Strategy Driven

JULY 13, 2011

Value: The Four Cornerstones of Corporate Finance by Tim Koller. While you can find numerous books focused on the topic of corporate finance, few offer the type of information managers need to help them make important decisions day in and day out. Discusses the four foundational principles of corporate finance.

ROIC 62

ROIC Balanced Scorecard Metrics McKinsey 62

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 25, 2014

But they don’t think nearly enough about operational meltdowns – technological glitches and other problems that can put them out of business. They are usually quick to recognize operational problems and deal with them before they become disasters. Operational meltdowns at midsized companies can take much longer to notice and resolve.

Operations 8

Operations Company Supply Chain Short-term 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 24, 2016

We have replicated these results in other surveys of C-suite executives at large public pension and sovereign wealth funds. Consequently, giant funds are often hamstrung by proportionally tiny operating budgets, which have historically forced them into the all-too-happy hands of intermediaries.

Operations 8

Operations Intangible Assets Venture Capitalist Hedge 8

Harvard Business Review

DECEMBER 6, 2010

Today, the guild mentality persists within companies, where functions such as marketing, sales, finance, IT, human resources and R&D all have their own area of special expertise. Marketing, sales teams and the DSD force itself operate with tremendous coordination to ensure that they are consistently aligned in their business objectives.

Operations 13

Operations Competitive Advantage Supply Chain Retail 13

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 19, 2016

manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers, according to a leading technology industry analyst. Executive teams need to assess their industries’ and companies’ time horizons for the technology, because they will have a huge amount of strategic and business process planning to do before their companies adopt it.

Supply Chain 8

Supply Chain Execution Analysis Technology 8

Strategy Driven

MARCH 21, 2011

The modern corporation that has evolved as a result consists of many specialized functional departments, such as sales, engineering, marketing, manufacturing, operations, and finance. Getting a 50,000-foot picture of our operations illustrates outdated, cumbersome, inefficient processes.

Hammer 50

Hammer Chief Executive Officer Metrics Process 50

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 15, 2012

Among other skills, he wanted to find executives who had the wisdom to know when the organization needed to be fundamentally changed and shaken up — and when the organization needed time to incorporate prior changes. Brad's comment illustrates an important truth about succeeding to the executive level.

Innovation 15

Innovation Merchandising How To Proposal 15

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 28, 2016

And you probably won’t even know you’ve been affected until it’s too late to prevent significant damage to your company’s finances, operations, and reputation. But the scale of the problem means cybersecurity should be a concern for every executive, from HR to Marketing. The risk is growing.

Content 8

Content Industry Finance Report 8

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 23, 2010

Operations : Approaches problems practically; stands firm on issues, perseveres; maintains a standard of consistency and quality; provides stable leadership and supervision; develops detailed plans and procedures; implements projects in a timely manner; keeps financial records straight.

Process 14

Process CEO Insurance Banking 14

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 6, 2018

Unfortunately, while C-suite executives talk “strategy,” they’re often confused about what it means. In this case let’s make the business Dan Murphy’s, Australia’s largest liquor retailer with a national footprint. Sorry folks, but not even one of these responses is a strategy. Why this confusion?

Strategic Planning 12

Strategic Planning Planning Objective Seminar 12

Harvard Business Review

JULY 11, 2017

Few executives appear prepared for the challenges of digital M&A. When we recently interviewed top M&A executives in Europe about their experience, fully three-quarters of them said that digital disruption has had a relatively large impact or even requires a complete overhaul of their M&A strategy.

Due Diligence 8

Due Diligence Company Learning Curve Finance 8

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 13, 2012

An impatient marketing or finance manager would, on the sly, secure some extra budget money and hire a contractor to build a little database that tracked mailing addresses or top-line financials. Slowly but surely, as the little database grew bigger and bigger, the manager would wedge the cost into her operating budget. The result?

Supply Chain 15

Supply Chain CIO Budgeting Project 15

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 23, 2014

There is a lot at stake here for GE’s operations strategy. At their training center in Louisville, they bounced ideas and product prototypes off of retail salespeople who came to learn about GE’s products. Vic Roos, Lead Purchasing Program Manager, explained, “We let a finance guy in the room. and compete successfully.

