WHAT’S NEW
MANAGEMENT FOR DESIGN Winter 2014
Is your Strategic Plan sitting in the top drawer? Here are 12 reasons why strategic plans fail: •
Not understanding the environment
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Partial or minimal commitment
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Too much focus and activity on the day-to-day
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Not having the right people involved
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Writing the plan and putting it in the top drawer
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Unwillingness or inability to change
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Having the wrong people in leadership positions
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Ignoring marketplace reality, facts, and assumptions.
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No accountability or follow through
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No clear execution plan
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Unrealistic goals
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Lack of investment or resources.
And that’s not all of them! By avoiding these and other pitfalls, you can create an effective planning process, build a realistic business direction for the future, and greatly improve the chances for successful implementation of your strategy. We have worked in strategy development and business planning for over 15 years and successful strategy is no accident. In our experience the three most critical factors are: •
Business leaders with drive and ambition
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Having clear actionable and measurable objectives
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Considering execution before you start
Management for Design have developed a unique approach to strategy development and execution that if implemented effectively ensures results. At the core is a methodology and system to ensure successful execution that involves the key people in the business. If you are struggling with your business direction and can’t get the traction and results you need to improve your business then don’t sit on it! If you want to be set on new path and have the tools to make it happen please contact David Somerville or Rob Peake at 03 9645 8834. Here’s our website: www.m4d.com.au
World Business Forum 2014 We recently attended the World Business Forum held in Sydney in May. The forum is held annually and is an opportunity to hear and discuss the ideas, trends and innovations that are shaping the global business landscape. Among the speakers were a range of business ‘gurus’ including Michael Porter (Professor, Harvard Business School), Lyn Heward (CEO, Cirque du Soleil), Gary Hamel (London Business School and author of What Matters Now), Randi Zucherberg (Zucherberg Media), George Kohlreiser (author of Hostage at the Table), and Kevin Roberts (CEO, Saatchi & Saatchi). Among the topics of discussion were: •
Creativity in Business
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Creative Leadership
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Strategy
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Management Innovation
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Big Data
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Execution
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The Power of Social Media
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Leadership
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The Global Economic Future
Michael Porter spoke about the significant change that is occurring in how businesses are thinking about corporate and social responsibility. Businesses have realised that social responsibility is no longer a cost to the business but is in fact a driver of profitability. Business leaders need to consider their businesses products and services and the role they play in society. Businesses create wealth by meeting important needs at a profit. The more we do in business to contribute to society and community — create shared value — the more profit we are able to generate. Think about how you can align your business values with the client’s and with society, because how you create shared value can be at the centre of your business strategy. Business has the greatest power to change the world!
Kevin Roberts’ presented on how to drive creativity in your business. According to Kevin we now live in the age of the idea — a VUCA World. That is a world that is Vibrant, Unreal, Crazy and Astounding. The businesses that will win have lots of good ideas, not necessarily the big idea, and cultures with the most ideas will be the cultures that thrive and win. We need to change our cultures from roles and responsibilities to learning, excitement and joy. The key role of the business leader today is to allow ideas to flourish; it’s not about information — we are drowning in it — it’s about inspiration! Your language is what gets people to change/join revolutions. The three keys to business success are strategy, execution and IDEAS. Take those ideas and turn them
into solutions; that is the essence of creativity. His thoughts on execution? Eliminate unproductive activity — emails, meetings, travel — and focus on making things happen rather than on getting things done and measuring results. As Winston Churchill said, “Success is the ability to move from one failure to another without the loss of enthusiasm”. We have attached the link to the website if you are interested to delve deeper. Or we can provide an overview for you at some time in the future, get in touch for a chat. World Business Forum is held annually. Let us know if you’re interested in attending next year! World Business Forum: www.wbfsydney.com
Reviewing your HR needs If your business can’t afford a dedicated Human Resources (HR) department, perhaps it’s time to find one elsewhere. As Adam Turner MYOB says “Of all the growing pains experienced by businesses, dealing with HR issues can be some of the most frustrating ones. Finding, managing and retaining good staff involves dealing with a myriad of contracts, policies and government regulations, not to mention the finer points of payroll tax, superannuation and other financial issues. Don’t make the mistake of thinking these problems only affect big businesses. Even the smallest businesses need to be familiar with the National Employment Standards and how these entitlements relate to flexible work conditions” .
