Management Blog

Link roundup - 29 September 2006

A selection of interesting links and articles collected over the previous week...

ThisNext: A shopping network where you can recommend, share and discover products with other consumers.

Top 10 creativity boosters: Dave Jeffrey's list of resources and things to do to get those creative juices flowing.

Best tips that no one seems to know about: From the Joel of Software Discussion Group - tips and shortcuts for your computer

How to be an effective complainer: From Management-Issues - how you choose to handle complaints about your work determines whether you're a workplace professional, or a professional complainer.

On-screen advertising aimed at golf carts

A Chandler company, ProLink Solutions, is selling on-screen advertising as part of a global positioning satellite system the company makes for golf carts.

The GPS lets the golfer know such things as how far he is from a hazard and how far from the hole.

"It also provides pro tips and pictures of the hole so the golfer has a better idea how to play," said Larry Bain, president and CEO of ProLink, the largest publicly traded golf course GPS company in the world.

The advertising strategy affords companies a direct link to a vital but elusive demographic.

"It's who the advertisers are looking for: male, rich and ready," Bain said. "We're finding lots of national advertisers looking to sell beer, automobiles, laser eye clinics, casinos, cigars - anybody that sells to men."

Billabong founder on the crest of a wave

Reclusive surfer Gordon Merchant tells how he turned his love for surfing into the listed billion-dollar Billabong company, in a recent profile piece in The Bulletin.

As the founder and major shareholder of Billabong, Merchant learnt along the way about the fickleness of banks, the fear of failure and the need to work hard.

"At times I didn't surf for six months at a time. When you got the demand, you just had to work - you can't have it both ways. It got to the point where we thought we could make a living and one day retire."

Today, Billabong is the leading surfwear-streetwear label in the world. It also manufactures skateboarding and snowboarding apparel, its annual sales top $1 billion and its market capitalisation is around $3 billion. Merchant retains a 15% stake.

Strategy innovation the key for companies

In today's world, a company must be capable of reinventing its core business concepts year on year.

"Twenty years ago the challenge was quality. Ten years ago the challenge was re-engineering. Now it is strategy innovation," says Professor Gary Hamel, one of the world's most profound business thinkers.

Speaking on 'Reinventing Your Strategic DNA' at the India Times Strategy Summit, he unveiled steps such as inducing new passions in employees, a never-ending effort to engage and capture the imagination of every single individual, and a need for top management to surrender its monopoly on setting strategic direction.

Connecting information within an organisation

Information connects through at least three archetypes, according to the social networking studies described in Karen Stephenson's The Quantum Theory of Trust, and highlighted in a recent Strategy+Business article (free reg required).

The archetypes are network roles that recur regularly in organisations and communities, no matter how different they might be in other ways. In any given organisation, Stephenson says, there are always some people who play the part of hubs around which information pathways radiate - they know the most people and others seek them out.

Gatekeepers are, by contrast, expert at managing information flow. They know what to tell, when, and to whom.

Less obvious, but just as influential archetype is the Pulsetaker. They are avid people and trend watchers who have the skill for excellent mentoring and coaching.

Rules of modern management

Management Blog reader Ian McDonell has compiled his list of "Rules of Modern Management".

They include:

• Embrace change willingly, it will happen no matter how hard you to try to derail it.
• It is safe to assume that in every case the word NO will not be understood by anyone else in the management team.
• The RIGHT answer is always better than the CORRECT answer.
• Being flexible means to be able to identify and hit the target well after you have fired the shot.
• The role of communication in management cannot be overstated. Make sure everyone who needs to know, does know.
• You have to be at full strength to reach full capacity. It works for beer.
• When all is said and done, a lot more will have been said than done.

What rules of management do you live by? Add your own by following the Comments link below.

Paying a premium for good corporate governance

Institutional investors are prepared to pay a premium to invest in well-governed companies, according to a recent article in The Financial Express. This should be a key incentive for companies to improve their standards.

The idea of a premium for corporate governance came from a McKinsey survey in 1996 which concluded that institutional investors were willing to pay an average of 11% more for well-governed companies. A subsequent survey, in 1999-2000, revealed a relative premium of 20-27% in selected Asian countries; 18-22% in Europe and the US; and 21-28% in Latin America.

Such premiums arise when a company shows qualitative improvements in aspects of corporate governance such as transparency and disclosure, shareholder rights, board structures, duties and responsibilities, and stakeholder engagement.

Identifying connected consumers

Latest research from the Digital Consumer Practice at Strategic Analytics, entitled 'Goodbye Youth, Hello Technosumers', reports that so-called marketing concepts such as "baby boomer" and the "youth market" are redundant.

The report identifies six distinct connected consumer market segments, ranging from "Affluent Technostyles" to "Practical Mainstreamers", and provides in-depth profiles of each group according to the group's adoption of and interest in digital products and services.

They include:

• "Prudent Nesters": late adopters but view the Internet as a vital communications tool
• "Connected Aspirers": have the strongest interest in technology but only adopt products at an average rate
• "Affluent Technostyles": while making up only 10 percent of households, have twice the ownership and usage rates for many digital products compared with the average consumer
• "Technosumers": own many digital products but have little interest in the Internet

David Mercer, Vice President of Digital Consumer Practice said, "New segmentation approaches that take into account the strategic role of consumer attitudes and behavior towards the web are critical for businesses wishing to maximize their growth and profit potential."

Protecting intellectual property

Protection of patents, trademarks and registered designs is done by only 45% of innovating businesses, according to research by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Despite an improvement in awareness of the value of intellectual property, there is a long way to go, says Peter Willimott, Director of Marketing and Customer Engagement for IP Australia, the government agency responsible for administering the patent system.

He points out that the IP Australia website contains a collection of valuable material for SMEs. Its Smart Start package describes how patents and other IP types can add value to business, and the IP Toolbox gives direction managing intellectual property.

Target marketing workers

Fully employed Americans now spend more time at work than anywhere else, according to the US Bureau of Labor.

Marketers seeking a lucrative and captive audience have an obvious, if difficult to reach, target with enormous spending power.

WorkPlace Print Media, the Mentor, Ohio, is one of several marketing firms devising ways of breaking into that market. The Peapod campaign consists of paper discount coupons sent to workers with their payslips.