Ries 9

Ries Waterman Finance Learning-by-Doing 9

Harvard Business Review

DECEMBER 28, 2017

Even before announcing his new cabinet, Mnangagwa installed a key reformist, Patrick Chinamasa, as acting finance minister, tasked with tackling corruption and re-engaging with international institutions to unlock funds to ease liquidity shortages. An influx of capital could also result in a revival in the formal retail sector (e.g.,

Banking 8

Banking First-mover Advantage Politics Finance 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 28, 2014

It’s not been a great year for venerable retailer Sears, which is reputed to be closing 130 retail stores and laying off more than 5,000 employees. Founded in 1886 as a mail-order watch retailer, Sears was already 71 when it became an original member of the S&P 500 in 1957. The results are spectacular.

Retail 8

Retail Quinn Real Estate Apparel 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 11, 2017

It’s time for boards and executives to ask themselves hard questions about how the new mobility could affect their business models. What’s our role in the value chain: facilitator, fleet operator, driverless “driver” supplier (versus vehicle manufacturer)? What will our retail footprint be?

Automotive 8

Automotive Transportation Health Care Maturity 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 1, 2016

Right behind it are media, finance, and professional services, all of which have far more sophisticated digital capabilities than the rest of the economy. They are more likely to use software to manage their back-office operations and customer relationships.

Industry 8

Industry Benchmarking Supply Chain Health Care 8

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 23, 2010

He started very well, but as soon as his cash flow improved, financial burdens from family systems stifled his operations. When artisans have no understanding of their cash flows, they fail prey to spending a big percentage of their working capital, without meaning to, on non-business issues that usually cripple their operations.

Books 13

Books Guidelines Banking Telecommunications 13

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 26, 2016

Compared to professions like engineering or business disciplines like Finance or Operations, the concept of a dedicated salesperson is relatively recent. Now, however, students’ college and pre-MBA experience is more likely to be in a finance area or perhaps in coding. Each group has its own operating procedures.

Education 8

Education Levitt Retail Training 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 18, 2018

But it was crystal clear who’d made the negative comments in the assessment of one executive. Barker had licensing deals with sports leagues to make merchandise with their logos and partnered with large brands to produce it for retail markets, and when Lance took the company over, its revenues were about £100 million.

Case Study 11

Case Study Team CFO Merchandising 11

Harvard Business Review

DECEMBER 13, 2013

Professionals from the banking, finance, investing, and accounting worlds. Technology, marketing, retail, HVAC, construction, and manufacturing pros. Executives could face criminal prosecution, and investors could lose everything overnight if the federal government or local officials crack down. And more are joining every day.

Industry 9

Industry Retail Banking Brand 9

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 27, 2016

If you’re a chief executive officer, your job is to execute. But what does it mean, in terms of daily tasks, to be the company’s top “executer?” One pharmacy retail chain CEO who wasn’t particularly good at investor relations simply hired people who were better and entrusted them with that duty.

CEO 8

CEO Class Chief Executive Officer Strategy 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 6, 2016

The bank has since fired 5,300 employees for the illegal behavior and eliminated retail bank sales goals entirely. Despite five years of explicit and repeated warnings, the executive team and the board of directors were remarkably slow to see the breadth and gravity of this fraud, and to address it effectively.

Banking 9

Banking Committee Leadership Ethics 9

Harvard Business Review

JULY 17, 2017

It’s far from the only case of a failure to embrace a more digital approach; the larger shift to digital is changing the way every industry operates. The current innovation model in the finance sector is designed to generate the highest possible short-term returns. Insight Center. Crossing the Digital Divide.

Industry 10

Industry Short-term Planning Long-term 10

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 28, 2013

In business, volatility used to be more limited to the realms of finance and high tech. These approaches show how companies are going beyond simply establishing an outpost in Silicon Valley to creating, instituting and sustaining different “operating models.”. Innovation Operations Strategy' Idea Scouting.

