Consider these 6 building blocks to successful innovation. It’s not starting from a blank sheet of paper, nor waiting for lightening to strike. It’s a process that you create and improve, learning from what others have done and being clear on what you need. Consider these specific recommendations. And check out my friend and colleague Norbert Majerus’ book on lean innovation at Goodyear – a journey to world class profitable innovation.
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Executives make dangerous assumptions. Too often, in a hurry to move along to the next thing, they assume a decision made is a decision implemented, and an order given is an order executed. Most of the time, neither is true. This propensity to keep going without confirmation is why so many manufacturers struggle becoming good, much less great. Finish Strong™ is the process I developed to solve that problem. Invest 2 minutes in considering if you are making dangerous assumptions.
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Short-term, biased, egotistical decisions can be very expensive for any organization. Political leadership has led to the US Military, the best in the world, losing wars and killing millions of people. In 2017 military leadership enabled expensive deadly decisions by the Pacific Fleet. None of those choices were made expecting the massive costs that resulted. But those painful losses weren’t given sufficient credence when making the decisions. While politics can influence your business decisions, who really owns them at the end?
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Have you ever wondered why some cultures morph into their surroundings, while others do not? Failure to sufficiently consider differing cultures during a merger and acquisition contributes to the breakdown of operational integration that plagues many deals. My earlier podcast series on successful integration of operations provided a strategic look at integration of cultures. In this podcast, I supplement those with tactical steps to create a culture that enables every employee of the joined operations to reach their full potential.
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How do merging operations balance the need for speed, throughput and quality of their multiple innovation processes during the difficult first 18 months? Innovation was one of the 8 key factors I addressed in my earlier series on successful integration of operations in a merger or acquisition. Here I answer the questions I received from executives on those recommendations, specifically on why the innovation processes should NOT be immediately integrated.
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M&A deals rarely accomplish the great financial success outlined in the agreements. Failures in integrating operations dominate those unsatisfactory transactions. About 2 years ago I developed a series of podcasts suggesting how to succeed in merging 8 key operational categories. This podcast helps you prepare for rationalization considerations described in one of those earlier podcasts before the ink is dry. Parts, customers and suppliers are just a few of the arenas to examine.
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Sharing of knowledge and technology while merging operations will not happen automatically or well without a defined plan. This is true within an organization, and certainly when combining operations in an M&A deal. My earlier podcast on fully leveraging knowledge and technology in this series discussing effective operations integration recommended 4 steps to execute. In this podcast I expand those recommendations to include pre-merger activities, including when M&A is not on your radar.
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Success of any merger or acquisition depends on the effective integration of operations. My earlier series on that operations integration addressed 8 key factors, one of which is Supply Chain Management. Now I expand on my earlier podcast detailing 4 aspects of successful integration of SCM. The 2 additional factors addressed here are essential to actualization of intended benefits.
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Why do so many Mergers and Acquisitions fail to find promised success? These next several podcast expand on an earlier series in which I addressed that question. Follow this methodical process for understanding where the real potential lies, and then take advantage of it. Listen to the earlier podcast expanded on below.
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While your experience working for a PE firm-owned manufacturer may have been miserable and driven by short term views, that world is changing significantly. More and more are investing in true operational expertise that will thrive over time.
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