About the Reference

The No Asshole Rule by Robert Sutton provides methods for constructively dealing with the workplace bullies, creeps, jerks, tyrants, tormentors, despots, backstabbers, and egomaniacs – regardless if they are seniors, peers, or subordinates. His research provides insight to the financial costs such hostilities have on an organization as well as the proven methods for effectively dealing with such ill-mannered individuals.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like The No Asshole Rule because its well researched strategies for dealing with hostility in the workplace provide effective methods for isolating these negative influences and restoring personal effectiveness. We further appreciate the insight Dr. Sutton presents to enable the reader to recognize instances where his/her behavior creates workplace hostility and how to eliminate such behavior.

We believe workplace hostility is a leading contributor of diminished moral, reduced productivity, and elevated attrition; all of which poison an organization’s culture and hurt its bottom line. (See StrategyDriven‘s Diversity and Inclusion topic area.) Effectively dealing with such hostility not only benefits the organization but helps the individual by reducing stress and increasing effectiveness. Dr. Sutton’s actionable methods for recognizing, isolating, and dealing with workplace hostilities – for becoming part of the solution rather than a perpetuator of the problem – in a manner that improves individual productivity makes The No Asshole Rule a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Decision Points
2. Management and Leadership – Leadership Lessons from the United States Naval Academy: 3 Minute Rule
3. Recommended Resource – How to Win Friends & Influence People
4. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes
5. Recommended Resource – Finance Without Fear

About the Reference

How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie is the timeless classic that reveals how leaders can engage and motivate individuals to become teams; joining together to achieve a common purpose and produce more than the sum of their singular efforts. This book unveils:

• The six ways to make people like you
• The twelve ways to win people to your way of thinking
• The nine ways to change people without arousing resentment

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like How to Win Friends and Influence People because is provides the reader with easily understood and actionable methods of influencing people without being manipulative; engaging and motivating them to achieve more together than they could as individuals.

StrategyDriven Contributors believe that while leaders naturally act to serve and promote their self interests, it is equally important to benefit those who are supporting those initiatives. Dale Carnegie’s prescription for advancing one’s agenda is a benevolent, win-win approach that influences instead of manipulates. His ‘honorable’ approach to winning people’s support makes How to Win Friends and Influence People a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Born to Win
2. Recommended Resource – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
3. Recommended Resource – Bringing Out the Best in People
4. Recommended Resource – The Talent Masters: Why smart leaders put people before numbers
5. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 17 – An Interview with Garry Ridge, co-author of Helping People Win at Work

About the Reference

Finance Without Fear: A Guide to Creating and Managing a Profitable Business by William S. Hettinger and John Dolan-Heitlinger unveals the mysteries of financial statements in this easy-to-understand, example filled book. William and John arm leaders with the knowledge of what is in each financial statement, how statements relate to each other, and, more importantly, how business operations impact reported financial outcomes.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like Finance Without Fear because it imparts the appropriate level of financial report understanding needed to be a successful executive or manager while not requiring the reader to be a CPA. Additionally, the illustrative examples relating business operations to financial statements clearly conveys the relationships and importance of strategic and day-to-day decisions to the financial well-being of the organization.

StrategyDriven Contributors believe it is vitally important for all executives and managers to understand how operational decisions impact financial performance and its conveyance in financial statements. Likewise, it is critical that these leaders be able to draw conclusions about business operations from their financial statements. While newly ascending managers may not have this knowledge, they should seek and be provided this information early in their management careers. Finance Without Fear can be used to impart such knowledge; making it a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – I, Steve
2. Share Your Financial Results and Improve Performance
3. Recommended Resource – Getting to Yes
4. Recommended Resource – Make Every Second Count
5. Recommended Resource – Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure

by Roger Fisher and William Ury

About the Reference

Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher and William Ury recognizes that professionals are in a frequent state of negotiation and provides them with the tools needed to achieve a desirable outcome. This book probes many diverse negotiation circumstances from both sides of the debate and offers constructive, easy-to-follow methods to achieve one’s desired outcomes by:

• Disentangling the people from the problem
• Focusing on interests, not positions
• Working together to find creative and fair options

These methods help the reader negotiate with anyone at any level of their organization.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors believe that negotiation is a key component to individual and organizational success. Getting to Yes breaks down these give and take situations; providing the immediately actionable tools needed to achieve a favorable outcome and making these situations less intimidating. If we had one criticism of the book, it would be that the authors seek to achieve a ‘fair’ or ‘equitable’ outcome for each side. While this appears admirable, it forfeits an upside gain that an effective negotiation might be able to otherwise achieve.

Getting to Yes provides a thorough, actionable negotiation tool set that is critical to every professional and organization’s success; making it a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – I, Steve
2. Recommended Resource – Make Every Second Count
3. Recommended Resource – Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure
4. Recommended Resource – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
5. Recommended Resource – Born to Win

About the Reference

I, Steve: Steve Jobs in His Own Words edited by George Beahm reveals Steve Jobs’ core beliefs about business in a way no other author has been able to achieve… because these insights come directly from Steve Jobs himself. George’s book systematically covers a wide range of topics from ‘Being the Best’ to ‘Risking Failure’, from ‘Passion’ to ‘Values’, and ‘Beyond Recruiting’ to ‘Firing Employees’.

Throughout I, Steve, three predominate themes are revealed:

• the intersection between design and business values as expressed in products
• the importance of people, teamwork, and organizational culture in achieving innovation, and
• the necessity of cutting against conventional wisdom to fulfill what people want before they know they want it.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like I, Steve because it reveals the intimate thoughts and beliefs of a man who was not only a creative genius but who was also a business giant. Most of Steve Jobs’ approaches align well with the principles and philosophies we recommend business leaders adopt to further the success of their organizations. While we recognize that some may disagree with Steve Jobs’ approach to certain circumstances – and on occasion we do too, all agree he was one of the great leaders and visionaries who has shape our modern world.

StrategyDriven Contributors appreciated the layout of I, Steve, the organization of quotes around meaningful topic areas, the dating of each quote, and Steve Jobs’ life story timeline provided at the end of the book. We found that knowing the setting and circumstances of the Steve Jobs’ quotes provided insightful context from which to interpret them. As such, we recommend first-time readers review the ‘Milestones’ timeline presented at the end of the book first and refer to it often when reading individual quotes.

For it’s intimate portrayal of an American entrepreneurial icon, I, Steve is a StrategyDriven recommended read.

Tribute to Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs was one of America’s greatest entrepreneurs who has forever changed our global society. This tribute video by Antonio Marotta and Diana Casadiego was made on one of Steve Jobs’ Macs…

…and this article produced on another.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – The Executive Guide to High-Impact Talent Management
2. Recommended Resource – Make Every Second Count
3. Recommended Resource – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
4. Recommended Resource – Born to Win
5. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 9 – An Interview with Steve Kerr, author of Reward Systems

About the Reference

Born To Win: The Ultimate Seminar by Zig Ziggler is an inspiring program focused on helping individuals recognize their value and potential. The program then provides insights as to how to unlock that potential by:

• Achieving balance in seven key areas
• Developing and maintaining a winning attitude
• Building stronger professional and personal relationships
• Becoming a better leader, employee, and parent through more effective communications

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like Born To Win because Zig recognizes what prevents many individuals from achieving their full potential and his methods provide real solutions to overcoming these barriers. His style and humor draws in seminar participants/listeners; making the principles presented easy to understand and relate to and the seminar itself engaging. If we had one criticism of the audio seminar it would be that the methods presented are not more actionably detailed.

