During the late 90′s I was a turnaround GM over a a new leadership team. I happened to be rummaging through some notes last night and ran across a proposed article I had written called “25 Points of Growth”. This was based on training notes for the new leadership team. I had to laugh as the last page was missing… so here are the 18 points that were left.
By the way – that team of leaders – Mary Hopkins, John Prather, Ed Sullivan, and Robin MacDonald – were awesome!
Cheers!
1. Exploiting a business idea in a formulated paradigm versus creation of novelty with new frames of reference.
2. Overcome the misbelief that there is only one best way. Innovation results from differentiation and integration.
3. Shift from the notion of extractive value to constructive value.
4. Develop the real capability to look outside the traditional corporate constraints for innovation seeds.
5. Shift stagnant thinking from products and production to customers and company.
6. Recognize there are two views of share – your number of the total population and your share of the business with each individual customer.
7. Create a customer-centric philosophy:
- each customer is an individual,
- each is a source of business,
- we have an obligation to relationship competence, and
- relationships frame the transaction – not vice-versa.
8. Measure value-add in terms of how an activity increases customer loyalty to the company and increasing share-of-wallet.
9. Create a critical density of action. What level of resource mobilization can effectively be accomplished as measured by time, space, actors, and constellation? Design the mobilization based on:
- Time – when things can be done
- Place – where things can be done
- Actor – who can do what
- Constellation – with whom can it be done
10. Unbundled – are services able to generate fees, what piece drives the profit
11. Rebundle – re-link, connectivity, interactivity, reciprocity
12. Consider new transformations -
- Dematerialization
- Liquification – moving about
- Versatility – manifestation in different shapes
- Specialization – continuation of opportunities to relieve actors of performing tasks by more specialized actors.
13. Re-architect operational flows. Consider how the resource is utilized most effectively, context of future production, and context of information flow.
14. Apply lean techniques to look for economies of scope or scale in a different way.
15. Re-frame your mindset to be a Value Creator. They have an increasingly intuitive capability to align their realm of operation versus intellectual freedom. They start by systematically looking at the life cycle of the products and the total value creation for the customers and by the customer for the venture. In the way they frame themselves as an extension of their customers business (like Rackspace).
16. Really, in your gut, know what drives your customer’s effectiveness and efficiency. Two major opportunities are to relieve/reconfigure the customer system through the supplier system (aka Value Chain) or enable them to do things they were not able to do before.
17. Design the customer experience from a physical, intellectual, and emotional aspect.
18. Use branding as an asset strategy. By this I mean have a strategy for renewing and invigorating the brand that connects with your segmentation, targeting, and positioning audiences.
