409 Posts Found

There are many organizing templates you can use that are designed to persuade and inspire your listeners. One that’s ideal for leadership communication is the past/present/future framework. It’s particularly effective when you’re speaking about your company’s vision and your future prospects, or when you’re announcing a new project that requires everyone’s buy-in and commitment.

The Past

Take a moment to remind your employees of a host of … [ Read more ]

Author: Bruna Martinuzzi | Source: The Communication Strategy Sure to Inspire Employees | Subject: Communications Questions

The unspoken beliefs that wield the most influence over business behavior are the metaphors that people use to envision the following major aspects of the work experience:

1. What is business all about?
2. What is a corporation all about?
3. What is management all about?
4. What role do employees play?
5. What really motivates people?
6. What is the nature of change?
7. What’s the role of technology?
8. What is the essential nature of work?

The answers to … [ Read more ]

Author: Geoffrey James | Source: Make Your Company Smarter | Subject: Organization Questions

There are four key areas that contribute to leaders’ ability to do the work we are asking them to do. This model has been adapted from the work of Elliott Jaques (Requisite Organization.)

1. Are they smart enough to manage the complexity of the judgments they will be asked to make? Can they get their head and arms around the work, or will it overwhelm them?
2. Do

… [ Read more ]

Author: Brian Brittain | Source: The leadership immunity to making things happen | Subject: Change Management Questions

Jim Collins has spent a career probing the inner workings of great companies. Below, he boils 25 years of research into 12 questions that leaders must grapple with if they truly want to excel. Collins’s advice: Be systematic. Every month, have your leadership team discuss one of the following questions. Repeat the process annually for five years.

1. Do we want to build a great

… [ Read more ]

Authors: Bo Burlingham, Jim Collins | Source: Jim Collins: Be Great Now | Subject: Management Questions

Employees

If you’re involved in activities that you’re already naturally inclined to do well, your attitude toward work is different and you contribute more to your workplace compared with someone who may have similar skills but less natural ability. Doing what you do best is essential to being a star performer at work. As an employee, you should ask yourself these questions:

• Do I know what

… [ Read more ]

Authors: Aniruddh Haralalka, Leong Chee Tung | Source: Why Strengths Matter in Training | Subjects: Human Resources Questions, Leadership Questions, Management Questions

In order to serve the channel-savvy, highly mobile, multidevice-happy consumer, chief marketing officers (CMOs) have their work cut out for them. These CMOs need to have an accurate understanding of consumers—their intentions, impressions of products and services and their behavior; to pinpoint exactly which marketing channels—online or offline—are yielding maximum MROI.

For example, knowing the impact of paid search engine marketing (SEM), online display media, natural … [ Read more ]

Source: Multichannel Attribution: Measuring Marketing ROI in the Digital Era | Subject: Marketing Questions

Priority 1: Market opportunity validation

• How are we, as a combined company, positioned in our existing markets, and how can we sustain our differentiated capabilities to sustain our growth?
• What new opportunities are available to pursue as a result of the deal, and which of them have the highest growth potential?
• How will our target markets shift as a result of this merger or acquisition?

Priority 2: Go-to-market … [ Read more ]

Authors: Iain Bamford, Jessica Kosmowski, Nik Chickermane | Source: Growth Through M&A: Promise and Reality | Subject: Mergers and Acquisitions Questions

Supply chain barriers to trade are both complex and widespread. A more comprehensive approach to foreign investment decisions means recognizing costs in four important categories of the supply chain. Executive teams can begin by asking some key questions relating to each category:

Market access

• Do you know how many regulatory agencies you have to deal with as you move goods into or out of your chosen

… [ Read more ]

Author: Mark Gottfredson | Source: Finding the hidden costs in broken supply chains | Subject: Operations Questions

1. Are you able to break down your operating inventory into the three major categories when reporting levels—safety, replenishment and excess or obsolete stock?
2. Is your company using the most effective method to calculate your safety stock levels?
3. Do you recalculate safety stock levels on a regular basis to ensure they are up to date?
4. Who decides key inventory-related policy such as striking the right balance between

… [ Read more ]

Authors: Francois Faelli, Pratap Mukharji, Raymond Tsang, Ronald Fink, Sam Israelit, Thierry Catfolis | Source: Ten ways to improve inventory management | Subject: Operations Questions

• What is the business case for investing further in social media? Where and how much should we invest?
• Fundamentally, how much is consumer behavior changing? What are the biggest opportunities and threats? How aggressively are my competitors investing in these tools, and are they capturing differential advantage?
• What are the best practices in deploying social media strategies? What are the pitfalls to avoid?
• Should we build or

… [ Read more ]

Authors: Chris Barry, Chris Brahm, Eric Almquist, Rob Markey | Source: Putting social media to work | Subject: Marketing Questions