The principles presented in Born To Win are well aligned with StrategyDriven‘s recommended personal performance improvement and leadership practices; making Born To Win a StrategyDriven recommended resource.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Make Every Second Count
2. Recommended Resource – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
3. When in the course of human events… The American Republic was Born
4. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes
5. Recommended Resource – Manager Tools

About the Reference

Make Every Second Count: Time Management Tips and Techniques for More Success With Less Stress by Robert Bly presents a collection of time management and productivity tips to help knowledge workers and other professionals achieve greater levels of efficiency. Robert’s productivity methods address personal performance practices as well as the employment of technologies. While the methods presented focus on improving workplace performance, many of these methods are equally applicable to one’s personal life.

Benefits of Using this Reference

While the productivity methods presented are commonly known individually, the book itself does a good job at providing a fairly comprehensive and organization collection of productivity enhancers. This book will be particularly beneficial to those new to and entering the professional business world or to those who are reentering the professional workforce after a long-term sabbatical.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure
2. Do You Make Things Happen or Just Fill Time?
3. Complimentary Resource – Talent Management Helps Small Companies Make Big Moves
4. Recommended Resource – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
5. Recommended Resource – The Accountable Organization

The Business of Innovation is a five part series created by CNBC in association with IBM. Within each episode, Maria Bartiromo and a distinguished panel of guests discuss what it takes to be an innovation leader.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. The Business of Innovation – Redefining Innovation
2. The Business of Innovation – Innovate or Die
3. The Business of Innovation – The Human Element
4. The Business of Innovation – The Execution Plan
5. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth

About the Reference

The Executive Guide to High-Impact Talent Management: Powerful Tools for Leveraging a Changing Workforce by David DeLong and Steve Trautman provides a complete talent management program blueprint covering:

• Diagnosis of talent related organizational risks
• Evaluation and measurement of talent management initiatives
• Acceleration of leadership development
• Transference of individual and organizational knowledge

This blueprint provides the details needed to institute each of these programs and achieve real, measurable results.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like The Executive Guide to High-Impact Talent Management because the blueprint provided is implementable, actionable, and based on many of the practices endorsed by StrategyDriven. These practices focus on continuous programmatic assessment and performance measurement to drive superior results. If we had one criticism of the book it would be that the solutions presented appear too academic and unaltered by the realities of the business world.

The Executive Guide to High-Impact Talent Management provides a thorough, implementable talent management program based on sound principles of accountability; making it a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Talent Management Magazine
2. Recommended Resource – The Talent Masters: Why smart leaders put people before numbers
3. Complimentary Resource – The Executive Guide to Data Loss Prevention Whitepaper
4. Complimentary Resource – How Do You Know if Your Talent Management Strategy is Creating Value?
5. Complimentary Resource – How Do You Know if Your Talent Management Strategy is Creating Value?

About the Reference

Soup: A Recipe to Nourish Your Team and Culture a business novel by Jon Gordon illustrates the significant impact senior leaders have on setting and nurturing their organization’s culture. Jon goes on to reveal how culture, in-turn, drives performance and ultimately an organization’s success.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors believe leaders at the top set the tone and tenor of the organization’s performance; that the workforce will, over time, embody a set of beliefs aligned with senior management’s decisions and actions.

StrategyDriven Contributors like Soup for the way in which the relationship between senior leader decisions and actions, organizational beliefs and work ethic, and overall company results is illustrated. Through the story of Soup, Inc., Jon reveals the nuances of decisions and actions by a CEO and how these effect those immediately around her and are then translated throughout the workforce. These easy-to-relate-to interactions follow closely with our own experience with personnel reactions in the workplace; making Soup‘s lessons both real and applicable.

The lessons in Soup go one step further; illustrating in an implementable step-by-step fashion how to positively impact and change an organization’s culture.

Soup‘s insights and implementable actions on how to constructively improve an organization’s culture makes it a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
2. Corporate Cultures – Culture’s Impact on How Work Gets Done
3. Corporate Cultures – Culture-based Work Performance Model
4. Recommended Resource – The Accountable Organization
5. Corporate Cultures – Culture Trumps Strategy

About the Reference

The Talent Masters: Why Smart Leaders Put People Before Numbers by Bill Conaty and Ram Charan provides unprecedented insight to the people development programs of several legendary organizations including General Electric, Proctor & Gamble, and Novartis. Conaty and Charan illustrate in great detail the specific programs these organizations use to develop talent and plan for and execute on succession plans; including the behind-the-scenes consideration of organizational, cultural, and operational impacts such changes incur. They also share their experience-based insights on the critical personal traits and organizational supports needed for succeeding leaders to excel in their new positions.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like The Talent Masters because of its in-depth, behind-the-scenes insights to the talent management practices of globally recognized ‘leadership factories.’ Many case studies highlight the mechanics of these organizations’ programs but Conaty and Charan present the intimate executive discussions and thought processes on personnel development and succession that only insiders possess. This book captures the nuance of thought that makes these processes work so well at creating some of the world’s most sought after leaders.

The in-depth real-world business experience of leading companies presented in The Talent Masters makes this book on personnel development a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Talent Management Magazine
2. Recommended Resource – The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
3. Recommended Resource – Bringing Out the Best in People
4. Complimentary Resource – How Do You Know if Your Talent Management Strategy is Creating Value?
5. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes

About the Reference

What I Didn’t Learn in Business School: How Strategy Works in the Real World by Jay Barney and Trish Gorman Clifford reveals the shortfalls of the principles learned in the idealistic academic environment when applied directly to the messy, unpredictable and politically charged business world. Through a storied approach, Jay and Trish reveal the inadequacies of modeling to fully predict business outcomes and the challenge of creating alignment among leaders with differing points of view and personal agendas. They go on to illustrate the power of moving leaders past the limits of these barriers and their own collective experience to gain significant marketplace advantages and organizational prosperity.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like What I Didn’t Learn in Business School because it so clearly illustrates the premise for our website, namely, that while highly beneficial, academic principles must be adapted from the ideal environment of the classroom to the unpredictable environment of the shop floor in order to provide real value to any organization. Furthermore, no single model or performance measure can adequately portray a given situation in such a way that a definitive decision can be made. Rather, multiple models and measures should be employed to create a complete picture of performance from differing perspectives to enable robust decision-making.

Its well supported, fully illustrated assertion that strong business performance is achieved through the application of sound academic principles tempered by real-world business experience makes What I Didn’t Learn in Business School a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Decision Points
2. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes
3. Recommended Resource – The Effective Executive
4. Recommended Resource – Essentials of Strategic Management
5. The Big Picture of Business – What Business Must Learn: Putting the economic downtown and recent events into perspective

About the Reference

In Beyond Performance, Scott Keller and Colin Price reveal that achieving organizational excellence is a combination of performance – the delivery of financial results – and health – the ability to perform year after year. Both are shown to be measurable and achieved through the five frames of:

• Aspire: Where do we want to go?
• Assess: How ready are we to go there?
• Architect: What do we need to do to get there?
• Act: How do we manage the journey?
• Advance: How do we keep moving forward?

The findings presented in Beyond Performance are founded on extensive research and empirical data. This underlying evidence gives Beyond Performance a level of credibility few other business books have been able to achieve.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven Contributors like Beyond Performance because it provides a method for achieving organizational excellence that is founded on the real-world performance of top companies. Additionally, Beyond Performance provides insights to the role of organization leaders in fostering ongoing performance excellence.

The analysis behind the actionable performance enhancement method is presented in such a manner that it gives the reader a clear understanding of how excellence might be similarly fostered within his/her organization. Use of organizational characteristic models and definition tables further enhances this clarity. Enough detail is provided so that the reader can create performance metrics to measure for the existence of enabling organizational characteristics and performance improvement when the journey for excellence is undertaken.

Beyond Performance‘s method for achieving organizational excellence is well aligned with that recommended by StrategyDriven; making it a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes
2. Recommended Resource – Good to Great
3. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Paul Leinwand and Cesare Mainardi, authors of The Essential Advantage
4. Recommended Resource – Strategy Maps: Converting Intangible Assets into Tangible Outcomes
5. How to Turn a Great Strategic Principle into Great Results

About the Reference

Adapt reveals the power of adaptive trial and error in solving the most difficult organizational challenges. Tim Harford illustrates the benefits of performing small, non-threatening trial projects to determine optimal product features, service options, or process performance. Further, he shows how such trials are often responsible for the new product breakthroughs that result in new market categories and propel companies to the next level of success.

