Defining Your Strategic Direction Part 3

CORE COMPETENCY
A final question in defining your strategic direction is: what are your core competencies? Following are the requirements for a competency to be considered core:

• It must deliver significant value to the customer.
• It must create differentiation from competitors.
• It must form the basis for entry into new markets.
• It is not easy for other organizations to replicate.

The requirements for competency to be considered core are stringent. Organizations must possess many skills, technologies, and capabilities in order to succeed, but that does not make them core. They have to meet the criteria mentioned above.

Core competencies are not specific products or services but rather a bundle of skills, technologies, and capabilities that result in a broad class of customer benefits. A well-developed core competency results in competitive leadership within an industry, but that takes time to develop.

TOMORROW'S CORE COMPETENCE
Finally, you will need to jump to the future and consider a core competency that could give you strategic advantage 5 years in the future.

Until next time...






Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/

Defining Your Strategic Direction Part 2

WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS? 

CUSTOMERS

• By customer, we are talking about anyone who directly receives the products or services you provide. Remember that there is a difference between stakeholders and customers. Stakeholders are individuals or groups, inside or outside the organization, who have a significant stake or interest in your success. However, stakeholders are not the direct recipients of the product or service you provide.
• Some organizations have a single "generic customer." An example would be fast food store that treats all customers the same. Most organizations have different types of customers, representing either different segments of the market or different segments of the business. For example, a service station might have people who fill up with gas, others who want repairs, and still others who purchase convenience store items.

WHAT ARE YOUR DELIVERABLES TO THEM?

DELIVERABLES

A deliverable is an "end result benefit" that an organization provides to its customers.

• It is not simply a product or service.
• It is linked to a specific and measurable improvement in the life of the customer.
• It begins to distinguish an organization from its competitors.
• The best way of thinking about a deliverable is by identifying how the life of a customer improves by being a beneficiary of the organization's deliverable.
• The concept of a deliverable gets at the deeper needs, concerns, or desires of the customer.

TOMORROW'S CUSTOMERS AND DELIVERABLES

Next, we will jump to the future and consider the same questions – who will be your customers five years from now and how will you describe them? Your answers should, at least in part, come from your understanding of your mission, environmental analysis, and forecast of the future.

How might tomorrow's deliverables change?

Until next time...






Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/

Embrace Reality

Embracing reality is one of the core principles for living in the paradigm of Integrity.  This does not mean that we like all aspects of reality, but it does mean that we have a healthy respect for it and seek to live in harmony with it. The four views of reality are: "mentor," "challenge," "taskmaster," and "enemy."

Truths about Reality 
"The way things are" defines the context of our lives.  Reality defines the rules of the game of life and the context in which we make choices.  Some realities we may choose, such as our career, spouse, etc.  Others are thrust upon us by our heritage, such as our stature, age, etc.  These realities form the boundaries within which we live and make choices daily.
 
Trying to live in the world of "unreality" or "what is not" results in frustration and disappointment.  This only wastes our energy and leaves us unhappy and feeling disempowered.
 
Reality has no inherent meaning.  It is not good nor bad, right nor wrong, but rather it is what we make of it.  For example, your job is just your job.  The same is true of your appearance, the way your boss is, or a flat tire on the way to work.
 
People who are high on the scale of emotional intelligence live from "the way things are" rather than "what is not".  They acknowledge and respect the realities of their lives and make a conscious choice to live well, given their reality.  Those who succeed in life view their reality as a winner.
 
Present, Past, and Future
This moment is the only moment that is real.  Your entire life is lived in a moment of "now" - the present. The past exists only in our minds in the form of memories.  What does this mean about the past and the future?  They are not real.  They exist only in our minds.  However, there is value in thinking about the past and the future.

We have lots of good memories that we can access and enjoy.  We can learn from our painful experiences of the past and use them to grow.  Likewise, we can dream and consider new and exciting possibilities for our lives in the future.  Then we can make specific plans to make that future a reality.

Until next time...






Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/

Market-Driven Strategy

Although some industries are more stable than others, the organizations that flourish in the long-run are those who engage in continual strategic renewal.

Most businesses are internally driven, which means their strategy is driven by what they have done in the past.  The weakness is not anticipating changes in the marketplace and therefore failing to be adaptive and innovative.  Organizations that are customer-driven try to develop a strategy by "being close" and "listening" to the customer.  The consequence of trying to be too customer-driven is trying to be "all things to all people." 

Organizations that are market-driven make conscious choices about which markets they will serve and how they will add value to their customers.  They seek to differentiate themselves from their competitors by identifying the specific benefits they will or will not provide, and they organize around the delivery of these benefits.

A market-driven strategy is not the same as asking customers for their input and feedback.  It is based on making decisions about how the organization wants to compete.

We believe that it is through a market-driven strategy that you will best compete in the present and plan for your future.

Until next time...







Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/

Leadership and Change

Leadership is the ability to inspire other people to do what is required to achieve the organization's desired goals. 

Leaders provide what is needed to ensure that change initiatives succeed.  Effective leadership is crucial for successful change at every level in an organization.  When introducing change, it is the management team's role to provide leadership and to ensure that it is mirrored at every level of the organization.  For local change, it is the responsibility of the supervisor or team leader to provide leadership to the team and to make sure that the change is completed successfully.

Leading Successful Change Projects Means:  
    
- Agreeing on the objectives  
- Deciding on the tasks  
- Planning how the tasks will be done  
- Organizing the resources  
- Communicating tasks  
- Making people responsible  
- Monitoring and controlling

It is important to remember that people facing change are being asked to deal with the unknown.  The leader is the one who provides the vision of the future, inspires confidence that the future will be even better than today, and who shows that he/she knows how to get to the destination - the change.
 
Until next time...







Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/

A Clear Vision of the Future

Change affects people to a greater or lesser extent depending on what kind of change it is.  To ensure the success of a change program, everyone must change to some degree.  In practice, this means understanding two factors: what influences behavior and what motivates people to change.

Five factors that influence behavior at work:
KNOWLEDGE is what people must know to be able to do what is required, and it is the easiest element to change.

SKILLS are what people need to carry out new tasks, and they may be physical or behavioral.  Skills are more difficult to change than knowledge because they must be practiced.

BELIEFS determine attitudes which determine whether knowledge and skills are really applied on the job.  Beliefs can be very difficult to change since they require people let go of established behavior.

BEHAVIOR is also influenced by environment.  If desired behavior is rewarded, and undesired behavior is corrected, then organizations are more likely to succeed.

PURPOSE:  The leaders' collective beliefs determine the purpose of the organization and create the environment.  A clear vision of the future and the ability to convey it creates an environment that encourages productive and effective behavior.

 

What motivates people to change their behavior?  

According to Abraham Maslow, our needs drive our behavior. Maslow believed that only unsatisfied needs motivate an individual.  A supervisor can impact an employee's sense of security, belonging, and self-esteem.  Supervisors can make a link between ability to change and value to the organization.  

People always have predictable concerns about change.  Anticipating and responding to these concerns can lessen and, in many cases, resolve them.

Until next time...







Sheryl Tuchman, SPHR, SHRM-SCP
http://tools2succeed.com/