Is Culture Superior than Strategy

Culture is the way, behavior; attitude and/or approach to work/task adopted by or embedded among group of people in the conduct of business. Every organization has a culture - defined or not. Actual culture is a function of actual leadership, starting at the top. While strategy is a set of choices set by businesses, following with a series of actions to compete for the fture. We all heard culture eats strategy for breakfast, does that mean culture is more important than strategy?

1. Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast 

Culture may be rooted in values, but it is expressed in practices and behaviors. The culture of an organization is comprised of many intricate and interconnected parts, including corporate strategy and related strategic goals, job roles, business processes, core values, communications practices, corporate attitudes and business policies. Culture therefore is or ought to be very dynamic - changes constantly.

• Culture should be mainly generated by the organization's values and vision and the strategy is about how to take a position that allows it to deliver missions that move the company along the never ending road to delivering the vision. As such, the culture will only be a strong as the behaviors of the senior execs and the way they use these to demonstrate their commitment to the vales and vision on a daily basis. When this is done poorly, the real culture (as propagated by the employees, who out number the execs) is often misaligned with the fancy organizational statements and mood music. 

 

• The right culture is a prerequisite foundation for implementing strategy. Culture precedes strategy. An organizations cultural orientation forms the basis for initiating and improving on strategies for sustaining it. In as much as both culture and strategy are important to an organization, it must have evolved its brand culture and strategy overtime to maintain it as well as improve upon it. Culture is like a brand while the different components of the brand and how it’s aggregated to becomes the strategy for keeping that brand/culture unblemished.  

 

• A great culture can support a weak strategy, but a weak culture cannot support a great strategy. Culture is one of the main factors that affect implementation of strategies. While successful strategy should also take into account culture into enterprise even around the enterprise. A too strongly infused culture affects changeability negatively. A too weak culture infusion affects the ability to walk in one direction, and fill in the gaps when formal artifacts - such as strategy, processes and org charts - are not good enough. That doesn't mean culture always shapes strategy. Strategy leads an organization to success according to a clear vision, a strong ambition, a right analysis of all issues and parameters with culture of course. So the two elements are correlated with each other. When conditions become grim, it's culture (ingenuity, innovation, perseverance, helpful vs. competitive) that will carry the day. A diverse, open, and questioning culture will produce a viable strategy. On the other hand, a great strategy in a corrosive culture is doomed.

 

• Culture represents the 'ethos' of the organization, as it has evolved since its inception. Strategy represents the direction the leadership chooses to consider for future growth and orientation. Well-meaning strategy, which does not take into account the organizational culture, cannot succeed, unless the intended changes in direction are also expected to influence culture. Culture brings speed to market, competitive advantage and defines your brand. Once that culture is established as part of the DNA of the organization then strategy can be implemented. A great culture can also help shape strategy, but you have to WANT to listen.

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• "Culture eats strategy for breakfast” Did Drucker told us that culture is "stronger" than strategy? Why it's stronger is because people have accepted the culture internally, by definition, and it drives their actions. If they didn't identify with it, they would probably leave. And culture is more important because you can recover more quickly from mistakes in strategy if the culture supports these changes than you can from culture that is maladapted to the evolving needs of the business or industry. Of course strategy can guide changes in culture. Since in established organizations this can take a long time, culture could be the place for strategy to start. A key to effective strategy implementation is to achieve the same level of internalization and sense that this strategy is part of who we are. Then, the actions will also align with the strategy

2. Strategy and culture are inextricably linked 

Being fully aware of the culture and its underlying values enables strategy to be input to, validated and executed across the organization. When strategy is developed with the insights of people/stakeholders in the organization then culture becomes the vessel that drives the ownership and alignment needed to guide the strategy. You can't guide a fluid book of business if culture and strategy are not inextricably linked. Culture is part of the strategy.

• Strategy drives the business and also "defines" the culture you need to achieve strategy. Culture is the one thing that other companies can't copy quickly - it gives you competitive advantage, it fosters safety, it generates innovation, it encourages leading across boundaries, etc. etc. Strategy doesn't do any of those things - simply calls for them. Thus, focus should be on mobilization. Effective Mobilization addresses Strategy and Culture, together as one. It combines the structure and direction of top-down strategy with the pragmatism and wisdom of bottom-up insight. This feedback loop reduces the resistance to change and the proactive participation allows the strategy to be rapidly and efficiently implemented. 

• Strategy development requires understanding the current environment including the organizational culture. It requires an assessment of how the various factors (including the culture) help or hinder efforts to move to the desired end state. A successful strategy must account for culture's impact on implementation efforts if the strategy is to succeed. Stated another way, culture may dictate the methods and resources needed to implement the strategy. Also, the desired end state will include a culture, either the current one or some new one necessary to succeed in the new environment. Strategy implementation methods may have to deal with culture change as part of achieving the new end state. 

• A strategy is very important but will only be successful if it is embedded into a company’s culture and if the culture is designed to implement the strategy successfully. Conclusion: a company must have a strategy that is focused on serving its markets/ segments with the defined services/products and a strategy to mold the needed culture accordingly while culture is certainly part of the environment in which an organization operates, it represents the 'box' in which actions and decisions occur. When an organization makes a logical decision to 'move outside the box' then cultural change is certainly part of the equation. However, if cultural change is not part of the strategy defining the change process, then there are limits to the execution of desired change, and what normally happens is a sub-optimized result. Strategies fail because they often do not address tough issues like culture. 

