Business Quote - 2

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Causes of Failure for Change Drivers within the Business Infrastructure

You are all excited about the results and business improvements you are going to achieve as you implement your first process change or embark on the development of a new market.  As you move down the road things do not seem to be happening the way you thought they would.  What went wrong? 

To avoid the bumps - opportunities for failure - you need to know what to watch out for and when to take action.  There are five major reasons that Change Drivers fail due to the business infrastructure.  Please look at these areas carefully because they will be some of the most difficult obstacles to overcome on your road to Leadership and Lean Practices!  They must be dealt with head-on and may require a change in your business culture, procedures, IT, and information dissemination, etc.  Look at how these areas will affect the possible outcome of your Change Process or Organizational Innovation Process.

Remember:  Failure is not an option!

Failure could mean the loss of your competitive edge, revenue losses, etc.  It must be avoided and the only way to avoid it is with an open, enlightened environment of collaborative personnel at all levels.

In today's 21st Century Organization knowledge is a valued commodity.  Knowledge is something you must retain and manage.  We will speak in more detail about knowledge management in future posts. Every organization has a vast amount of knowledge about their processes, products, and customers.  Keep that in mind as you look at the five most common reasons for failure for Change Drivers within the business infrastructure: (O'Sullivan, 2002)

1. Poor knowledge management (of people, processes, products, customers)
2. Poor organization of company infrastructure
3. Poor communication within the company in general
4. Poor empowerment of individuals to do the job
5. Poor leadership of the change and the company, division, unit, etc.

See also:
- Drivers for Organizational Innovation
- Causes of failure for Change Drivers within the Change Driver Process
- Example of a corporate Quality issue and suggested leadership approach

Leader?

What is a Leader?  (In other posts we will discuss a Lean Leader and Lean Leadership.)  Here we want to look at the idea of a Leader and make some comparisons to a Manager and why do we need both?  You can then take a look at how you perform your work function to see which position fits your style.

Definition of Leader: (from Dictionary.com)

 

lead·er/ˈlēdər/

Noun:	The person who leads or commands a group, organization, or country. A person followed by others.
Synonyms:	chief - head - conductor - guide - director - captain

The Leader is the focal point of any organization.  The person is responsible for a specific set of actionable items.  These items are generally different for leaders and managers.  Think about people you know... are they leaders or managers?  Do you want to be a leader or a manager?  Generally speaking there are many more managers than leaders and some people exibit characteristics of both.  Organizations need both skills to be successful.  Leaders do not function well as managers and managers are not able to lead as well as leaders.  So what are the characteristics of a leader?

Leaders are innovative, creative and collaborative.

See Leading vs. Managing for additional information.

21st Century Organizations

“On the road to exceeding customer expectations in the 21st Century organizations must be  flexible, fast learners, adaptable,  know where they are headed, and how to get there. Yet, everyone from the CEO to the hourly employees must be aware that everything could change in the blink of an eye and are prepared to meet any new challenge faster than the competition.”                                                    

Richard R. Hibbard

How can I implement Lean Leadership principals and programs with limited consulting services?