Chances are, staff-related issues aren’t your area of expertise. And unfortunately these issues can become overwhelming long before your business is large enough to justify maintaining an in-house HR team. In any case, you should be focussing on your areas of expertise — design, project delivery and building and sustaining client relationships. If HR challenges are impacting adversely on your business then look for outside assistance.
Manangement for Design is well positioned to provide quality, in-depth and compliant HR advice and guidance to your business. The first step is for Management for Design to conduct an HR ‘health check’ of your current people, systems, processes and activities. This enables us to conduct a review of your company’s current HR ‘back of house’, including any supporting HR materials, documentation, policies, processes and activities. This will be achieved by: (a) M4D reviewing all required HR information in the business, as well as any face-to-face discussions to further ascertain the current HR state of play across the business. This includes any unwritten HR processes and activities in place for your business presently. (b) M 4D will then provide your business with a summary HR ‘health check’ report of HR findings arising from this process to confirm areas of current HR strength and further clarifying opportunities for further improvement. There are a number of automated tools and templates designed to walk you through creating policies, procedures and documentation. They should be designed to ensure your business is compliant with workplace laws, such as Australia’s Fair Work Act. Choose with care, as many online HR tools offer templates based on US or UK workplace laws. The next step up from fully automated tools is HR consulting services, which often combine online HR tools with a hands-on appraisal of your HR needs. Rather than simply generating forms and policies, such services often assist you with managing the entire employee lifecycle from recruitment and orientation to performance reviews, personal development, ongoing training, and termination and exit interviews. Please give Rob Peake or Adam Kreuzer a call 03 9645 8834 if your business would benefit from specialist review of your HR activity.
Cloud-based business systems Much has been written about the cloud and its impact on how business is conducted today. But is the cloud really that significant? In a word, yes! The cloud is the great equalizer. The cloud offers everyone (businesses and individual consumers) the ability to obtain products and services from literally anywhere, anytime in the world on a device of their choosing. That is the power of the cloud. A consistent experience that is always available and appears to the consumer as something that is indistinguishable — large or small companies, local or global, morning or middle of the night, simple to extremely complex — it’s all there, all the time. But… The cloud is only a method by which we all obtain our experience. The experience is, and has always been, controlled and delivered by the business
utilizing a combination of exceptional people and exceptional solutions. This is a critical point. The best cloud in the world won’t transform a bad experience into a good one. The cloud does not know if your information is accurate or not. It is up to you to embrace your clients and prospects and give them an experience that will have them coming back time and again. So how are you using your Business Management Systems? IT and Systems Managers surveyed told CIO Magazine that their core Business Management System modules were used chiefly for accounting and financial applications (96%); project management and resource scheduling (78%); CRM/ Marketing and proposals (64%); and HR management and payroll functions (55%).
When asked in which areas of their business the systems worked best, respondents overwhelmingly cited the financial side of the house (70%). But what is really disturbing is that the majority of firms said that they are only using a small percentage of the capabilities of their system. This is a waste of money, and makes it harder to implement automation and processes that enable the firm to grow quickly. Business systems now have the capability to not only hold and retrieve information but to slice and dice the information on the spot to enable immediate decision making. In an age where all business technology applications should provide some competitive advantage, 76% of IT chiefs said operational efficiency was the goal of their organisation’s business management systems, followed by support of global business (12%); growth (5%) and IT cost reduction (4%). Just 4% of IT leaders said their business management system offered their companies competitive differentiation or advantage.
The future To be competitive at all (forget competitive advantage), businesses are going to have to begin utilizing their business management systems — that ultimate repository of almost all corporate data — in a much more integrated, intelligent, dynamic and client-centric fashion. What does that mean for tomorrow’s business: Decision making needs to happen at the time of accessing the information — not three meetings later! •
Access to information needs to be anywhere and anytime, utilizing the tools that people understand and prefer, and with the device they want to use.
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All of the information must remain accurate, up-to-date and easy to find.
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Security, platform, bandwidth, e-commerce, and other technical issues are as important today as ever.
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Your internal systems must also interface and interact with an external and ever expanding ‘social’ world.
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All of this must be seamless, simple, always on and presenting your brand in the most professional manner possible.
Where does all the corporate information reside? The vast majority is found within your internal financial and project management systems. Few businesses these days have business management systems that integrate all of their data and processes, and manage the entire project lifecycle in one system. Never, in the history of automated accounting solutions, has this played a more important role for every company regardless of their size. Because the cost of computing is so low, it is expected that your systems will provide all of the information they need. How can small businesses compete with global giants? Enter the cloud.