• Some organizational strategies set the tone for the culture they want to develop. Other organizational strategies ensure the culture is continued. .Every company has a strategy - implicit or not. Culture must match strategy.  In the "Age of Discontinuity" strategies can shift, but culture must provide some continuity. So either you build a very strong culture that naturally evaluates and adopts presented strategic variables, or – if such a culture is not established – over and over again present and go through the key variables with all employees. But, of course, nothing beats the combination of a nurtured, functioning and good working organization culture with sound and well defined strategic variables. 

3. Strategy can be changed quickly, Culture can Take Long Time to Change       

There are interactions between the strategic fundamentals, the style of the leadership, the systems of the management, the structures of the organization, the culture understanding and the shared knowledge. Culture is tough and can take long time to change because it may require leadership and change management practices. Strategy on the other hand, can be regarded as the means to attaining and maintaining a position of advantage over adversaries through the successive exploitation of known or emergent possibilities rather than committing to any specific fixed plan designed at the outset. 

• Culture can take a long time to change.  Culture change is like any other change – sometimes it is welcome, sometimes it is not, by people in the organization. For example, a high avoidance culture – it is a cultural profile that is hard to change because the very behaviors that need to change, the avoidance behaviors, generate avoidance of changing them. The challenges are: (a) analyzing and understanding the existing culture; (b) assessing the effectiveness of the culture; (c) understanding what changes need to be made in order to support the new strategy. It is imperative to understand what is/isn't working before attempting any changes 

• Anyone deciding on changes to strategy in an organization need to ensure they are either (1) Consistent with the current culture, or (2) making a knowledgeable decision to buck the culture and move in a new direction. If you decide to buck the culture, you really need a strong leadership team supporting your effort, or you will lose. Strategic success without cultural agreement is nearly impossible. Short-term change may occur, but the 'silent majority' in the background will immediately begin to find workarounds, and wait for their time to simply revert to their normal comfort zones. 

• A strong bond between these two elements will lead to success either by goal attainment,. A strategy is the vision for how the goals or the “why” of an organization are achieved. Culture is the language in which it is expressed. A vision that cannot be effectively communicated will, ultimately, fail. However, culture without purpose is like an unbroken stallion. If those who are strategizing on change understand the culture clearly, and can estimate how that culture will evolve over some period of time, then they can use that timeline to their advantage in assuring successful change. In that instance, the effects of culture are not antagonistic or even competitive -- rather they become complementary, and should enhance success. 

Thus, culture and Strategy are inseparable. Without dynamic positive organizational culture, no meaningful achievements can be attained with any Strategy. A successful organization will create a symbiosis between these two elements to develop a cohesive realization of goals and communication of purpose. If there is no symbiosis between strategy and culture, the organization will not realize its goals. Worse it may have difficulty in understanding why. Essentially; they are both equally important. And what is absolutely critical is that they are a matched pair.

 

 

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What is the Highest Strategic Priority?

Contemporary businesses today have quite many strategic goals, from Human Capital to Customer/Client Relationships, from Innovation to Corporate Brand Reputation, from Operational Excellence to Corporate Governance, If only pick one, what is the highest strategic priority though? 

1. Strategy Focus should never be One Dimensional

A good strategist pivots between the External and Internal drivers, and frames a systematic strategic change agenda that addresses all the corporate priorities. The guiding vision and mission should dictate the focus of the organization and sets out the proper order of priorities.

• The approach to strategy is multi-dimensional: As a strategist, one cannot think in terms of single thread serial actions alone nor can one give undue priority to areas that are covered by the tactical implementation of the strategy, the approach to strategy is multi-dimensional with one main goal in mind. Most of people may give an answer based on importance rather than thinking about priority. This changes the answer substantially 

• Systematically addressing the strategy agenda is forged by Alignment, the critical pivot point, bridging from Developing the Strategy to implementing it. This involves aligning the Metrics (and Targets), Initiatives, Resources and Operating Plans with the Strategy’s Goals & Objectives. There are people, priority, plans, processes, culture and organization structure...(4 P's, C and O).

2. People are the Weakest Link, Innovation is the only Light

Though strategy is multi-dimensional, it’s no surprise that human capital and innovation catch more attention as strategic priority because:

• People are the weakest link: Human capital is the base on which Innovation, Operational excellence, Customer/client relationships, Corporate/brand reputation & others are built on. Without the right people, excellence cannot be achieved. Human capital makes or breaks a company therefore should be given highest priority 

• Innovation is Light: If people are the weakest link in business, then innovation is the only light all businesses need to pursue now, as innovation touches broader aspects of organization such as culture innovation, business model innovation, process innovation to directly impact operational excellence and customer satisfaction. Innovation with new concept, technology and novels views help substantially to leave a different mark and stand in better leading position always. 

• People Plants Innovation Seeds to make Strategy Fruitful: Human Capital, as talent plants the innovation seeds, as such, the efficiency innovation will improve operational excellence & business governance, and "disruptive" or sustainable innovation will improve customer satisfaction and business brand.  

3.  Depend on Which Areas are most in Need of Improvement

It takes science and analytics to make a good strategy. Strategy is about people, process, technology and vision. You need to let the fact pattern tell you what it needs. Not force fit an arbitrary assumption about what priorities must be.

• It’s situation-driven: The "right" answer about the highest strategy priority is that it depends on which of these areas are most in need of improvement in the organization in question. If they have an excellent human capital program, then putting human capital as the top priority won’t make further improvement, because, as a strategy, nothing changes.  

