Win
An Online
Subscription To The Wall Street Journal
What
To Think About Now
Recently we were asked
to
develop an executive mastery course for large multinational banking
client. We quickly agreed with the client that it wasn't enough to just
cover time management but we had to go further, covering decision
management and priority setting.
It got us to thinking
about what
executives would be doing Q1 2010. The answer is simple: growth. It's
very likely that all the cutting and retrenching that your company is
going to do is already done. This is not to say that costs could not be
cut further, but cost cutting is unlikely to be the focus for most
firms (keep in mind what Peter Drucker says about cost: it can't be
controlled, only cut). One of the things to keep in mind about
executives is that they have a long planning horizon. Individual
contributors think day to day, week to week. Managers think month to
month, quarter to quarter and good ones, to the end of the year.
Executives start at years. Senior executives think in decades.
Right now, either
you're an
individual contributor who works for a manager who works for an
executive who ought to be thinking about growth; or you're a manager
who works for an executive who ought to be thinking about growth, or
you're an executive who ought to be thinking about growth.
How can you contribute
to the
growth of your firm? What new products or services for your customer or
markets could you create or suggest? 10 years ago, Apple was in
computers. Now most people think of them as a consumer technology
(music!) company who also do computers. If you need help thinking about
what growth areas look like, consider reading the great book Blue Ocean
Strategy.
Ask yourself not "what
are other
guys thinking about?" but rather "How can I contribute to growth with
either work or ideas?". Hopefully, your company 'raced' to the bottom
rather than 'chased', and you/they are now thinking about new markets.
Your competitors are. If your company isn't, then the other company
will grow at your company's expense. (As Texans like to say, "we don't
want everything, we just want what's ours and what's next to ours." ;-)
)
Every time Mark flies
in and out
of San Antonio airport, he has to pass a display in the concourse
commemorating the building and growth of the airport itself (the
airport is undergoing major reconstruction right now). There's a quote
from the San Antonio Magazine amid the display: "The building has all
the recommend facilities for a modern airport. It has a lounge, a
dining room, a coffee shop as well as airline offices". If you were in
the airport business in the 1950's and could get transported to today,
you'd be astounded.
In 1951 you had everything you needed with a lounge, a dining room, a
coffee shop and airline offices. Now there are banks, restaurants,
museums, shops and more shops and more shops. Municipalities (in the US
anyway) make money not only from airlines paying for gates and ramps,
but also from passengers buying hamburgers, books, diamonds and CDs
(and ipods too). Municipalities fight
over the revenue; some balance their budgets with it.
Did the airport
industry of 1951
envisage this? Not likely. But between then and know someone thought
about growth. Someone said, maybe we could sell retail. Someone said,
maybe it would be cheaper to have a restaurant come in and run the
dining room. Someone said, maybe people would like to buy gifts. This
all happened because someone envisaged growth and made it happen.
Some other
executive/manager/individual contributor in some other company is
thinking about growth - growth in your market - and envisaging new
markets and new places to sell. It's too late to do that when everyone
is profitable.
The time to think about
growth
is now.
Wall
Street Journal
Mark has been reading
his Wall
Street Journals on his Kindle DX for sometime now, and has found that
the paper version is superfluous. However, we wouldn't want our
cancellation of his edition to cause the Wall Street Journal to stop
existing, so we've decided to run a sweepstake. We will give away an
online
subscription to the top 2 entries in our sweepstake.
Please
write 75 words starting with: "I really want a Wall Street Journal
because...". Send your entries to show@manager-tools.com
with the subject
heading Wall Street Journal. Closing date will be 28th February and
we'll announce the winners on
the blog
on 19th March and in
the next newsletter. Winners will be judged by the Manager Tools team
and on our view of your entry's merit.
This is the first time
we've had
a competition, and we're really excited to see your entries. Good luck!
Distribution
Those
of you who have
premium
content know that use of that content is only for that particular
member. This newsletter is not premium content, and we'd love for you
to forward it to anyone who would find it interesting and useful.
If
someone forwarded it
to you,
and you'd like your own copy in future, become a Manager Tools member here.
It's free!
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