The 12th century Cistercian monk Bernard of Clairvaux said that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Despite good intentions, too many organisations make bad interventions that cause them to end up somewhere they really don’t want to be. Continue reading
Collective problems in organisations are often notoriously hard to fix. When people feel they’re not doing anything wrong themselves, finger pointing at others is all too easy. But it doesn’t help. Even when it feels justified. Especially when it feels justified.
Most organisations and their advisors regard strategy formulation as the foundation for everything else. But to avoid ‘death by mistaken identity’ it’s important to look beyond strategy to understand what business you’re really in. Continue reading
Silo busting challenges the natural, innate human tendency to align with others similar to ourselves. Traditional organisation structures amplify this tendency and by measuring the performance of each part separately, we further reinforce silo mentalities. The end result of this is local optimisation and fragmentation of the whole.
Next level performance can be elusive, even for organisations with a good track record of innovation. Procter & Gamble’s experience with Pampers demonstrates what often happens when the time comes to reinvent your organisation. Continue reading
Many business leaders aspire to achieve innovation leadership. This means doing what Apple repeatedly demonstrated under Steve Jobs – that the best way to predict the future is to invent it.
Organisations must go beyond organisation design as the ‘next obvious logical step’ following on from strategy development. This conventional wisdom is increasingly outdated in a world where future success depends on adopting innovation as a way of life. Continue reading
Hubris Syndrome blinds people in positions of power to the value of other perspectives. It is a self-deception that not only curses its victims but also eats away at organisations like a cancer.
Reinventing HR offers the opportunity to add much greater strategic value. HR should become a centre of excellence for releasing the brakes on organisational performance.
The boggy back-end, rather than the fuzzy front-end, is the main barrier to innovation in organisations. Here’s how to tackle it (video with downloadable transcript).