363 Posts Found

The vast majority of small businesses stay small – and not by choice. Only the most savvy and persistent – a tiny one tenth of one percent – break through to annual sales above $250 million. In The Breakthrough Company, Keith McFarland pinpoints how everyday companies become extraordinary, showing that luck is a negligible factor. Rather, breakthrough success turns out to be associated with a … [ Read more ]

Content: Book | Author: Keith McFarland | Subjects: Best Practices, Entrepreneurship, Management

“We tend to assume that great leaders must make difficult choices between two or more conflicting outcomes. In an interview study with 26 CEOs of top American and European companies (incl. IKEA, Campbell Soups, Nokia, H&M), we find that instead of choosing between conflicting outcomes such as long-term strategy or short-term performance drivers, top tier managers argue that their role is to embrace such paradoxes … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Authors: Flemming Norrgren, Michael Beer, Nathaniel Foote, Russell Eisenstat, Tobias Fredberg | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) | Subjects: Best Practices, Management

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Marketers spend a billion dollars a year targeting influentials. Duncan Watts says they’re wasting their money.

Content: Article | Authors: Clive Thompson, Duncan J. Watts | Source: Fast Company | Subjects: Best Practices, Marketing / Sales

Here is a summary of the concluding volume in Chris Zook’s trilogy on the business core. The previous two books focused on supporting, exploiting and expanding your core business, whereas this book shows you what to do when your position in the marketplace is under threat. Zook points out the dangers of defending your core until your company dies, or of jumping to the next … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Chris Zook | Source: Bain & Company | Subjects: Best Practices, Management, Strategy

Best practices only work in a given context, says Günter Stahl, INSEAD Associate Professor of Organisational Behaviour. “So what works for one company may not work for another.”

That’s one of the key findings of The Global Human Resource Research Alliance, a study of best practices in talent management on which Stahl was a lead researcher. It investigated the processes and practices of 37 multinational companies, … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Günter Stahl | Source: INSEAD Knowledge | Subjects: Best Practices, Human Resources

In the global competition for talent, some companies may view the endgame as a matter of adding the right individuals. But the key to winning on talent is multiplication, not addition. Companies that build this critical capability will generate superior effort, creativity and results from their workforces.

Content: Article | Authors: Elizabeth Craig, Peter Cheese, Robert J. Thomas | Source: Outlook Journal (Accenture) | Subjects: Best Practices, Human Resources

Across the automotive industry and around the globe, Toyota ranks as suppliers’ preferred OEM-the one with which they would most like to do more business. Yet Toyota is also known to be extremely demanding of its suppliers and rigorous in its insistence on openness and highly disciplined processes. The authors outline the principles and practices that Toyota employs to win its suppliers’ extraordinary performance-and loyalty. … [ Read more ]

Content: Case Study | Authors: Georg Sticher, Jagjit Singh, Malte Kalkoffen, Xavier Mosquet, Zafar Momin | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subjects: Best Practices, Operations | Industry: Automotive | Company: Toyota

Companies cannot achieve superior and lasting business performance simply by following a specific set of steps.

Content: Article | Author: Phil Rosenzweig | Source: McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Best Practices, Management

Rand Fishkin has been doing an inordinate amount of online shopping recently and feels uniquely qualified to share a few e-commerce site design tips – 17 tips, actually.

Content: Article | Author: Rand Fishkin | Source: SEOmoz.org | Subjects: Best Practices, IT / Technology / E-Business

According to the results of a recent APQC study, finance organizations, no matter what their size, are still spending almost two-thirds of their time on transaction processing, to the detriment of more strategic functions such as decision support and management. The study concluded, in part, that the respondents who are able to spend the most time in these critical areas are able to do so … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Sources: American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC), SAP | Subjects: Best Practices, Finance

Incorporating corporate social responsibility into all strategic decisions is, arguably, one of the most difficult challenges a manager faces. Professor Tima Bansal discusses a research project that investigated how Canadian businesses manage that challenge.

Content: Article | Author: Tima Bansal | Source: Ivey Business Journal | Subjects: Best Practices, Social Responsibility (ESG)

Companies continue to aggressively pursue offshoring, even in the face of negative onshore media attention. Why? Because offshoring offers potentially great rewards: It helps companies compete in a global age, creates value for their shareholders, and improves their operational performance.

Content: Article | Source: Kearney | Subjects: Best Practices, Outsourcing / BPO

Companies that focus on planning, budgeting and forecasting perform better than those that emphasize control and cost accounting and management, says this survey.

Content: Article | Author: Laurie Brannen | Source: Business Finance Magazine | Subjects: Best Practices, Finance

Every corporate disaster has its own awful story — yet most debacles are the result of managers making one (or more) of six big mistakes.

Content: Article | Authors: Kenneth Labich, Patty de Llosa | Source: FORTUNE | Subjects: Best Practices, Management

An “extraordinary guarantee” – a radical departure from a typical low-octane guarantee-has proven to be a powerful catalyst for galvanizing an organization to eliminate the causes of customer dissatisfaction in every part of its business.

Content: Article | Author: Christopher W. Hart | Source: Chief Executive | Subjects: Best Practices, Customer Related

Benchmarking is very popular today — but companies benchmark the wrong thing. They benchmark what other companies do, when they should be benchmarking how those companies think.

Content: Quotation | Source: Fast Company | Subjects: Best Practices, Management

There’s no longer any real argument about whether enterprise systems add value. The eye-opener now is just how far those systems can catapult companies ahead of their competitors by giving them the distinctive capabilities that drive high performance.

Content: Article | Authors: David L. Hill, Jeanne G. Harris | Source: Outlook Journal (Accenture) | Subjects: Best Practices, IT / Technology / E-Business

The competitive environment makes market and customer intelligence extremely critical for any company. Yet many small to medium sized companies cannot afford to regularly conduct primary market research, and while secondary research can be helpful it isn’t always on the topics the C-Suite are grappling with. What can a CEO or a company’s leadership team do to affordably keep a pulse on the market and … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Laura Patterson | Source: CEO Refresher | Subjects: Best Practices, Management

Solid receivables management can result in a big payoff. Follow these seven steps to optimize accounts receivable management, reduce days sales outstanding, and create immediate and long-lasting value.

Content: Article | Author: John Salek | Source: Business Finance Magazine | Subjects: Best Practices, Finance