Category Archives: Strategy/Planning

Critical Element Missing from Fast Company 3M Article on Innovation

Fast Company published an interesting article about an old story, 3M’s innovation culture yesterday, “How 3M Gave Everyone Days Off and Created an Innovation Dynamo” by Kaomi Goetz. The article repeats the well-known story of 3M’s policy of giving employees time to … Continue reading

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Why Should You Develop a Business Plan for Going Concern, How to Do It, and How Do You Convert the Plan Into Action?

Why Should You Develop a Business Plan? For every startup the development of a business plan is a  required first step. It is so obvious – business schools have course on writing the business plan and it is impossible to … Continue reading

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The 6 New Management Imperatives by Bruce Temkin – comments

Bruce Temkin has published a free book on his blog[[1]], The 6 New Management Imperatives – Leadership Skills for a Radically Changed Business Environment. Mr. Temkin sets out to define a “new set of skills” for managers. These are the … Continue reading

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Podcast – Delegation (Outsourcing) and Keeping a Focus on Strategy and Results

Delegation and Outsourcing Share a Common Management Focus on What Needs To be Done, What Are the Results Required, and When?

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Delegation (Outsourcing) and Keeping a Focus on Strategy and Results

Delegation and outsourcing share many management requirements. And they illustrate the overlap between the personal and organization spheres. Both benefit from a more nuanced use of the general management maxim, “Build on Your Strengths”. Both require a substantial understanding of what needs to be done, how it should be done, the results required, and the needed timelines. And, finally, both require ongoing management involvement to assure that those responsible for the tasks or functions, whether individuals or vendors, succeed. Continue reading

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Podcast: Outsourcing – not a strategy that is as simple as a make or buy decision

Outsourcing is sometimes seen as a panacea, especially for startups. However, a sound knowledge of  business practices is required to make outsourcing really work.

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Outsourcing – not a strategy that is as simple as a make or buy decision

Outsourcing functions is a key element of every business’s strategy. Richard Mammone, Rutgers University BEST Institute, has written a brief article, “Humility and the Successful Startup: Every skill required to form a business should be judged on make-or-buy grounds. If … Continue reading

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Time Management – is now the time to get beyond this distracting oxymoron?

Time management is an extremely popular topic. Is this productive? A Google search for the phrase “time management” returns the droll news that there are more than 14,900,000 responses. Amazon lists 448 books with ‘time management” in the title or … Continue reading

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Podcast – Increase Your Value Through Customer Perception in Professional Services

Increase customer perceived value by managing expectations, making services visible, and following up.

This podcast is 12 minutes 41 seconds long. A text version is available here

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Increase Your Value through Customer Perception in Professional Services

Most professional services firms, and many other companies where services are a significant component,  are troubled by customers who do not perceive or understand the true value of what they are providing. They have difficulty getting customers to pay for upfront diagnostic/assessment work,  concept modeling, … Continue reading

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