• Mutual Effect: Human capital seems to be getting the most attention. However, even the deepest and most invigorated talent pool will quickly be undermined by chronic inefficiencies in an organization. Alternatively, a group of stead, if underwhelming talent in an excellent organizational hierarchy, should accomplish a great deal more. That said, you can have the best people, but if the organization does not have a growth mindset, the culture of learning, these people will not be properly utilized. If an organization is looking for excellence, it will incorporate the other areas of importance by virtue of pursuing excellence. 

• The Trade-offs of Different Dimensions: It takes a logical approach to considering the trade-offs between operational excellence, product leadership (paralleling your innovation category), and customer intimacy. While it is important to be "good enough" on all three dimensions (and depending on the nature of your industry, good enough might be a very high bar), a company can not pursue leadership on all three simultaneously because of trade-offs in the allocation of top talent (human capital) customer confusion about what the company delivers (brand and reputation). Amongst other dimensions. 

•  A strategy pyramid: Innovation as a key strategic differentiator and the lifeblood of any business operation, and place it on top of a Pyramid, with Customer/ client relationships and Human Capital in the middle, then Operational Excellence and Corporate/ Brand reputation at the base. the argument: is that innovation needs to drive your business to be able to develop and compete effectively, Customers are the reason for your operational existence while Human Capital are your asset to reach critical business targets, and as enablers for your operations, you need Operational Excellence and a sound Corporate/ Brand Reputation.. 

• Investors should then evaluate allocating capital based on

1) The management's vision as stated through the mission statement and strategy

2) Whether the product/service set and road maps are consistent with this strategy,

3) How effectively the strategy (and plans) has been articulated internally and externally,

4) Employees' ability to execute consistently over time (allowing for the occasional hiccup

5) Valuation based on financial metrics and projections for future revenues, cash flows and income.

An effective strategy is always multi-dimensional, and the strategy priority setting is about the right people, doing the right things at the right way, by first-things-first priority, within a culture and organization structure specifically designed to fulfill the right mission and achieve the right long-term objectives

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Change, or Resistance to Change, What’s the Problem

Change is only constant, but most of change management effort fails. Indeed, change is difficult, some say, change is not a problem, the primary reason for change failure is resistance to change, while the secondary reason is the inability of leaders to deal with resistance, what are the true problems behind the change, or what’re the real roadblocks to step in changes?

1. Change is Problem if for its Own Sake 

Change is clearly not just one thing. There is positive change, negative change, and change as a response to changing external conditions and changes that are initiated because of external factors. There is disruptive change and incremental change. Change you want and change that is forced upon you. Some change is inevitable and other change is purely elective. One of the noble purposes of change is to pursue simplicity, how to well align business processes with organizational goals; how to improve clarity in communication, performance., etc. follow "keep it simple" principle, do it elegantly. And all leaders need to become change agents themselves, walk the talk

• There are two types of change: proactive and reactive. Proactive implies anticipation of changes – external and/or internal – that will affect the company. Reactive is adaptive to change that has already occurred or is underway. The common denominator to effecting outcomes is communication, which by definition is a two-way street. 

• There is good and bad change depending on the outcome of the change process and final benefit of the person who is directly affected by that change. Change itself may be detrimental to ones well being. We also need to recognize that there are various approaches to change such as planned change, unplanned change, imposed change, negotiated change and participative change. It is therefore safe to conclusively say that some forms of change may be difficult to be resisted 

• Three Change Factors: Organizational Change, Technological Change and Behavioral Change, according to Kotter, success can be attributed to these three major elements: All these elements need to be addressed as part of the change process. Sometimes change is the problem, sometimes lack of change is the problem, sometimes the lack of clarity to discern the difference is the problem. Sometimes the problem is with the ability to plan and manage elective incremental change. Sometimes the problem is the inability to perceive change in the environment and adapt when conditions require it. 

2. People Do Not Resist to Change, but Resist being changed

 As say’s going, "people don't resist change, they resist being changed." Prevention of "R" is what most people call "good leadership." 

• Two types of resistances are expected, Personal and Structural, and both need to be addressed effectively and efficiently. Change is inevitable, and the only differences are the reasons and goals behind the change and its scope and depth/breadth (Why the change, what you need to accomplish, what does it consist of and what does it impact). Overall, good anticipation in planning is key for a smoother execution, while regular updates and plan adjustments will enhance your chances of success 

• The five personalities are: Pathfinder (2.5% of population); Listener (13.5%); Organizer (34%); Follower (34%); Diehard (16%). (Lowest resistance = Pathfinders...highest resistance from the diehards.). People look for “What's In It For Me". Given this, change management needs to craft and most importantly deliver these messages at both the individual and group level, and most importantly reinforce these statements through consistent action. Resistance to change isn't necessarily the problem either since it’s a natural human response to loss or fear of uncertainty or to hideous management of change 

• The person labeled a resistor may even share the same purpose as the sponsors, it is wise to look for a "positive intent" behind a "resistor", actions or opinion before making assumptions it's just resistance to change. If someone is "resisting" change, what's that about? Are they perhaps interested in "certainty", "stability", "think things are on the right path" or is it something else? It's a good idea to get clarity around what the "resistance" is all about and look closer into reality of what's going on. Or they may just try to alert sponsors to poorly thought-out elements of their plan - or has better ideas. At a minimum, they need to be heard and understood - which removes some of the perceived resistance. Better yet, engage people in the design of change solutions so that issues can be surfaced and addressed early.  

