Qualifications and experience
The measure of effectiveness is the extent to which you get things done, and how well they turn out, not how well you theorise, discuss, and promise to "move forward". There are lots of highly qualaified, smooth young operators out there who do a great job at the...
The last 10 yards.
Independent produce retailers appear to be resurgent, based on the quality of their offer to consumers. For years anybody who has been involved with FMCG has known about the challenge of the "last 10 yards", the distance between a supermarkets back dock and the...
Afghanistan revealed
I wonder why, when no army since Alexander has managed to retain control over what is now Afghanistan, that the US and it "Allies" including Australia think they can. The leaks over the weekend on...
Having a vision statement make you visionary?
Obviously not, but you would be surprised at how often the obvious is ignored. A carefully crafted vision statement is agreed at an annual senior executive retreat, and out away until the review next year. Nonsense. You need to live it, create alignment, and ensure...
Democratising the net.
Most of us instinctively buy into the notion that the web has a "democratising" impact, it is a way for information to flow, to be disseminated, and this is absolutely true. However, what of the instinct of institutions, public and private to keep things secret? No...
Apple bites it own hand.
It will be fascinating to watch how Apple, the masters of digital marketing, handle the latest hiccup with the antenna problems on the iPhone4. Apple has now stumbled twice in a short time, the first was the furore over the wages paid to employees at Foxconn, one of...
Paradox of choice.
So much choice in everything we do, isn't that great? Maybe not. There is so much choice in most things that now we are running the risk of paralysis, procrastination, and often, we just walk away. Barry Schwartz, a psychologist and terrific communicator puts the...
Money is just a scoring mechanism.
People stress over money, how much they have, how hard it is to make it, what others make, how much the house is worth, how much the share portfolio has tanked, and so on. The reality is that money is just a scorecard, an entirely one dimensional method of comparing...
Wal-Mart, Woolworths and logistics.
In Australia, the major chains are seeking ways to expand their scope of activities, and staying within the Trade Practices Act is increasingly difficult given the dominance of the "big two", and now the "rest" have further consolidated with the take-over of Franklins...
Lean manufacturing and Demand chains.
Two differing approaches to management improvement you may think? Not so. Both require extensive: * Collaboration, * Transparency, * Robust processes, * A set of values imbued through an individual organisation, and group of organisations in a demand chain, *...