Leadership Initiative Pledge

Business Owners International is a proponent of Napoleon Hill – one of the original “success” authors. Napoleon Hill wrote about Leadership, Attitude, Human Relations, and did an extensive study on the habits of the most successful people in the world. Here is Hill’s “Leadership Initiative Pledge” – Enjoy! I urge you to not just read this and move on with your day. Take the initiative to print this out, sign it, and put it somewhere visible.

Leadership Initiative Pledge

 Having chosen leadership as my life’s work, I now understand it is my duty to transform this purpose into reality.

Therefore, I will form the habit of taking some definite action every day that will carry me one step nearer the attainment of a great leader.

I know procrastination is a deadly enemy of all who would become leaders in any undertaking, and I will eliminate this habit by:

 - Doing some definite and useful thing each day, without anyone telling me to do it;

 - Searching until I find at least one thing I can do each day that I have not been in the habit of doing, which is of value to others;

 - Telling at least one other person each day of the value of practing this habit of doing something each day that ought to be done, without being told to do it.

I can see that the muscles of the body become strong in proportion to the extent which they are used; therefore, I understand the habit of initiative becomes fixed in proportion to the extent that it is practiced. I realize the place to begin this initiative is in the small, commonplace things connected with my daily work; therefore, I will go at my work each day as if I were doing it simply for the purpose of developing this necessary habit of initiative.

I understand that by practicing this habit of taking initiative with my daily work, not only will I be developing that habit, but I will also attract attention of those who will place greater value on my services as a result of this habit.

Signed,

______________________________ Date: _____________

More Than the Meetings

The BOI Mastermind Alliance has created an ongoing membership, and, although the meetings are the “main course” of what we provide, it’s not just about the meetings. We have managed Mastermind Allinace peer-groups for over ten years and have seen a lot of important exchanges happen between the meetings. We understand it can take a couple meetings to get to know everyone and build rapport, but we have seen so much valuable information shared electronically, over the phone, and even face-to-face visits between our members. And we periodically call our members to check in on goal progress or find out if there’s something you’re working on that we can tap into the other members for assistance. And if that’s not enough, we also provide a private group web-page where we post general meeting info such as agenda, logistics, follow up, ‘Best Ideas,’ document sharing, etc.

The point is that this is about more than just a couple of meetings each year; the BOI Mastermind Alliance is an ongoing membership in a peer-group with potential value you can tap into at any time.

Best Idea Session: "5S"

We just facilitated our Fall 2011 Midwest Manufacturing Alliance meeting last week. I in St. Louis, Missouri. It was a good use of time, and our members all appreciate our meeting format and the quality of their fellow members.

One of the sessions we facilitate is called “Best Ideas.” BOI members have really come to appreciate it because it encourages meeting take-aways that produce tangible ROI. We ask that members report anything that has had a positive (preferably measured) impact on sales, operational efficiencies, marketing, etc. One of our members explained to the group that they had implemented the 5S program at their plant. 5S stands for Sorting, Straightening, Sweeping (cleaning), Standardizing, Safety. This is a well-known manufacturing program but it is not commonly practiced because of the difficulty to stay consistent. This member found that the ROI is far greater than the time invested. The primary results are, of course, a cleaner, more organized, and safer plant. The performance results are that the process naturally encourages employees to come up with new ideas to run leaner and more efficiently. It also empowers employees by making them proud of their work stations and instills an “ownership mentality.” As a matter of fact, since implementing 5S, this BOI member has seen an average of 1.5 new performance improving ideas per week from his employees. The group benefits because they don’t have to work the program from scratch or spend money hiring a 5S consultant. They can visit this member already advanced in 5S and learn the program first-hand from a fellow Manufacturing CEO they already know and trust.

Do you have a non-competing, same-industry peer who you can turn to when you need help implementing a new idea or business practice? Each of BOI's industry peer groups are built to allow members to do just that - talk freely with one another, without the risk of losing business to competition - - because all of our groups are made up of professionals who do not compete with one another.

Manufacturers Alliance :: October 12 and 13, 2011

We just had a very positive conversation with Don Wainwright, Owner of Wainwright Industries. We invited Don to come share with us at our next Manufacturers Alliance meeting on October 12 & 13 in St. Louis and he said it would be his pleasure. As I’m sure many of you know, Wainwright Industries is a leading manufacturing company on many of the fronts we all strive for – Quality, Service, and Operational Efficiencies to name a few. As a matter of fact, Wainwright Industries won the prestigious Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in 1994.

 Mr. Wainwright will be presenting first thing on Wednesday, October 12^th. Don will be sharing his experience running his business over the years – history, lessons learned, etc. He will also go into detail about the two main reasons Wainwright Industries won the Baldrige Award: 

1. Ensuring “total customer satisfaction” – a moving target that the company tracks through extensive sets of quality measures that are aligned with five strategic indicators. In order of priority, these indicators are: Safety, Internal Customer Satisfaction, External Customer Satisfaction, Six Sigma Quality, and Business Performance.                                                  
2. Employee Engagement – Wainwright Industries has done an impressive job of engaging employees in their quality efforts. Don will share the process they implemented that consistently produces at least one improvement per week; this could be anything from streamlining a process to improving training or decrease delivery times, or anything that will enhance the company’s performance.

 BOI is all about learning and we will certainly learn from what Don Wainwright has to share. Our agenda is really coming together – stay tuned!

 We look forward to seeing everyone again and meeting our new folks too – John & Jason Monnig (Monnig Industries), Bruce & Brent Williams (US Tool Group), Bryan Hoffa (Majona Steel), Tom Murphy (CMS Communications), and Jerry Jost (Jost Chemical) – Welcome!

Goals for Strategic Planning :: Impacting the Future

What makes a successful strategic plan?

1) If your horse is terminal…it’s time to dismount. Michael Porter, the father of strategy, says, “50% of a company’s success is based on the industry it is in.”

- Where is our industry in the market growth curve, and can we still make a profit?

- What innovative changes have/are occurring in our industry?

- Which customers and products drive our economic engine?

- Which customers and products drive our bottom line expenses?

- What are the emergency industry sectors, and what opportunities are there that fit our capabilities?

2) Non-dependency on core business.

Porter also suggests that dependency on your core business is a dangerous road. The mix should be 65%+ core business; 20-30% adjacent business; 5-15% edge business. Build on your core competencies, but don’t be dependent on them. Our pharmacy matrix shows that, on average, our members’ core business (prescriptions) average 92% of their total business.

3) Differentiate yourself.

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” asked Alice.

“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.

“I don’t much care where,” said Alice.

“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.

                    - From Lewis Carroll’s Adventures in Wonderland.

- Differentiation rests on unique activities based on customers’ needs by building a value chain that cannot be easily duplicated.

- Define your company by what you do…not by what you make or the service you provide.

- Once established, the culture of your company must reflect your value proposition.

4) Execute

– Often companies pay good money for a good strategic plan and come away from it very enthusiastic. But two-to-three months later, 99% of them are back in the present, focusing on the present.

- For a strategic plan to succeed, leaders must commit to execution and measurement to assure that goals are being met. Those measurements should include defined, agreed-upon key performance indicators, which should be measured monthly.

- The team should meet two times a year to assure that the strategic plan is being followed and executed.