• Resistance to change is not a problem - it's a balancing mechanism. And its also one of change's biggest opportunities. If you can tap into, better understand and work with the energy of resistance you can also accelerate purposeful change. Resistance is a balancing mechanism that says something isn't aligned or set right. if approached/managed well, will point to where important learning is needed to come up with goals/strategies/actions that will actually work and, by virtue of engaging that part of the system productively, generate the buy-in needed to make something positive happen. The most important factor is multi-dimensional representation on your scenario team - management-dancers-finance etc. Most businesses need creative people, who can think outside the box, and key stakeholders in parts of the process as well - in order to get an external viewpoint. There is understandably tension sometimes between the creative and the administrative, but we continue to work through these. My view: effective leadership - whether artistic or administrative- involves creativity. 

3. Leadership, Communication & Engagement are Key 

Change is driven by a combination of the pull of the leadership and the push of the self-managed teams, the effective communication and deep engagement around change

• Leadership is the key, effective, inclusive, sharing and trusting leadership are combined with effective situational / personnel management and planning. The top-down, externally driven attempt at creating significant change might be catastrophic for the businesses/situations. In other words, if the people of the business are 'connected', 'included', part of the identification and development of remedies and take-up of opportunities as they present and as part of operational and strategic planning, tell the story of the organization, past and present, through diverse eyes. This helps to acknowledge and give credence to everything that is good and should be preserved as well as to get a good handle on what it is you're changing.

• Communication around change is essential - Change fails because generally it is not well communicated (especially the rational and the end game), that's a no brainer, the process for implementation is not well thought out, lack to identify 'barriers' before they block the implementation and not gathering enough 'change-agents' to support the change. Also, the problem lies in simplistically equating resistance to change with a failure to communicate enough. Should leaders make time to listen to the real fears and concerns, it could provide them with an opportunity to (1) show the parties concerned how the business case for change makes provision for their fears and concerns - hence use productive influence to deal with resistance and obtain respect and buy-in in the process. It could also serve as an opportunity (2) to give recognition to those people that have "identified holes in the hull of the ship" that could cause the ship to sink on the change journey. Successful strategy and change implementation can only benefit from an organizational culture where people are encouraged to provide their inputs towards successful change as well as potential risks and mitigation strategies. 

• Engaging around change is a far deeper, more difficult process but talks to listening and understanding the realities that people face (the multiple 'realities' that represent their 'truth') as much as it does to conveying information. It talks to connecting with people at an emotional as well as a rational level and working out the best way to meet multiple needs within a change process. Change enablement through appropriate engagement is an important element of dealing with complex change. It may take more time but as you learn - sometimes you need to go slower, to go faster. True engagement usually accelerates change in the medium term. If it doesn't, the reality is that it certainly informs the discretion about the change. After deep engagement, if people still believe that the proposed change is not right for them, better pay attention to the wisdom in their views. Remember, they're a lot closer to the Customer interface and the real world of the business than most of the executives who launch change initiatives. 

4. Neither Change nor Resistance to Change (RoC) is Problem

Indeed the sentiments expressed on change management make sense. However, if managing well, neither change nor resistance to change is problem. Change should be viewed and embraced as a solution and an opportunity and not a problem. The resistance to change is a natural occurrence that needs to be addressed in a very well thought out change management plan

• Change should be viewed as an "opportunity" either to solve a business problem or improve productivity or cut costs or improve a product/service. To achieve desired change, an organization must create an environment that enables effective collaboration, share and promote ideas, and provide necessary incentives for employees. Change itself is an acceptable concept in organizations and acknowledged by people, so change isn't a problem itself, the content & Context of a change may cause problem. Change can be classified into long term transformation, mid-term organization's collective habit change, or short-term sprint to reach certain performance goal, for mid or long term change, vision is critical, the future can be reachable, also inclusive, every participant see him/her self in part of picture; for short term change, communication is important to create sense of urgency, Make change cascade, set up right milestone, well align change goals and business processes accordingly.  

• Within resistance lies deep wisdom (amongst other elements) and great energy. The resistance issue is the failures story of selling the ideas of change to people, not being committed to the requirement of change and the new paradigm that address that. Usually compare change with a trip plan, destination change, path change, speed change, alignment of all (family) members all are part of change plan, failure to convey, arrangement and commitment are called reasons for resistance. "Education" is often a missing key ingredient to overcoming the RC factor. Managers can communicate all they want about the coming changes and need for change but if you don't teach people why it is necessary and how the change will eventually benefit all they will not internalize the need and will naturally resist. 

• Change is part of Strategy: Strategic planning process should be cognizant of change from the beginning and should incorporate some of the core change management principles into its approach, involving those responsible/needing to support the initiative in creating this desired future themselves. The right horizontal and linear slices of the organization/network will offer a microcosm of the system and generate:1) best-informed solutions and 2) committed action. More specific steps in managing change include:
  (1) Ask lots of good questions. Keep it simple, not simpler; (2) Accomplish change by identifying the pain points through unique well-developed processes  (3) Outline the implementation process with assignments, dates, and deliverable. 4). Remove cultural, organizational, and systemic obstacles.  5). Measure performance, create KPIs and monitor and measure before and after for validity and value proposition to the organization   6). End results: growth, profits, improved culture, better communications, stronger organizational structure, and streamlined systems.  

