They don’t tackle things at which they are not proficient. They make sure other necessities get done, but not by them; they appoint someone else.
Successful leaders make sure they are effective. They are not afraid of strengths in others. They recruit “A” players as their direct reports and monitor their progress. They spend much of their time making sure they have the right people “on the bus.”
Andrew Carnegie, the founder of the Mastermind Concept, wanted to put on his gravestone, “Here lies a man who learned to put into his service men more able than himself.”
Fellow Masterminds, attending a BOI Mastermind Alliance surrounded by your peers and facilitated and managed by a privately-held, high-touch, experienced company (BOI) – will make you a more effective leader. Andrew Carnegie, and all the leaders who understand the importance of ‘getting out of the trenches’ now and then, would urge you to join an organized Mastermind Alliance such as Business Owners International.
“Effectiveness can be learned – effectiveness must be learned.” Peter Drucker
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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: _____________
]]>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.
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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.
]]>Mr. Wainwright will be presenting first thing on Wednesday, October 12th. 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:
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!
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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.
]]>Michael Porter (Harvard professor, 1980) reconciled these approaches, providing a fresh way of looking at strategy – from the point of view of industry itself, rather than just from the point of view of markets, or of organizational capabilities!
Somewhere between 1980 and 1990 (with Porter leading the way), strategic planning became unstuck. Old theories no longer worked as customers became more demanding and changeable, and markets and technologies rose and fell even more rapidly. Even industries that were once distinct with definable products and services now converged and became blurred. A new wave of more strategic thinking emerged to replace the old rule box.
Porter suggests strategic planning lost its way because managers failed to distinguish between strategic and operational effectiveness and confused the two. The old strategic model – which still held up in the 1980’s – was based on productivity, increasing market share, and lowering costs. Hence TQM, benchmarking, outsourcing, and re-engineering were all at the forefront of change in the 1980’s as the key drivers of operational improvements.
The new strategy means that:
1) Strategy rests on unique activities based on customers’ needs, customers’ accessibility, or the variety of a company’s products or services.
2) Company activities must fit and link together. In terms of the value chain, one link is prone to imitation, but with a chain, imitation is very difficult.
3) Making trade-offs: excelling at something means making a conscious choice not to do others – a question of being a master of one trade to stand out from the crowd as opposed to being a jack-of-all-trades and lost in the crowd. Trade-offs purposefully limit what a company offers. The essence of strategy lies in what not to do.
Strategy can be defined as “the framework which guides those choices that determine the nature and direction of an organization.” Strategic Planning is the process to develop a road map that translates the organization’s vision and mission into things people can do. The goal of strategy is to help a company position itself for the long-term future by concentrating on what it does best. The search for and the defense of competitive advantage lies at the heart of leadership’s responsibilities.
]]>- Rising costs for corporate taxes, healthcare and pensions, regulations, utilities, and tort litigation add almost 18% to a manufacturer’s cost relative to our major trading partners. The US now has the second-highest corporate tax among our major trading partners, trailing only slightly behind Japan.
- The US is losing import market share to both Asian and European competitors in the Asian marketplace. This is an indication of the sustained large US trade deficit in manufactured goods.
American ingenuity, creativity, hard work, and most importantly, the entrepreneurial spirit of owners of privately-held companies like the ones in our Mastermind Alliance will keep us in the #1 spot. Ultimately, in spite of the challenges, we always rise up to the occasion, and our Mastermind Alliance is an opportunity for us to come together in order to share best ideas and practices, so we can continue maintaining our lead in the manufacturing marketplace. We welcome your comments and thoughts on this topic!
]]>“Last year, the U.S. created 19.9% of world manufacturing output, compared with 18.6% for China; with the U.S. staying ahead despite a steep fall in factory production, due to the global recession.
“If China does become the world’s biggest manufacturer, it will return to the top slot for a nation which - according to economic historians - was the world’s leading country for goods production for more than 150 years, or until the 1850’s, when Britain took over for a brief spell, mainly to the impetus of the industrial revolution.”
Top Manufacturing Countries:
1) United States
2) China
3) Japan
4) Germany
5) Russian Federation
6) Italy
7) United Kingdom
8) France
9) South Korea
10) Canada
Is it possible that the United States is about to relinquish its leading role in manufacturing, after 110 years in leadership? We believe the privately-held sector of companies similar to those in our Manufacturers Mastermind Alliance will be the reason this will not happen. Obviously, it will not be easy, but companies like the ones represented in our Alliance will be able to retain our leading role in manufacturing – it is indeed the very backbone of the American economy.
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Manager – Creates order and focuses on the pragmatic systems and procedures that make the company run well. The Manager focuses on planning, order and predictability. He/she is effective with organizing teams to get results, and works to coach the staff to success.
The time spent by the Manager can be summarized in three sentences:
1) Gets the right people on the bus;
2) Gets the wrong people off the bus;
3) Gets the right people in the right seats.
Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, clearly defines what it means to get the right people in key seats. Won’t you take a moment to read the following? It will be worth your time:
Getting The Right People In Key Seats
The specifics can vary, even within companies, but research delivers six important traits that identify the “right people.”
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The right people fit the company’s core values |
Great companies build cultures in which those who don’t share the institution’s values are surrounded by antibodies and ejected like viruses. People ask: “How do we get people to share our core values?” The answer: Hire people already predisposed to them - - and keep them.
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The right people don’t need to be tightly managed |
When you feel the need to tightly manage someone, you may have made a hiring mistake. You need not spend a lot of time ”motivating” or “managing” the right people. It’s in their DNA to be productively neurotic, self-motivatied, self-disciplined, and compulsively driven to excel.
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The right people understand that they do not have “jobs” – they have responsibilities |
They grasp the difference between their task list and their true responsibilities. The right people can complete the statement, “I am the one person ultimately responsible for…”
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The right people fulfill their commitments |
In a culture of discipline, people view commitments as sacred – they do what they say they’ll do, without complaint. Equally, this means that they take great care in saying what they will do, careful never to over-commit or to promise what they cannot deliver.
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The right people are passionate about the company and its work |
Nothing great happens without passion. The right people display remarkable intensity.
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The right people display window-and-mirror maturity. |
When things go well, the right people point out the window, giving credit to factors other than themselves; they shine a light on others who contributed. Yet when things go awry, they do not blame circumstances or other people; they look in the mirror and say, “I’m responsible.”
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