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Streamlining Distribution

By Ted Margison

As the economy slowly heads forward, most companies need to get more done with the same resources.

globeStreamlining operations means eliminating activities that don’t add value and putting in place controls to make sure transactions get processed quickly and effectively.

Eliminate Non-Productive Activities

Everyone is really busy – they’re already overloaded, or are they?

“Why does it take so long to turn around orders?” asked the CEO, “Everyone says they’re working as hard as they can but how can it take so many days?”

“Your company is doing credit checks when orders are received and again when they are about to ship. Since your customers are Fortune 500 companies, do you really need these credit checks? If you skipped these checks you could save 2-3 days” the consultant replied.

“Of course we don’t need to do credit checks on our customers. Why on earth are we doing them?

“Apparently, several years ago you sold to smaller companies that had credit issues. To ensure credit checks got done the controller had all orders credit-checked.”

“We could probably handle 25% more business by eliminating these delays. We can stop that practice immediately.”

A lot of companies think they have a good grasp on how they operate but reality is different. Several years ago I began asking consultants ‘Have you ever asked someone how their company operates and found out later that what you were told does not match what really happens’. Without exception, the answer was ‘yes’ for every project they ever worked on.

A critical part of streamlining is making sure you understand exactly how you really operate, and eliminating all the activities that don’t add value. Usually, there are several opportunities to immediately free up resources. The following example is one that occurs in many companies:

“How are things coming with the new system?” asked the VP.

“I was really struggling with one thing but I finally figured out how to do the Flash report on the new system” the consultant said.

“What Flash report?”

The one Adam does. He spends about eight hours a week pulling together data from different sources to create the Sales Flash report.”

“Oh, that one. We stopped using that months ago.”

Well, now Adam has time to work on other efforts.

Make Sure Things Stay On Track

As you get busier and busier it is easier and easier for things to ‘fall through the cracks’.bizman maze

♦ Did the customer sign-off on requirements?
♦ Did the job get re-scheduled?
♦ When are the parts going to arrive?
♦ Did the change-order get approved?

Some demands might come from new customers or be for new types of products and services, resulting in considerable variation in the demand requirements. As such, not only do your personnel have to handle more transactions, they have to handle a lot of different processing requirements. This is where proper controls for managing transaction processing are invaluable. ‘Transactions’ are quotes, sales orders, purchase orders, service orders and so on.

“We get about 2,500 quote requests per month. Of these, we auto quote about 800 a month” the Customer Service person indicated. “The rest go to Engineering, so they are really swamped and turnaround takes a long time. Unfortunately, it is taking so long we get a lot of customer complaints and lose a lot of business – we only close 15% to 20% of our quotes.”

In a subsequent meeting with Engineering, “We work on major quotes – about 25 a month”.

Wait, what happened to 1,675 quotes? It turned out that these were going to some clerical personnel in another department that had no formal processes or tracking for these quotes. Two-thirds of all quotes were falling through the cracks.

Even worse, the people processing these quotes were only looking at how long it had been since the product was last sold and then trying to guestimate a cost and price based on a more recent sale of similar products. They didn’t take into consideration if the job was a government job or a commercial job, nor if there was one delivery or multiple deliveries. When a job was run for a government quote the cost overrun was extremely large, causing serious repercussions with the government agencies. Also, no one was tracking costs for preparing the quotes, which ended up being a problem for the government agencies.

In setting up new processes we addressed the issue of ‘transaction management’ – how do we manage the workflow to ensure things are done in a timely manner and cost-effective manner. In this situation, ‘cost-effective’ covers ensuring processing costs are properly recorded and cost risks for the transaction (e.g. potential for penalties, lost bizman cutting mazerevenue, lost profit) are properly covered.

In this situation, the most expedient solution was to use a shared spreadsheet document to track the processing of quotes. A separate worksheet was used for each type of job – government versus commercial. Within each worksheet, columns were set up for each department to record the date and time they received the quote and initials for when they completed their portion. Managers could quickly see what should be coming to their department and what was sitting too long in one department.

