Endgame Dialogue
Mission:
Our current business environment doesn’t allow us to think
about or apply strategy as in the past. Remember when you would
place the ultimate goal at the end of a three-year plan and then
grind on each day? In this new economy everything is moving faster.
Resources and capital remain very precious. Consequences are realized
over time, but the right choices cannot wait. So we must be sure
the best strategies are in play now and that key resources are
properly aligned to leverage those desired results as part of each
week’s operations.
At Endgame Fundamentals we will build the contextual framework,
rule set, and filters to help us grade strategies in this era. Finding
the right strategy requires this type of assessment as the tendencies
and tools of the information age are producing more manifestly altered
expectations and behaviors in clients and employees.
The ‘take-away’ will be thought applied. Considerations
to derive better strategic fit. We seek a delineation of operative
rules which provide the entrée for modeling and sensitivity
analyses, as opposed to the reverse.
Placing strategies
in context challenges their efficacy. For arriving at an operative
context is the essence of knowing your fundamentals.
This element of awareness is indeed part of the rule set we seek.
It must exist far beyond our typical binary tendencies. So often
we seem to view even plans and ideas as black or white applications.
Fixtures to be grafted on or poured over an organization bringing
vision, cohesion, and stellar performance. We are trapped by such
thinking. Neglecting outside influences – competitors, regulatory
trends, economic climate, and the client’s changing hierarchy
of needs and so on. We also continuously fail to assess the internals
- the whole of a process, the play of tolerances, what moves alter
the organizational level of amplitude, and which approaches best
mitigate the hidden barriers of Kruger’s Change Management
Iceberg.
What is similar
to this dynamic understanding strategy in context? Those familiar
with
chess often marvel at how its masters ‘see’ the
board in a totality. They assess the pieces and positions, the time
left on the clock, where the opponent’s eyes are glancing and
more. These masters play with confidence and guile. They will quickly
move out the middle-game, trading pieces as they perceive the endgame.
For them, it isn’t necessary that those final moves are even
calculated in detail for the ultimate operation of this Queen, Pawn
or that Rook, Knight combination is a foregone advantage. They move
with prior knowledge of endgame rule sets.
Whether you compare this strategic mode to chess masters or call
it street-smarts, vision, or eclectic capabilities, they all are
grading alternatives to seek the best move for a winning position.
Our conclusions at Endgame Fundamentals will provide a vehicle to
successful actualize your strategic mission.
The New Age
What exciting times! Are we lost in a difficult, confusing, regrettable
world- perhaps? Change begets tension. And with the forces
of technology and demographic change all ready running at a
fast clip, we will continue to deal with a lot of both change
and tension for some time to come. But as the old techniques
and power positions of the mass production and physical asset
world are displaced, what great opportunities are also dawning!
Those who recognize such and act will have aligned their organization
with the new hierarchies of values. They will operate from
congruent positions of strength.
Primary concept-
New World
Operates in the new value chain of human capital management: abundant,
transferable information; knowledge and ideas are sources of wealth,
management of intellectual capital is the path to success.
Primary concept
- Old World
The old value chain: information was scarce and expensive; physical
assets were sources of wealth; success was based on control over
assets.
Essential strategic
drivers
The following items
are compelling industries to become different. They are particularly
evident in service industries, which is now
the dominate aspect of our business economy. Although these same
items have been addressed in differing manner in recent tomes, we
focus on an excellent summary and discussion as presented in Reinventing
Strategy, by Willie Pietersen. He outlines five discontinues shaping
the new economy, which overall, as noted above, “…are
moving from asset-based to knowledge-based competition.” Pg.
12. These five are as follows:
· Internet = represents
the new information age - enables a power shift to buyers, authoring
margin squeeze, and creating multi-channel
marketplaces.
· Disintermediation= “the distance between producers
and consumers is shrinking” pg. 18. This results in margin
squeeze, new interactions and access between personnel.
· Convergence= “traditional industry boundaries are
disappearing…new rivals from disparate fields bringing unique
skills or products into your arena” Pg. 20
· Globalization= in three parts – markets; business
functions; and knowledge. “As a result, knowledge sharing is
becoming the crucial new competency…globalization is more of
an idea and a place.” Pg. 24
The knowledge/value concept and these drivers are active forces
pushing the behavior and ultimately the application of capital for
business arrangements. One way to conceptualize and discuss these
drivers to arrive at our ultimate endgame grid is to use the metaphor
of a fulcrum and lever.
Our macro assessment of the above items is that the fulcrum for
leverage has shifted. And the lever to actualize it is a bit of a
different handle. Superior business propositions for today and the
future are now going to operate most effectively by applying these
changes. So understanding where the fulcrum exists and how to best
leverage its nature are akin to the understanding of chess pieces
and how they play.
In this respect there
are two areas of concern. One is the use of capital; how it can
best be deployed (where the fulcrum sits), and
the other is concerned with the harmony of resources to be applied.
In this metaphor, consider this item the length of the lever. So
the longer the lever, the less force that needs to be applied against
the fulcrum – i.e. the better the harmony of resources the
less effort needed to actualize the plan.
Fulcrum changes:
Use of capital-
Stated a bit esoterically, it’s all about understanding the
dynamics of new changes in relationship to the elements of execution.
Or
·
Knowledge trumps assets
·
Quality and Depth trump scale
·
Service trumps products
·
Access & engagement trump silos and channels.
A transitory item existing in both worlds
Application of disaggregate analyses.
Key to Harmony of Resources-
· Demystification of Leadership
·
Cross-functional team ownership
·
Community is preferred to corporate
·
Non-financial measurement emersion
·
Reports aligned to the most actionable time horizons
The Targets
At this point we have established our mission, and the need to ‘see’ strategy
as an application in the whole. We have also identified today’s
underlying currents and key focal points that must be the touchstones
of future discussions.
In order to test these hypotheses in context, as recommended, we
will work this discussion within the arena of two selected subjects.
These are hospital nurse workforce and their related contingent workforce
issues. These areas were chosen not only due to the background expertise
of the author and associates, but also as they possess critical characteristics
that apply to key workforce efforts in play throughout the economy.
The fact that hospitals and the clinical profession are in multiple
states of transition and crises only adds to the challenges and should
dismiss any accusation that we are picking an easy target set.
The next installment of Endgame Fundamentals we will begin establishing
the strategic grid for these areas.
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