In a recent post I suggested that when initially introduced, frameworks tend to address specific problems with limited scope. If they help successfully address the problem, over a period of time they evolve to address problems across a broader section of the organisation. As a result of this extension of scope, what can happen is […]
Most companies advertise a statement of purpose, often on their websites, as a mission statement that describes how they provide a valuable service to a certain set of customers. But it is no secret that the way they are actually managed could be quite different. What keeps CEOs awake nights is not how much value […]
Bridgewater Associates has been called the “world’s largest macro hedge fund” and has an award-winning track record of financial performance. In a recent TED talk, the company CEO Ray Dalio shared the secret sauce to which he attributes the success of his organisation – a philosophy of radical truthfulness and transparency. What he described looked […]
We use business cases to help us make rational decisions. Regardless of the criteria used to assess the decision alternatives, our expectation is that a business case will minimise the influence of our personal or group preferences or biases. This week we look at whether business cases are all they are made out to be.
In our exploration of strategic alignment, a recurring theme is the idea that the outcomes of our organisational interventions are inherently unpredictable. Given that we seem to routinely underestimate this unpredictability, it may be worth looking at the origins of the idea and some illustrative examples.
In the last two posts we explored learning (individual and organisational) and Relational Frame Theory (RFT), the explanation for mindfulness in psychology. This week we explore how learning and mindfulness might be related and the possible significance of the relationship for organisational effectiveness.
In our search for a relationship between organisational and individual learning and mindfulness, we now take a look at mindfulness from the perspective of a psychologist trained in the western tradition. Relational Frame Theory (RFT) attempts to explain the variety of human behaviour as the basis for therapeutic interventions. This introduction to RFT will place in a better position to understand how the different forms of learning can address ineffective behaviour in individuals and organisations.
We have in recent weeks looked closely at organisational learning, concluding that learning is critical to organisational change. Over the past few years, the practice of mindfulness has become popular enough in the conversation about management to be considered mainstream. Let’s explore these two conversations to see if they are related in some way.
In the last couple of posts we looked at the value of introducing a strategic perspective into an operational conversation and then whether strategic and operational topics can be distinguished from each other. But what happens when we take an operational view when dealing with a strategic issue.
In the last post we looked at whether it would be appropriate to use strategic metrics in an operational conversation, concluding it could be. But that brings up another question. How does one distinguish a strategic conversation from an operational one? Let’s look a bit more closely at this topic.
A recent conversation on LinkedIn about the relationship between a strategic artefact and an operational conversation led to some interesting insights. The original question posed was whether or not it would be appropriate to use a Balanced Scorecard as part of the day-to-day operational conversation. There was general agreement that it would, but for not for what most people might think is the reason.
We’ve now looked at two promising frameworks intended for organisations to understand and implement change: Design Thinking (DT) and the Logic of Scientific Inquiry (LOSI). Both acknowledge the complexity and human nature of organisations and both enable iterative learning as an approach for steering change. The instrumental, practical focus of DT appears to be very different from the theoretical focus of LOSI. In this post we compare the two to see what exactly the differences are, and whether they matter.
In the past two weeks we have been considering popular models and frameworks for organisational change, focusing on their ability to enable organisational learning. We didn’t find one that supports all the three requirements: an iterative process that supports the accumulation of knowledge, emphasis on cause-effect explanation and support for multiple modes of learning. This week let’s look at how well the framework sometimes known as the ‘scientific method’ supports the three learning requirements.
Last week we identified some characteristics of organisational learning and checked to see if four well-known models for change consider these requirements. We concluded that none of them do. But readers suggested of a couple of frameworks that do seem to support at least some of these requirements. Let’s take a look.
When dealing with change in organisations, most of us have some experience of unexpected outcomes. One way limit the scope of this unpredictability is the use of frameworks, which represent the insights and knowledge of those who built them. We’ve explored, compared and integrated a few frameworks over the past few weeks. Another way to deal with the unpredictability is to adopt a learning approach. Let’s look now at how we can do that and how some popular change management frameworks support this approach.
In the last few posts we have been looking at frameworks for understanding and aligning with expectations of the firm’s key stakeholders: investors, customers and employees. If we were to recast the balanced scorecard to be truly balanced from the perspective of the stakeholder, what might it look like?
Thus far we have looked at frameworks that can help a firm understand meet expectations of two key stakeholders: investors and customers. That leaves one other key stakeholder, the employee. In this post we explore the process of understanding and meeting employee expectations.
In the last post we concluded that the Economic Value Added (EVA) framework can be used to establish and meet expectations of the investor stakeholder within the broader Business Performance Management (BPM) framework. In this post we look at Customer Value Added (CVA), a framework that can be used to establish and meet expectations of the customer as stakeholder.
In the last couple of posts we compared the Business Performance Management (BPM) and Economic Value Added (EVA) frameworks with the Balanced Scorecard (BSc). There is no shortage of frameworks for improving organisational performance, so it might useful to see how they relate to each other. In this post we’ll consider the relationship between EVA and BPM.
In the last post we looked at the Business Performance Management (BPM) framework and compared it to the Balanced Scorecard. Continuing to use the Balanced Scorecard as a reference, in this post we explore another framework, Economic Value Added (EVA).