Certain conditions could result in extensive analysis which would require special handling and delay turnaround of the quote. For example, if the requested item was no longer available but the ‘replacement’ item might need to be certified, the quote was ‘red flagged’. This allowed the managers to zero in on problem quotes.

In summary, the basic steps for ‘transaction management’ are:

♦ Identify transaction characteristics that change how a transaction is processed and the steps required to process the transaction.
♦ Identify the role for each department (or person), involved in processing a transaction.
♦ For each department role, identify the following:
♦ What is needed to manage the schedule for processing the transaction:

─ Identify key ‘milestone steps’ for processing a transaction (based on its characteristics) and the desired timeframe for reaching that milestone
─ Identify critical steps and potential red flag conditions

♦ Identify what is needed to manage costs:

─ How to ensure costs are properly recorded
─ How to avoid excess costs (e.g. expediting costs, penalties)
─ Identify critical steps and potential red flag conditions.

“We should be able to book an extra $4 million this month.”

“How’s that?”

“We have some jobs that weren’t quite ready at the end of last month but should be good to go now.”

“Are those the ones we were waiting for sign-off from the customer?”

“Yes.”

“Did any one follow up with the customer to get the sign-off?”

A few minutes later … “Oops.”

Final Thoughts

According to Dana Borowka, CEO of Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC and author of the books, “Cracking the Personality Code” and “Cracking the Business Code”, hiring the right people is key to future growth. If you would like additional information on hiring, please click here to see an article on this subject.

Permission is needed from Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC to reproduce any portion provided in this article. © 2014 

Ted Margison is a Senior LCS Consultant and has over 30 years experience in operations management and process improvement. Ted worked for Ernst & Young in their manufacturing & distribution practice and then headed up one of PriceWaterhouse’s manufacturing & distribution practices on the west coast. You can contact Ted at ted@lighthouseconsulting.com.

If you would like additional information on this topic or others, please contact your Human Resources department or Lighthouse Consulting Services LLC, 3130 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 550, Santa Monica, CA 90403, (310) 453-6556, dana@lighthouseconsulting.com & our website: www.lighthouseconsulting.com.

Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC provides a variety of services, including in-depth work style assessments for new hires & staff development, team building, interpersonal & communication training, career guidance & transition, conflict management, 360s, workshops, and executive & employee coaching. Other areas of expertise: Executive on boarding for success, leadership training for the 21st century, exploring global options for expanding your business, sales and customer service training and operational productivity improvement.

To order the books, “Cracking the Personality Code” and “Cracking the Business Code” please go to www.lighthouseconsulting.com.

Are You Getting Full Value from Your System, or Could Your System Use a Re-alignment?

By Ted Margison

[dropcaps type=”circle” color=”” background=””]A[/dropcaps] company was considering replacing the three systems they were using to run the business. One system handled financial information, a second handled production and a third handled service calls. The company felt that it would be more productive to consolidate into a single system.J0287005

The controller, who started with the company around this time, joined in the interviews to meet people and get a better understanding of how the company operated. Thirty-two (32) systems were identified. On top of this, he found the financial performance reports management had been using did not come from the corporate financial system but from isolated Excel documents. Thirty-two systems sounds like a lot, but someone recently told me that they had worked with a Fortune 500 company to consolidate databases and uncovered over 3,000 different databases (many of which were in Excel).

Right now, the odds are this is happening to you. How does this happen?

Over time, the organization goes through changes. Personnel changes occur, functional needs change and roles and responsibilities change. Often times, people forget what they were trained on because they only perform the function once or twice a year. Sometimes personnel changes mean the new person is not fully trained on all aspects of the system. As changes occur, people are not sure how to handle them within the current system and because they need to get something done now, they begin to look for workarounds such as using Excel. The greatest problem is that it goes unnoticed until it becomes so overwhelming that processes collapse. The issues with workarounds are:

• Data are being entered into multiple systems – potential for keying errors
• Extra time and effort is required
• Potential for the various systems to get out of sync
• Users tend to rely more and more on the workaround systems which then become the operational systems.

