The pain from broken systems effects businesses in multiple ways. Some of the common pains include high customer service costs, high warranty claim costs, frustrated employees and low customer retention. Of course all these pains eat away at your profits and impact your ability to remain competitive and develop loyal customers. I’ve recently experienced this [...]
People Don’t Leave Companies, They Leave Managers
June 1, 2011 By Leave a Comment
“People don’t leave companies, they leave managers,” a colleague and mentor recently shared with me. The more I thought about that, the more I realized how true that is. Oftentimes those exiting employees can point to the specific conversation that triggered their decision to leave their companies. Here are just a few that have been [...]
Optimized for whom? Your employees, your customers or neither?
March 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment
I was checking out at my local grocery / general merchandise store and witnessed the shopper in front of me struggling through the checkout process. She was required to maneuver her cart a 90 degree angle so that it was assessable to the checker. “Like parking a car in the garage”, the checker suggested. Then [...]
Balancing Capacity and Sales for Profitability
December 30, 2010 By Leave a Comment
What’s the link between sales, profitability targets and capacity planning? How do you grow your sales, optimize capacity and maintain the level of quality and service that your customers require? Let’s start by looking at profit, which is simply your sales revenue minus your costs. If you increase your sales, but your operating costs go [...]
Take Time to CELEBRATE!
December 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment
What opportunities can you seize to strengthen your company?
November 19, 2010 By 1 Comment
Last week I had the opportunity to attend a conference for manufacturing and distribution leaders. The last 12-18 months have delivered significant challenges to these companies: sagging sales, issues with suppliers and distributors, customers with reduced ability to pay and cash flow challenges just to name a few. They were candid in their discussions of lessons [...]
What Does Ice Skating have to do with how your business Handles Change?
September 18, 2010 By Leave a Comment
I was a big fan of watching figure skating – to me it was the perfect melding of athleticism, artistry and music. I watched Scott Hamilton, Kristi Yamaguchi, Oksana Baiul, Nancy Kerrigan (yes I followed the whole Kerrigan/ Harding drama). They made it look so easy. I envisioned myself gliding effortlessly on the ice, doing [...]
Focus – Making it Work for You
September 18, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Have any of you ever done the magnifying glass experiment? The one where a magnifying glass is used to capture the sun’s rays, focusing the intensity of that energy and incinerating a dry pile of wood scraps. The focus provided by the magnifying glass harnesses the sun’s typical pleasant warmth into a burning force. So [...]
5 Tips for Surviving an Economic Slowdown
September 18, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Engaging in business Process improvements can be a great opportunity to lower your costs… There’s nothing like rising gas prices, an erratic stock market, sagging sales, and gloomy economic projections to get everyone worried about a potential economic slowdown or imminent recession. What’s a business to do? Here are 5 tips to prepare your business [...]
How Loyal Are Your Customers?
September 15, 2010 By Leave a Comment