Thereafter, neither change nor resistance to change is a problem. Instead, leadership, communication and engagement are the key to successful change, or lack thereof is the problem. Everyone accepts that change happens. Some changes we embrace, some we resist. It is incumbent on management to identify and explain the changes first, and then what proactive or reactive measures (changes) are being taken to address it. Change Management is not a standalone subject matter. It is part of strategy, which if done properly, includes change in the process. 

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How to Embed Analytics into Organizational Culture

As information is life blood in modern organization, thereof, how to build up a digital business with culture of analytics is strategy shift to compete for the future. A truly analytical organization not only measures the right things at the right time to facilitate quality decision making but also measures for the sake of improving the business productivity and optimizing customer services.

1. The Roadblocks of Doing Analytics

Analytics is the right way to get ahead, though the road to creating an analytic culture in a company can often be a long and arduous journey and hit a few roadblocks.

• The biggest bottleneck is adoption. Many organizations and executives are ill-prepared or reticent to act on information, too many organizations target analytic output at "interesting" questions rather than truly "important" crunchy questions that matter to the business. Interesting questions tend to be hindsight ("what happened?") oriented, while crunchy questions tend more toward insights ("Why did it happen?") and foresight ("What will happen if...?"). 

• "Technical complexity": The problem with traditional advanced analytics solutions is that they are not accessible by decision makers. The highly technical nature of traditional solutions, time delay due to SDLC of custom developments/ customizations/ enhancements, the performance limiting amount of data needed for accuracy, inability to share results to stakeholders etc. causes the decision makers not to have the answers that they want and more importantly when they want it. 

• Run into "multiple versions of the truth" issue. Lots of data and reports floating around companies and in many cases, each developed to support a specific business unit or individual agenda and not necessarily linked to what drives or could improve a business. For example, two different business units will come up with two very different conclusions based on the same data, depending on how it is analyzed and presented.  

• The other major problem is that analytics often reveals inconvenient or unpalatable "truths" to the business side of the organization. In an open, progressive culture that is welcomed. However, most cultures are not, so analytics is often used as the proverbial lamppost to support the corporate status quo, rather than being a searchlight to illuminate the way forward. Analytics types tend, by nature, to be quiet, observant types, and a-political, so the function is often perceived as passive, rather than dominant and crusading within organizations.

• The study indicates that the biggest obstacles to successful business analytic deployments are not data related, but in fact are due to skills and corporate culture. Strong analytic based businesses outperform others hands down, so it is not an issue of not wanting to be successful in this space. Rather, many executives just don't know where to begin and how to get this pushed into practice with so many other competing priorities.

• Complexity, data quality, intend to “boil the ocean”, are all roadblocks to successful analytics. There's a need for a change management component in each and every business analytics initiative. Fact-based decision making is an activity that does require concrete buy-in from all stakeholders, data quality is key to overcome the Garbage in Garbage out situation, relevant and authorized access to the data is paramount. 

• Talent Gap: last but not least, it’s lack of cross-boundary talent, the visionary executive who can integrate the collective thoughts, and hard data together to manage the strategy setting and decision making. more often than not, there's a huge disconnect between senior management saying they value analytics and doing what it takes to actually embed analytical thinking into one's organization. 

2.    The Principles in Shaping Culture of Analytics

Success in analytics is more about the people than it is about the tools. The point of analytics is not just to run the number, create new algorithms, etc., but to provide new and unique insights that drive decisions and/or strategies. Make sure the business decision is the first thing discussed. After that then create the analytic solution/methodology/process, work closely with customers to demonstrate how different types of analytics can be employed to provide insights into different types of business problems.

• “The what, the why and the how" of how analytics helps to inform strategy. Reporting is about the "what". Analytics is about the "why". And you should care about the "why" because it will tell you tomorrow’s "what".  Analytics is not about getting to a point certain, but rather it needs to be used as a tool for reducing uncertainty in business. To make analytics pervasive within an organization, it needs to be promoted as a way of reducing, not eliminating, or explaining uncertainty in both strategic decision executives make and the daily decisions the staff make.  

• Analytics must be easy to understand, easy to access and rely on validated corporate data as to avoiding the Fantasy Forecasting and Modeling (FFM) syndrome.
  
  
• Let the data do the talking Analytics must drive employee decisions in the field without disclosing too much data, but "just enough" to help staff improve by small steps. Analytics technology exists that can be used to facilitate better communication with business leaders and reduce the aforementioned political problems. This leads to more fact based decisions being embraced and implemented by the business.
  
  
• Simplicity because the people that are going to make the decisions based on the, "why", do not have time to understand the process behind delivering the "why". They just need to know what happened and what caused it.
  
  
• Accountability is needed because far too often people in Analytics simply provide their portion of the work and walk away. Once the numerical part is over so is their part in the effort. Senior leadership gets jaded when this happens. They get all of these promises of closure once root cause is identified but then the ball is dropped because there is no follow through on the remediation of key business problems
  
  
• Have really effective graphics and "presentation ready" results that show well and can be shared at the senior levels. Succinct and insightful commentary also helps get visibility and support. The snazzier and more professional it looks the more interest it gets. They do get excited when present ROIs, efficiency gains, market share, ability to select the most profitable customers, managing risk, and identifying new profitable niches
  
  
• Analytics can redefine the box in such a way as to encourage and reward creative problem solving versus the same old, tired methods that produce consistent results but fail to reach potential if only because the new definition of success has raised the bar. A report is used to answer questions that are known in advance. Analytics are about asking and answering the next question(s), generally in the form of 'why' or even better, 'if/than'.
  