There are times when the current system simply does not handle a new requirement so, it’s either modify the system or use a workaround. The first step should be to check with the software vendor to determine if this requirement is addressed in any new release that the company has not installed or is in an upcoming release. If the requirement will be addressed in a new release due out in a few months then the interim workaround solution need only be a relatively inexpensive, temporary solution. If the vendor does not have any plans for addressing this requirement contact other companies using the software system to see if they have addressed this requirement. The key question here is whether to create a solution outside your current system or modify your current system. If you do any modifications, review them with the software vendor to ensure they will not impede implementing future releases from the vendor. If you create an external solution make sure you identify any points of ‘connection’ with the current system and develop controls to keep the systems in sync.

Challenges with New Implementations

Maybe you have just implemented a system and so this can’t be a problem, can it? Hopefully, the implementation effort went well with a smooth transition. However, more often than computers connectingnot, transition is not smooth so, users hold onto the workaround systems they were using because they still need to get things done and they are not fully comfortable with the new system.

Security is often a major concern during implementation. Great care is taken to ensure users are restricted to just the functions and reports that apply to their job. I have seen numerous implementations where users are using workaround solutions because the system does not provide a report they need or perform a task they need to do; only to find out that the system really does meet their needs – the functions and reports had been hidden from the user. IT had based the set-up of user menus on perceptions of what was involved in a job position. Unfortunately, perception does not always match reality.

• When implementing new systems try to keep open access to as many functions and reports as possible (taking into account appropriate segregation of duties).
• As accountability is defined, or re-defined, for each person, ensure the functions and reports are aligned accordingly.

Past problems are often carried forward to the new system: “The reports that come from our corporate system are the lifeblood of the company. We need to ensure that each report bizman connecting with computeris reproduced in the new system exactly as it is now.” the CEO directed. “Talk to everyone and make sure you understand exactly how each report is used so that we can be sure the new system can produce them.” Actually, 98% of all information on the corporate system reports was thrown out. Users took selected bits and pieces of information from the reports and put them into Excel documents along with data from other sources to produce reports for management. Converting the corporate system reports would perpetuate the need for workaround systems.

A major problem with new implementations is too much change all at once – users get overwhelmed and return to familiar tools (workaround systems). Traditionally, implementation focuses on identifying a desired new way for how to do business and then rolls out the new system. One Friday night the current system is turned off and on Monday users start with the new system: new tools, new concepts, new terminology, new processes, new workflows, new roles and responsibilities and even new organization structures. Is it any wonder that this heralds a period of disruption, despite preparation efforts? This ‘big bang approach’ to change is too much for organizations. Major changes take time to institutionalize and usually involve a culture change.

Sometimes, when new systems are being implemented companies modify them to exactly fit the current operations, eliminating flexibility. When operations need to change, the system is unable to adapt without heavy modifications. When this happens – workarounds!

• Avoid doing extensive modifications during initial implementation – implement ‘as vanilla as possible’. Take six months, preferably twelve, to learn the different ways of using the system to handle various issues that arise.
Have users log issues they have difficulty addressing with the system and identify what they did to handle each issue.
• Review any desired modifications with the software vendor to determine if this fits into their R&D efforts. Avoid any modification that restricts your ability to implement new releases from the software vendor. You are better off to create an external sub-system that interfaces with the new system.

Solution Approach

Survey each employee to identify which systems they use and how they use them (this includes manual systems). In particular, ask them what issues cannot be addressed by the primary system and which systems, or tools, they use instead.