Benefits of Using this Reference

Adapt provides several methods for leaders to foster small, non-threatening trial projects within their organization. From skunk works to formal pilots, these projects represent little financial risk but offer the opportunity for a product, services, and/or process breakthrough as well as better engaging employees; all helping enhance the bottom line. Additionally, Adapt reveals how to extract lessons learned from those efforts that initially appear to be a failure; ensuring the organization benefits from all its efforts and continues to move toward a beneficial innovation.

StrategyDriven Contributors like Adapt because it not only illustrates the concepts presented, it also provides many real-world examples and immediately implementable methods to foster ongoing innovation. The adaptive trial methods put forth in Adapt reflect several of the employee engagement and planning principles endorsed by StrategyDriven; making Adapt a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Complimentary Resource – Responding Quickly to Changing Markets: Anticipate, Adapt, Excel
2. Resource Management Best Practice 5 – Staggering Project Starts
3. Leadership Inspirations – The Permanence of Success and Failure
4. Recommended Resource – Essentials of Strategic Management
5. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes

by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Black swan events are by definition unpredictable, catastrophic, and retrospectively believed to have been fully predictable and by extension less impactful.

About the Reference

In his book, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, Dr. Nassim Nicholas Taleb illustrates the truly unpredictable nature of black swan events. He shows how the limits of human imagination and available information hide the possibility of these events from us regardless of the retrospective assertions made by ‘the experts.’ Dr. Taleb goes on to reveal micro-level black swans that influence the day-to-day success and failure of companies and individual employees.

Benefits of Using this Reference

The Black Swan brings to the forefront the reality of unpredictable events. Through his proof of their existence, Dr. Taleb creates a mandate for executives and managers to examine and prepare their organization to deal with black swan events at the corporate and employee level.

The one shortcoming of Dr. Taleb’s book is the absence of a set of guiding protocols or principles for effectively dealing with black swan events once they occur. This remains as an outstanding research and development project for the reader with no initial direction provided.

StrategyDriven likes The Black Swan for its exposure of unpredictable events and the inferred call to action to prepare one’s organization to deal with these catastrophes commensurate with the organization’s overall risk profile; making The Black Swan a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes
2. Recommended Resource – The Effective Executive
3. Recommended Resource – The Accountable Organization
4. Recommended Resource – Decision Points
5. Recommended Resource – Essentials of Strategic Management

The conventional wisdom about strategy may be leading your company astray. In The Essential Advantage: How to Win with a Capabilities-Driven Strategy, Booz & Company’s Paul Leinwand and Cesare Mainardi maintain that success in any market accrues to firms with a coherence premium – a tight match between their strategic direction and the capabilities that make them unique.

Achieving coherence requires a sharpness of focus that few companies have mastered. This book helps you identify your firm’s distinctive blend of strategic direction and differentiated capabilities that give you the ‘right to win’ in your chosen markets.

Based on extensive research and providing a wealth of exercises, tools, and company examples from many industries – including Amazon.com, Walmart, Pfizer, Inditex (Zara), Itaú Unibanco, and Procter & Gamble – The Essential Advantage helps you construct a strategically coherent company in which the pieces reinforce each other instead of working at cross-purposes.

Additional Insights… An Interview with Paul Leinwand and Cesare Mainardi, authors of The Essential Advantage

SD: Why did you write The Essential Advantage?

PL and CM: Turbulent markets demand focus and discipline.

In this unpredictable economy, traditional approaches to strategy are a luxury most companies cannot afford. They cannot chart a future course based on a wide-eyed search for external growth: “There’s an attractive, adjacent market. Let’s go after it.” Rather, they need to conduct a clear-eyed assessment of what they as a firm already do exceptionally well, and then double down on those differentiating capabilities. Further, they need to limit their focus to, at most, six capabilities, and make those capabilities work together as a mutually reinforcing system that perpetuates competitive advantage.

SD: What is the ‘coherence premium?’

PL and CM: Coherent companies – those that possess a capabilities system that aligns their strategy with their product/service portfolio – generate superior performance over time, which is what we call the coherence premium.

For a company to be described as ‘coherent,’ according to our definition, it must be resolute and clear-minded in three critical ways: in the way the company creates value in the market (its chosen ‘way to play’); in the system of capabilities it deploys; and in the products and services it provides to its customers. The goal is balance: A coherent company strikes a balance where the right product and service portfolio naturally thrives within a capabilities system consciously chosen and implemented to support a deliberate strategy or way to play. We believe coherence confers a substantial premium, and we’ve measured it. We’ve established a strong correlation between coherence, as we define it, and superior performance over time in a number of industries.

SD: What does it mean to have a ‘right to win?’

PL and CM: The right to win is the confidence held by a company that its combination of way to play, system of capabilities, and products and services will outdeliver those of its competitors, drive sustained earnings growth, and thus give it an essential advantage in its market.

The right to win is the ability to enter or participate in any competitive market with the reasonably justified belief that you will succeed and create value. That belief stems from having chosen a differentiated way to play that is supported by a strong system of mutually reinforcing capabilities. A right to win isn’t a guarantee that things will go your way, but it reflects your relative coherence: the fact that you are better prepared to attract and keep customers than any of your competitors. A right to win can be measured in having share or margin advantage relative to competitors who compete within the same market.

SD: What is ‘capabilities-driven strategy?’

PL and CM: Capabilities-Driven Strategy (CDS) is a pragmatic series of choices designed to lead you to increasing levels of coherence and thus to gain an essential advantage for your company over time.

CDS starts with what you as a company do best – better than anyone else – and builds from that internal base of strength in making market participation choices. Traditionally, the practice of strategy has moved in the opposite direction. Companies scan the market for attractive expansion opportunities and build capabilities to suit those opportunities. We think they have it backward. It’s much harder to build capabilities than to leverage what you already do exceptionally well in capturing value. Those companies that focus on building a system of three to six best-in-class, interlocking capabilities that support their way to play achieve a right to win in their industries. They exploit their strengths over and over again, becoming even better at what they already excel at.

SD: What new ideas are you bringing to the table with capabilities-driven strategy?

PL and CM: Our take on capabilities and how they work in systems is new, as is our view of coherence as this three-part balanced system that confers a measurable premium.

While capabilities and competencies have been written about many times before, our firm’s perspective is that capabilities work together in systems and must be coherent with your way to play and the products and services you sell. Any one of these elements is not enough to gain the type of essential advantage that is sustainable over time. In addition, we believe that your starting point for strategy development is what you are already great at, rather than studying the industry and market for opportunities. This perspective is a shift from existing strategy perspectives as it affects nearly every major decision a company makes, from growth initiatives, portfolio strategy, and M&A opportunities to its approach to budgeting and cost cutting.

SD: Why now? Is it more important to consider capabilities when you develop a strategy now than it was, say, five years ago?

PL and CM: Economic downturns intensify the need for coherence and distinguish those who have achieved it.

CDS is not more important, but it’s certainly more timely, given the economic upheaval of the past couple of years. That creates an imperative for coherence. As a business, when you have a dramatic reduction in demand, you will be far less successful on the fringe. And you’re not going to be able to invest in those external market opportunities that traditional strategy would suggest. In a downturn, there is all the more reason to focus on what you already do well that your customers value and your competitors can’t beat. Finally, many industries are responding to the pressures of the last few years by differentiating themselves. The theoretical optimized industry is one with two or three players performing very different roles. Large downturns (such as this recession), technology disruptions, or regulatory shifts create discontinuities that simply accelerate the industry’s evolution toward this equilibrium state. The leading companies are getting out in front of this trend.