  
• Measures are fundamental for anyone building a system and for such a few more measures, more metrics more angles are better to find and to fix problems. Leadership should demonstrate that they are leading; managing and operating through measurements and that will influence a lot to the rest of the levels in the organization. 

3.The Practices & Factors in Managing Analytics Program

The concept of "Think big, start small" is critical to advancing analytics in most organization, small successes can gain experience in advancing to the next levels of analytics (forecasting, segmentation analysis, predictive and optimization). The long term plan then has credibility because of those small successes and there is trust that the employees will individually benefit which leads to the company benefiting, always understand the key success factors and prepare for the next best practice: capture the latest analytics trends such as Social BI, Operations Analytics or Real-Time Analytics, Customer Loyalty Programs, In-Memory Analytics, etc. These topics will give food for thought to management and help get some momentum and enthusiasm behind effort.

• People & Culture:  It is about the company culture and whether or not your people are "curious". Do you have employees who are willing to get past the ‘what’ part of numbers to wondering about the why? Is senior leadership in full support of adopting the changes in the culture necessary to get past the report/dashboard stage? Now comes the hard part, moving the organization to next levels so that predictive analytics, forecasting and optimization can be incorporated successfully. This is where training, education, and people will be critical. And the culture has to be right and open to accepting how analytics may change fundamental views about clients, processes, what is a profitable niche, etc.     
      
• Process Selection: the key is to understand the business processes. In order to build out an Analytical Capability. Which business processes is the natural first beach head for the service? Marketing? Supply Chain? Operations? Customer Service?  Finance?  IT? Which would be the "last" door you would knock on?  Asking pertinent ‘WHY’ questions could be a good starting point, the real answer to "Why the business is losing customers?" can only be provided by the customers themselves. One way of starting out is conducting targeted surveys to build a "gut feel" and get a sense of direction. Having received inputs for building hypotheses, use data to validate or disprove them wherever possible, as the early part of the exercise is subjective with no statistical justification. And blind exploratory analysis could be equally futile. So always verify the numbers against the subjective information and vice-versa to ensure consistency. And, "Why?" question may be an intermediate to a "How?" question. and business eventually want to find out "How to retain customers?", "How to increase sales?" or "How to enhance profits by retaining profitable customers?"…etc. 

• Move farther down from Visibility to Understanding to Guidance, you gain more and more added value. That's what you need to impart into your culture. 1) That Visibility is the first step in the process but delivers the least added value (but without visibility you're running around in the dark!). 2) Understanding offers more added values because it helps you understand the business problem better, so you can better create a solution. 3) And Guidance offers the most added values because it's objective and exact. Numbers never lie, only the people using them. So proper Guidance coupled with deep Understanding, both based on clear Visibility... those will deliver the most value to your company/group/team/projects. 

• Analytic talent has 3 "C"s: curiosity, creativity and concentration. Discover which of your employees are curious, which ones are starting to see things that were not evident before and who will be the ones to advance organization. The focus has been in identifying individuals who have the curiosity gene in them rather than looking at the specific business processes and who will quickly see benefits for them. 

• Consider starting a Center of Analytic Excellence (CAE) that is tailored to that particular business' culture. Set out with strategies for: Organization, Architecture, Implementation, Governance, Training & Evangelism. The key activities that needs to be in place for effective implementation and utilization of Analytics are
  * Consistent support and direction from the leadership.
  * Business driving the analytics projects and initiatives.
  * Investment in training and sharing of information within the company.
  * Skill sets (both analytics, business)
  * Infrastructure, in terms of hardware and software.
  * Ready availability of sand box to explore and examine.
  * An integrated, clean and trustworthy data.
  * A data driven process that is consistent across the board and helps determine
  the value acquired through implementing and using Analytics.
  * Dedicated resources that focus on Analytics exclusively and be a main contact for business to drive their initiatives.
  * A governance structure that could help identifies who does what in the company so that there is accountability and responsibility.
  * Governance for security and data that could be implemented, maintained and followed 

• Frameworks from  "Competing on Analytics" by  Thomas Davenport
  Framework 1: Key Questions Addressed by Analytics
  Information about the Past - Reporting
  Information about the Present - Alerts
  Information about the Future - Extrapolation
  Insight about the Past - Modeling, Experimental Design
  Insight about the Present - Recommendations
  Insight about the Future - Prediction, optimization, simulation
  
  Framework 2: Ladder of Analytical Applications
  Level 1: Get Data in Order (which would facilitate accurate, timely reporting)
  Level 2: Key Targets and Segments (which allows for customer profiling)
  Level 3: Differentiation Action (begin to think about how to treat segments differently)
  Level 4: Predictive Action (recommend differentiated treatments to segments based on some type of behavioral/attitudinal analysis)
  Level 5: Institutional Action (prediction and differentiated action embedded in repeatable processes...would also include a robust measurement strategy that creates a feedback loop to data collection, reporting, refined segmentation, etc.)
  Level 6: Optimization (recommend modifications to strategy, given a finite set of resources, based on learning from predictions, measurements, etc)  

Embedding analytics into organization culture is vital step in building the “learning organization, with competencies in data analysis, good information management systems which communicate the results of analysis, support and understanding from the top about the value of data analysis so that the effort is supported and promoted. People who work in the various data departments have excellent communication skills to link their work to the organization’s objectives and outputs, a governance structure which has integrating mechanisms so that information is shared, all departments are valued. So analytics culture becomes organizational DNA in competing for the future.