For business management efforts have each manager identify key controls, such as ensuring on-time delivery. Have the managers identify what information is needed and where they expect the information comes from. Then have each employee identify what system they use to provide each piece of information. On an ongoing basis, have employees identify situations in which they could not use the current system and had to use an alternate tool.

Review the surveys and logs to determine:

• Potential risks with current workarounds
• Which workarounds can be addressed by current system or new release
• Which workarounds need a more formal solution

Looking to Replace the Current System

If you have decided that your system needs to be replaced, take heart – this is not as daunting as it might appear.

Finding the right software package is straightforward. Packages can be divided into ‘solution classes’; identifying a few key requirements of your operations will determine the right bizpeople climbing up arrowsolution class. Any package in the solution class will meet your key functional requirements. The next step is to pick the right vendor and the package that has an intuitive ‘look and feel’ to your users – it will be easier for users to understand this and use this system. This is where the product demonstration is important. Be sure that the demonstration focuses on your business; in particular, ‘a day in the life of’ your company.

Do not spend all your time and money on finding the right package. Implementation is key. Try to implement as close to your current operating environment as possible. Make sure you identify the current workarounds and determine how to address them with the new system. Do not make massive changes in processes, roles and responsibilities. Once the new system is in place, focus on accountability. Ensure that accountability is properly defined for each employee and restructure process, roles and responsibilities to align with accountability. Adjust the system as well to align with accountability.

 

Permission is needed from Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC to reproduce any portion provided in this article. © 2014

Ted Margison is a Senior LCS Consultant and has over 30 years experience in operations management and process improvement. Ted worked for Ernst & Young in their manufacturing & distribution practice and then headed up one of PriceWaterhouse’s manufacturing & distribution practices on the west coast. You can contact Ted at ted@lighthouseconsulting.com.

If you would like additional information on this topic or others, please contact your Human Resources department or Lighthouse Consulting Services LLC, 3130 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 550, Santa Monica, CA 90403, (310) 453-6556, dana@lighthouseconsulting.com & our website: www.lighthouseconsulting.com.

Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC provides a variety of services, including in-depth work style assessments for new hires & staff development, team building, interpersonal & communication training, career guidance & transition, conflict management, 360s, workshops, and executive & employee coaching. Other areas of expertise: Executive on boarding for success, leadership training for the 21st century, exploring global options for expanding your business, sales and customer service training and operational productivity improvement.

To order the books, “Cracking the Personality Code” and “Cracking the Business Code” please go to www.lighthouseconsulting.com.

Things to Consider for Operational Excellence

By Ted Margison – Excerpt from the book, Cracking the Business Code

[dropcaps type=”circle” color=”” background=””]T[/dropcaps]his section was going to be “8 Things to Consider for Operational Excellence”. The good news for you: there are only two things to consider.
bizbuilding1

Better Visibility Provides Better Results

A supplier of protective gear was struggling to meet demands. “We have tried everything over the past couple of years but nothing works. Our turns are less than 1 and we still can’t fill demand. We’ve been selling size 10 and 11 boots the last couple of years and now a customer needs size 13. No matter what we stock, it doesn’t seem to be the right thing; it’s like a guessing game.”

While I was in the General Manager’s office, he received a very angry call from the CEO of a very large customer. Without proper protective gear workers could not work – the downtime on one of their lines cost them about $100,000 per day.

biz in hourglassObviously, the current decision-making processes were not effective; something was missing. We mapped the decision-making processes to find the “blind spots”. These are decision points that are not fully understood or assumptions have been made about them. The blind spots in this case were the decision-making processes of customers. In particular, what drives demand.

We interviewed the top 20 customers and found that demand was driven by two things: replacement of worn-out items and new hires. For replacement we realized that we could predict product life-expectancy based on job position and work environment characteristics. We proposed to the customers that we would gather and consolidate data across customers on job positions and work environment characteristics to predict life-expectancy and then automatically reach out to replace the items. For example, if a product had a life-expectancy of 36 months for workers in a particular department, we would do an inspection at 30 months and replace the item before it wore out. “New hire” demand was primarily “large scale” – new plants being opened, new mining projects. We identified a simple way of inserting ourselves in the hiring process to identify the best-fit product based on job position and work environment characteristics.

