I am inspired to write this article today, because of Elon Musk and his incredible team at SpaceX. Today, December 21, 2015, SpaceX, founded by Elon Musk accomplished two incredible feats. First, they successfully launched 11 satellites into space on a single rocket, the SpaceX Falcon 9. This was followed by the successful landing of…
One of the concepts I really like from the book “Playing to Win” by A.G. Lafley (Procter and Gamble CEO) and Roger Martin is their strategy “sniff test”. I have found the sniff test to be a useful tool to quickly determine whether an organization understands what a “real strategy” is and whether or not…
Many companies claim to have a strategy, but all they have done is an exercise in goal setting. This is a mistake. Here’s how to create a “real” strategy. Research from the Harvard business school shows that (up to) 90% of strategies fail due to poor execution. This assumes your company even has a “real”…
KPIs vs. OKRs. Talk about alphabet soup! What do these 3 letter acronyms mean, and what exactly is the difference? Lately, a number of clients have asked about the difference between OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) and KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), so what exactly is the difference? The OKR acronym has been getting some press…
Let’s just say my thinking has evolved… After I met my birthfather, Richard Callaway, I became convinced we are so completely hard-wired to be who we are, there’s really little we can do to move the needle. (See my previous blog: “There’s No Training After Toilet Training”.) And yes, I still do believe human beings…
The work we do at RESULTS.com gives us the rare privilege of being able to study thousands of businesses, working closely with them to identify the right goals and approach to developing a successful business strategy. We observe what works, and what doesn’t work in the real world, across a variety of industries. By having…
By working closely with our clients, we’ve identified a real need for companies to set, manage & measure customer service KPIs. All too often we’ve found that customer service teams could be doing far better than they expected or, they’re just not getting the credit they deserve.Customer service is a very broad subject, and the…
They also believe that marketers are not focused enough on results to drive incremental growth. My observation is that most companies seem to have a pretty good handle on the sales function of their operating model. They track things like appointments, meetings, orders, and conversion rates in their CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems, and it…
“Always plan ahead. It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark.” Cardinal Richard Cushing Greetings from 32,000 feet over Salt Lake City, Utah…. Today, I visited a factory with one of my clients who is a key supplier, and experienced an incredible tour by the materials manager, Bob. In this plant, this materials manager isn’t a…
Everybody tells us to celebrate failure, but nobody ever comes to the party. Failure is an essential ingredient for success, but it is absolutely no fun. I think the main reason I am an effective advisor and coach is that I have failed so many times! Let me tell you about a couple of my…