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Leadership Spark: Motivation vs. Inspiration

Change your thoughts and you change your world. Norman  --Vincent Peale

Motivation and inspiration both are feeling encoded. You don't get motivated or inspired without feeling it, as their validity is on the perception of individuality. But, what's the difference between motivating and inspiring? And between feeling motivated and feeling inspired?

1. Motivation is EXTERNAL and inspiration is INTERNAL 

2. Motivation is the personal needs for each one and it is different according to personality and culture; while inspiration is for ideas and principles which leads to major changes and actions 

3. Motivation is at the ground level and immediate. It can be either the carrot or the stick. Inspiration is at the 30,000 foot level. It involves a bigger perspective and a longer range view. It sees the future. 

4. Motivated has two elements of push and pull factor. You are motivated to move away from something because it is painful and also move towards something which is inspiring. Inspiration is something that elicits an awe or admiration that can also motivate you to action. So, inspiration is the pull factor in the continuum of motivation.      
       
5. Motivation is the additional urge to get something done; inspiration is a notch up from motivation because it's the urge to do something significantly different and with heart! 

6. The only one who can motivate you is you. You have to have desire and be willing to challenge yourself to be all you can be. A strong leader can inspire you and leads to motivation to take action or change. 

7. Motivation and inspiration are received from two distinctly different sources. Motivation comes from a cheerleader, a dynamic speaker, a coach on the field, or a even a reward of some kind. Inspiration is In-Spired or In-Spirit and absolutely comes from a power greater than yourself.  How do you know the difference? Once you experience being truly In-Spirit, you won’t have to ask. You will know. 

8. Motivation is to drive action; inspiration is to provoke deep thinking first; motivation may take incentive; while inspiration takes vision; motivation is push ahead, while inspiration is pull up; motivation is to compete to win; while inspiration is to reflect who you are, compete for uniqueness. 

9. Motivation is not a feeling but describes the trajectory of a behavior. As such motivation can be understood and influenced using behavioral principles. Inspiration is a feeling that is more transient and much harder to influence. 
10. 
    

10. Fear is an effective motivator but only for a short run. As soon as you remove the threat the motivation is removed as well. True leaders don't lead by fear but rather by respect. Mutual respect goes both ways up-and-down the ladder. Inspiration creates synergy in strengthening positive thinking and influencing, An inspirational leaders can build trust through empathic message and exemplary actions. 

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BPM within IT & Beyond

In many organizations, CIO and IT plays critical role in enterprise scope BPM implementation, however, within IT, some say, that maintaining the status Quo prevents organizations from implementing IT Process Automation (ITPA). Thus, what’re the lessons to share in managing processes within IT and across-enterprise as well?

1.  Ten Reasons IT Prefers Maintaining the “Status Quo”

There are both technical reasons and personal interest (change inertia) to stop IT from process automation. Technically, process automation is only effective if the processes being automated have low risk and high maturity. This must also be coupled with the obvious requirement of the underlying technology to allow the process to be automated in the first place. It is because of a lack of one or more of these things that process automation does not take hold. There may be other reasons as well. Perhaps the technology solutions in place already (that are not ITPA related) increase the overall efficiency of the organization that the "law of diminishing returns" takes effect and the cost-benefit analysis does not yield a compelling enough reason to pull the trigger.

• The single biggest reason is resistance to change.
• Failure of previous automation projects
• Complexity 
• Difficulty in quantifying tangible value (ROI) 
• Security (read "insecurity") 
• Price 
• Desire to preserve investment in legacy in-house scripting 
• Lack of organizational readiness for automation 
• Tough choice to which automation can be applied (potential for ROI) 
• Lack of integration capability with existing systems (potential for ROI) 
• Some are simply not mature enough and automate those processes may create a lot of issues, not all processes are delectable for process automation

2.   The Benefit from IT Processes Automation

The competitive advantage of businesses is creativity and innovation, but many times, businesses do not look very deeply into "Best Practice" and challenging the Status Quo.So when the business is looking at cost recovery, they look at their most expensive resource for a quick fix or IT to solve a problem, without investing the time to look at different ways the workload should be managed and the opportunity that can result. The potential benefit from IT Process Automation:

• Preventing revenue loss due to increased operational efficiency. Manual execution of run book scripts takes longer due to manual effort as well as the inability to take advantage of parallelism. 

• Preventing revenue loss due to man made errors. Manual execution of run book scripts is prone to error and can cause more problems than they were originally intended to fix. 

• Optimizing operational costs due to decreased need of specialized staff.  Because mature processes can be automated, the need to retain staff with specialized experience is significantly lessened. These specialized staff members may have a higher FTE than those without. 

• Accelerating strategic goals with Simplicity and Pragmatism: Strategic importance of process in consideration can also be additional factor: processes with direct impact on strategic goals are preferred to implement process automation in order to accelerate business growth, while some processes have relatively low influence on results and when question arises, which process automation project resources should be allocated to,

• Organizational Silos: A well-implemented process automation can bridge functional silos, as businesses today are information-intensive, data and process are usually correlated with each other, at most of businesses, IT is data steward, but business functions may declare “ownership” for their data, it makes situation tougher, as siloed data will cause bad decision making, siloed processes, resources wastes, as well as risk loopholes.