Innovation 8

Innovation Telecommunications Technology Entrepreneur 8

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

TIAA-CREF, the big financial services company, includes customer loyalty score improvement in senior executive compensation. Phones4U, a UK mobile phone retailer, announced a big increase in the weight of Net Promoter scores in its frontline pay plan. Your CFO and finance team can take a leadership role here.

Incentives 10

Incentives Sample Customer Loyalty Metrics 10

Harvard Business Review

DECEMBER 7, 2017

Among other things, there is growing demand from both retail and institutional investors to align their capital with better environmental and social outcomes, and more resources going into index fund or quasi-indexing products. By banding together, firms in an industry can make life harder for free riders who seek to act less responsibly.

Supply Chain 8

Supply Chain Asset Management Chemicals Long-term 8

Harvard Business Review

MAY 3, 2011

Instead of directing the money to specific causes, Buffett could have revolutionized the system, or the context within which the causes he cares about have to operate. This reality undoubtedly suppresses retail giving. And yet how entirely normal in the scheme of what the affluent do with their philanthropy. A big fat zero.

Advertising 14

Advertising GDP System Public Relations 14

Harvard Business Review

MAY 5, 2016

” At most Fortune 1000 firms, executives who’d “walk out the door and come back in” fully recognize their status quo is both inadequate and unsustainable. So retailers dramatically shrink merchandising departments and defer procurement decisions to data-driven algorithms for selecting what goes on their shelves.

Levitt 8

Levitt Disaggregation Kaizen Call Center 8

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 9, 2014

The 2014 survey polled approximately 1,600 executives and managers from over 40 countries and across a range of industries. Pricing pressure is more intense in retail, less so in areas like top-branded luxury goods or highly differentiated machinery. Why does pricing feel so out of executives’ hands?

Price 9

Price Productivity Products Simon 9

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 29, 2015

MedStar operated nine hospitals, but realized that its long-held objective of increasing revenue and profits at those venues was unsustainable, given the outcries over runaway medical costs. “We needed an enduring strategy independent of any legislation,” recalls MedStar executive vice president Eric R.

Strategy 8

Strategy Long-term Health Care Insurance 8

Harvard Business Review

MAY 1, 2018

We still believe the executives at Tejon Ranch made some mistakes, as did we, but our biggest collective mistake was thinking in terms of threats rather than opportunities. One popular view of activists is that they are short-term, cut-and-run operators who are looking for a quick profit. It is tempting to look down on activists.

CEO 8

CEO Real Estate Long-term Short-term 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 5, 2017

These truck drivers, misclassified as independent owner-operators, were forced by companies whom they worked to purchase new vehicles to comply with more stringent emission restrictions. Lacking capital, truckers purchased new vehicles through financing provided by these very same trucking companies.

Document 11

Document Insurance Construction Cooper 11

Harvard Business Review

MAY 8, 2017

Some companies that made the list were obvious choices; for example, the biggest online retailer now gets most of its profit from cloud services (Amazon). Yet these executives also had an outsider role where they worked on an emerging growth business or consciously explored external opportunities, giving them critical distance from the core.

Franchising 14

Franchising CEO Business Model Strategy 14

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 27, 2017

Executives dedicated to data-driven excellence accept the reality that smart algorithms need greater autonomy to succeed. Executives who wouldn’t hesitate to automate a factory now flinch at the prospect of deep-learning algorithms dictating their sales strategies and capex. That’s hard.

Outsourcing 8

Outsourcing Software CAPEX Competitive Advantage 8

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 20, 2012

The answers give rise to four styles for executing strategy: classical, adaptive, shaping, and visionary. It's more important for them to take the time and care they need to marshal resources, plan thoroughly, and implement correctly so that the vision doesn't fall victim to poor execution.

Strategy 8

Strategy Organization Committee Environment 8

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 22, 2016

From Nigeria to South Africa , retail investors are still below pre-Great Recession levels. Investors are genuinely concerned that regulators are incapable of making sure that published financial statements of companies in their exchanges accurately reflect the true operating positions of the firms.

Insurance 8

Insurance Incentives Quality Marketing 8