Like many of you, our clients have reacted to the credit crunch and the continuing decline in spending. Here are a few examples of steps they’ve taken so far:

1. A construction-related business has decided to unload any excess inventory in the warehouse by selling it through the Internet. This should make their end-of-year physical inventory easier, clean out some space for new materials, and generate cash flow.
2. A service business has reduced the last steps for on-boarding new clients, shortening the documentation process for clients to go live. This approach hopefully will reduce the risk of losing a client at the last moment and speed up the billable period.
3. A marketing agency has redoubled its sales efforts. This means more networking, greater attendance to industry events, and the calling-in of some favors. These efforts are designed to offset the potential loss of clients in coming months.
4. A video production company has lost three people through normal attrition since the summer. Some of their development and production duties have been assumed by others internally and others outsourced. But they have held off hiring full-time replacements.

Many industries will have no choice but to cut jobs. A recent Boston Business Journal survey estimated that 7,200 jobs will be lost in finance alone in New England. Nationally, the manufacturers and distributors of high-ticket items like big boats and automobiles will surely suffer. Most small to medium-size businesses will tighten up and try to survive. More than likely, the ones that do will emerge leaner and stronger, ready to take advantage of the inevitable upturn in 2009.   Mike Oleksak   2008

If the feedback confirms that everything you’re doing today is perfect, for both 2008 and on into 2011, then congratulations. If not, it’s time to make your changes and execute.  Mike Oleksak  2008

• How is the business at risk from this project? Determine which of your activities have the potential for “stopping the train,” and interfering with the growth and/or operations of the company?

• How do you mitigate these risks? Focus on the key risks in the project and devise a plan that will outline how the work can be done with minimal disruption to the underlying business

• What is driving your deadlines? Sometimes the goals for finishing a big project are top down and the “let’s just get it done” mentality prevails. Make sure you allow for bottoms-up planning. Understand what it will take to “get the job done right.”

• Can the job be broken down into phases? If you take things in steps, the risk and the results can be more carefully controlled. This will enable you to switch one car at a time.

Change can occur without interrupting your business. Think through the process beforehand and keep the train moving.

- Michael Oleksak  2007

Getting deals done in banking ultimately depended on your ability to get a proposed deal approved. Approval hinges on acceptance of a written presentation of the deal. This meant that when I was a banker, my ability to package the compelling aspects of a deal while still addressing all the potential risks was the critical real-time test of my thought leadership. Over time, I also found that as credit officers came to know the work that my peers and I did, our ability to get deals done was enhanced.

When I worked at Citicorp, expertise was recognized through an international register of credit approval authorities. Sign-off was often required from officers with special approval powers for specific industries or markets. They earned these powers through their experience but also through writing briefing memos, structuring guidelines or guidance documents that would be used throughout the huge international network that existed at the time in Citi.

Wherever you work, there probably is a similar dynamic going on. It may not be as formal as in banking or consulting; but in any job, you ultimately earn your credibility— and your ability to do business—through the development and packaging of your ideas. Read on for some ideas from Michael on how to accomplish this. -Mary Adams  2007

• Retaining your current customers. It is many times cheaper to keep a customer than to land a new one
• Cross-selling existing customers
• Reacting to the market

If you keep doing the same things the same way, there is no reason you should grow. What will you do better or differently? Acting offensively is about gaining ground and winning new territory:

• Finding new customers
• Pursuing new markets
• Developing new offerings
• Finding new ways to do what you do more efficiently
• Leading the market

If you are planning 20% revenue growth this year, the easiest way to make your number is to use defense to keep 100% of your existing customers and use offense to increase your base by 20%. Are you ready with both defense and offense?

- Michael Oleksak

Paralysis by over-analysis meant that years of planning and investors’ money went down the drain because the partners who had control did not execute to make it all happen. Nike had a famous slogan a few years back: “Just Do It.” Ultimately, action is the only path to results.

Intellectual Capital: Knowledge is the most important competitive resource in today’s economy. The best way to think about knowledge resources is through the identification of the three types of intellectual capital:

• Human Capital: You need people, including supportive management, to filter out and identify the best ideas, research the appropriate markets, nurture innovation and move it along its path to completion. Do you need to add new people and/or skills to your team to get it done?

• Structural Capital: Beyond your ideas themselves, you also need processes to filter the best ideas from the not-so-good ones, and to follow the path to execution and production. What knowledge and/or processes do you need to deliver on your ideas?

• Relationship Capital: In today’s market, it is a rare company that is fully integrated. Most work through networks of suppliers, outsourcers and partners to deliver value. Many innovations address the same market but some open up new markets and opportunities. What should your network look like?

Physical Capital: Even in the knowledge economy, physical capital can be important. What do you need in terms of facilities, hardware, and equipment?

Financial Capital: In order to make the necessary investments to convert your innovation to profits, you will probably need budgets that encourage short-term innovation and long-term investment in its execution. Do you have enough money to see this idea through?

In order to deliver on good ideas, you need to think about the whole solution. Identify the resources you will need…and then get busy.

- Michael Oleksak    2006

The interest in innovation signals to me that corporations are starting to think more strategically—looking beyond this quarter’s results to longer term improvements—to keep American companies ahead of the curve in a very competitive international market. To do this, you need to think about how to leverage your resources for maximum value. This is the essence of innovation—it is ultimately about resources. Ideas don’t just fall from the heavens on unsuspecting innocents. They are the result of a good process that brings together the right combination of human, knowledge and relationship resources.

The Apple iPod is a great example of this. The innovation wasn’t just about the technology and idea of the iPod itself. It was also about adding to the technology and market competencies at Apple (human resources), building bridges with the owners of music (relationship resources), and the development of a downloading system (knowledge resources).

It is this type of systemic thinking that will be needed to deliver on the current interest in innovation. Read more in Michael’s piece below to get some ideas on how to broaden your thinking about innovation and execution.

*This data can be found on a website that our firm hosts called the Intellectual Capital Knowledge Center. To read more about this data, look under Presentations on the Resources page.

-Mary Adams   2006

Here’s how it works. Look at your job in three distinct ways:

• Roles: What are your daily activities inside the business?
• Relationships: How and with whom do you interact?
• Knowledge: What special knowledge do you have about your business, customers and market?

Once compiled, we analyze how the roles, relationships and knowledge can and/or should be shared with subordinates. This self-analysis will help to highlight the more important value-building activities on which the CEO/Business Owner should focus, identify the low-return activities that can be handled by others within the organization, and develop a more robust senior layer of management.

For a more detailed description of this type of succession planning, see “Can Your Company Survive and Thrive Without You?”

- Michael Oleksak     2005