, because the competitive landscape is shifting. This maneuver strategy seeks to win by building competitive insights, taking valuable positions before competitors recognize them, and attacking competitors in areas of recognized weakness. Maneuver seeks to win the most at the least possible cost, understanding that slow and steady no longer wins the race.

Rupert Murdoch said recently that the victory no longer goes to the large over the small, but to the fast over the slow. Large, bureaucratic companies are slow to move and slow to change. They don’t compete based on strategic insight, speed or agility. Instead they hope to slowly wear down their opponents, gradually forcing them over a market or segment after a long struggle. When markets were more stable, when consumers were less demanding, when it was more difficult to enter a market as a new competitor, this strategy made sense. It doesn’t any longer.

Shifting market demands require more speed and agility. Consumers demand new products spawned from innovation. Rather than consider these factors in isolation, maneuver provides a rationale to think strategically about speed, agility and innovation. Thinking isn’t enough, however. You need people who can execute new strategies, who can compete in new ways in order to remain competitive and to grow in the new market realities. What kinds of people are necessary to conduct maneuver strategies and tactics? What skills and capabilities does your organization need to succeed?

While attrition strategy is relative simplistic, maneuver strategy requires more careful planning and execution. Attrition seeks to mimic or copy existing solutions and engage competitors in head to head competition. Maneuver looks for overlooked opportunities, valuable but unoccupied positions, or seeks to attack competitors indirectly. For these reasons, maneuver requires more competitive insight and intelligence gathering, identifying emerging segments and competitor tendencies. Maneuver also requires people who can interpret the intelligence and make rapid decisions. Maneuver requires people who can innovate new solutions for new and existing customers. From these requirements and others we can see that competing with maneuver strategy requires new skills and capabilities, including:

  • The ability to move quickly and decisively, using speed in two dimensions: planning speed and execution speed
  • The ability to shift course, act nimbly and to demonstrate agility
  • The ability to gather and interpret information about customers, markets and competitors
  • The ability to move quickly and quietly to valuable new positions, to act in a stealthy manner
  • The ability to communicate clearly and accurately as new needs evolve or circumstances change
  • The ability to delegate effectively. Agility and speed require delegation
  • The ability to understand new needs and innovate new solutions

These skills and capabilities are what new competitive markets and strategies demand. Does your existing workforce have the skills to compete as markets, competitors and consumers create rapidly changing market conditions? Can you afford to react to markets that are constantly changing, or can you begin to develop the skills necessary to remain competitive?

Maneuver strategy demands a new kind of thinking, but more importantly a new kind of workforce. Already we can see demands for more speed, more agility and more innovation. Approaching these demands as discrete requirements may be helpful, but providing an integrated approach as proposed by maneuver strategy places these demands in context. Speed, agility and innovation provide maneuverability, but only when the critical resources of an organization – its people – are able to perform.

Is your workforce ready to compete in an entirely new way? Does it have the ability to develop and interpret competitive insights and draw conclusions about emerging opportunities? Can it move quickly and decisively to new conclusions? Does it have the ability to change direction quickly? Does your workforce communicate effectively and clearly, in order to delegate responsibility quickly and effectively? Does your workforce have the capability to innovate consistently? If not, you may find your market share and profits eroding, and face dramatic disruption.

OutManeuver describes the strategies needed to compete in the emerging new market and the kinds of people and skills that will help you compete.[/wcm_restrict][wcm_nonmember]

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About the Authors

Jeffrey Phillips leads a strategy and innovation practice at OVO Innovation. Before OVO he has led strategic marketing and sales teams in software and consulting companies. Jeffrey is a recognized thought leader in innovation, and has published three books on innovation, including Relentless Innovation. He has consulted in the US and Western Europe, and led training programs and workshops in the Middle East, South Africa, South America and Southeast Asia.

Alex Verjovsky brings over 20 years’ experience in the consulting and technology sectors as both a consultant and entrepreneur. His most recent company, Castor Fields SAPI, reached over 12 billion dollars in sales. Prior to Castor Fields, Alex founded BioFuel Alternatives, a pioneer in the biodiesel market. Alex is a graduate of Columbia Business School.

Bruce Piasecki

New World Companies: The Future Of Capitalism

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How does a good company generate value in society? How do the leaders of these new world companies reshape and remake our families’ available goods, our friendship networks, and the many smaller firms that support them?

As a management consultant to over a hundred firms in the last thirty years, my team and I have worked with global companies such as Toyota, Suncor, Siemens, and FedEx, to name a few, to help them transform into new world companies – companies ready to take on the challenges of today’s global economy. In doing this, I derived a way to describe how companies mature by seeing the process as a symbolic clock of corporate competitiveness. As this concept evolved, I came to focus not on the clock itself, but on what it represents: time. Furthermore, I’ve broken down the time periods into segments that represent significant stages in the life of a global business. I often refer to these timeframes as “urgencies,” because, as I view it, corporations must accomplish the business goals outlined within each time period if they are to be successful.

Throughout the years, I have revised my description of these timeframes in a company’s life to take into account the emergence of what I call social response capitalism. I became increasingly aware of the financial ramifications of social response capitalism while working with new world companies. I came to see how each company contributes to this most important new business movement in decades, and why this evolution is crucial to the health of any company – whether a large global corporation or a small regional family business.

[wcm_restrict]The Six Timeframes of a Company’s Life

The first of the six timeframes in the life of a company can be summarized by the term “profit margin improvement.” Increasing revenues and profits is of primary significance for success in this initial stage.