SD: It sounds logical to develop strategy by starting with one’s capabilities. What do most companies do instead?

PL and CM: Most companies look outside to adjacent markets for growth and invest in assets to exploit those opportunities.

The well-worn path to strategy in most industries is to seek growth outside your doors. You look at adjacent markets. You assess the attractiveness of the demand, the size and growth of the market, and the amount of profit that could be delivered, and you make participation choices and invest behind them. And, invariably, you invest in assets. You buy a company, invest in a brand, do R&D to meet that unmet need, expand into a new geography. These choices historically conferred advantage – first-mover, scale – but asset-based scale advantages have diminished in recent years, thanks to technology, cheap information, and outsourcing. Assets are important, but they are, increasingly, table stakes in most competitive industries; everyone in the game has them. Moreover, fixed assets are more difficult to leverage across diverse businesses than capabilities, and they tend to expire, become obsolete, or give way to related services. As the intrinsic value of assets diminishes, the competitive value of capabilities will only grow. In fact, we would assert that capabilities have already passed assets to become the primary means of creating value in most industries. They deserve at least equal weight in strategy setting.

SD: How does capabilities-driven strategy create value?

PL and CM: Capabilities-driven strategy creates value through four levers: effectiveness, focused investment, efficiency, and alignment.

First is an effectiveness benefit, which is realized simply in doing what you’re exceptionally good at over and over, day in and day out. Those companies that ‘sweat’ their capabilities continuously improve them and sustainably capture the top-line growth in their industries and, ultimately, market leadership. A coherent, focused, and aligned capabilities system creates not only value but a lock on value, as it is enormously difficult for competitors to replicate. Second, a coherent system focuses strategic investment on what matters. Coherent companies direct capital, time, and other resources with purpose to those activities, products, and businesses that will extend their lead. Third, there is the simple efficiency argument. Organizations that are clear-minded about where and how they participate in a market spend less on those capabilities that are not competitively differentiating. Finally, CDS forces alignment between strategic intent and day-to-day decision making. In a messy, incoherent world, those companies that can look through a capabilities lens set a straighter and more sustainable course and avoid costly missteps. These organizations move in lockstep, because everyone understands what’s important. They execute faster and with more force. And they attract, in turn, people who excel at the capabilities they wield with such mastery.

SD: Can you measure the success of a capabilities-driven strategy?

PL and CM: We have established a strong correlation between capabilities coherence and superior returns over time.

In fact, we have devised a way to measure the success of a capabilities-driven strategy and applied it to a number of industries. We call this measure the ‘coherence premium.’ To demonstrate it, we’ve examined a number of industries and mapped the level of capabilities coherence in the portfolio of each of the major players against their operating margins over the past five years. We have confirmed that coherence in capabilities correlates strongly with greater profitability (as measured by EBIT margin over a five-year period). Our approach to scoring coherence is similar across industries and can be distilled into three essential steps. First, we define the segments each company serves. Next, we identify the capabilities that drive value for the company in each segment. Finally, we determine the number of common capabilities across all the segments a company serves. The resulting score is then mapped against EBIT margin to determine the coherence premium. Our research shows that companies that invest mindfully in a capabilities system that supports their way to play and their product and service portfolio outperform the competition in their industry.

SD: Why haven’t more companies adopted capabilities-driven strategy as ‘the’ way to develop strategy?

PL and CM: It’s easier to accommodate incoherence than to fight for coherence.

What many people don’t realize is that CDS can be implemented at any level—function, business unit, subsidiary, enterprise. The complete coherence we’ve described is an ultimate destination, but there is also value created in the journey, in staking and exploiting ‘pockets’ of coherence. In an incoherent world, the relatively coherent company can prosper. In an incoherent company, the relatively coherent division can grow.

SD: Can you name some companies that have earned the coherence premium?

PL and CM: Walmart and Pfizer’s former consumer healthcare division are a couple of great case studies in capabilities coherence.

Pfizer’s consumer healthcare (PCH) division offers a great start-to-finish case study of capabilities-driven strategy development and the returns it affords. After absorbing the much larger consumer healthcare divisions of Warner-Lambert and Pharmacia in the early 2000s, PCH was looking to develop a focused growth strategy. Based on the breakthrough insight that consumer healthcare was more a healthcare business than a consumer products business, PCH restructured its entire business and product portfolio around six healthcare-oriented capabilities: pharma-like innovation, regulatory management, new product development, claims-based marketing, channel management, and the ‘Rx-to-OTC switch’ (adapting prescription pharmaceuticals into over-the-counter products). It divested a number of personal care and confectionary lines (e.g., Schick razors and Trident) and acquired other products (e.g., Purell) consistent with its chosen way to play. In 2006, Pfizer directly redeemed the value built by PCH by selling the business to Johnson & Johnson for an unprecedented US$16.6 billion, or 20.6 times EBITDA (compared to average multiples of 15 at the time).

SD: How can capabilities-driven strategy be applied to cutting costs?

PL and CM: CDS and cost reduction go hand in hand, as you need to make explicit choices about what to cut and what to keep.

Strangely, cost reduction exercises in most companies – no matter how extensive – are almost always divorced from business strategy, which makes little sense. You’re never just cutting costs. You’re making a decision that something is no longer strategically relevant, and that other things are essential. In coherent companies, every discretionary expenditure enhances a company’s capabilities system and thus strengthens its competitiveness.

SD: Does capabilities-driven strategy apply equally well to all industries and in all regions of the world?

PL and CM: We can’t imagine an industry or geography in which being good at what you do is not relevant or desirable.

The short answer is yes, CDS applies to all industries and all regions. Each company will come up with its own way to play based on its unique capabilities system – and in many cases, still, its advantaged assets. It’s true that different sectors and markets are at different stages of development and maturity. For example, in China, markets are still highly regulated, and domestic players protected. But even in such an environment, capabilities are essential – for example, working with the government to ensure distribution, or negotiating labor contracts to secure continued access to talent. Capabilities-driven strategy works in all contexts.

About the Authors

Paul Leinwand is a Booz & Company partner based in Chicago. He works in the consumer, media, and digital practice and focuses on capabilities-driven strategy for consumer products companies.

Cesare Mainardi is managing director of Booz & Company’s North American business and a member of the firm’s executive committee. He works with global Fortune 500 companies to help them achieve major business transformations.

To learn more about Capabilities-Driven Strategy, click here.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Jon Katzenbach and Zia Khan, authors of Leading Outside the Lines
2. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky, authors of The Practice of Adaptive Leadership
3. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Joel Roth, author of The 20% Solution
4. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 51 – An Interview with Priscilla Nelson and Ed Cohen, co-authors of Riding the Tiger
5. Capabilities Driven Mergers & Acquisitions – The Path to Coherence, part 2 of 5

The Business of Innovation is a five part series created by CNBC in association with IBM. Within each episode, Maria Bartiromo and a distinguished panel of guests discuss what it takes to be an innovation leader.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. The Business of Innovation – Innovate or Die
2. The Business of Innovation – The Human Element
3. The Business of Innovation – The Execution Plan
4. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth
5. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth

The Business of Innovation is a five part series created by CNBC in association with IBM. Within each episode, Maria Bartiromo and a distinguished panel of guests discuss what it takes to be an innovation leader.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. The Business of Innovation – The Human Element
2. The Business of Innovation – The Execution Plan
3. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth
4. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth
5. Develop A Process For Continuing Business Model Innovation

• General Wesley Clark, Co-Chairman Growth Energy
• James Hackett, Chairman, President & CEO, Anadarko Petroleum
• Suedeen G. Kelly, Commissioner, The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
• T. Boone Pickens, Chairman, BP Capital, and Architect, “The Pickens Plan”
• Jigar Shah, Founder, SunEdison and CEO, The Carbon War Room
• Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani, Founder, The Center for Global Energy Studies and Saudi Oil Minister and Former Head, OPEC

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Executive Vision – Navigating the New Leadership Landscape: Retail
2. Executive Vision – Leading in an Interconnected World: Transportation
3. Executive Vision – The Blueprint for Breakthrough Leadership: Health Care
4. Executive Vision – Building a Global Leadership Brand: Technology
5. Leadership Inspirations – Great Vision

About the Reference

Decision Points by former U.S. President George W. Bush explores his decision-making and thought process when dealing with the major issues challenging his administration. Regardless of whether the reader fundamentally agrees with President Bush’s decisions, this book illustrates the many organizational, political, and social pressures that shape the decision-making processes as well as the use of multidiscipline teams, devil’s advocates, and redundant information sources. President Bush also highlights the many lessons learned through each of the complex decisions presented; what made aspects of each decision and its implementation successful and what could have been done better.