The customers were so excited about the recommendations that five of them offered, each, to pay half the cost of any system effort. Some offered the opportunity to bid on business that was going to competitors, while others simply switched their business from a competitor. As one customer said “We no longer have to worry about these decisions – you are making them for us. The cost of these products is far less than the cost of downtime; why would we talk to anyone else.”

Another company was about to make a strategic decision that would have serious operational impact. “We need to move to same-day shipping to get a competitive edge. Our customers buy when something breaks so we have to be able to respond quickly”, said the Sales Manager. The company had recently moved from 5-day turnaround on orders to 2 days and inventory had climbed to the point where turns hovered around 1.2. Moving to same-day shipping was going to be a major challenge.

In order to better understand the buying process for customers we interviewed the top 20 customers. Surprise: All could give at least three months notice on demand; one could give 12 months.

“Why do you give us only 2 days notice”, the CEO asked.

“Because that’s the lead time you gave Purchasing.”

We found some quick and easy ways to get this advance notice and in just a couple of months we were buying ‘to-order’ for these customers. We also approached supplier offering the advance notice. The VP Operations for the largest supplier (a company whose typical customer was 40 times our size) said “If you give us this advance notice you can order anything man jumping bldgyou want up to end of the day on Friday and it will be on the truck Monday morning.”

In less than a year inventory turns reached 7.3. Shortly afterward, the company went on to acquire a larger company.

To get better visibility you need to go beyond your operations to include customers, business partners, suppliers and other external organizations. Start with processes that are key to achieving your business goals. Map your current processes (goes as far upstream and downstream as possible):

• Identify decision points

• Find the ‘blind spots’ for decision-making

  1. Who makes the decisions?
  2. What drives their decision-making? 

— Triggers?
— What are they measured on (what’s a win for them)? 
— Are they ‘driven’ by others in their org (interview those people)?

Accountability

For internal operations this is probably the single biggest problem for companies. Almost every company feels they have a good handle on accountability – unfortunately, they are usually wrong. When things aren’t performing effectively it’s usually because no one is accountable for the performance.

A manufacturing company was looking at getting a new ERP system. The CEO had heard horror stories from various customers and was concerned about implementation.  

“What kinds of things go wrong during an implementation?” asked the CEO.

“Well, a major problem in many companies is that accountability is not well defined.”

“Oh, that’s not a problem here. We’re a very lean organization and everyone understands what they’re accountable for,” replied the CEO. “But, just out of interest, can you give me an example?”

“Well, although it might not apply here, companies that have problems with inventory often find that no one is responsible for inventory accuracy.”

“That’s not an issue for us. Dave, tell him who’s accountable for inventory accuracy.” said the CEO, nodding to his COO.

“No one,” replied the COO. “Maybe that’s why we have a $14 million inventory discrepancy.”

Effective accountability covers ownership, span of control, performance measurements and your reward/ recognition system.

 

Ted Margison is a Senior LCS Consultant and has over 30 years experience in operations management and process improvement. Ted worked for Ernst & Young in their manufacturing & distribution practice and then headed up one of PriceWaterhouse’s manufacturing & distribution practices on the west coast. You can contact Ted at ted@lighthouseconsulting.com or call him at 310-453-6556, ext. 422.

Permission is needed from Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC to reproduce any portion provided in this article. © 2014
If you would like additional information on this topic or others, please contact your Human Resources department or Lighthouse Consulting Services LLC, 3130 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 550, Santa Monica, CA 90403, (310) 453-6556, dana@lighthouseconsulting.com & our website: www.lighthouseconsulting.com

Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC provides a variety of services, including in-depth work style assessments for new hires & staff development, team building, interpersonal & communication training, career guidance & transition, conflict management, 360s, workshops, and executive & employee coaching. Other areas of expertise: Executive on boarding for success, leadership training for the 21st century, exploring global options for expanding your business, sales and customer service training and operational productivity improvement.
To order the books, “Cracking the Personality Code” and “Cracking the Business Code” please go to www.lighthouseconsulting.com.

