19 Posts found for Author: Jonathan Byrnes

Understanding how and why people think the way they do will help you with everything from customer service to evaluating mergers and strategic initiatives. Takeaways from a life of study.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Chief Executive | Subjects: Decision Making, Organizational Behavior, Personal Development

To do it right, let go of your company’s “evolutionary past” and take a granular look at where your profitability comes from today—it might surprise you.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Chief Executive | Subjects: Finance, Management

When I speak with managers about profit generation, one of the most frequent topics that come up are the pitfalls and logic traps that lead to major profitability drains. Here are the biggest offenders:

Contribution – Why shouldn’t we take business that contributes to overhead, even if it doesn’t cover full cost?
Product line – Why shouldn’t we carry products that lose money if they are … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Business Finance Magazine | Subjects: Finance, Management

Top financial managers have an opportunity to boost their companies’ profits to new heights. The key to success: become your company’s Chief Profitability Officer. How can a CPO reverse his or her company’s massive embedded unprofitability and generate new streams of profits? Three essential steps: develop a profit map; define priorities and serving models for your important account/product segments; and align compensation throughout your company, … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Business Finance Magazine | Subjects: Finance, Management

The business case process is seriously flawed in all too many companies. This is a very important issue, because evaluating business cases is one of the core processes for allocating capital to move the company forward. How can such a logical process be misused? This typically occurs in six areas.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Business Finance Magazine | Subjects: Finance, Management

Consider some of the business disciplines that are often held above reproach: revenues are good, costs are bad; give the customer what they want; don’t mess with a good thing; and supply chain integration is always a benefit. Those beliefs have passed their expiration, according to Jonathan Byrnes, a consultant and senior lecturer at MIT. According to Byrnes, some of those disciplines are merely myths … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Authors: Jonathan Byrnes, Peter Alpern | Source: Business Finance Magazine | Subjects: Finance, Management

Successful change, being effective, involves three things: structuring change, managing change and leading change. I call this The Golden Triangle of Change.

Editor’s Note: one of the best change related articles I have read recently.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: ChangeThis | Subject: Change Management

You can explain your vision. They can see your vision. They can buy into your vision. Then they’ll do what they are paid to do.

Content: Quotation | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: ChangeThis | Subjects: Organizational Behavior, Vision

Precise thinking and business discipline are essential for business success. Yet, for too many managers in too many companies, “self-evident truths,” that really are vague generalities, get in the way. Jonathan Byrnes calls these “business myths” and exposes ten of the worst offenders in this article.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: General, Management

Companies suffer from “embedded unprofitability,” says Jonathan Byrnes. Time for CFOs to build grassroots profitability management processes into their companies’ core management activities.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: Finance, Management

What is the single most important thing a CEO can do to maximize his or her company’s performance?

The answer is to creatively, aggressively, and systematically build the capabilities of the company’s middle management team: the vice presidents, directors, and managers.

Middle management excellence, resting on managing at the right level, coordinated profitability management, and managing as teaching, can be systematically developed and constantly improved. It … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subject: Management

When it comes to supply chains, having three or more may be just what you need to meet the needs of your best customers.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subject: Operations

Managing quantum change is a complex, daunting process. It is very important to bear in mind that the “true north” in any management process is to maximize the long-run health of the company. In order to reach this objective, a manager can frame an effective change process using six principles.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subject: Change Management

In many organizations, managers manage at one level too low. And that makes it difficult to create paradigmatic change.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: Management, Organizational Behavior

Forget traditional supply chain management. Managers must be responsible for the earning power and productivity of the assets in their trust, not just cost control.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subject: Operations

When you do a good job of fixing a customer service problem, you often earn more customer loyalty than if there had been no problem to begin with. Jonathan Byrnes details how to show your worth and earn your customer’s trust.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: Customer Related, Management

In many companies, top managers are frustrated because the sales process seems disconnected from corporate objectives, says Jonathan Byrnes. Here’s what you can do to fix it.

Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: Management, Marketing / Sales

Core integrated planning is a five-step process. Here are the key Magic Matrices (a spreadsheet chart with key products or service lines on one dimension, and key market segments or accounts on the other, both arranged in descending order by total revenues), and some important planning issues they enable managers to address.

Read the follow-up article in this series at:
Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: Consulting / Analytical Tools, Management

The most important issue facing most managers in this difficult economy is making more money from an existing business without costly new initiatives. Here’s how to do it.

Editor’s Note: Find part 2 at
Content: Article | Author: Jonathan Byrnes | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subject: Management