Benefits of Using this Reference

Complex decisions are never easy to make and no decision will ever please everyone. Decision Points provides an in-depth look at several of the decisions that are both familiar and shape our world today. StrategyDriven Contributors like Decision Points because President Bush’s candid reflection on his decision-making process and how he would improve on his decisions if he had the opportunity to remake them provides readers with incredibly insightful lessons learned that they can apply to their decision-making process. Additionally, many of the decision-making best practice recommendations found on the StrategyDriven website compliment those found in Decision Points; making this book a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Great Escapes
2. Decision-Making Best Practice 5 – Ongoing Decision Evaluation
3. Recommended Resource – The Effective Executive
4. Decision-Making Best Practice 7 – Identify the Decision-Maker
5. Decision-Making Best Practice 10 – Establish Decision Execution Performance Measures

• Robert Crandall, Former CEO, American Airlines
• Tony Fernandes, CEO, Asia Air
• John Krafcik, CEO, Hyundai Motor America
• Anand Mahindra, Vice Chairman & Managing Director, Mahindra & Mahindra
• Elon Musk, CEO, Tesla Motors
• David Neeleman, Founder, JetBlue
• Dr. Beverly Scott, CEO, Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Executive Vision – Navigating the New Leadership Landscape: Retail
2. Executive Vision – Building a Global Leadership Brand: Technology
3. Executive Vision – The Blueprint for Breakthrough Leadership: Health Care
4. Recommended Resource – The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century
5. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Jon Katzenbach and Zia Khan, authors of Leading Outside the Lines

• Dr. Jean Botti, Chief Technical Officer, EADS
• Marissa Mayer, Vice-President, Search Products & User Experience, Google
• Bill McDermott, President, Global Field Operations, SAP
• Gerald Quindlen, President & CEO, Logitech
• Ram Shriram, Founder, Sherpalo Ventures
• Jimmy Wales, Co-Founder, Wikipedia

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Executive Vision – Navigating the New Leadership Landscape: Retail
2. Executive Vision – The Blueprint for Breakthrough Leadership: Health Care
3. Lessons from the Best Global Brands 2010: Building trust and stability in the age of transparency
4. Recommended Resource – The Effective Executive
5. Leadership Inspirations – Vision, Focus, and Determination

• Tommy Hilfiger, Founder and Principal Designer of the Tommy Hilfiger Group
• Kendall Powell, Chairman and CEO of General Mills
• Steve Sadove, Chairman & CEO of Saks
• Sir Martin Sorrell, Founder & CEO of WPP Group
• Tom Stemberg, Founder & Former CEO, Staples and Managing General Partner, Highland Consumer Fund

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Executive Vision – The Blueprint for Breakthrough Leadership: Health Care
2. Leadership Inspirations – Great Vision
3. Recommended Resource – The Effective Executive
4. The Advisor’s Corner – Why Is My Organization’s Vision Unclear To Employees?
5. Leadership Inspirations – Vision, Focus, and Determination

• Sir Bill Castell, The Wellcome Trust Chairman
• Dr. Bill Frist, Cressey & Co. Partner and Former United States Senate Majority Leader
• Bill George, Harvard Business School Professor Of Management and Former Medtronic Chairman & CEO
• Jeffrey Kindler, Pfizer Chairman & CEO
• Gerard Kleisterlee, Philips Chairman & CEO
• David Snow, Medco CEO
• Myrtle Potter, President and CEO of Myrtle Potter & Company and Former Genentech COO

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Leadership Inspirations – Great Vision
2. Complimentary Resource – What Is ISO 14001 And Should I Care?
3. Leadership Inspirations – Vision, Focus, and Determination
4. The “Vision Thing”: How to Find It, Frame It, and Live It
5. Self Assessment Program Best Practice 1 – Executive Sponsorship

Every enterprise has an informal as well as a formal organization. The formal is the side with which business people are usually most familiar. It consists of analyses, strategies, structures, processes and programs – all codified in memos, charts and Power-Point presentations. These tools are designed to align decisions and actions. The informal is generally less familiar. It consists of emerging ideas, social networks, working norms, values, peer relationships and communities of common interest – the elements that often hide beyond the boundaries of the formal. In Leading Outside the Lines, authors Jon Katzenbach and Zia Khan make the compelling case that it is in the less familiar informal world where magic happens… yet one without the other is unlikely to sustain peak performance over time.

Additional Insights… An Interview with Jon Katzenbach and Zia Khan, authors of Leading Outside The Lines

StrategyDriven Contributors recently interviewed Jon Katzenbach and Zia Khan, authors of Leading Outside the Lines; receiving many invaluable, beyond the scope of the book insights.

SD: Why did you write Leading Outside the Lines?

JK and ZK: To help leaders gain a powerful performance ‘boost’ from their informal organizations. In our years helping leading organizations improve performance, we’ve learned that leaders at all levels have a difficult time with, or don’t realize they need to address, a key avenue to success: balancing two distinct dimensions of human behavior and organizational performance – the formal and the informal elements. Learning how to mobilize the informal elements of an organization to accelerate the formal elements goes a long way in helping leaders fill the gap between intention and results. Further, the recession and slow recovery have forced many organizations to reduce headcount to a bare minimum, and have undermined employee motivation. Without making changes to headcount, systems of performance management and processes, leaders can tap into the informal elements of the organization to realize additional performance potential, and do so ‘for free.’

SD: What is the ‘informal organization?’ And what is the ‘formal?’

JK and ZK: The informal unlocks the emotional side of behavior; the formal is the rational side. The informal organization is a bundle of organizational elements that are often hidden from view, but exert strong influence on people’s decisions and behaviors. The informal includes values that drive decisions, networks that guide personal interactions and the spread of information and emotional feelings about the work that drives the amount of effort and commitment that people put into their jobs. The formal organization, on the other hand, includes the codified elements of organization that are usually disseminated on paper. They include strategies, structures, processes, metrics, etc. In other words, the informal organization is comprised of interpersonal connections, influences and “rituals” that happen beyond, around and beneath the formal rules; they are seldom codified or reference-able. The formal is the structural lines, boxes, rules, measures and processes that describe how things are supposed to work; they are almost always codified and reference-able.

SD: What do you mean by ‘Leading Outside the Lines?’

JK and ZK: Influencing results by using informal mechanisms beyond the hierarchy. The lines represent the formal organization – the usual elements of strategy, structure, hierarchy, metrics, etc. Most effective leaders are well trained in using those elements. However, the best leaders also learn how to mobilize the informal organization – the values, networks, and sources of pride that drive motivation and high performance. These elements are more responsive to leadership outside the lines, so to speak. So, leading outside the lines is really stepping outside of formal roles and responsibilities to influence emotions that accelerate behaviors that determine performance.

SD: Why is the ‘Leading Outside the Lines’ concept and call to action any more important now than it was, say, five years ago?