Planning For The Upcoming Recession!

By Larry Cassidy, Ted Margison, Paul David Walker

[dropcaps type=”circle” color=”” background=””]S[/dropcaps]pring time is upon us and it is time for house cleaning and planning. Many of you are familiar with the economists, Alan and Brian Beaulieu and how their economic forecasting helped in preparing for the last recession as well as for the financial impact that it had on most companies and individuals. They have presented another opportunity for us to be aware of in the coming future. They are projecting that sometime between the later part of 2013, we will be heading into another much milder recession that will continue through 2014.

We thought that we’d share some ideas from our Lighthouse Consulting team, so that you and your organization can begin to prepare and take advantage of the opportunities that could be just around the corner. We’re going to focus in on management, leadership and operations:

Management – Larry Cassidy

I would start with the following caution: whenever times get even a little better, it is an invitation for overhead creep. Put another way, a little bit of success invites a lot of overhead.man looking at maps Given that truth, and the fact that many businesses have experienced at least somewhat better times, it is likely time to grab the pruning shears.

  1. First, I suggest this process: go through every expense on your P&L, and ask the following questions: “Does this expense truly touch our customer and/or make his/her experience better? If not, is it at least critical to our future success?” Prune any expense which does not meet one or both tests.
  2. Second, take a stethoscope to your balance sheet. Get rid of bad inventory (it is rarely a “too much” thing, usually a “wrong stuff” thing). Your first loss is your best loss. Move it! Then get on and stay on your receivables. Both need to come down and cash needs to go up.
  3. Third, be sure you have top people in key positions. You will ask more out of the team in tougher times, so be sure you have quality and you trust the players. Then have the team cross-train all hands. Every employee should be able to do at least one back-up job adequately. This creates flexibility and can reduce headcount.
  4. Finally, make sure your critical systems are operating smoothly. The last thing you will want to do is have to plug “holes” with bodies.

Leadership – Paul David Walker

Take Market Share Now

hands holding up bizpeopleDuring a recession relationship is more important than ever, because it is relationships that will hold you, your customers and vendors together.

Together, during a recession, you can increase market share easier than increasing profits. If you, your customers, and vendors survive and / or thrive during weak demand, you will rise together as demand increases, which it always does. Here is how you do this.

Recession Value Proposition

Adjust your value proposition to fit the new economic circumstances, and train all people who interact with customers to implant this in the minds of customers. For those of you who are in the B to B space, at some point in time your customer will be in a meeting with corporate leaders asking, “What vendors can you eliminate? How can we reduce our costs and be more appealing to our customers?” At that time you want the voice in the back of your customer’s head to be saying that your company is a keeper for the reasons you have implanted. Likewise, if you sell to the consumer, you want the consumer thinking that your products will help them live better in this economy. The consumer advertising, packaging and PR should be positioning your brand as the answer. Your new value proposition should to targeted and ever present.

One of my B to B customers mission is to provide “Engineered Solutions” that improve the efficiency of their client’s factories. They explain, “We will work with flexibility and expertise.” They are making sure all their customers have this on the top of their minds. Another client, who sells to consumers, vision statement is: “Better Products … Better Life.” They are sure their advertising drives home how their products provide twice the value at lower prices. They are working on getting this message into the scripts of their customer service teams around the world. The most successful businesses during a recession implant their new value proposition at every contact with customers. This makes the relationship strong, and creates hesitation before a customer changes brands. That relationship will benefit all as the tide rises.