During the second timeframe of a company’s life, business practices must focus on improving efficiency in the areas of manufacturing, distribution, and sales. The essentials of efficient manufacturing include improving the automation of the manufacturing process, and finding outsourcers who can reduce production costs. A company’s sales and distribution may produce as much as 80 percent of its profits. What has become known as distribution channel realignment is a crucial area in which companies can significantly enhance performance. This may include strategies such as broadening networks, reducing transportation costs, and improving customer service.

Enhanced performance expedites the third stage of a company’s life: expansion of its global customer base. Successful companies must develop globally if they hope to remain competitive. Expansion may not be the “mother” of invention, but it certainly is the “sibling.”

Presuming a company progresses to a successful third phase – and only a few do – its fourth stage must focus on product differentiation. In the extremely competitive environment of global business, companies must continually increase the recognizability of their products against those of their competitors. Once this goal is attained, the corporation enters the fifth stage – reducing risk factors for investors. Whatever companies produce, they must do so with fewer financial and operational risks than their competitors.

The sixth and final stage of a successful global business focuses on environmental, social, and governance practices – three areas of concern that lie outside company operations. This recently evolved step involves a company’s efforts in responding to the social concerns of its customers and clients; having these actions recognized by the analysts and investment managers who assess its likelihood of success.

This is social response capitalism. One of the most significant ways of evaluating a company’s prospects and performance rests with its social products differentiation. This involves the assimilation of “social response values” into its products and services. Throughout the years – as I’ve refined my approach to corporate success by adding social concerns as measurable criteria – I’ve come to realize that this sixth stage is necessary not only for corporate success, but also for corporate survival.

Unless a firm takes into account the profound changes that have become part of the new global corporate culture, it can neither thrive nor can it survive.

Circle of Urgencies[/wcm_restrict][wcm_nonmember]

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About the Author

Bruce PiaseckiBruce Piasecki, PhD, is president and founder of AHC Group, Inc., a management consulting firm specializing in energy, materials, and environmental corporate matters, and is author of New World Companies: The Future of Capitalism. This article is adapted from material in his new book.

For more information visit ahcgroup.com.

Affordable Business Consulting - Experienced Advisors

Affordable Business Consulting – Experienced Advisors

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StrategyDriven’s radically different approach to management consulting provides you the access you want – no more and no less – to the business executives and senior managers who have the hard-earned experience needed to get the job done faster, better, and ultimately cheaper.

 
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Harry Hutson and Martha Johnson

Leaders: Build Your Pre-Resilience for Times of Crisis

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Your organization is going to face a crisis. This is not a question of IF but WHEN. Our world is too complex, markets too volatile, and technology too fast-paced for us to relax into complacency about organizational safety and normalcy.

What’s a leader to do? How is a leader to be ready? How can leaders prepare, knowing disasters are becoming commonplace?

[wcm_restrict]We explored those questions while researching for our recent book, Navigating an Organizational Crisis: When Leadership Matters Most, (available on Amazon) and came away with some insight about how leaders might ready themselves. We call it “pre-resilience.” The “pre” is intentional because it seems foolish to us to think that resilience is something that pops up when disasters test you. We believe there’s more to it than that. Just as you prepare your organization for disaster response, crisis communications, and continuity of operations, you can also prepare yourself.

The basic idea is to know and to appreciate that you already have a tremendous inventory of personal, internal data about how you respond in a crisis. Often it is overlooked or considered too trivial to study. Indeed, it is not and we encourage leaders to dig into it.

Our core suggestion is that you allow your own stories to inform you. We invite you to recall moments in your life in which something unexpected happened, something that surprised you and upset the norms of the day. These need not be major calamities such as divorce or illness. They can be much more mundane.

  • How do you act when you lose electricity?
  • What did you feel when your daughter smashed a tooth falling off a bike?
  • What were your instinctive priorities when you saw the 9/11 events on television?
  • How did you handle things when your checkbook revealed a significant error not in your favor?

You have probably hundreds of examples of experiences, and from them you can cull a sense of your tendencies and behaviors in the face of an unexpected turn of events or sudden difficulties.

As you collect your own examples, compare what you did in one incident with your response in another. Watch for the patterns. Step outside yourself for a moment and observe your behaviors. Much can be gleaned from your simple stories because you can see into the heart of each incident, uncluttered by the complexity of an organization, the pressures of the moment, and the trappings of your role as a leader.

Leaders have a wealth of human experience to draw on which should never be deep-sixed. For some reason, however, when people step into the executive suite there is an expectation that their behavior should be of a mold: heroic, upbeat, courageous, and perhaps larger than life. Setting a leader up like that can be a stifling and even self-defeating. The idea that leaders have some special aura only removes them further from their genuine, authentic, and human selves, which is precisely what they need at hand to help their stressed organizations.

Use your own stories to educate yourself. Take some time to do this now – because there is no free time during a crisis to be wondering if your behavior is normal and consistent with who you are. Organizations turn to their leaders with intensified demands during crisis. Start building your pre-resilience muscles now.[/wcm_restrict][wcm_nonmember]

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About the Authors

Harry Hutson and Martha JohnsonA 25-year veteran in senior human resources and leadership and development roles in four multinational companies, Harry Hutson is now an independent consultant. He has passion for talent development, change management, organizational integration, and – most of all – finding a way when people feel lost or confused and tough choices need to be made. He lives in Chapel Hill, NC and teaches classes in Executive Education and the MBA Program at the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina.

Martha Johnson is a leadership expert who draws on the lessons she learned as an executive with a more than 35-year career in business and government. Johnson is former Administrator of the General Services Administration under President Obama and also served for eight years in the Clinton Administration. Her private sector career has spanned the information technology, architecture, strategic consulting, and automotive industries.