JK and ZK: The recessionary recovery challenge demands emotional as well as rational leadership capabilities. There are two reasons. First, managing the formal organization has become a widespread and broadly used discipline. In the past, optimized processes and fact-based strategies gave companies an advantage. Now, anyone can buy them off the shelf, so it’s hard to gain a competitive advantage through formal elements alone. The informal organization, however, is mostly uncharted territory. There’s lots of excitement about social networking and the like, but there aren’t many practical frameworks or approaches for using informal elements to gain performance advantages. And the advantages gained from the informal organization are very, very hard to copy. Second, as mentioned before, because of the recession and slow recovery, most companies are in much greater need of leadership capacity that both the formal and informal organizations provide.

SD: You say that if the informal isn’t working for you, it’s working against you. What do you mean by that?

JK and ZK: Informal forces are always at play – you cannot simply turn them on and off by command. The informal is working all the time: It’s not ‘stoppable or start-able;’ it’s only influence-able. It either resists and de-rails what the formal is trying to accomplish, or it supports and accelerates it. It is never ‘in neutral.’ So, the chances that the informal organization is working for you without any deliberate attempt to mobilize it in the right direction are fairly low. In many cases, when left unattended, the informal works against you even if you’re not trying to change anything. In fact, the informal organization can align itself in the opposite direction that leaders want to take the whole company if the informal organization hasn’t bought into the change.

SD: What are the results when leaders successfully balance the informal with the formal?

JK and ZK: Emotional commitment supplants rational compliance to optimize performance results. Overall, leaders can accelerate performance results by combining the best of both the informal and the formal, and do so without having to make trade-offs. They get the efficiency of the formal with the creativity of the informal; the focused execution of the formal with the responsiveness to new opportunities of the informal; the accountability of the formal with the emotional commitment of the informal. In other words, you get behavior change that yields higher performance results or faster results – and often BOTH!

SD: You tell a lot of stories in the book. What’s your favorite one?

JK and ZK: We don’t have a single favorite; it depends on the issue. We like all the stories, and there are different categories. Perhaps our favorite ‘informal miracle’ story is the one about the transformation of Aetna. Early in the decade, Aetna had been on a treadmill to nowhere – even though it had tried three different change programs. It continued to lose $1 million a day. But a new CEO, Dr. John Rowe, had a vision to turn it all around – by bringing the company’s pride back. He engaged all levels of the informal organization and created evangelists for formal change. The core of the program was known informally throughout the company as ‘restoring the pride.’

SD: You mention types of workers call ‘fast zebras.’ Who are they? What do you do with them?

JK and ZK: People who get important stuff done quicker by going down informal as well as formal paths. In the wild, the fast zebra gets to the watering hole quickly and escapes predators who might be waiting. Similarly, in organizations, there are those who can quickly find innovative ways to realize their objectives without getting bogged down by organizational predators like bureaucracy, politics, senseless policies, outdated rules, etc. They have learned how to get things done by using a dynamic variety of formal and informal mechanisms; they know when to follow the rules, when to bend the rules and when to change the rules. The best thing to do with them is to learn from them, and draw on those learnings to make changes to the organization so you can enable potential fast zebras. Give them room to interact, get them together to energize one another and listen to – and act on – their insights.

SD: What kinds of leaders are best at ‘Leading Outside the Lines?’

JK and ZK: Those who have learned the power of the informal through trial and error. They are very open to the informal – and realize they don’t have all the answers. They are willing to take personal risks by drawing on emotional intelligence as much as analytical intelligence. They spend time with people at any level, particularly the frontline, and not just with a select few at headquarters. Most importantly, they believe that while the informal organization may appear to be unruly chaos and resistant to control, they know it can be mobilized to generate real performance results.

SD: What are the biggest mistakes leaders make when trying to manage and maximize the informal organization?

JK and ZK: The biggest mistake is to try and manage the informal like the formal. It can’t be told what to do; it must be convinced, influenced and energized. We tell clients that they must mobilize the informal and manage the formal. Therefore, it’s a big mistake to think that top-down communication will keep the informal interactions positive. It’s also a mistake to believe that broad-based ‘engagement scores’ are indicative of informal support and to underestimate the importance of emotional commitment over rational compliance.

SD: Are you saying that strict ‘traditionalists’ will fail in this environment?

JK and ZK: Only if you define under-performance as failing. They won’t actually fail – and that’s part of the problem. Right now, any leader who can’t use the formal organization has a very short career. So they get weeded out quickly. However, those who don’t use the informal will usually accomplish good enough results, as there aren’t many who know how to use both and who achieve outstanding results. However, we expect that as the discipline of using the informal spreads, the pressure to be versed n it will increase. We do believe that those who only take advantage of one side of the “organizational brain” will fall short of their potential – and end up as mediocre guardians of the status quo.

SD: What happens if a leader backs off from the informal organization and just lets it grow organically?

JK and ZK: He competes with one hand tied behind his back. It would be the same as forgetting about marketing and hoping your customers buy your products by chance. It’s an asset that needs to be used with purpose. It may adapt to support you organically if you have effective and committed leaders down the line, but it can also align against you if you change the status quo to which it has evolved. Remember, the informal organization has a mind of its own, which may not be in sync with your priorities. More often than not, when left to evolve on its own, the informal organization works against you. Put another way, it would be analogous to letting ivy find its own home.

SD: Your book mentions ‘master motivators’ and ‘pride builders.’ Who are they, and what do you do with them?

JK and ZK: They are people in supervisory situations who know how to make others ‘feel good’ about the work that has to get done every day; they instill pride in the work itself. We use these terms inter-changeably. We urge leaders to listen and learn from them, and get them into networks and communities where they can spread motivational skills experientially among peers and colleagues. The people who work for them ‘never want to disappoint them’ and the people who work beside them want to learn their ‘secrets.’

SD: What can leaders do to get better at actively leveraging the informal and balancing it with the formal?

JK and ZK: Keep working at it; if at first you don’t succeed, try and try again. The first thing is to get an understanding of your current informal organization – the values, the networks and sources of pride. Front line leaders can seek out peers who are natural pride-builders; leaders at the top can find ways to connect with them, learn from them, and spread their behaviors; leaders in the middle can do both.

Jon Katzenbach is a senior partner at Booz & Company and leads The Katzenbach Center, where promising new approaches in leadership, culture and organization performance are developed for client application. His consulting career has been largely focused in these areas, and spans several decades across several different professional books, including The Wisdom of Teams, Peak Performance, Why Pride Matters More Than Money, and the new Leading Outside the Lines. He received his MBA from Harvard, where he was a Baker Scholar. Jon is a founding partner of Katzenbach Partners. To read Jon’s complete biography, click here.

Zia Khan, co-author of Leading Outside the Lines, is vice president for strategy and evaluation at the Rockefeller Foundation, which supports innovations that help people share globalization’s benefits more equitably and strengthens their resilience to social, economic, health and environmental challenges. Zia also advises leaders on the integration of strategy and organization as a senior fellow of the Katzenbach Center, which he co-founded with Jon Katzenbach, and as an individual consultant. Prior to joining the Rockefeller Foundation, Zia established and led Katzenbach Partners’ San Francisco office and West Coast Practice and pioneered the firm’s work on the informal organization. Zia hold a B.S. from Cornell University and an M.S. and Ph.D. from Stanford University. To read Zia’s complete biography, click here.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky, authors of The Practice of Adaptive Leadership
2. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 26 – An Interview with Omar Khan, author of Liberating Passion
3. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Joel Roth, author of The 20% Solution
4. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 28 – An Interview with Ken Blanchard, author of Leading at a Higher Level
5. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 30b – An Interview with Lynne Lancaster and David Stillman, authors of The M-Factor, part 2 of 2

The Business of Innovation is a five part series created by CNBC in association with IBM. Within each episode, Maria Bartiromo and a distinguished panel of guests discuss what it takes to be an innovation leader.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth
2. Complimentary Resource – How Scientific Business Intelligence Can Drive Top Line Innovation Growth
3. Develop A Process For Continuing Business Model Innovation
4. Leadership Inspirations – A Call for Innovation
5. Celebrating Our Second Year… Continuing a Trend of Innovation

About the Reference

How The Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In by Jim Collins examines the reasons great and good companies slip into decline, the five phases of decline, and the questions company leaders can ask to identify if their organization is declining or at risk of doing so. Consistent with his past work, Jim Collins’s conclusions of why organizations fall into decline is founded on rigorous examination of imperial evidence and the book filled with highly illustrative examples.

