When I was a business school student, veterans of the U.S. nuclear submarine fleet surrounded me. These men were mature beyond their years and happy to be verbally jousting in the relatively unconfined, sunny arena of a graduate-school classroom. The submariners did well as students, and employers eagerly competed to hire them.
Why would such naval service be a good background for a business...
One of my college roommates had a brother who was a graduate business student and often visited our rooms. Since one of my possible career choices was to work in business, I asked this business student many questions about his studies and career choices. Everything he said expanded my knowledge and made me more interested in a business career.
This information meant a lot to me because I...
In designing new business models from successful tests, respect is the most valuable currency you can use with stakeholders. Providing respect begins with asking for and listening to reactions to what you are thinking about doing . . . before you make a decision.
In many cases, respect will also mean making major changes in the direction you finally choose to reflect the reactions of...
CEOs have typically reported that their most difficult decisions relate to how the economic rewards of a company should be divided among stakeholders. This challenge is increased by the competition that stakeholders can feel with each other.
Shareholders and employees often see themselves in opposition. Communities are wary of hidden corporate agendas. Suppliers sometimes learn that...
Let's think about the typical company. Turnover of employees may be from 20 percent to more than 50 percent a year (in some low-paying service businesses). That turnover means that companies expect to either lay-off or have voluntarily leave the whole work force on average every few years.
The good news of the turnover is that it creates potential for new ideas to come into the company....
I remember looking for a job just before I finished graduate school. I poured over lists of companies that were located where I wanted to live, and I dreamed a lot about what it might be like to work in different industries.
I was reminded of when several my friends graduated with MBA degrees the preceding year and the goals they had.
One handsome, tall fellow wanted to become a vice...
Almost every successful business model innovator I have studied told me that their company nurtured an environment in which there is great latitude to take small risks on personal initiative, and great care in avoiding big risks that could set the company back. A major benefit of such cultures was to stimulate large amounts of innovation occurring without explicit direction, encouraged by...
How can you get your new business model into implementation faster without taking a lot of unnecessary risks?
Relax. While the experiments and tests are occurring, you can be thinking about the best course for your company.
A good place to start is to understand more about the elements that successful business models contain. Then, you can compare where you are with those patterns....
Rogers Corporation provides an interesting example of how advance thinking about business models can occur and add valuable business model insights. The company is a long-established one, based in Connecticut.
A strong research tradition made the company rich in polymer-based materials knowledge that could be used to create higher performance products for electronic components in the...
If you learn to use these four questions, you'll usually make successful cost reductions. Ignore these questions, and your results won't be very good.
How can your proposed cost-reduction tests be improved to help you get more profitable customers?
This question has the probable added benefit of reducing your risk of losing profitable customers. Consider starting your thinking with...