3.    Process Management Goes Beyond Automation

Process management goes beyond automation; also include process optimization & innovation as well. Usually process automation is to pursue efficiency, but more importantly, process effectiveness is to ensure the process is doing right in aligning with business goal via holistic design and well taking advantage of the latest technology. Thus:

• BPM and EA may need to go hand in hand, to encourage cross-functional orchestration via well design, the focus of BPM project is about process optimization, It is upon how to enable the enterprise achieve its goals in the most effective and efficient way 

• Change Management, for any process improvement project or regular IT project, Change management must work hand-in-glove with PM throughout the project life cycle to ensure all the necessary elements of success are in place; it's because creating and sustaining change is a leadership responsibility requiring strong governance /sponsorship on both the IT and business side; to create the need/culture for change (Executive support, alignment, incentives, understanding, communication, policies & procedures, etc.) which ensure the success of the project 

• BPM Project is for Business Purpose, not for IT Sake: too many IT and business areas are too fixated on Business as Usual functions. This means they are continually fighting fires and operating in a reactive mode, leaving no energy left for strategy and looking at the bigger picture to introduce a continuous improvement strategy. Then often when Process Automation is tried to be introduced, it has been addressed from too much of a technical perspective and the right level business case simply hasn't been done correctly that truly identifies the business benefits and gains the support of the business key stakeholders. The management needs to correctly identify the business benefits including cost, productivity and revenue generation opportunities that are being introduced to help achieve strategic business objectives.

BPM management is both science and art, how to manage process more effectively, from automation to optimization, from inside out to outside in, from within IT to cross business ecosystem, from top-down, bottom-up, to system-wide,, only with right methodology and talent alignment, organizations can manage processes more strategically and holistically

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Is ‘Agile’ Strategy on the Way

Agility is the ability of an organization to sense opportunity or threat, prioritize its potential responses, and act efficiently and effectively.  While Agile as software project development methodology intends to enforce iterative communication, increase customer satisfaction and expedite project delivery, to scale Agile effect, can such Agile philosophy also retool business strategy planning, as the rate of change is accelerated, and strategy needs to be more dynamic than you think.  An agile strategy embraces three “C”s: Context, Cascade and Creativity

1.    Strategy Planning is a “Living Process” 

A clear purposeful "North Star" - a vision of what organizations want to be, to achieve, and a good strategy encompass the direction upon how to get there. Organizations much be proactive in keeping short term and long term strategy goals clearly in sight, but strategic planning is a living process, not a static shelf-ware. It has characteristics such as:

• Cascade: Strategy Planning becomes a "living process" with regular evaluation, scanning, listening, revisiting and potential course correction. There is no "predictable future", but there are many possible ones. Long term planning has its place, but linearity and over prescriptive-ness" don't. If you laid all of the corporate strategists in the world end-to-end you wouldn't reach a consensus 

• Context: Strategic corporate goals are sacrificed at the expense of reactively adjusting strategy. A proactive strategy has updated context, and accurately established strategy and goals should serve as general "borders" within which businesses utilize problems as opportunities for fine-tuning strategy. 

• Part of strategy is scenario planning. You never know for sure what is going to happen, but through continuously scanning the market, you should be able to identify different scenarios. After evaluating these factors, you need to use the different scenarios as an input for you strategy. The processes should not be rigid; you always need to be able to adjust. But by considering different scenarios into strategy, you are most likely to be prepared for these changes.

2. A Good Strategy Embraces Creativity 

We are truly entering a new evolution of the discipline, where strategy, innovations and change must converge dynamically...and where we should ALL be looking at any strategy - whether for product, service, or total business through the lens of "sustainable development": 

• Strategies that are overly prescriptive act as a cork on innovation and creativity. When a company can be quickly disrupted from a competitor from a different industry, businesses need strategy that is resilient enough to enable people to shift and adapt and a good strategy embraces creativity. Companies experiencing paralysis from process and policy will find themselves unable to envision alternatives that fall outside the self-imposed boundaries they function within. 

• Any movement leads to feedback that allows strategy correction and refinement. A good strategy needs collaboration right from the beginning.  A collaborative approach can help to leverage the existing knowing upon how the organization enables teams grow beyond their limits and thus create solutions that can be implemented. While strategy should be a team effort, sometimes decisions simply have to be made, as being stagnant can be dangerous. No movement - Paralysis by Over-Analysis - will kill a product, project, and corporation faster than anything else. Staff and clients take inaction as fear and lacking a leader with whom the "Buck Stops." 

• Part of framing a strategy is to have built -in a mechanism to correct the direction if the variables are changing or if there is an innovation that has disrupted the landscape all together -either in a big bang way or in a gradual manner.

3.   Execution is Part of Strategy 

Strategy definition shouldn't be done without thinking about execution at the same time.Coming up with new strategies is easy. Executing them takes tireless effort and daily diligence

• Communicate Strategy Clearly: A good strategy needs to get feedback from bottom-up of the organization and helps in better communication and execution of the strategy. Strategy is not strategy if it does not take people, management and leadership into account and put it in perspective. In the networked society, strategy and execution are more and more intertwined.  

• A necessary condition for the implementation of strategies is proper governance and, most critically, ownership by a resilient and empowered executive team that has the implementation of strategy as a "live" objective. This of course requires that the formulation of the strategy is a team effort, based on consensus reached by rational criticism. Effective governance practice streamlines strategy execution seamlessly. 

An Agile strategy embraces three Cs: Context, Cascade and Creativity, it’s shareware, not shelf-ware, a dynamic planning, not a static document, and a good strategy always includes execution as part of strategy. 

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