Benefits of Using this Reference

StrategyDriven contributors like How The Mighty Fall because of the unique perspective Jim Collins provides on organizational decline founded on imperial research. We believe it is important for business leaders to remain ever watchful for indicators of declining performance and to this end, Jim Collins provides an insightful list of decline indicating markers. If we had one criticism of How The Mighty Fall it would be that Collins omits any thoughts as to how and with what periodicity a leader or an organization might systematically examine itself for the existence of one or more markers of decline.

How The Mighty Fall keeps with the StrategyDriven philosophy of self evaluation; giving readers insight to the warning flags of organizational decline and demise and making How The Mighty Fall a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – Good to Great
2. Recommended Resource – The Effective Executive
3. Recommended Resource – Manager Tools
4. Recommended Resource – Silos, Politics, and Turf Wars
5. Recommended Resource – Bringing Out the Best in People

The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World by Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky provides guiding questions, worksheets, and exercises to help business leaders make progress even under the toughest circumstances. Readers learn to focus on adaptation rather than execution, orchestrate conflict rather than resolve it, and nurture interdependence rather than self-reliance. Using these tools, leaders build adaptive organizations that are able to thrive an ever complicated world.

Additional Insights: An Interview with Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky, authors of The Practice of Adaptive Leadership, Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World

StrategyDriven contributors recently interviewed Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, and Marty Linsky, authors of The Practice of Adaptive Leadership; receiving many invaluable, beyond the scope of the book insights.

SD: To begin our discussion, I hoped we could establish a frame of reference for our listeners by first defining what is meant by adaptive leadership and then comparing and contrasting adaptive leadership with the more directive, hierarchical leadership approach used in the past?

RH, AG, ML: Adaptive Leadership is what is required when the problems being faced have no known solution. When facing complexity and change, it can be tempted to try patterns of the past that have worked. When business as usual doesn’t work anymore, the organization needs to build adaptive capacity to build tomorrow’s business practices. Traditional hierarchical leadership works when the problems being faced have known solutions and the work is really about managing people and processes to efficiency.

SD: Does adaptive leadership mean that the leader much adapt his or her values to the given situation or simply his or her leadership approach with one’s personal values being foundational regardless of the situation?

RH, AG, ML: First of all we consider leadership a behavior or an activity, not a person. Adaptive leadership requires learning and question which of the current values and norms may need to change in order to move forward. The person practicing leadership needs examined their own deeply held values as well as everyone else’s.

SD: Because members of an organization will observe the adaptive leader changing his or her approach depending on the given circumstances, is there a risk that the leader will be viewed as a chameleon, changing so as to be self serving? And if so, how does a leader avoid this appearance?

RH, AG, ML: In practicing management consistency is a virtue. In leadership it is a liability. If people know how you will act and what ‘buttons’ to press, your options for engagement will be limited. Most people need to practice a mix of both management and leadership and yes you are right, too much change all the time will be disorientating. Reading and learning how to balance the two different skills of management and leadership is an important skill.

SD: I have always found that fundamental to engaging the minds and hearts of those I was leading was to first gain their trust. How does adaptive leadership directly and indirectly earn the trust of those who are following?

RH, AG, ML: In leadership, there is a paradox of trust. Trust is earned by doing what people expect and yet leadership requires you to go beyond those expectations. One of our current favorite definitions of leadership is disappointing your own people at a rate they can absorb. In other words you have to stretch the trusting relationship to new boundaries and possibilities.

SD: In The Practice of Adaptive Leadership, you discuss adaptive leadership as an approach, I thought a system of processes, that leaders could use to be more effective. Could you provide our readers with a high level overview of the adaptive leadership approach?

RH, AG, ML: Half of leadership is diagnosis. Much of our work with clients is about trying to stop the leap to action to spend more time understanding the external context and internal dynamics. Once you can begin to see the patterns and realities at play, then the work is to determine what of the Business ‘DNA’ is essential to the future and what is expendable patterns of the past. The work now is to hold people through the process of change, creating a value proposition for moving off of business as usual, holding them through the process of loss when giving up patterns of the past and strategically experimenting and inventing the new.

SD: What do you see as the key characteristics or traits of the adaptive leader?

RH, AG, ML: The ability to get above the noise, what we call ‘getting on the balcony’ and spending more time in interpretation is a critical skill set. Because there is no reason to practice leadership without a compelling reason or value proposition, the ability to connect to and articulate purpose is also key.

SD: Are there any organizational types or cultures within which the adaptive leader would not be effective?

RH, AG, ML: In technical organizations or contexts, where the business as usual works and the context is not changing, a management challenge is being faced, not an adaptive challenge. When we starting writing the book four years ago, we did not imagine that organizations and communities would be facing the amount of adaptive challenges we face today. We have been lucky to learn along with our clients, students and colleagues that there is a set of skills, tools and practices that can help make progress against critical challenges and the unknown challenges ahead.

Final Thoughts…

The StrategyDriven team would like to thank Ronald, Alexander, and Marty not only their time but for sharing their beyond the scope of the book insights on adaptive leadership. We thoroughly enjoyed The Practice of Adaptive Leadership, not only for its depth of insight but also for the unique case studies and challenging On The Balcony and On The Practice Field questions posed; giving the reader clear starting point from which to become a more adaptive leader. These assessment tools compliment many of the best practice recommendations found on the StrategyDriven website; all of which makes The Practice of Adaptive Leadership a StrategyDriven recommended read.

Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linsky are co-founders and Alexander Grashow is Managing Director of Cambridge Leadership Associates (www.cambridge-leadership.com), an international leadership development firm with clients from around the world in the corporate, non-profit, and public sectors, including Microsoft, IBM, Pfizer, CARE, YMCA, Boston Public Schools, the Dubai School of Government, and the African Leadership Group, among others. Each week, the authors answer questions about leadership in their online column for The Washington Post.

Ronald Heifetz is also the founding director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. Renowned for his seminal work on the practice and teaching of leadership, his research focuses on how to build adaptive capacity in societies, businesses, and nonprofits. He speaks and consults extensively in the United States and abroad.

Heifetz’s widely acclaimed book, Leadership Without Easy Answers has been translated into many languages and is currently in its twelfth printing. He is also the co-author of Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive through the Dangers of Leading, written with Marty Linsky. Heifetz is a graduate of Columbia University, Harvard Medical School, and the John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Marty Linsky has had 25 years of experience as a leadership consultant, author and educator. His clients come from public, private, and non-profit sectors in the U.S. and abroad. Linsky has been on the faculty at Harvard’s Kennedy School since 1979, except for three years as Chief Secretary to the Governor of Massachusetts. He has been chair of several of the School’s Executive Programs on leadership. Linsky has served as a Massachusetts state legislator, an editorial writer and reporter for The Boston Globe, and editor of The Real Paper. In addition to contributing regularly to The Washington Post website, Linsky blogs at Linsky on Leadership. He is a graduate of Williams College and Harvard Law School.

Alexander Grashow is responsible for the overall design and content of Cambridge Leadership Associates programs. He has worked extensively with executive teams and is experienced in delivering adaptive leadership in a variety of formats and geographies. Before joining CLA, Grashow worked at The Synergos Institute, where he was the co-founder and director of the Bridging Leadership Program, designing collaborative partnerships and leadership trainings across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the United States.