Extend Your Team

Make it clear to your vendors and customers, that we are all in the same boat floating on a low tide of demand, and that we must work together for mutual success. Continuously reach out to customers to understand their changing needs and wants and make temporary deals with the customers and vendors that will carry all through changing economic dynamics. If your customer needs a price break, ask your vendors to reduce their prices. If they need to reduce their inventories, get your vendors to help you create just-in-time inventory programs. Find out what your customers and vendors need to help their business prosper, and have the flexibility to change your products or services to fit. Do not get stuck in business as usual. Business as usual will be a death sentence. Build a community of strong relationships with your customers and vendors.

Talk about your mutual missions and synchronize them so all can succeed during economic change. Make it clear to all that you and your company are committed to mutual success. Let them see and feel your commitment to mutual success.

Attack Weak Competitors

As your competitors fail to adapt to the changes in the wants and needs of the market place, their customers will be moving. Be sure they move to you. Conduct research to determine your competitor’s weaknesses and focus on acquiring their customers, who will be frustrated with those weaknesses. If your value proposition is right, and being communicated in the market place at every point of contact, they will come to you. The most venerable competitors have the following weaknesses:

  1. Overextended credit
  2. Old technology
  3. Cash flow problems
  4. Poor customer service
  5. Inability to adjust prices
  6. Lack of flexibility

Once you understand the nature of the weaknesses of your competitors, select the three weakest and develop a strategy to acquire their customers.

Position yourself as the life raft for the customers tied to a sinking ship. People in corporations tend to change at a slower rate than people in the market. Be ahead of the wave of change and find competitors who are not. Business has always been driven by relationship and trust. During high demand it may not be as important because of the lack of supply for surging demand.

During economic and social change when demand is falling, relationship and trust are even more important.

If you have ridden the wave of demand, maximized your profits and weakened your relationships, it is past time to change, but never too late. Do not hesitate, find and communicate the correct value proposition for your business, extend your team to include customers and vendors, and rescue customers from the sinking ships of your competitors.

Operations – Ted Margison

Interestingly, the key things a company should do in preparing for a downturn are often the same things they should do in preparing for an upturn.

  1. Streamline and standardize processes; you will need to be able to do more with less. Automate as much as possible in order to respond more quickly to changing bizpeople buildingdemands.
  2. Design processes for flexibility and adaptability. As customers change to accommodate changes in their marketplace the transaction size will often vary dramatically from what you have been used to. As well, new types of demand can arise as companies look for different ways to provide value to their customers, which might result in new types of demands for your business. You should be doing the same by looking for new types of opportunities.
  3. Understand the decision-making processes that drive demand for your product or services. Better visibility on what drives customer demand means better predictability for you. Do this with each of your key customers in particular. Then work with them to make sure you can respond to their changing needs in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Final Thoughts

According to Dana Borowka, CEO of Lighthouse Consulting Services LLC www.lighthouseconsulting.com and author of Cracking the Personality Code, hiring the right people is key to future growth. If you would like additional information on raising the hiring bar, please click here to see an article on this subject: Cracking The Personality Code: Hire Right The First Time.

In our blog, we are sharing more specific ideas in these various areas. If you have any specific questions, please feel free to contact any of our consultants. Also, if you have additional topics that you’d like us to address either in our Keeping On Track publications or Open Line monthly web conferences, please let us know. We look forward to hearing from you.

Permission is needed from Lighthouse Consulting Services to reproduce any portion provided in this article. © 2014

If you would like additional information on this topic or others, please contact your Human Resources department or Lighthouse Consulting Services LLC, 3130 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 550, Santa Monica, CA 90403, (310) 453-6556, dana@lighthouseconsulting.com & our website: www.lighthouseconsulting.com.

Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC provides a variety of services, including in-depth work style assessments for new hires & staff development, team building, interpersonal & communication training, career guidance & transition, conflict management, workshops, and executive & employee coaching. To order the books, Cracking the Personality Code and Cracking the Business Code, please go to www.lighthouseconsulting.com.