Agility = SustainabilityLearn Management Articles on management-info.biz. Agility = Sustainability article will help answer your questions on Management Articles.We at management-info.biz specialize in Management Articles. Management Articles at management-info.biz provides the most up to date news and articles. If you have questions please do not hesitate to contact us.
Sometimes, I think we overlook the fact that the rules of the game have changed as well. Early on in my career, businesses were evaluated by the amount of assets or “Retained Earnings” showing on their books. “Good Will,” used to be a bone of contention in determining the real value of an organization. Today, little if any attention is paid to “Retained Earnings” as we have switched to measuring “Return on Investment” and other measures of efficient use of capital. In part, efficiency has become the key instead of asset accumulation because a product and process that is generating a profit today may be tomorrow’s buggy whip. Change in our environment and change in the rules we are measured by all point to the need to be adept at change. To me, an agile organization is one that is proficient at change. It can do anything it wants, whenever it wants. There have been lots of different operating strategies presented over the last few years to help us transform our organizations to higher levels of performance. These strategies include, LEAN, TQM, Continuous Improvement, SMED, Process Reengineering, Mass Customization and others. Sadly many of the efforts to implement these strategies have failed not because the strategy was wrong, but rather because agility was missing in the organization. Agility is a people issue not a strategy or process issue. Successful adoption of operating and transformational strategies will happen much faster and with less expense as an organization becomes more agile. Like evolution and mutation in living organisms, organizational adaptability or agility is a core survival requirement. Achieving agility in an organization is contrary to the way most of us were trained to manage. Most management training even today is still based on the work of Frederick Taylor. It is an approach to management that worked well at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, but is sadly out of date in today’s highly sophisticated world where computers, cell phones, the internet, radio and television are commonplace and workers are better educated and more involved in their world than ever before. As I witness the changes in organizations, I become more convinced daily that all of the process improvements in the world will not by themselves solve the problems facing organizations. It is time for a new approach to management that involves people in the issues that affect them leading to engagement, creativity and commitment in the workplace. Jack Stack in his book The Great Game of Business makes the case when he says, “…productivity depends on people. I don’t disagree that machines can make you more competitive. They can absorb overhead. They don’t take breaks. They don’t go on vacation. They don’t sit around wasting time. What machines can’t do is figure out how to make money. Only people can do that. If you have people who know how to make money, you’ll win every time.” For too long, we have relied on a leader – who by virtue of position, greater experience, wisdom or skill, is relied upon as the problem solver and that leader fails to ask for or accept input from team members. Psychologist Patrick Laughlin and his colleagues at the University of Illinois recently released a new study that shows that the approaches and outcomes of cooperating groups are not just better than those of the average group member, but are better than even the group’s best problem solver functioning alone. Not only do groups make better decisions, but once agreed to, the decisions are far easier to implement and have much greater likelihood of success. More and more research points to the advantages of group engagement and decision-making. It is no longer a matter of why you should adopt a high engagement strategy with your people to gain agility, but rather how to implement this process. Roadway is a trucking company that is currently implementing a high engagement strategy in their organization with some tremendous successes. Their approach includes three elements and may very well be the model for other organizations. The three elements of their program are: 1.) Education, 2.) Tools, 3.) High Engagement. First, Roadway is spending a lot of time educating their people about the business. They have adopted much of the thinking from Jack Stack’s book, “The Great Game of Business.” The key is to help their employees understand the financials of the business and how they affect the numbers. Second, they have trained their people in the basic principles of LEAN so that they can evaluate current processes and procedures and have a basis for making changes that will positively affect the bottom line. Finally, they have adopted and use a positive approach to achieving “High Engagement.” Rather than focusing on the problems in the company, they have chosen to look at the strengths of the company and build on those strengths using David Coopperrider’s 4D model for positive change. The results at Roadway have been impressive. There are many stories of success at individual terminals that are now being shared across the company and in the meantime just one of the measures they use has recorded a $10 million improvement over the last 4 years. Roadway is rapidly developing Agility to help them face a very competitive and rapidly changing world. Without it, they would most likely not have survived. ã Copyright Bob Cannon/The Cannon Advantage, 2003. All rights reserved. Byline Bob Cannon helps visionary leaders make decisions that gain a competitive advantaget. Check out other interesting articles available in the Taking Aim newsletter available at www.cannonadvantage.com . Bob can be reached at (216) 408-9495 or mailto: bob@cannonadvantage.com This article courtesy of http://www.cannonadvantage.com. You may freely reprint this article on your website or in your newsletter provided this courtesy notice and the author name and URL remain intact.
|
More Articles:1. Safety Policy Sample Outline By Lance Winslow Writing a safety manual is a tough job and most larger corporations outsource such jobs or they have someone on staff with the proper credentials in risk management. Imagine writing the safety manuals for NASA? I had the opportunity to be in the unique position of being able to imagine just such a thing when writing our company safety manuals. It takes lots of studying and review of case law to do it properly. Each industry is somewhat different and hopefully you know your industry and company… 2. I Said Pareto Chart… Not Potato Chart! By Martin Pl Does this sound familiar? You were hired for the new management position. You were tasked to turn the numbers around. You take some time reviewing the current situation. Now it’s time to take a look at the current processes and get your staff together to analyze the data. You tell them that you want to brainstorm; work on a few mind maps, whip out a couple Ishikawa’s to get started and then have them bring Pareto charts relative to their respective functions.One of your department heads looks … 3. Why Do I Need a Board of Directors By Rick Johnson Family owned/privately held organizations in wholesale distribution, both small and large, with succession issues, family preparation and second and third generation leadership issues have been subjected to the evolution of leadership. These organizations are often founded by an aggressive, highly talented entrepreneur. Many of the principles of leadership employed by the founder that helped build the success that the organization enjoyed in the past is not the type of leadership that will mai… 4. 3 Steps to Stop Absence and Make People Happy At Work By Alan Fairweather If you're an employer or a manager then work place absence is costing you money, inconvenience, and upsetting your customers. And as we all know, not all days taken off work are due to genuine sickness. Many employees "take a sickie" because their morale is low and they just don't like or can't do their work.The challenge for employers and managers is to make people happier at work. And if people are happy at work then they are less likely to take a day off every time they wake up with a stuff… |
||||