Grashow has been on the executive education faculty at the Wagner School at New York University, Duke Corporate Education, and Harvard’s Kennedy School. A graduate of Wesleyan University, and a former Coro Fellow, Alexander studied economics and fine arts, and is also the co-founder of the U.S.-Africa Children’s Fellowship, an international non-profit that partners with schools in Africa.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resources – An Interview with Joel Roth, author of The 20% Solution
2. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 15 – An Interview with Susan Bloch and Philip Whiteley, authors of How to Manage in a Flat World
3. Recommended Resources – Introduction
4. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 1 – An Interview with Robert Thompson, author of The Offsite: A Leadership Challenge Fable
5. Recommended Resource – Silos, Politics, and Turf Wars

The 20% Solution: A Practical Guide to Dramatic Cost Reduction in MROP by Joel Roth examines how businesses of all sizes can effectively exploit cost-cutting opportunities in times of economic recession, increased global competition, and credit and cash flow distress. Within The 20% Solution, Joel Roth provides actionable advice and real world examples of how businesses can reduce costs and increase productivity throughout their maintenance, repair, operating, and production supply chains.

Additional Insights… An Interview with Joel Roth, author of The 20% Solution

StrategyDriven contributors recently interviewed Joel Roth, author of The 20% Solution; receiving many invaluable, beyond the scope of the book insights.

SD : In The 20% Solution, you reveal that MROP supplies only account for about twenty percent of the average organization’s overall supply budget. Why then should businesses focus their cost savings efforts here?

JR: First, because in most organizations, this represents a fertile area for cost-savings that have never been identified or exploited, while most other areas have been repeatedly mined. Second, this 20% of spend represents a highly disproportionate (about 80%) share of cost, time and effort throughout the supply chain.

SD : Joel, in The 20% Solution, you discuss ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ dollar savings. What is the difference between ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ dollar savings and why is it important to distinguish between the two?

JR: Hard savings are those represented by invoiced charges based upon price paid and quantity bought. They are generally variable expenses. Soft dollar savings are everything else including inventory investment and carrying costs, purchasing costs, accounts payable, and other administrative or overhead costs. They are important because they are fixed but hidden from view. Most procurement people tend to discount or scoff at the value of soft dollar savings because they are more difficult to measure.

SD : In The 20% Solution, you present several prerequisites that must be in place prior to moving forward with an MROP cost reduction initiative, one of these being an MROP database. What is the purpose of an MROP database?

JR: The database is the foundation for any effective cost control or cost reduction program. You cannot control or reduce what you cannot measure. Moreover, the database enables you to identify the greatest savings opportunities and set appropriate priorities.

SD : Two other prerequisites you discuss are goal setting and process feedback and control. What are some of the common performance measures organizations pursuing MROP cost reduction use and what target goals do they first establish?

JR: All goals should have these characteristics: 1.) reflect what management seeks to achieve e.g. reduction in costs, transactions, staff, errors, time, inventory, etc. 2.) quantify desired results and relate them to cost drivers e.g. cut maintenance spending by $10,000 per kwh produced 3.) be measurable against the database so that accomplishment can be determined and 4.) be significant enough to justify the time and effort to be invested.

SD : Joel, having met the prerequisites for an MROP cost reduction initiative, what are the critical, high level steps typically taken to execute the project?

JR: Management must back the program; responsibility must be specifically assigned; adequate resources should be allocated; and results should be measured against objectives. I would strongly suggest that key suppliers be made part of the initiative.

SD : You’ve provided readers with a great list of cost savings opportunities to assess in both the ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ savings areas within The 20% Solution. As a bonus for our StrategyDriven readers, are there one or two additional areas you would recommend they explore?

JR: In the present economic climate, there are a great deal of assets being made redundant due to cutbacks, closings, bankruptcies, downsizings, etc. I would suggest looking for good used or surplus materials in secondary markets rather than buying new.

SD : Joel, you suggested that an MROP cost reduction initiative could be used as a developmental opportunity for an up and coming manager. Such a project certainly requires a leader to work cross functionally with the business’s many line and support organizations. What other developmental opportunities does an MROP cost reduction initiative afford its project manager?

JR: Most top management does not come from a procurement background and does not realize the significant potential of an innovative/change-driven procurement function to dramatically affect corporate cash flow, investment and earnings, as well as risk/reward relationships. Someone who can learn to identify, dramatize and communicate the benefits of such a program to top management can move much further and faster in the organization than is typical. This is addressed in The 20% Solution.

SD : Joel, your website, www.the20percentsolution.com provides additional resources for those seeking to pursue MROP cost reductions. Would you tell us a bit about the website and its content?

JR: If you click on the Resources Section of the website, you will find substantial additional insights into corollary topics such as innovation, changing the strategic role of purchasing and other examples of cost-savings techniques, as well as my availability to assist those who wish to pursue these programs.

Final Thoughts…

The StrategyDriven team would like to thank Joel Roth not only for sharing his time but also for his beyond the scope of the book insights on streamlining the MROP supply chain process. We found The 20% Solution to be particularly valuable because it provides actionable insights and real world examples for achieving cost reductions and process streamlining, both of which make an organization more effective. Additionally, Mr. Roth’s use of self assessments, performance goals, and feedback and control systems compliment many of the best practice recommendations found on the StrategyDriven website; all of which make The 20% Solution a StrategyDriven recommended read.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resources – Introduction
2. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 5 – An Interview with Michael Gurian, author of Leadership and the Sexes
3. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 9 – An Interview with Steve Kerr, author of Reward Systems
4. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 11 – An Interview with Marshall Goldsmith, author of Succession
5. StrategyDriven Podcast Special Edition 1 – An Interview with Robert Thompson, author of The Offsite: A Leadership Challenge Fable

About the Reference

StrategyDriven contributors find Talent Management Magazine to be an invaluable source of information on effective talent management practices. Each month, Talent Management Magazine provides readers with the talent acquisition, management, and retention insights of successful executives and managers.

Talent Management Magazine is supported by an accompanying website (www.talentmgt.com). This website contains numerous articles and resources covering topics such as:

• Recruitment and Retention
• Assessment and Evaluation
• Compensation and Benefits
• Performance Management
• Learning and Development
• Succession Planning

Benefits of Using this Reference

Effective acquisition, management, and retention of talent is a critical success factor shared by all organizations. In today’s rapidly changing, hyper competitive marketplace, the loss or churn of key personnel resources can instantly cripple any business attempting to remain competitive.

Talent management is no longer the sole responsibility of the Human Resources Department. The expanding war for talent, brought on by increasing demand for knowledgeable, skilled personnel and a contracting labor pool, demands that executives and managers throughout the organization work together to create a work environment that attracts, retains, and motivates talented individuals.

The practical methods and actions presented in Talent Management Magazine can be implemented immediately to improve an organization’s talent management effectiveness. Additionally, Talent Management Magazine’s recommendations embody StrategyDriven ‘s organizational accountability and alignment philosophies; making it a StrategyDriven recommended read.

Subscribe to Talent Management Magazine for Free!

Sign up for your free subscription to Talent Management Magazine by clicking here.

FREE StrategyDriven Trial Membership Start your FREE trial membership* and receive: FULL ACCESS to StrategyDriven’s premium content for 14 days FREE COPY of a StrategyDriven Expert Contributor book† EVALUATE how StrategyDriven gives you a competitive advantage

* Free 14 day trial included with a monthly membership registration. A monthly recurring subscription of $9.95 will begin after the initial 14 day trial period. Memberships can be cancelled at any time. Premium Member access will continue until the free/paid subscription expires.

† Available only to those living within the United States after the first monthly membership payment is received. Name and address information required. Books typically valued from $14.95 – $29.95 USD. Book value is not guaranteed.

Relate Articles:

1. Recommended Resource – The Welch Way
2. Resource Management Best Practice 1 – Attract the Best with Accountability
3. Recommended Resource – The Accountable Organization
4. Recommended Resource – Managing the Nonprofit Organization
5. Recommended Resource – Manager Tools