1. How willing are customers to continue to pay for further improvements in performance that historically merited attractive price premiums? One of the key tipping points in a market occurs when a company, in Christensen’s language, overshoots a given market tier by providing them performance that they can’t use. Your television remote control probably serves as a daily reminder of overshooting. Each of those

… [ Read more ]

Author: Scott D. Anthony | Source: Create Early Warning Systems to Detect Competitive Threats | Subjects: Competition Questions, Management Questions

1. What exactly influences our consumers today? The digital revolution and the explosion of social media have profoundly changed what influences consumers as they undertake their purchasing decision journey.2 When considering products, they read online reviews and compare prices. Once in stores, they search for deals with mobile devices and drive hard bargains. And after the purchase, they become reviewers themselves and demand ongoing

… [ Read more ]

Author: Jim Stovall | Source: Winners’ Wisdom | Subject: Marketing Questions

In Build, Borrow, or Buy, Laurence Capron and Will Mitchell a highly structured examination of the three fundamental modes — or “pathways” — for obtaining the resources needed to grow. They are: developing the needed resources internally, or “building” them; contracting or partnering to obtain resources, or “borrowing” them; and acquiring, or “buying” them. According to the authors, companies should be adept at all three. … [ Read more ]

Author: Ken Favaro | Source: Sourcing Growth | Subject: Strategy Questions

• How can we better measure our ROI on R&D spending?
• Do we have the infrastructure to support our global innovation and product development needs now—and three years from now?
• Who owns product lifecycle management? Who should own PLM for the company?
• Do we have a definition, strategy and roadmap for PLM?
• How do our current CRM, SCM and ERP initiatives link to PLM?
• What impact could improvements in PLM

… [ Read more ]

Authors: A. J. Gupta, Kevin P. Prendeville | Source: The innovation enabler goes mainstream | Subject: Products & Services Questions

• Does it violate any strategic laws of gravity?
• Do my numbers match my strategy?
• Will it create value?
• Is it material?
• Is it differentiated?
• Is it just ‘PowerPoint engineering’? (assuming that anything people say they can do, they can do)
• Where are we in our strategic journey?
• Are we properly balancing growth and risk?
• What are the facts?
• Is the problem solvable, and do we care?
• Who can solve that problem?
• Why might we fail?
• How

… [ Read more ]

Authors: David Speiser, Gail Lumsden, Jeffrey Elton, Raymond Gilmartin | Source: How We Do It: Strategic Tests From Four Senior Executives | Subject: Strategy Questions

• Can we create a reliable story around what we do?
• Can we create symbols, rituals, or culture around our offerings?
• Can we create and mobilize tribes to help our cause?
• Can we leverage the power of every individual within our company to humanize our brand and create more passion around what we do?

Author: Francois Gossieaux | Source: The Seven Myths of Hyper-Social Organizations: Why Human 1.0 is Key | Subject: Customer Questions

The following series of five yes-or-no questions can help you manage future performance in a new way. Your answers will steer you toward a turnaround conversation appropriate to the situation and the underperformer.

Once you become familiar with the questions, you’ll be able to assess which conversation is needed in a matter of minutes. You’ll be on your way to managing underperformance instead of living with … [ Read more ]

Author: Jim Bolton | Source: How to Turn around Problem Performance in Five Questions or Less | Subject: Human Resources Questions

1. What are your company’s distinctive capabilities — those that support your strategic priorities — and how can they be improved with information technology?
2. How should you prioritize your IT projects accordingly?
3. What sequence of investment and activity will allow you to reach the goals you’ve set, and close the gaps you need to close?
4. What kinds of cultural and governance support do you need to put

… [ Read more ]

Authors: Eduardo Alvarez, Srini Raghavan | Source: Road Map to Relevance | Subject: IT Questions

Value proposition

• Is your value proposition well aligned with customer needs?
• Could someone offer a better deal?
• What other jobs could you do on behalf of customers?

Customer segments

• Are you continuously acquiring new customers?
• Could the market become saturated?
• What new segments could you serve?

Channels

• Are your delivery channels efficient?
• Are your channels in danger of becoming irrelevant?
• How can you improve channel effectiveness?

Customer relationships

• Are you easily replaced by a

… [ Read more ]

Author: Matthew E. May | Source: How To Create A Disruptive Business Model | Subject: Strategy Questions

1. Customer Segments. For whom are we creating value? Who are our most important customers?
2. Value Propositions. What value do we deliver to the customer? Which one of our customer’s problems are we helping to solve? Which customer needs are we satisfying? What bundles of products and services are we offering to each Customer Segment?
3. Channels. Through which Channels do our Customer Segments want to be

… [ Read more ]

Authors: Alexander Osterwalder, Matthew E. May, Yves Pigneur | Source: The 9 Elements Of An Ironclad Business Model | Subject: Strategy Questions