Onward

How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul

This week’s book review is Onward by Howard Schultz.

Schultz artfully weaves the story of Starbucks from its humble beginnings, through it’s astronomic growth, it’s desperate decline, and it’s eventual reinvention and re-invigoration. The main focus of the book is the process he led to turn Starbucks back into the customer focused, coffee centered, culture forming icon that it is today. The book is packed with great stories and profound business wisdom.

Are You Being Killed By Your Business Plan?

If your business plan was written more than one year ago, chances are it is out of date and not in tune with the current marketplace.

The classic business plans in the past relied on 5 year and 10 year horizons that gave the organization a vision and a direction to dominate in their market. But today, the marketplace is changing so quickly that any long-term business plan is a waste of time and, if you follow it, will probably result in your business failing.

Motorola and the Iridium Business Plan

In the late 1980’s Motorola launched an initiative they called Iridium. This was an ambitious 12 year program to launch 66 satellites that would provide global satellite phone coverage. They came up with this business plan because they saw that cell phone technology was expensive for the users and for the companies providing infrastructure.

The New Gold Standard

5 Leadership Principles for Creating a Legendary Customer Experience Courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company

The book review for this week is The New Gold Standard by Joseph A. Michelli

Michelli provides a very detailed history and study of the Ritz Carlton business. The book documents the culture,  business practices and the five leadership principles of the Ritz Carlton;

How Peer to Peer Recognition Can Dramatically Improve Your Business

Peer to peer recognition is one of the most powerful workplace motivators there is. When your workplace culture encourages employees to recognize their peers for; work well done, stellar customer interactions, mentoring, going above and beyond, etc., you are positioning your organization for success.

I have seen peer to peer recognition systems implemented in many different organizations in many different ways. It can be as simple as an email, a pat on the back, a handshake or an anonymously submitted form. It can be as formal as a monthly meeting with all employees where people are recognized for their exemplary service.

6 Simple Steps To Align Your Staff With Business Objectives

We need team members to see their job as not just confined to their precise scope but to help the group around them or team get the best possible resultsAtul Gawande

A strong business depends on people who can see beyond their own cubicle walls. What I mean by this is that a business depends on employees who understand how their actions impact the overall performance of the business. These employees have enough knowledge of the business that they can adjust their day to day work routines, deliverables and interactions so that they maximize value to the business at every occasion.

And, this applies to every employee at every level of the business from the cleaning staff to the board room!

Earlier in my career when I was a new project manager, I ran into an issue where project team members were taking actions that were good for their particular scope of work but they were not considering the impact on the project as a whole. They would take actions that would allow them to get their work done quickly and efficiently but it was causing significant work and rework for other project team members.